To help beginners who want to start playing Terran but face big problems in TvP, I did a tutorial for a safe opening in TvP, namely the siege expand. In the video I explain the basic build and reasons behind it. I also go a bit into a 5 Factory follow-up. I hope you can learn something from it. Replay and written build order are below.
9 - Supply Depot 11 - Barracks 12 - Refinery @100% Refinery - 3 SCVs on Gas 15 - Supply Depot @100 Gas - Factory, 1 SCV off Gas 17 - Marine @100% Factory - Machine Shop, 1 SCV on Gas 22 - Command Center on high ground @100% Machine Shop - Tank 25 - Supply Depot 26 - Siege Mode 27 - Tank 29 - Engineering Bay @100% Command Center - float it to your natural @100% Engineering Bay - Turret at natural, ramp and main
9 - Supply Depot 11 - Barracks 12 - Refinery @100% Refinery - 3 SCVs on Gas 15 - Supply Depot @100 Gas - Factory, 1 SCV off Gas 17 - Marine @100% Factory - Machine Shop, 1 SCV on Gas 22 - Supply Depot @100% Machine Shop - Tank 25 - Command Center on high ground 27 - Tank 29 - Engineering Bay 31 - Siege Mode @100% Command Center - float it to your natural @100% Engineering Bay - Turret at natural, ramp and main
On March 19 2014 08:56 HyralGambit wrote: Mind if I add this to Liquidpedia's Terran section?
Also, you should do a FD guide, you know, the build every SOSPA Terran and their mothers are doing these days :p
Sure go ahead, I would have done it myself sometimes later then. I specifically decided for a Siege Expand because it is way more beginner friendly as it is much safer and you don't need much micro to defend any aggressive openings. Maybe I will do one sometimes, but I don't think that a fake double is suitable for beginners as you need a pretty good understanding of Protoss' capabilities to not lose in the early game.
On March 19 2014 10:16 pebble444 wrote: i enjoyed that. Some parts where well explanied Why do you get your gas at 12 and not 11? also could you make one on mech tvz
With a Siege Expand you don't get aggressive early on and you wall in, so there is no need in cutting SCVs. One of the reasons to get gas at 11 is that you get marines to defend early and are able to get aggressive in the early game. With gas at 11 you have 100 gas before you need a second supply depot and can build your factory before it. But it comes at the cost of having not continuous SCV production. Getting gas at 12 with marine production would just be inefficient as you either get badly supply blocked or have a much more delayed factory.
I don't really know how to mech in TvZ aside from the mid/lategame switch. It is pretty difficult to win with a mech opening I think as you always need to know the composition of Zerg's army to not just lose instantly with your first push. It is also very hard to claim additional expansions.
On March 19 2014 08:56 HyralGambit wrote: Mind if I add this to Liquidpedia's Terran section?
Also, you should do a FD guide, you know, the build every SOSPA Terran and their mothers are doing these days :p
Sure go ahead, I would have done it myself sometimes later then. I specifically decided for a Siege Expand because it is way more beginner friendly as it is much safer and you don't need much micro to defend any aggressive openings. Maybe I will do one sometimes, but I don't think that a fake double is suitable for beginners as you need a pretty good understanding of Protoss' capabilities to not lose in the early game.
Not to mention at low levels the amount of Protoss who would cheese you, Siege Expand does seem very appealing...
In your particular example the protoss keeps away from you while teching after his initial attack fails, and you don't take a third, but in my games I more often try to take it pretty quickly, and I have big trouble with dragoons camping the perimiter of my base, there's no way can claim the third and even if I do I don't have enough production to spread my forces to 2 bases (nat+3rd) How would you go about that after this opening?
On March 20 2014 00:47 McRatyn wrote: Great guide, thank you very much
In your particular example the protoss keeps away from you while teching after his initial attack fails, and you don't take a third, but in my games I more often try to take it pretty quickly, and I have big trouble with dragoons camping the perimiter of my base, there's no way can claim the third and even if I do I don't have enough production to spread my forces to 2 bases (nat+3rd) How would you go about that after this opening?
