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Italy12246 Posts
Hello TL! I am a 1k Master Protoss on EU, and this is my first guide. It features the 2base Templar build used by Startale Protoss players, i hope you enjoy it as i personally think it's a much more fun playstyle than colossus-based builds.
This is basically your gameplan. Except the bad macro.
Build Overview:
The goal of this build is to take a third as safely as possible off a fast Templar opening, while getting good upgrades and having good scouting information on the Terran to be able to react to any possible opening they might throw at you. To do this, Startale Protoss players open with a very safe 3Gate+Robo early/midgame infrastrucutre after fast expanding, and then use map the map control of early stalkers and observers to cut units while ramping up your infrastructure as much as they can afford to. Once your extra production and tech kicks in, take a third safely and play the macro game.
The key difference between this build and many other 2base templar openings is how much more safely Startale players open. Many other templar builds try to get storm up in time for a 10 minute medivac timing (like this build), leaving the Protoss player a little more vulnerable to pre-10 minute attacks like a dedicated stim push. With a fast templar build, you can get only two of the following:
-Fast upgrades -Early observers -Fast storm
This build focuses on the observers for scouting, safety and positioning, and on fast upgrades; this forces you to delay storm and charge for a bit, which means your way to hold any medivac pressure is with archons, good forcefields, slow zealots and well placed stalkers in the main.
The other interesting adjustement Startale players use is their production set-up. The standard for PvT builds has always been going 3 gates->tech->6gates, while Startale players generally go 3-5-7. The idea of 3-6 is, simply, you get your extra 3 gates of production around 8.30-8.40 ish to time up your production with a Terran's medivac timing; really straightforward; this production "setup" of 6gate robo+whatever tech has long been the standard in PvT. The Startale variation gets gates 4-5 sooner and 6-7 later than a more standard build. What this does is it allows you to cut gates 6-7 and focus on units if your obs sees a potential push coming, and to have a bit more production later on if the extra gates aren't needed to defend a more standard medivac timing.
A really good example of this reaction is Squirtle's game on Cloud Kingdwom vs MVP in their GSL finals (VOD at the end of the guide): Squirtle sees the marine/tank timing moving out, and immediately cuts tech, gets immortals, and most importantly has 5 gates worth of production instead of just 3. This allows him to be completely safe against the attack, and he forces MVP back.
Also, having 7 gates is nice if you are forced to turtle up on 2 bases a bit longer by drops or annoying factories. If you only have 6 gates worth of zealot archon you risk floating a bit of money eventually and you may be forced into adding two more gates before taking your third, which can be annoying and not very smooth.
Early game:
I am going to assume both players fast expand in some way, without aggression. You get your tech and upgrades quite fast with this build, which can be extremely dangerous if not outright suicidal against a 1basing terran. If you see something that is not a cc first, 1rax fe, 1rax reactor expand, marauder expand or reaper expand do not go for this build. At the same time, you aren't looking to put any pressure on early game, your opening should be some 1gate fe variation or nexus first into a safe and passive 3gate robo.
Midgame build, holding off the medivac timing:
Most PvT games will feature the Terran putting pressure with their first two medivacs, and every macro PvT build has to account for that possiblity. This build is tailored specifically for it.
You can start teching up as your robo is about to halfway done. Use stalkers and probes to make sure no push is coming your way; if the Terran is being passive feel free to cut a few units early on to get your production and tech up, otherwise get 1-2 rounds of gateway units to hold stuff like 4-5rax marine or early stim timings. The rough timings that Parting hits with the build when playing greedy so are:
6.00: Robo, make 3 observers as it finishes 6.30: Forge, third gas, start +1 armor as soon as it finishes. 7.00: Fourth gas. 7.40: Twilight Council 8.00: Gates 4-5 @100% Twilight Council when you can afford it (8.40ish): Templar archives, 2 templar for an archon when archives finish 9.00: Gates 6-7
This way, you will have a production spike around the 10-11 minute mark, right when a Terran's first medivac poke would hit you. You want about 6 stalkers in your main to defend drops (6 stalkers will 2-shot a medivac), 3 sentries from early game, 1-2 archons and as many zealots as you can afford; 10 is a good number to aim for; if you want to maximize your production, cut probes when you see the Terran moving out and start again when you push him back.
A nice trick Parting uses in the replay included is to keep his 3rd and 4th hts unmorphed to feedback two medivacs, then merging them into an archon.
Because you already have plenty of observers and stalkers in positions, dropping you should also be extremely tough. Make sure to use your observers wisely! What i do is send my first to the Terran's main, my second to common drop locations and my third in front of my nat to see his army size and positioning. Later on in the game, having 4-5 observers on the map will be extremely useful, and really easy to do since your robo will have quite a bit of idle time.
Teching up is quite slow and safe: charge is normally started at around the 9.30- 10 minute mark together with +1 attack when +1 armor finishes, and storm isn't started until the 11-12 minute mark, while taking a third, as Terran backs out and saturates his own third. Against bio play you don't need storm much faster as at this point zealot/archon with good upgrades deals extremely well with any terran army.
Reacting to different Terran builds:
This build is extremely solid and versatile against anything a 2base Terran is throwing at you, not just medivac timings. Using your observer you can optimize your build against every Terran build out there:
- If you see some kind of 2base tech like cloak banshee, you can also play a bit greedier in terms of teching, getting faster charge and storm as the actual army of the Terran will be far smaller. You will always get a second and third observer, so deflecting cloak banshees should be easy.
Against a 2base allin like Marine/Thor/Banshee or Marine/Tank/eventual Banshees, you want to add a few immortals to your mix. Against a pure Marine/Tank timing, chronoboost out 2-3 immortals and units off 5 gateways; as usual, you want to cut a few probes when you see the Terran moving out to maximize the units you have and crush his attack.
- If the terran is going for a faster 3rd cc and/or double eng bay, you need to play greedier in response. I don't have any Startale games against a fast Terran third to look at, but at best you can get your own third before your 6th and 7th gate, anything before that would have to be done blindly as your observer will most likely not scout it in time if you don't open 1gate into Robo. Since you are not getting a fast storm and you invest in a robo just for several observers, while also delaying charge, you do not have a timing to punish it. If anyone has a better reaction/suggestion, feel free to let me know.
- Against a more aggressive stim timing or ghost timing (really unlikely these days), your early game 3gate/robo or 5gate/robo production should give you enough units to hold if you cut probes and tech accordingly (ie, when you see him move out).
Mid/lategame transitions:
Once you have your third up and running, you are in a very confortable spot. You have a really good gateway army, lots of AoE available as your storm comes online, an idle robo and good upgrades. You should have 4-5 observers out on the map plus one templar per base with storm, which makes drop play extremely hard to pull off against you.
From here, there are two common transitions: add more gateways, perhaps a second forge and focus on gateway units, or add a support bay and a second robo and go for a colossus switch.
The pros of adding extra gates (i add 6, going up to a total of 15) is that you can move out, play aggressively and try to deny the terran's fourth. You have had an idle robo for a long time and easy access to a dt shrine, so adding warp prisms for harassment can be extremely strong. On the other hand, your maxed army will be weaker than you would with a colossus switch.
If you do go for Colossus you will end up with a much stronger maxed army, and you can potentially win the game outright if you show up with 4 Colossi and the Terran has too few Vikings. On the other hand you are basically forced to turtle up to 200/200, which can be pretty boring.
