[D] LiquidHerO's PvZ harass/multitasking

So I've been on some sort of HerO VOD binge as of late, being a big fan of his because of his refreshing take on Protoss matchups, but I am very much interested in his PvZ in particular. As we all know, the PvZ match up is somewhat of a "stagnant" matchup, where the common routine is that the Zerg becomes exponentially stronger as the game progresses, especially when the dreaded Broodlord/Infestor composition makes it appearance. The only Protoss response to this composition that has the greatest chance of taking this composition out is the Archon toilet, which can be effective, but it is often termed as "gimmicky" and one dimensional. People lament that Protoss severely lacks choice and variety in dealing with lategame Zerg, which often results in most Protoss players resorting to cheese or 2 base timings/all-ins to effectively deal with this.

However on the other side of the coin, HerO is a player who deals with the Zerg lategame in slightly different ways. He uses the warp prism as his primary tool for harassing Zerg mineral lines, warping in Zealots to take out drones and important tech structures (e.g. greater spire, infestation pit, etc.), and dropping HTs for storm drops, a strategy carried over from BW PvZ. He also splits his army very effectively, attacking one base while using another part of his army, or using his warp prisms, to open up another attacking front in another base. This keeps the Zerg tied down to defending his bases and stretches his forces thin. And most importantly, he does all of this behind solid macro and eventually powering up to an endgame Protoss army that can effectively deal with the BL/Infestor combo, which somewhat loses strength and power through HerO's harassment of the Zerg's economy.

So what I've been pondering as of late is that, why don't most Protoss players try to incorporate this multi-harass style against Zerg? Is it because most players don't have the multitasking capability that HerO has? Is it because most Protoss players are, for lack of a better term, "lazy" and complacent to just either sit and turtle to a huge economy without harassing the Zerg or just doing 2 base timings? Or is it because most Zergs, given the proper conditions, can easily shut this strategy down and just power through anyway?

Thoughts?

(P.S. Here's an example of HerO's PvZ multi-harass style from the recent Dreamhack EIZO Open against LiquidRet, Game 1 of their BO3 http://www.twitch.tv/dreamhacksc2/b/321773208?t=5h29m30s )

Walitgon Australia. July 01 2012 11:33. Posts 542

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Honestly it is a hugely effective strat. Anytime I go BL-infestor, if he goes warp prism mass harass with zealots and HT, and does it perfectly, I cannot win.

Toss are just too used to two-base all-inning, they can't multitask; and they're lazy. Once they try to go to the late game more often, I actually forsee BL-infestor going out of style in favour of ultra bane infestor.

BRB laddering ^_^ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Random_Guy09 Canada. July 01 2012 14:14. Posts 800

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On July 01 2012 11:33 Walitgon wrote:
Honestly it is a hugely effective strat. Anytime I go BL-infestor, if he goes warp prism mass harass with zealots and HT, and does it perfectly, I cannot win.

Toss are just too used to two-base all-inning, they can't multitask; and they're lazy. Once they try to go to the late game more often, I actually forsee BL-infestor going out of style in favour of ultra bane infestor.

It's not that their lazy is that all zergs keep going mass roach and if toss gets through that then they have to deal with the most annoying late game comp and have to coin flip to beat it. So 2 base all inning is the response to all the stephano style play lately. And that dealing with broodlord infestor is really hard to deal with from our point of view unless you have the apm and decision making of someone like HerO to get an advantage late game when its split map and zerg just turtles waiting for Toss to make 1 bad engagement to win.

So dont go calling players lazy because they're pigeon holed into either going stargate or 2 base all inning to even win the matchup.

Grubby|Liquid`HerO|ST_Squirtle|ST_PartinG|CreatorPrime Na'Vi

Whatson United States. July 01 2012 14:22. Posts 4467

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On July 01 2012 11:33 Walitgon wrote:
Honestly it is a hugely effective strat. Anytime I go BL-infestor, if he goes warp prism mass harass with zealots and HT, and does it perfectly, I cannot win.

Toss are just too used to two-base all-inning, they can't multitask; and they're lazy. Once they try to go to the late game more often, I actually forsee BL-infestor going out of style in favour of ultra bane infestor.

Really...I mean seriously? Unless you have the multitasking and decision-making that HerO has, a Protoss would rather not risk a risky battle with a zerg deathball, or survive the waves of roaches that come at the 12 minute mark. I would love to see you play against a BL-infestor-corruptor deathball late-game at the GM level if you think you can play so much better.

hooahah July 02 2012 07:15. Posts 1054

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because 1) it requires you to get to three bases, a tall order in itself with how popular roaches are right now, and 2) that shit is fucking hard yo. Even if you manage do manage to harass the zerg down until he's starved, you still need to kill his Deathball.