If you mean by quick 3rd, building the cc after your 2nd fac+acad, as long as protoss also took a third it should not be that difficult. If he camps your third just use your whole army except maybe 1 tank on the high ground to secure it, he also can't be at two places at once. So large counter attacks cannot happen. After you took it just wall it off and then a turret and two tanks should be enough to secure it. But here also applies the rule that you should not siege everything at your natural in case he suicides a shuttle to kill the tanks. If he didn't take a third, and instead went for some heavy gateway style, just add your 3rd and 4th factory and tech as usual and take it slow. You don't have to take it right away just because your CC finished. You should also build 3-4 vultures with speed+mines while building your CC, which should run around the map and threaten runbys. That way he cannot use his whole army to delay you.
Woo this reminds me of my beginning terran days! Nice tutorial
edit:
One of the reasons I don't siege expand anymore is I find it hard to scout 1 or 2gate double expands, because you don't have the very early vulture out and if they camp goons in front of your base you can't scout until quite late, how do you overcome this with siege expand, 5fac hits too late to punish this afaik?
On March 20 2014 07:04 DarkNetHunter wrote: Woo this reminds me of my beginning terran days! Nice tutorial
edit:
One of the reasons I don't siege expand anymore is I find it hard to scout 1 or 2gate double expands, because you don't have the very early vulture out and if they camp goons in front of your base you can't scout until quite late, how do you overcome this with siege expand, 5fac hits too late to punish this afaik?
You are right, a 5 Fac would be difficult to pull off especially vs. 1 gate double expo. But a 1 gate expo is scoutable because you should be able to scout a 1 gate core expo build and if you know that you can just build one vulture for scouting instead of a tank or use an SCV after expanding. He only has ~4 goons at that point and can't cover everything. And if he did just build some additional marines for tank cover and then go kill his 3rd. 2 gate double expo is not really scoutable, yeah. Versus 2 gate openings I would just go for a 3rd base after 2 fac. Even if he goes for 2 gate double expo, you are pretty much even then. Generally siege expand is difficult to play versus greedy openings, vs. 12 nexus for example you are just behind as you can't do anything, but it's safe and you can overcome your opponent with better macro.
On March 20 2014 07:08 art_of_turtle wrote: Great guide but 1 quick question. If a probe got into your base while you were building rax do you still delay building a marine before fact?
Generally yes, because I don't want to cut SCVs nor delay my factory, but if you see that the probe is more annoying than you can handle, you can build a marine instead of an SCV, just don't delay your factory.
Thank you for the video! I am a complete beginner and have been struggling to take my 3rd vs Protoss on Python when playing the 2x armory strategy so therefore I really appreciate that you also included how to do the 5 factory follow up.
What is the best way to respond if you get your gas stolen? How many workers do you use to kill the Assimilator(if any)?
What is the best way to respond if you get your gas stolen? How many workers do you use to kill the Assimilator(if any)?
It depends on your style and how early the probe got in but the best way to respond is to just 1 rax FE and take gas at natural and send 13 scvs to the gas to get 100 gas all at once to immediately put up your factory. The reason why I say how early the probe got in is sometimes the protoss will get first scout and will be in your base before your first supply depot is even done. You don't wanna just grab the gas before the rax when you haven't even scouted what the protoss is doing yet.
If the protoss did a proxy gateway and you take your gas first, then your rax will be incredibly late + he may even constnatly circle around the location with his probe where you need to build ur rax to complete the wall and constnatly attack the scv making rax and if u get that rax delayed even slightly (when your rax is alrdy late since you took ur gas first) then your gonna have a hard time fending off the stream of zealots and he's also gonna probably pylon your wall so that you can't complete your wall.
But if you still don't wanna 1 rax fe then you can send 4-5 scvs to attack the gas and when it's about to die, WATCH WHERE THE PROBE IS, if it's close to the assimiltaor then stop attacking the assimilator because he will just make another gas..wait until it goes away(make sure to send one scv to constantly chase probe this whole time) then immedately make your gas. Keep making marines and get your fact up when you get 100 gas and just go from there. Your gonna have more marines than usual.