Replays and Vods:
Parting vs MKP: in this game the robo and forge are switched but other than that the builds are identical. http://drop.sc/162121 Parting vs Virus from IPL4: perfect execution of the build. http://drop.sc/166853 My own ladder replays: fairly bad games, but at least i execute reasonably well http://drop.sc/244264; http://drop.sc/244265; http://drop.sc/244266; http://drop.sc/244267
http://www.gomtv.net/2012gsls2/vod/67119 Parting vs Polt set 1, standard game http://www.gomtv.net/2012gsls1/vod/66854/?set=13&lang= Parting vs Jjakji, set 1. Shows how to play out the game if your third gets delayd by a Terran's pressure. http://www.gomtv.net/2012gsls2/vod/67132/?set=4&lang= Squirtle vs Mvp set 4, showing the reaction to a fast tank opening http://www.gomtv.net/2012gsls3/vod/67561/?set=2&lang= Ace vs Taeja set 2, Ace plays a bit greedier as he's on Entombed Valley. http://www.gomtv.net/2012gsls2/vod/67128/?set=2&lang= Hero vs Supernova set 2; the build is a bit different but this game shows how to react to a 4rax stim timing. http://www.gomtv.net/2012gsls2/vod/67128/?set=3&lang= Hero vs Supernova set 3; great defense of 2base Marine/Thor/Banshee thanks to the power of storm. http://www.gomtv.net/2012gstls1/vod/67091/?set=4&lang= GSTL Finals, Set 4, Parting vs MKP.
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Just a quick question:
To get that screen shot, were you facing a potato?
haha only joking, this is awesome, i've been wanting to shake up my PvT lately. Collossus, although safe, is soooo boring to use.
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Great guide!, will try it out
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This reminds me of kcdc's build, this one: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=319339
The idea is similar, although kcdc's build has different gateway timings, like getting only one more gate instead of two before robo. Thanks for this guide, I will compare these build more thoroughly once I check out all the replays you kindly provided
HT or colossus is a choice of style, but I feel HTs aren't as easily hard countered as colossus can be with vikings, and your drop defense is definitely easier with HTs. So if you're having trouble holding the 10 minute medivac aggression with colossus, this is a very good build to try out.
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edit: nevermind. I'm an idiot
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Italy12246 Posts
On August 29 2012 06:14 Shikada wrote:This reminds me kcdc's build, this one: of http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=319339The idea is similar, although kcdc's build has different gateway timings, like getting only one more gate instead of two before robo. Thanks for this guide, I will compare these build more thoroughly once I check out all the replays you kindly provided HT or colossus is a choice of style, but I feel HTs aren't as easily hard countered as colossus can be with vikings, and your drop defense is definitely easier with HTs. So if you're having trouble holding the 10 minute medivac aggression with colossus, this is a very good build to try out.
This build is a bit safer and gets better scouting at the cost of slower tech essentially. Other than that yeah, kcdc's build is really good.
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Good guide Teoita, I might give it a run when I ladder over the next few days. As a low level Protoss I usually stick to getting out my Colo asap as it is a lot safer. But Templar play is definitely a lot more fun.
Nice to see you doing a Guide, by the way. Thanks also for your help to the Brotoss in the Protoss Help Me thread. _b
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Wait, so your forge is idle between starting +1 armor at 6:30 and 11 minutes when you start +1 attack?
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big flaw of this kind of play is lack of upgrade advantage over terran and 2reactor 1techlab medivac push is super effective vs this, if ur opponent splits well enough storm do very little damage, colossus is more reliable
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On August 29 2012 14:51 SMMN wrote: big flaw of this kind of play is lack of upgrade advantage over terran and 2reactor 1techlab medivac push is super effective vs this, if ur opponent splits well enough storm do very little damage, colossus is more reliable That's what the 7 gates and archons are for. It's designed to hold medivac pushes like that and then just kill them or transition easily.
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Great Teoita, always liked your posts. Was looking for some build w/ storm tech. Thanks
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Italy12246 Posts
On August 29 2012 14:45 Mikelius wrote: Wait, so your forge is idle between starting +1 armor at 6:30 and 11 minutes when you start +1 attack?
No, sorry if i worded it poorly, i edited that part now. You get +1 attack together with charge the instant +1 armor finishes at 9.30-10.00 ish, you start storm at around 11 minutes after terran backs out of his pressure.
@Fatale: i had just killed 4 full dropships with feedbacks as the supply tells you, so i think he might have been a little pissed.
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by startale protoss you surely mean parting and squirtle only right?? ace hardly uses templars.......
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Italy12246 Posts
On August 29 2012 17:49 X3GoldDot wrote: by startale protoss you surely mean parting and squirtle only right?? ace hardly uses templars.......
Ace also used this build, i have a vod of him in the OP. By Startale Protoss i mean, the way Startale Protoss players go 2base Templar, that simple.
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This build is very good. On the other hand, if you see Terran getting greedy, you can always switch up to Zealot Templar and bust his front off 2 base.
Another trick I like to use is get a Warp prism with 7 gates off 2 bases. When Terran start moving out around 9-10 minutes, warp in 7 zealots and wreak his main.
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On August 29 2012 17:49 X3GoldDot wrote: by startale protoss you surely mean parting and squirtle only right?? ace hardly uses templars....... You're talking about the guy who was most recently using pure templar builds and storm dropping Taeja's army?
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I love templars before colossus because it makes defending drops so much easier. Even if I don't kill the medivacs, the drop itself is a lot easier to manage with no healing on top of it.
However, I couldn't really get my timings right so thanks for the build, I'll surely try it on ladder.
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Italy12246 Posts
On August 29 2012 18:07 covetousrat wrote: This build is very good. On the other hand, if you see Terran getting greedy, you can always switch up to Zealot Templar and bust his front off 2 base.
Another trick I like to use is get a Warp prism with 7 gates off 2 bases. When Terran start moving out around 9-10 minutes, warp in 7 zealots and wreak his main.
As i said, i don't think you have a timing to bust a greedier terran with this specific build because you delay your storm so much and you invest in a robo that initially only for observers. If anyone has a high level game/replay with it though i'll update the op. Same with the warp prism, if you get 3 observers before anything else (which i really like) your warp prism won't cross the map in time. If you go 1gate into robo into 3 gates or cut a couple of observers it's doable i guess, but you are capable of crushing his push while still taking a decently timed third anyway so i'd rather do that. Overall though, warp prisms with this kind of play are really really damn good, as kcdc talked about a while ago
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Why not keep all templars unmorphed to get 4 feedbacks, then morph them into Archons ?
This is more of a curiosity question as I play zerg, but I'm interested. Isn't four feedbacks better than two ?
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The usual Terran medivac timing pushes out with their first 2 medivacs, so 2 templar should be sufficient. It takes a while to morph an archon too, so premorphing one of them will ensure you have it's dps from get go.
Thanks for the guide, looks really well written!
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Bosnia-Herzegovina439 Posts
Really cool guide, but i didn't acually use any precise build just the idea. Because i really strugle and don't understand PvT i was looking something like this. This is something i can understand, and it is finally something fun in PvT, i hate standard collosus play, fucking drops by good players really destroy me. I just used the idea - upgrades, enough gates, charge, observers!, few archons, eventually storm - asap third when safe. Had a really fun PvT and got and easy win vs 1300 masters. Somehow it felt easy. Probably because terrans are soo used to standard play and don't really know how to play perfectly vs templars. Their drops aren't strong anymore (they need to be extremly carefull), they have take care the bio blob constantly, and use ghosts and army not just one hotkey, hehehe. I will definetely just use templars first for a while no matter the result. It's fun, underused strategy, strong in current metagame. Thaks for the guide.
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This is amazing. I've been trying out HT builds because of how much more fun they are, this is exactly what I needed!
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I have been playing a lot of high templar builds lately and they feel very comfortable. I skip the robo though because I think getting a robo is delaying the tech, but yeah it's more safe.
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United States8476 Posts
I think 90% of the time, +2 armor is started before +1 attack with this build. Usually it goes +1 armor -> +2 armor -> +1 attack -> +2 attack with first forge. Second forge gets +3 armor. +2 attack and +3 armor finish close to each other.