Daimai Sweden. July 02 2012 07:40. Posts 589

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1. Muta and corruptor is really good at taking out warp prisms, and with good overlord spread zerg should NEVER miss a warp prism going on their half of the map.
2. In lategame zerg has 5+ spines on every new expo and at their tech structures.
3. You need as much supply as possible in your deathball to stand a chance in an engagement.

Also I can confirm I'm lazy (well not really, more like colossi and immortals are priorotized over warp prisms for me).

Last edit: 2012-07-02 07:40:54

I despise every terran player on this earth, and I hope there is a special place in hell saved for them.

LiSAuCE United States. July 02 2012 07:50. Posts 33

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It's definitely not because Protoss players are lazy. Microing multiple drops/attacks while keeping up with macro is not easy at all.

I always thought Protsoss' greatest strength was its late game composition deathball, and splitting the army was not the best idea. Hero is just a freakin' boss of the highest order, so he can pull off crazy harass.

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-eXalt United States. July 02 2012 08:08. Posts 456

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HerO has insane game sense. Against a good zerg, if you don't start harassing him at the perfect time w/ warp prisms, he will get up walls of 7+ spines at each base (main base, and the outlying ones) making them nearly impossible to harass with zealots/dts. HerO seems to bypass this somehow due to his insane timing/scouting/multitasking, or because the zergs he plays are really greedy.

UeberFuerst Germany. July 02 2012 08:55. Posts 17

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You could drop Immortals to overcome all the spines, but it would be just to slow and the Zerg could react quickly (and immortals take up precious build-time, wich could be used for collossi

) or just shut down all the drops with Mutalisks (like in TvZ). On the over side: more Mutalisks mean less Broodlord/Infestor. It's maybe a good idea to force the Zerg into some more Mutalisks with a lot drops?

I always thought Protsoss' greatest strength was its late game composition deathball, and splitting the army was not the best idea.

I thought this way too, but maybe we should part from this "compfortable" deathball-style into something more mobile. Broodlord/Infestor is not one the fastest and mobile compositions anyway. Just some thoughts on this topic (written in some awful english on my side :D hurray)

MapleSparKz United States. July 02 2012 09:14. Posts 61

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This is actually what I've been working on a lot on ladder recently. Multitasking is somewhat of a weak point of mine. Anyways, I think the reason that we don't see it so often is because of how difficult it is to do well. If you harass too much or too early the zerg can just all in and kill you. If you wait too long then their deathball is already complete and the harass is pointless. Also, its very APM intensive to have multiple warp prisms and multiple bases.

Liquid NonY, why don't you win every game!?

tehemperorer United States. July 02 2012 10:15. Posts 2180

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My opinion:
1) you don't go into a PvZ planning on doing it
2) WP harass is shut down by corruptors which are fielded when P gets colossus
3) when zerg has 4+ bases, killing a few drones with 400-600 minerals worth of zealots is an extreme waste of minerals. Those drones are back in about 30 seconds.
4) by the time you have the luxury of WP harass, you might as well just use proxy pylons to warp zealots and have them walk most of the time.

Knowing is half the battle... the other half is lasers.

Tingles Australia. July 02 2012 15:48. Posts 221

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So i've been doing this recently ( now in all match ups actually), and i feel that this style suits me the best. I feel like i play much more comfortable if i am controlling the game, and if you mass harass and out mutli task, you control the game in the direction you want.
Unfortunately i haven't got to a late game zerg yet, so we will see how it actually goes, as i dont' think i'm going to have the APM to do it properly.
I feel that the hardest part is not overcommitting with your main army. It's hard to judge sometimes how much damage you should be doing with the balls of your army, while the zerg is split up defending the harass. I struggle alot with overcommitting against zerg, just because of the shear fact that i forget that any second you could face a swell of extremely fast units, when you think you are safe.
I am going to make this my consistent style i think. I struggle to find consistency playing passive or aggressive or just standard. If you play this a craptonne throughout your games, hopefully the late game of PvZ should come easier. At least that's what i am hoping, as i almost always loose to Ling/Roach / Infestor / Brood / Corrupter.

HinagikUx United States. July 02 2012 16:00. Posts 178

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it takes huge apm and costs a ton of money. watch hero vs annyoung a few days ago in ipl team arena, and you'll see what i mean....the zerg deathball just has no answer to beat straight up so you need to cripple the re-max to stand a chance (is hero's goal).