I'm a protoss who hates PvP and enjoys playing TvP once in a while. What is the real benefit of siege expand? Is it only safety? It is usually not that difficult to scout 2 gate goon, and siege expand is only really good against 2 gate goon obs / dt rushes.
As a protoss, I usually double expand off 1 gate every time I see siege exp. (I also love to take the third at an unusual place to confuse the terran) and get a considerable economic advantage (especially with the 3 turrets terran systematically builds when ebay is done).
I'd say that walling-in can make the protoss believe it's a 2-fact or 1 fact starport build, but most terrans are dumb and build the CC at the edge of the cliff so the scouting probe can see it and know it's not a 2-fact.
You can easily timing push your protoss build with a seige expand opening. It is up to the terran to scout for something of the and sort from you and he will make sure he has that opportunity if he knows anything about the matchup. Seige expand is nice because it is more economical than fd.
What is the best way to respond if you get your gas stolen? How many workers do you use to kill the Assimilator(if any)?
It depends on your style and how early the probe got in but the best way to respond is to just 1 rax FE and take gas at natural and send 13 scvs to the gas to get 100 gas all at once to immediately put up your factory. The reason why I say how early the probe got in is sometimes the protoss will get first scout and will be in your base before your first supply depot is even done. You don't wanna just grab the gas before the rax when you haven't even scouted what the protoss is doing yet.
If the protoss did a proxy gateway and you take your gas first, then your rax will be incredibly late + he may even constnatly circle around the location with his probe where you need to build ur rax to complete the wall and constnatly attack the scv making rax and if u get that rax delayed even slightly (when your rax is alrdy late since you took ur gas first) then your gonna have a hard time fending off the stream of zealots and he's also gonna probably pylon your wall so that you can't complete your wall.
But if you still don't wanna 1 rax fe then you can send 4-5 scvs to attack the gas and when it's about to die, WATCH WHERE THE PROBE IS, if it's close to the assimiltaor then stop attacking the assimilator because he will just make another gas..wait until it goes away(make sure to send one scv to constantly chase probe this whole time) then immedately make your gas. Keep making marines and get your fact up when you get 100 gas and just go from there. Your gonna have more marines than usual.
Pretty much as MaRiNe23 said, I usually do the latter, because first you don't know if he proxys, second he is protoss and will probably try to block your natural with a Pylon too and if he does you are really behind. Happened to me more than once. It is also usually hard to chase away the probe from the assimilator. But you can usually retake it before him, if you are building the refinery with an scv that attacks the assimilator from the top. Right before it dies just spam the build command on it and you are good to go.
On March 21 2014 08:48 puppykiller wrote: Hey how did you make this? I want to make one too!
I used the method OBS and Uscreencapture explained by Fold here.
On March 21 2014 18:21 endy wrote: Hi,
I'm a protoss who hates PvP and enjoys playing TvP once in a while. What is the real benefit of siege expand? Is it only safety? It is usually not that difficult to scout 2 gate goon, and siege expand is only really good against 2 gate goon obs / dt rushes.
As a protoss, I usually double expand off 1 gate every time I see siege exp. (I also love to take the third at an unusual place to confuse the terran) and get a considerable economic advantage (especially with the 3 turrets terran systematically builds when ebay is done).
I'd say that walling-in can make the protoss believe it's a 2-fact or 1 fact starport build, but most terrans are dumb and build the CC at the edge of the cliff so the scouting probe can see it and know it's not a 2-fact.
Thanks!
Yeah if possible, you shouldn't build the CC in sight range to keep him in the dark. Siege Expand is mainly for safety, yes. You are a bit more economical as you don't cut scvs, so a midgame push is faster than with an FD but you cannot react well vs early game greediness. That's probably why almost no better players do it, only if they either scout a 10/15-build and improvise one or they know that they will win in a macro game, even if they get a little behind economically early on like in Hiya vs. Sky in SSL for example.