I think Parting always gets 6 stalkers, as that's the amount you need to 2 shot medivacs.
First archon is essential to hold off 10 minute pushes. I would always morph an archon against this instead of leaving the first two templar as templar.
I would have written this if I weren't so busy with other stuff (some of which you'll see very soon!), but I'm glad you did! If I were writing the guide, I would also emphasize the theory behind this build. That is, most templar builds aim to get templar before the 10 minute timing, but this one safely transitions into it after, and thus, is safer versus pre-10 minute timings. Also, maybe something about the 3 to 5 to 7 gateway additions. That could be considered somewhat "revolutionary".
Also, you should link to MKP vs Parting games on Entombed in GSTL finals. Those are the two most iconic games of this build.
Btw just wondering, did you get those timings from me or did you come up with them yourself? I could have sworm I posted those somewhere.
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Thank you for this guide.
I copied the exact same build from the exact same replay quite a while ago, around when kcdc put up his 2-base templar guide. I didn't like the fact that kcdc skipped a robo, so tried to steal Parting's instead. I never really got it working though.
On August 29 2012 04:22 Teoita wrote: [*] If the terran is going for a faster 3rd cc and/or double eng bay, you need to play greedier in response. I don't have any Startale games against a fast Terran third to look at, but at best you can get your own third before your 6th and 7th gate, anything before that would have to be done blindly as your observer will most likely not scout it in time if you don't open 1gate into Robo. Since you are not getting a fast storm and you invest in a robo just for several observers, while also delaying charge, you do not have a timing to punish it. If anyone has a better reaction/suggestion, feel free to let me know.
This is what I found to be the biggest issue.
I always felt like the terran's taking a fast 3rd left me in an awkward position, where I was badly behind in economy without really even being ahead in miltary. Certainly not enough to pressure him back. Plus, T can still execute a (smaller) medivac timing off a fast 3rd, so I never felt able to cut stuff to match his third timing either. The push comes with less units, but I've also greatly increased the area I need to cover against drops...
I'm pretty bad, though, and drop defense has always been a challenge. Perhaps it would work for someone else.
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Italy12246 Posts
On August 30 2012 11:40 NrGmonk wrote: I think 90% of the time, +2 armor is started before +1 attack with this build. Usually it goes +1 armor -> +2 armor -> +1 attack -> +2 attack with first forge. Second forge gets +3 armor. +2 attack and +3 armor finish close to each other.
I think Parting always gets 6 stalkers, as that's the amount you need to 2 shot medivacs.
First archon is essential to hold off 10 minute pushes. I would always morph an archon against this instead of leaving the first two templar as templar.
I would have written this if I weren't so busy with other stuff (some of which you'll see very soon!), but I'm glad you did! If I were writing the guide, I would also emphasize the theory behind this build. That is, most templar builds aim to get templar before the 10 minute timing, but this one safely transitions into it after, and thus, is safer versus pre-10 minute timings. Also, maybe something about the 3 to 5 to 7 gateway additions. That could be considered somewhat "revolutionary".
Also, you should link to MKP vs Parting games on Entombed in GSTL finals. Those are the two most iconic games of this build.
Btw just wondering, did you get those timings from me or did you come up with them yourself? I could have sworm I posted those somewhere.
I got them from the Vods i looked at from GSL (i don't have a GSTL ticket so i haven't even seen the disconnect game lol) and especially from the IPL4 Parting replay that i included in the OP. You also pm'd them to me a while ago, after which i did my own research. edit: i went through all the vods to make sure, and Squirtle, Parting and Ace all get +1 attack before +2 armor.
If you want to suggest any edits and improvements to add to the guide, i will gladly add them, yours are far better than anything i could have written
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Really looking forward to any additions NrGmonk has to add. Not to diminish from your own awesomeness, Teoita
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First of all, really nice guide, the build seems to be really good. Thanks a lot.
The only thing i have to add, is the twilighttiming. I think the twilight will be added at 7:40-7:50, else you have a idle twilight for 30 sec.
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On August 30 2012 09:35 Gianttt wrote: I have been playing a lot of high templar builds lately and they feel very comfortable. I skip the robo though because I think getting a robo is delaying the tech, but yeah it's more safe.
Cloaked banshees can ruin your day and you can't scout his base. It's a bad idea imho.
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I used to do a build a bit like this. I think it was something like: 1 gate expand into 3 gates 6:30 robo 7:00 twilight council add forge and 2 more gates charge and templar archives 2 more gates getting attacked --> morph archons warp in zealots not getting attacked --> save energy for storms But that was forever ago and that build is hella outdated. It worked extremely well the entire time I used it, though. EDIT: ACtually no, I did this before people started 1 gate expanding, I did this with 3 gate expand. It was very nice because you got a bunch of sentries so you could FF + storm.
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Italy12246 Posts
On August 31 2012 02:20 MasterSquint wrote: First of all, really nice guide, the build seems to be really good. Thanks a lot.
The only thing i have to add, is the twilighttiming. I think the twilight will be added at 7:40-7:50, else you have a idle twilight for 30 sec.
Yeah your twilight is indeed idle for a while. This is because you are getting it to get a templar archives and archon up asap, not for fast charge, blink or +2. You still want it closer to 7.00 than 8.00 because the fast archons are really needed and useful.
edit: ops i was being silly. I edited that part to be more clear.
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No Problem Sir
I have found a replay in my archives from Parting vs MKP on Tal'darim Altar, Parting switched the timing of the forge and the robo around so he could get a bit faster +1 armor but the observers are quite delayed: http://drop.sc/162121
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Italy12246 Posts
Alright OP updated and improved, and i added that replay. Thanks for the feedback
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Bosnia-Herzegovina439 Posts
On August 31 2012 03:37 MasterSquint wrote:I have found a replay in my archives from Parting vs MKP on Tal'darim Altar, Parting switched the timing of the forge and the robo around so he could get a bit faster +1 armor but the observers are quite delayed: http://drop.sc/162121 Hey, thanks for the replay. I have few questions. In this game Parting is researching charge at 15 minute mark. I find charge very powerfull. Am i complete noob or did he just forgot about it? ...or thought he couldn't afford it because of how the game was unfolding. Really curious about that kind of stuff. Do pros actually forgot about the biggest part of strategy they are playing or do they watch precise timings almost every game.
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Italy12246 Posts
He most likely forgot it, no reasonable pvt build gets charge that late most especially if you for templar tech. This build does delay it a bit, but 15 minute mark charge is just pretty silly.
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found a vod Parting vs aLive set 2, parting placed his 3rd before archive, because alived lost a few marines with his marinepoke in the earlygame
EDIT: sry, thats actually not the same build
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Italy12246 Posts
On August 31 2012 16:21 MasterSquint wrote:found a vod Parting vs aLive set 2, parting placed his 3rd before archive, because alived lost a few marines with his marinepoke in the earlygame
Different build, Parting opens fast blink in that one.
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Omg thankyou so much for posting this, i was having such a hard time beating high masters terrans, but now i am raping them with ease
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Thanks, i'll try it out! Again, thanks for the guide. And again.......:D
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On August 30 2012 11:40 NrGmonk wrote: I think 90% of the time, +2 armor is started before +1 attack with this build. Usually it goes +1 armor -> +2 armor -> +1 attack -> +2 attack with first forge. Second forge gets +3 armor. +2 attack and +3 armor finish close to each other.
I think Parting always gets 6 stalkers, as that's the amount you need to 2 shot medivacs.
First archon is essential to hold off 10 minute pushes. I would always morph an archon against this instead of leaving the first two templar as templar.