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EMPaThy789 New Zealand. July 02 2012 16:28. Posts 846

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On July 02 2012 16:00 HinagikUx wrote:
it takes huge apm and costs a ton of money. watch hero vs annyoung a few days ago in ipl team arena, and you'll see what i mean....the zerg deathball just has no answer to beat straight up so you need to cripple the re-max to stand a chance (is hero's goal).

hero had that game won but just botched that game really really hard by doing all the harass instead of attacking when he had like 10 carriers with archons and storm. if he engaged he would have have won pretty easily since its pretty much imposible to focus carriers without stacking up and eating huge storms and vortex (magic box doesnt work cos u need to fly over the carriers which allows the archons to rape face).

the reason i think alot of people dont use this style is due to the mechanics needed as well as the risk you run of screwing up and just dieing because you had 20 supply tied up in zealots elsewhere. the harass requires you to be economicly ahead of the zerg so you can throw away resources in zealots and dts and is shut down quite hard when zerg has 5+ spines at each expo. when the zerg gets to that stage you pretty much lose unless u have a large amount of carriers with ht and archon support

Last edit: 2012-07-02 16:34:30

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ThePlayer33 Australia. July 02 2012 17:12. Posts 2377

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cos its hard. you have to be good to pull it off. most people arent even making sound decisions with their deathball. if they try this they lose. same as why only zerg is only so imba, foreign zergs? maybe 1? or 2(cough cough)?

Azzarox France. July 02 2012 21:45. Posts 7

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It is extremely powerful cause zerg cannot defend easily their bases. 3-3 zealots rape spines and kill hatcheries really fast. Plus zerg cannot attack because of how immobile its army is. If you a-click you just die to a vortex. So he needs to keep useless roaches and run from hatch to hatch and still...

LiSAuCE United States. July 02 2012 23:05. Posts 33

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On July 02 2012 16:28 mR.bONG789 wrote:

Show nested quote +

I got the feeling that Hero was just messing around that game. I mean, he had such a huge advantage and he knew it.

I think the general consensus is that harass is no doubt effective, but extremely hard to pull off with protoss. Protoss units don't trade well with zerg units on a 1:1 supply ratio, so if a drop gets shut down completely with loss of units, it's more devastating to a protoss than say a terran.

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skyyan United States. July 03 2012 09:44. Posts 69

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I think one of the biggest reasons that protoss don't go for mass harass at the late game is that there isn't enough supply. Generally protoss is at this point trying to work up a massive stalker/archon/colossus/mothership ball to hold onto their 3-4 bases against the incoming BL infestor doom push.

To put this in perspective, a terran drop consists of 8 supply, or maybe a double drop that would be 16 supply. However, a protoss drop usually consists of zealots, which are 2 supply each. To be effective, generally you need to warp in a round of zealots in addition to whatever the warp prism is carrying, so a single warp prism's drop can easily be 20+ supply if you want to have enough dps to kill a couple tech structures or drones before you are overwhelmed by infestors and zlings.

Simply put, having this much supply (15% of your army size) in units that don't "shoot up" and on the other side of the map, is a huge risk as it makes holding off the BLs and infestors that are pushing down your throat so much more difficult. I would agree that if zerg is TOTALLY out of position then it can do some damage that takes zerg a while to recover from, but I don't think that it's possible to have a game breaking drop as protoss in the late game, and since the risk is losing the game at your own front, it's simply not a risk that many protoss are willing to take if they are playing seriously and don't have ungodly micro/multitasking skills like HerO.

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7mk Germany. July 03 2012 10:19. Posts 9446

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On July 02 2012 10:15 tehemperorer wrote:
My opinion:
1) you don't go into a PvZ planning on doing it
2) WP harass is shut down by corruptors which are fielded when P gets colossus
3) when zerg has 4+ bases, killing a few drones with 400-600 minerals worth of zealots is an extreme waste of minerals. Those drones are back in about 30 seconds.
4) by the time you have the luxury of WP harass, you might as well just use proxy pylons to warp zealots and have them walk most of the time.

2)WP harass doesnt get shut down by corruptors if you have warp prism speed.

3)"killing a few drones with 400-600 minerals worth of zealots is an extreme waste of minerals. " Thats not entirely true but more importantly you can killl way way more than just drones. Besides, minerals are way less important for Protoss in PvZ than gas.

4) how are you gonna get a proxy pylon into a zergs main? In the midgame maybe if zerg is sloppy and doesnt scout it, in the late game its impossible. You cant just walk in either because of spine wall and army

I love HerO for the way he plays, but aside from requiring insane multitasking, the way he plays has disadvantages too, sometimes when he comes nicely ahead out of the midgame I wish he would just go for colossus on 3 base and crush the zerg like a player like MC would.
Also every high level protoss uses warp prisms in PvZ, if it does get to late game scenario. Just usually not to the extent that HerO does it (like warping in HTs just to feedback infestors), but warping in zealots with the warp prism is extremely standard.

Last edit: 2012-07-03 10:20:34

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Kharnage Australia. July 03 2012 14:35. Posts 831

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The reason people don't do this si simple.

In the other 2 MU prism harass isn't very good and you're much better off macro'ing up and stomping face. Because of that 2 out of 3 games you're playing a certain style, then 1 out of 3 you need to do something completely different. Even at the pro level most protoss are good at either PvT and terrible at PvZ or vice versa. the skillset for one is totally different than for the other with completely different builds and objectives. Since either style can be used in PvP one style or the other will be neglected.

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