I would have written this if I weren't so busy with other stuff (some of which you'll see very soon!), but I'm glad you did! If I were writing the guide, I would also emphasize the theory behind this build. That is, most templar builds aim to get templar before the 10 minute timing, but this one safely transitions into it after, and thus, is safer versus pre-10 minute timings. Also, maybe something about the 3 to 5 to 7 gateway additions. That could be considered somewhat "revolutionary".
Also, you should link to MKP vs Parting games on Entombed in GSTL finals. Those are the two most iconic games of this build.
Btw just wondering, did you get those timings from me or did you come up with them yourself? I could have sworm I posted those somewhere.
Wouldnt it be possible to skip a few stalkers since you have HT with feedback for drop defense?
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Italy12246 Posts
You get the stalkers specifically for the medivac timing, because you need the templar at your front as archons in your main army. They are also extremely useful vs faster pre medivac timings like 5rax marine.
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United States8476 Posts
On September 12 2012 03:28 Bam Lee wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2012 11:40 NrGmonk wrote: I think 90% of the time, +2 armor is started before +1 attack with this build. Usually it goes +1 armor -> +2 armor -> +1 attack -> +2 attack with first forge. Second forge gets +3 armor. +2 attack and +3 armor finish close to each other.
I think Parting always gets 6 stalkers, as that's the amount you need to 2 shot medivacs.
First archon is essential to hold off 10 minute pushes. I would always morph an archon against this instead of leaving the first two templar as templar.
I would have written this if I weren't so busy with other stuff (some of which you'll see very soon!), but I'm glad you did! If I were writing the guide, I would also emphasize the theory behind this build. That is, most templar builds aim to get templar before the 10 minute timing, but this one safely transitions into it after, and thus, is safer versus pre-10 minute timings. Also, maybe something about the 3 to 5 to 7 gateway additions. That could be considered somewhat "revolutionary".
Also, you should link to MKP vs Parting games on Entombed in GSTL finals. Those are the two most iconic games of this build.
Btw just wondering, did you get those timings from me or did you come up with them yourself? I could have sworm I posted those somewhere.
Wouldnt it be possible to skip a few stalkers since you have HT with feedback for drop defense? As you don't have charge, storm, or colossi before 12 minutes, you really need to rely on stalkers to prevent drops from landing. If a drop successfully lands in your base, you'll either take huge damage or lose on the spot. This game of this build of Parting vs MVP shows why you really need stalkers to intercept drops and what happens if you don't.
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On August 29 2012 06:54 Teoita wrote:Show nested quote +On August 29 2012 06:14 Shikada wrote:This reminds me kcdc's build, this one: of http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=319339The idea is similar, although kcdc's build has different gateway timings, like getting only one more gate instead of two before robo. Thanks for this guide, I will compare these build more thoroughly once I check out all the replays you kindly provided HT or colossus is a choice of style, but I feel HTs aren't as easily hard countered as colossus can be with vikings, and your drop defense is definitely easier with HTs. So if you're having trouble holding the 10 minute medivac aggression with colossus, this is a very good build to try out. This build is a bit safer and gets better scouting at the cost of slower tech essentially. Other than that yeah, kcdc's build is really good.
Yep, they're similar. I actually saw Parting do his 2-base templar build a few times a little after I'd hammered out how I wanted to play my 2-base templar build and noted the similarities and differences. The big differences are:
(1) Parting gets a robo and observers a good 4-5 minutes earlier than I do. This means he actually sees what Terran is doing, whereas I poke the front and make educated guesses based on unit counts and timings.
(2) I skip stalker production and the robo to get storm a couple minutes earlier, and I base my medivac timing defense around storm and feedback whereas Parting defends with archons and zealots while warding against drops with his stalkers.
(3) I get upgrades a little quicker.
I wouldn't say either option is safer or stronger. My build is definitely stomps the medivac timing more cleanly assuming you have storms in time, and templar with storms are much more effective and forgiving of mistakes than a handful of stalkers are for defending drops.
On the other hand, Parting's build is more flexible if you make a mistake or if Terran does something you didn't account for since he has observers, and the tech timing he's relying on (archons in time for 10:00 push) is less thin than the tech timing I rely on (storm in time for 10:00 push).
With a 2-base templar build, you can have two but not all three of the following:
-Fast upgrades -Early observer -Fast storm
I choose fast upgrades and fast storm, while Parting chooses fast upgrades and early observer. The result is that he has more information up to 13:00, but my army is a little stronger in the 10:00-13:00 timing.
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kcdc, I know that this question may be better placed in easy questions, easy answers or in the protoss help me thread, but I feel like no matter how much I read about the poke/early scouting, I never know what the terran is doing until I get my obs in his base. I've been using the 3 fast observer approach here but I would really like to delay the robo a bit more.
What am I looking for with the poke? What does it really tell me?
I see a bunker and am pushed away. Ok. I feel like I already knew that was going to happen.
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Italy12246 Posts
From Iamke55's thread on 3 base gateway play:
Step 3: The 7:30 Poke
You’ve confirmed a no gas FE by this point, right? If not, read the last section more carefully! You should’ve already switched to MC’s 1 gate FE if you didn’t see the command center.
At around 7:30, you should have either 9 or 10 gateway units (I prefer 4 sentries, 2 stalkers, and 4 zealots at this point if I didn’t scout the FE in time to cut stalkers, otherwise just sentry/zealot is good) at the proxy pylon. Walk into the ramp, but don’t use guardian shield or force fields yet! What you see will influence the rest of the build.
1 or 2 bunkers, 8 marines or fewer: this is likely cloaked banshees followed by either the 2 base “1/1/1” with banshee/tank, or Sage/jjakji’s banshee thor build. Make a robo ASAP and try to do as much damage as you can with your units. Meanwhile at home, switch your strategy to whatever you do against the 2 base 1/1/1. There are already 3 bunkers: this is probably the fast 3 orbital build. You can continue with step 4, or if you’re super paranoid you can get detection. This is a bit tricky because fast cloaked banshees don’t actually have enough marines to fill all 3 bunkers yet so they usually stick with 2. If you do see marauder shots this early in the game with 3 bunkers, you can just build a nexus and a twilight council immediately. Mass marines with no marauder, or you got attacked by mass marines before you poked: this is gasless FE into 4 or 5 rax marine pressure. I haven’t seen this enough to know exactly what to do, but what’s worked for me so far is to just continue on with step 4 because zealots under a guardian shield will always trade effectively against un-upgraded marines. You might be able to just add 3 more gates and all-in because the stim research is so late, but I haven’t tried that yet. Marauder: this is most likely the standard build (3 rax then starport). This is your cue to continue with step 4.
This is a scouting poke only.You should not try to do damage yet unless you see something like 1 bunker with only a few units around it.
The difference is that kcdc pokes with just one stalker rather than with a gateway force, but those are things you should be on the lookout for. As he just told me, it's a pretty inexact science, which is why i personally greatly prefer the observer openings.
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Yep, just count units and bunkers. If you see a marauder, you definitely don't need detection. If you see 2 bunkers, no marauders and a low marine count, you definitely do want detection.
I think that in most cases, seeing what Terran is doing is a little overrated. If you scout a gasless FE, he'll go for either the 10 minute medivac timing or a triple orbital build a good 85% of the time, and in both of those cases, you'll be better off without having spent early resources on the robo and observers. I've never really found 2-base marine-tank pushes to be all that scary, and there's a good chance your build will handle them without any deviations. Maybe you cancel an upgrade when you see him push out and chrono out a couple extra units. Beyond the tank rushes and the normal bio builds, you're basically left with 2-base cloaked banshee rush, which you should sense coming most of the time.
In a tournament, you'd want to mix things up so that your opponent wouldn't be able to exploit your favorite habits. But on ladder, a build that puts you in a good position 95% of the time is fine to do every time.
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Okay - good tip about the marauder. Tech lab on a rax means they aren't going cloakshee? I'm always worried about people doing unorthodox or confusing builds in the lower leagues (I'm diamond) because I tend to lose to things in an IdrA-like manner. "HE WON BECAUSE HIS BUILD WAS RETARDED AND COUNTS ON ME NOT KNOWING HE WAS RETARDED" etc.
Edit for thank you ^^
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Is this considered a better, safer macro build than the two base Colossus attacks everyone has been doing?? I like the idea of going Templar instead of Colossus, but it doesn't look as good on paper.
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United States8476 Posts
On September 12 2012 09:01 Havik_ wrote: Is this considered a better, safer macro build than the two base Colossus attacks everyone has been doing?? I like the idea of going Templar instead of Colossus, but it doesn't look as good on paper. Two base colossi attacks are neither safe nor macro builds. Colossi openings and templar openings all have their unique advantages and disadvantage. Neither style is considered better than the other. I will tell you that out of all PvT openings, this, the CreatorPrime openings, and fast colossi into double forge are the three most used in the pro scene. I also believe, they're three of the most stable and "safe".
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kcdc, NrGmonk and Teoita dishing out so many quality posts in this thread. Thanks a lot!
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thank you for this guide. This build has made my like 10% win against terran turn into a like 70% win. idk what it was but colosi and double forge just were not working for me. Storm is just so good!
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When do you stop morphing the Templars into Archons ? Or rather, mid to late game what kind of army composition would like to have more of? Archons/Templar
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Italy12246 Posts
I'd say as you research storm, after your first two archons. In that window of time, both players usually play passively as they take their third and get upgrades going (or in case of some terran builds, wait for upgrades, ghosts and a high medivac count to hit a 2base timing), so you can leave the templars unmoprhed, research storm and only get more archons if your observers spot his full army trying to kill your third and you won't have storm in time to defend (which is quite unlikely as storm does research really fast).
If Terran opens for some 2base allin like thor/banshee/marine you can skip the Archons overall and tech to storm faster, as you know there will be no 10-11 minute timing attack from him.
Regarding composition, if i decide to max out on gateway units to pressure a 4th i get about 6 templar in my main army, plus one more per base i have to defend; the rest of my gas goes in 1-2 extra archons and upgrades. If i go for a faster colossus transition, i cut out the 1-2 archons to be able to have more gas for a group of 10 stalkers with blink as well as double robo production.
Generally, i think having around 10 or so templar spread between your main army and your bases is a good number to have.
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Adding onto what Teoita said, in late game, I try to avoid the 200/200 situations with entrenched positions on both sides because I think they favor Terran. Teoita's right that about 10 templar spread around the map is a good number, but Iin my opinion, aiming to craft the perfect composition is a losing mindset.
Ghost vs templar micro is heavily ghost-favored if both players are giving it full attention, and even with colossi, T's fully upgraded MMMVG will beat you if you don't get off storms. On the other hand, Terran can't kite in multiple spots at once, and chareglots rock bio that stands still.
So instead of aiming to perfect your composition while Terran does the same, try to push a constant battle for map control, fighting to maximize your presence and mobility by putting pylons and warp prisms everywhere you can. Trade zealots and DT's for his army and economy, and when he looks away, surprise his main force with storms and colossi.
I don't like to group up more than 4 templar with my main army because I tend to get them EMP'd, so what I do instead is I avoid big fights while putting pylons across the middle of the map with a templar warped in at each one gathering energy. That way, if Terran tries to force a proper fight, he'll eat storms as he moves around the map. And of course if I do fight his army and need to retreat for any reason, I have storms littered across the map to take chunks out of his force and buy time to rebuild.
Basically, try to keep stuff moving around and trading to hold both of your supplies under 160 or so.
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On September 13 2012 02:27 kcdc wrote: Adding onto what Teoita said, in late game, I try to avoid the 200/200 situations with entrenched positions on both sides because I think they favor Terran. Teoita's right that about 10 templar spread around the map is a good number, but Iin my opinion, aiming to craft the perfect composition is a losing mindset.
Ghost vs templar micro is heavily ghost-favored if both players are giving it full attention, and even with colossi, T's fully upgraded MMMVG will beat you if you don't get off storms. On the other hand, Terran can't kite in multiple spots at once, and chareglots rock bio that stands still.
So instead of aiming to perfect your composition while Terran does the same, try to push a constant battle for map control, fighting to maximize your presence and mobility by putting pylons and warp prisms everywhere you can. Trade zealots and DT's for his army and economy, and when he looks away, surprise his main force with storms and colossi.
I don't like to group up more than 4 templar with my main army because I tend to get them EMP'd, so what I do instead is I avoid big fights while putting pylons across the middle of the map with a templar warped in at each one gathering energy. That way, if Terran tries to force a proper fight, he'll eat storms as he moves around the map. And of course if I do fight his army and need to retreat for any reason, I have storms littered across the map to take chunks out of his force and buy time to rebuild.
Basically, try to keep stuff moving around and trading to hold both of your supplies under 160 or so.
I wish I had your PvT game sense. Yes, I'm jelly.
So, clear this up for me kcdc. I've always favored going Storm first in PvT, but I always find that I'm contained in my base by a strong +1 medivac timing because I'm not totally sure how to handle my army when he pushes across the map. Assuming he has all of his forces in the front, am I eager to engage with my Zealots first (and if so, at my ramp, in front of my ramp, etc?), or do I try to use Storms to put damage on him and keep him away? I'd love to just crush his attack, but it just doesn't work for whatever reason. I also feel like I can't take a 3rd anywhere before this because of a lack of units and difficulty in covering more ground (especially against double medivac drops in the main).
My inclination is to attack him and try to trade everything I have, while eventually winning with warp-ins, but for some reason whenever I get into this situation I just freeze and eventually run out of Storm energy (and subsequently die or get contained for 3-4 minutes).
Please explain how a normal battle goes down in the 9-12 minute time window.
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Italy12246 Posts
It depends on what tech you have up, as we said in this thread there can be a lot of variations in how you go storm first.
If you do manage to get storm up (like you would with kcdc's build) you can definitely crush his army, especially when your extra gateways kick in. If he has only 2-4 medivacs and no ghosts, trying to attack into storm is suicide for him; there's actually a few 8gate storm allins based around that.
With this build you delay storm for upgrades, but at the very least when you get a few archons, complete 1/1 and charge your army will be quite cost efficient against bio with no ghost support (and possibly worse upgrades) assuming you engage well and land good ff's, so again you can move out and force him back.
In my experience, the situation you describe where terran just keeps streaming units until you run out of storms is caused by screwing up an engagement, wether it is by not landing forcefields or storms, and from there it kinda snowballs in T's favour.
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Sidewinder, I've had the problem you're experiencing where you feel like your army is strong so you move out onto the map, but Terran just seems to weather those storms with split micro and eventually kites down your zealots. Your tech advantage roasts T in a choke, but in an open space, he can spread and kite and do okay.
I've been trying out the ST choice where you delay storm and beat the medivac timing with archons instead. This lets me get the archives later which I've been using to get a fast robo, earlier charge and a second forge timed up with my +1 weapons completing. It's not really a build at this point, but it seems cool.
Maybe I'll try mixing in a fast warp prism to start chargelot harassment when he pushes out with his medivac timing. It might be fun to try a dark shrine instead of templar archives to defend with archon chargelot while you counter-drop with DTs and chargelots and take your third. After that, you could go to either colossus or storm tech.
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On September 12 2012 09:28 monk. wrote:Show nested quote +On September 12 2012 09:01 Havik_ wrote: Is this considered a better, safer macro build than the two base Colossus attacks everyone has been doing?? I like the idea of going Templar instead of Colossus, but it doesn't look as good on paper. Two base colossi attacks are neither safe nor macro builds. Colossi openings and templar openings all have their unique advantages and disadvantage. Neither style is considered better than the other. I will tell you that out of all PvT openings, this, the CreatorPrime openings, and fast colossi into double forge are the three most used in the pro scene. I also believe, they're three of the most stable and "safe".
I noticed that you didn't include the PartinG gateway style opening in your list of stable builds. Is it not quite as safe and stable as the other three? I've been playing around with that style after watching the Day[9] episode that covers it.
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United States8476 Posts
On September 12 2012 09:28 monk. wrote:Show nested quote +On September 12 2012 09:01 Havik_ wrote: Is this considered a better, safer macro build than the two base Colossus attacks everyone has been doing?? I like the idea of going Templar instead of Colossus, but it doesn't look as good on paper. Two base colossi attacks are neither safe nor macro builds. Colossi openings and templar openings all have their unique advantages and disadvantage. Neither style is considered better than the other. I will tell you that out of all PvT openings, this, the CreatorPrime openings, and fast colossi into double forge are the three most used in the pro scene. I also believe, they're three of the most stable and "safe".
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On September 16 2012 11:11 monk. wrote:Show nested quote +On September 12 2012 09:28 monk. wrote:On September 12 2012 09:01 Havik_ wrote: Is this considered a better, safer macro build than the two base Colossus attacks everyone has been doing?? I like the idea of going Templar instead of Colossus, but it doesn't look as good on paper. Two base colossi attacks are neither safe nor macro builds. Colossi openings and templar openings all have their unique advantages and disadvantage. Neither style is considered better than the other. I will tell you that out of all PvT openings, this, the CreatorPrime openings, and fast colossi into double forge are the three most used in the pro scene. I also believe, they're three of the most stable and "safe".
Maybe I misunderstand, but isn't this a high templar opening? I'm talking about the PartinG build with the huge gateway attack at 8-10 minutes--sometimes off of a double expand.
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United States8476 Posts
On September 16 2012 11:14 Salient wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2012 11:11 monk. wrote:On September 12 2012 09:28 monk. wrote:On September 12 2012 09:01 Havik_ wrote: Is this considered a better, safer macro build than the two base Colossus attacks everyone has been doing?? I like the idea of going Templar instead of Colossus, but it doesn't look as good on paper. Two base colossi attacks are neither safe nor macro builds. Colossi openings and templar openings all have their unique advantages and disadvantage. Neither style is considered better than the other. I will tell you that out of all PvT openings, this, the CreatorPrime openings, and fast colossi into double forge are the three most used in the pro scene. I also believe, they're three of the most stable and "safe". Maybe I misunderstand, but isn't this a high templar opening? I'm talking about the PartinG build with the huge gateway attack at 8-10 minutes--sometimes off of a double expand. Well, this is a gateway-based build that Parting, a Startale Protoss, uses. You should have been more specific. The Parting 3 nexus build that you're talking about is not that solid, as it has at least 2 solid bo counters. First is a 4+ rax rally of marines after 1 rax CC. You'll notice however that Parting most often does this build on maps where no gas marine rallies are generally bad on against normal builds. This includes Daybreak, Cloud Kingdom, and Metropolis.
The second weakness is again 1 rax CC into cloaked banshee into siege tanks for defense. See Gumiho vs Parting on Metropolis in their GSL game for an example of this.
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Thank you, Monk . I called the build "the PartinG Gateway Style" because that's how Day[9] referred to it in his Daily (450). I can see how the question was confusing since this build is also gateway-based and has been made famous by the StarTale protoss players including PartinG. Thanks again for your answer. I'll steer away from the style in Daily 450, and stick to one of the safer builds you mentioned.
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That double expand 8 gate build isn't very good in my opinion. If T holds, you have a good economy, but you're on gateway tech against MMM which means you're most likely going to take big damage or straight up lose. Timing attacks where you likely lose if they don't work are fine, but IMO, if you're going to do an all-in, you should make it as strong as it can be, and the double expand slows the attack down to the point that T has medivacs and stim. It winds up being a tweener build that's almost all in, but without the strength of a true all in.
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On September 17 2012 00:47 kcdc wrote: That double expand 8 gate build isn't very good in my opinion. If T holds, you have a good economy, but you're on gateway tech against MMM which means you're most likely going to take big damage or straight up lose. Timing attacks where you likely lose if they don't work are fine, but IMO, if you're going to do an all-in, you should make it as strong as it can be, and the double expand slows the attack down to the point that T has medivacs and stim. It winds up being a tweener build that's almost all in, but without the strength of a true all in.
its a very economical timing attack which is nearly as strong as a gate attack off of 2 base....
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Italy12246 Posts
I believe that might be why the 8gate followup was kind of dropped out by the P players doing the 3 nexus build lately, in favour for faster twilight tech and charge or blink, much like iamke55 does in his gateway pressure->third thread. If you can just defend with your massive gateway production, it's somewhat silly to risk your sentries and energy. Sure the attack is strong, but if you want to do something like that i'd also rather do a really fast 2base 6gate that can hit a full minute faster, before medivacs and potentially even stim.
I think the whole "parting gateway style" thing is more of a mid/lategame playstyle than a build. Parting wants to get to 3 bases with storm and lots of gateways a lot of the time. If he can get there with a double expand because either the map favours it (say Atlantis Spaceship) or he knows he plays someone really standard and passive, he'll do the 3 nex opening, if he wants to play it safer he'll do this or a fake colossus (as in, one colo with no range)->templar instead. Eventually both builds can kind of converge to the same mid/lategame point where you have good upgrades and lots of gateway units and storm: you can actually max in around 15 minutes with this build on pure gateway units, which is kind of nice since around that time a lot of terrans try to play aggressively with 2/2.
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On September 17 2012 02:03 Teoita wrote: I believe that might be why the 8gate followup was kind of dropped out by the P players doing the 3 nexus build lately, in favour for faster twilight tech and charge or blink, much like iamke55 does in his gateway pressure->third thread. If you can just defend with your massive gateway production, it's somewhat silly to risk your sentries and energy. Sure the attack is strong, but if you want to do something like that i'd also rather do a really fast 2base 6gate that can hit a full minute faster, before medivacs and potentially even stim.
Agreed. It's strong to try win early with a bunch of warpgates and forcefields, and it's strong to take a fast third and use some tech and upgrades to defend against medivacs. But if you split the difference, you wind up with an attack that's weaker than the former option and a defense that's weaker than the latter.
I'd much rather have 5 gate production and solid tech to defend medivacs than 8 gate production and no tech.
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I have been having some pretty good success using this strategy, but my execution still feels sloppy. Would anyone be able to kindly link me to the early game build order? Typically I just do 3 gates then a robo before expanding, but don't know what situations would dictate that I should do something different from this. What are some things to look for to changing this plan? Such as double gas vs 1 gas vs no gas terran and also the rax count.
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Italy12246 Posts
As i posted, any macro opening will do if your opponent is also opening with a macro oriented opening. Executing the midgame build (6.30 forge, 7.30 twilight etc) against a terran opening gas can be outright suicide against a one base allin as you will invest too much into useless tech that will not pay off in time.
In terms of openings, here's two solid 1gate fe guides; they both work really well vs pretty much any terran opening: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=319339 http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=294136 (cut the second stalker for a faster nexus vs gasless and chrono probes hardcore, i do this in my replays i think)
If you scout gassless expand or cc first, you can copy PartinG's exact opening from the replay i attached in the guide: cut out the zealot, stalker and third pylon and get a nexus up at 20 supply. Make sure to not let an SCV eng bay block you though.
Against any gas openings you can't tech as fast as this build does. I honestly don't know how good going for a build like this is in that situation, as if you open 1gate fe it's going to be hard to have a good read on what the terran is doing and you are forced to play defensive and potentially tech to colossus in case of a 1/1/1 allin, if you can get away with it. If you try to open with something ridicolously safe like 2gate obs expand, you might still kind of transition into this build by following similar timings: get a forge and twilight council when it's safe to do so (you see a cc at his nat) and go into the usual 5->7 gateway pattern. Here's a replay of me trying it out, notice how heavily delayed everything i do is http://drop.sc/253836. That said i'm terribad at playing vs gas openings, i'd like to hear from someone like kcdc how to transition more safely into templar play in that situation.
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This build also works great with a forge fast expand on maps where its viable!!
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On September 17 2012 07:54 Teoita wrote:Against any gas openings you can't tech as fast as this build does. I honestly don't know how good going for a build like this is in that situation, as if you open 1gate fe it's going to be hard to have a good read on what the terran is doing and you are forced to play defensive and potentially tech to colossus in case of a 1/1/1 allin, if you can get away with it. If you try to open with something ridicolously safe like 2gate obs expand, you might still kind of transition into this build by following similar timings: get a forge and twilight council when it's safe to do so (you see a cc at his nat) and go into the usual 5->7 gateway pattern. Here's a replay of me trying it out, notice how heavily delayed everything i do is http://drop.sc/253836. That said i'm terribad at playing vs gas openings, i'd like to hear from someone like kcdc how to transition more safely into templar play in that situation.
I open 1 gate FE every game vs T, including against gas openings. As for how to transition against a gas opening, it really depends on the opening and what you're able to scout.
You might be able to sacrifice a zealot to see whether he's done a marauder or reactor marine expand. If you confirm that it's one of those builds, you're gonna be fine with this ST 2-base templar play. Bear in mind that the earlier gas can speed up his medivac timing, but less minerals will mean a smaller push.
If you wait for your obs to scout T, I don't think you want to go templar before taking your third. There's a good chance that T will be preparing an all-in, in which case you obviously don't want to tech templar. If it's an expand build that you just scouted really late, I'd plan to get templar after you get colossi, forges, a third in some order.
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Italy12246 Posts
That's the problem i have vs gas openings. I am not really confortable with colossus openings, and a lot of the time i feel like i'm completely winging it and trying to tech up either too fast or too slowly.
The thing that annoys me the most though is cloak banshee into ridicolous greed like 3 cc double eng bay and almost no bio units for a long time. I'm sitting there terrorzied by a 1/1/1 allin, cutting probes and all and when my obs gets there he's got all this econ and tech up and i have nothing to threaten it. It drives me insane. Stuff like that is actually why i have been messing around with faster obs openings lately, at least i could still transition into this build which im really confortable with vs a 2rax opening.
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Thanks for the write-up, Teoita! I enjoy partaking in an aggressive zealot/archon/high templar style while flanking with high templar -- similar to the likes of STPartinG. I find that although they may have ghosts to combat my high templar -- my flanks on the high ground with high templar shred their army to pieces. During all this aggression, I secure more bases and tech to double robo colossus which lets me get the unbeatable deathball.
As previously stated, I enjoy this style as it allows me to be active on the map, to sometimes decide games extremely early in the mid-game if the terran plays greedy, or makes a mistake.
Additionally, I feel like incorporating a warp prism with high templar is an extremely strong tactic. If they have ghosts on the field, that is already a large amount of gas invested into ghost tech -- thus, no vikings can snipe it as if they do have vikings, they have far too little army.
Again, thank you for the write up!
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I love this guide...It blows my mind how freaking good HT are versus Terran.
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Did anyone watch game 1 of Rain vs. Taeja today? Rain did something similar to this style, but I think he got his Twilight up earlier and started Charge immediately, I'm guessing in order to have it ready at 10 minutes. He also never made any additional stalkers and did fine against drops nontheless. I'd like to analyze the game, but I can't watch it...
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Italy12246 Posts
The builds are similar, what Rain did is the more textbook version of safe 2 base templar that has been around for ages while the one i talk about in the guide is the specific adjustment to it made by Startale players.
The two key differences are: 1) Gateway timings. Rain went with the more standard 3-6 gates, while Startale players generally go 3-5-7. The idea of 3-6 is, simply, you get your 6gates of production around 8.30-8.40 ish to time up your production with a Terran's medivac timing; really straightforward; this production "setup" of 6gate robo+whatever tech has long been the standard in PvT. The Startale variation gets gates 4-5 sooner and 6-7 later than Rain's build. What this does is it allows you to cut gates 6-7 and focus on units if your obs sees a potential push coming, and to have a bit more production later on if the extra gates aren't needed to defend a more standard medivac timing. A really good example of this reaction is Squirtle's game on Cloud Kingdwom vs MVP in their GSL finals: Squirtle sees the marine/tank timing moving out, and immediately cuts tech, gets immortals, and most importantly has 5 gates worth of production instead of just 3. This allows him to be completely safe against the attack, and he forces MVP back. Also, having 7 gates is nice if you are forced to turtle up on 2 bases a bit longer by drops or annoying factories. If you only have 6 gates worth of zealot archon you risk floating a bit of money eventually; so Rain ends up being forced into adding 2 extra gates before his third, which he probably didn't plan to do. This change in how to set up your production in gateway heavy builds is a really nice and smart adjustment, and as monk posted in this thread i should probably have gone more in depth about it in the guide. I will edit it in sometime. 2) Fast charge vs fast archives: Rain also goes for charge zealots before getting his archives up, while the build i describe goes the other way around. The difference is that he can get charge done just in time for Medivacs, but he can only get 2 templar up so he decides to use them for feedbacks rather than Archons. Again, the fast archon makes it slightly easier to hold pushes before medivacs since you can get it up really, really fast (pre 10 minutes), but both choices are fine.
Other (smaller) differences are: Since Rain as you say cuts Stalkers, he gets a cannon in his main and goes up to 4 observers really fast, trying to use those to defend against drops. If you look at the minimap at around 10 minutes, he has great vision around any area where a drop could be coming in, so he can afford to have all his stuff at his front. Nice adjustment, and probably based on the map since Antiga is one of the few maps where having 2 observers to spot drops coming to your main instead of one is really helpful. Rain goes +2 armor before +1 attack. Not the bigget deal in the world and i think it comes down to player preference, but +1 attack finishes sooner and if you are going to switch into colossi and you invest heavily into armor, you will have a slower +3 attack which Colossi really benefit from. Going +1/+1/+2 also is really nice if you want to go double forge later on, as you can get 2/2 and 3/3 together. This is probably the smallest of the differences between the builds.
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Thanks for that reply. Very insightful.
Do you belive 3->5->7 gates to be strictly superior to 3->6 gates?
Do you think there's a connection between the fact that Rain gets Charge before Archives and the fact that he gets no stalkers at all? I'd think that Charge makes defending drops quite a bit easier.
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Italy12246 Posts
3-5-7 might be better to defend anything, yes.However, any timing that isn't 3rax medivac is really, really rare these days, so going 3-6 is just fine.
I think on Antiga it might be a good idea to go either Charge or even Blink to defend drops, yes. The area to cover in your main is so freakin huge that just 6 Stalkers might have a hard time covering it all. On the other hand, on maps where drops are easier to hold like CK or Ohana, both are just fine.
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Hey guys i have an addition to this build. I'm having pretty fun time with this build at mid-high masters and i had an idea while ago and it works actually. When you build your robo and get your 2 initial observers after them make a "warp prism" and send it to the enemy base and hide it. The idea behind this is arround that time mostly terrans push with 2 medivac and their whole army, they try to drop and things like that. Just that time when they are half the road go with warp prism in their base and warp in zealots. This most of the time force terrans to make mistakes like they commit too much to that attack or they get uneasy with attacking or going back. If he goes for an attack to you defend with your everything in your base and keep warping in zealots or stalkers to his mineral line. If he doesn't prepare to get your third with getting storms ready. They might try to drop you with part of their army and send rest back to base too but it isn't a real big deal because you'll have your stalkers waiting.
Now most of the time that kind of harrass wouldn't work against terran because of vikings but with this build terran doesn't feel the need to go any vikings so you can roam with your warp prism freely or if you cause so much mess they make vikings instead of medivacs which is actually good for you too
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mana uses a very interesing variation of 2 base templar play recently. his games can be seen here: http://www.sc2win.com/wp-content/plugins/download-monitor/download.php?id=4719 (he is called mouzcctosh ingame, has 9 pvt games of him from last week)
he does: gate-robo-gate-gate, take all gases, then drop 2 forges and a twilight at the same time, then add templar archive as twilight finishes and techs straight to storm (and charge..)
it seems just INSANELY greedy, when you look at his natural with 3 zealots and 1 sentry sitting there, while he researches storm, charge, AND +1/+1 and happily cruises around with his observers. but if you watch the replays carefully from his perspective he checks very thoroughly that no attack before 10:30 is coming, where all his researches line up ideally.
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United States8476 Posts
On September 20 2012 05:41 uLysSeS1 wrote:mana uses a very interesing variation of 2 base templar play recently. his games can be seen here: http://www.sc2win.com/wp-content/plugins/download-monitor/download.php?id=4719(he is called mouzcctosh ingame, has 9 pvt games of him from last week) he does: gate-robo-gate-gate, take all gases, then drop 2 forges and a twilight at the same time, then add templar archive as twilight finishes and techs straight to storm (and charge..) it seems just INSANELY greedy, when you look at his natural with 3 zealots and 1 sentry sitting there, while he researches storm, charge, AND +1/+1 and happily cruises around with his observers. but if you watch the replays carefully from his perspective he checks very thoroughly that no attack before 10:30 is coming, where all his researches line up ideally. Yea, Mana used it against Keen in Up/Down. It looks like an incredibly greedy, incredibly fragile build that requires precise execution. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who's not progamer level. I also don't think it's even viable on a map like Antiga with its short rush distance and huge natural choke.
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Pretty important to note that you don't want to morph the archon if the push is simply not coming. Might as well let that energy accrue.
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Italy12246 Posts
Bump!
OP updated with a couple improvements suggested by kcdc and monk.
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Congratulations on Blue ! You really deserve it. And great guide as well
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I have been using this same concept in PvT lately, with kcdc's help and replays, and it's been awesome. I really love kcdc's 2gate (total) + forge followup after expand.. the money spending is exactly on. 3 gates sits idle way too much, and the upgrades are really quick. I do prefer Archons before Storm though, but you have a good 2 minutes with Storm to be really aggressive before they get Ghosts on the map. Only downside is that the build is just a tad weak to double medivac drops if you don't go Robo before TC.. just need really good positioning (and I use a couple cannons).
GSL spoilers relevant to this build: + Show Spoiler +In the only game that Mana played vs asd in Code A in which asd didn't all-in, he used essentially this same idea. Once he researched Storm, he pushed out and hammered asd really hard, for an easy win. Really cool game to watch.
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I also want to become blue =( How do I do it?
Btw I hate facing this build because it melts my army in TvP all the tine. Luckily most Protoss still go colo business.
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Italy12246 Posts
From strategy forum guidelines:
The game is evolving all the time and no one has a definite answer for every strategy related question for SC2. Thus, it is extremely important that you back up everything with sound reasoning, a replay, or a VOD, anything that supports the point you are making. Your word is not enough. A one-line response to a post without anything to support it is not acceptable. In the same token, simply posting stories of what you do without any analysis or explanation in response to another post is not acceptable.
That said, there are people much more qualified to talk about strategy than others. You will see their posts in this forum highlighted with a light blue background. Statements by these “blue posters” will be weighted differently than had they be posted by complete unknowns. Thus, the less reputation you have, the more you need to back up your claims as previously described. Note, however, that this does not excuse outrageous claims by a good player – in the end, every claim will need proof.
So really, contribute as much as you can with good consistent posting. Tbh i was quite surprised i got it, since every other blue is in some way connected to a well known pro or generally high level team.
Also @Geiko: thanks a lot. Back in the day i suggested you should have become blue for your phoenix guide and the defensive 3gate you posted @Sidewinder: now that i've watched that game i feel even worse for Mana, i only saw game 2 and 3 It's interesting that he goes for a timing with storm while taking a third. I wonder if i can do that with this build, keeping the templar un morphed and getting faster storm to punish any kind of greedy play by the Terran, which as i mention is tough to play against.
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On September 26 2012 16:42 SidewinderSC2 wrote:I have been using this same concept in PvT lately, with kcdc's help and replays, and it's been awesome. I really love kcdc's 2gate (total) + forge followup after expand.. the money spending is exactly on. 3 gates sits idle way too much, and the upgrades are really quick. I do prefer Archons before Storm though, but you have a good 2 minutes with Storm to be really aggressive before they get Ghosts on the map. Only downside is that the build is just a tad weak to double medivac drops if you don't go Robo before TC.. just need really good positioning (and I use a couple cannons). GSL spoilers relevant to this build: + Show Spoiler +In the only game that Mana played vs asd in Code A in which asd didn't all-in, he used essentially this same idea. Once he researched Storm, he pushed out and hammered asd really hard, for an easy win. Really cool game to watch.
Yeah, I've been sticking with 2 gates and dropping a forge when pros tend to drop their 3rd gate. It seems straight up better against any follow-up to gasless 1-rax CC, so I don't know why pros stick with 3 gates. I guess they like having 3 gates in case they get caught off guard and need to ramp up production quickly. Still, faster upgrades seems much better than a security blanket that you'll never use.
As for archons + observers vs storm + playing blind, I'm still not sure which is better. I've been doing the faster robo with later storm and I've done fine with that, but something just feels off when I do it. My army feels weaker and if my archon(s) get focus fired, I might just lose to the medivac timing. I think the problem might be trying to get charge too early or maybe I'm not cutting probes when I should be, but I never had this problem when I would skip the robo and get storm out faster.
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That's also my experience. I tried going for a faster robo + 3 obs for a while ( all while continuying probes production and getting storm, but delaying charge ), and as you can imagine I haven't got much success.
What seems to work okay for me is going blind templars + charge without obs. It feels like everything is slightly too delayed for the stim + medivac timing if you insert a robo and some obs in your build
I've never felt comfortable with getting archons instead of storm versus the timing. In particular when you get dropped in your main, while terran pushes your third ( / third attempt ) at the same time. Archons just do not cut it mobility-wise. I prefer rushing for storm for defense.
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On September 27 2012 00:29 kcdc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 26 2012 16:42 SidewinderSC2 wrote:I have been using this same concept in PvT lately, with kcdc's help and replays, and it's been awesome. I really love kcdc's 2gate (total) + forge followup after expand.. the money spending is exactly on. 3 gates sits idle way too much, and the upgrades are really quick. I do prefer Archons before Storm though, but you have a good 2 minutes with Storm to be really aggressive before they get Ghosts on the map. Only downside is that the build is just a tad weak to double medivac drops if you don't go Robo before TC.. just need really good positioning (and I use a couple cannons). GSL spoilers relevant to this build: + Show Spoiler +In the only game that Mana played vs asd in Code A in which asd didn't all-in, he used essentially this same idea. Once he researched Storm, he pushed out and hammered asd really hard, for an easy win. Really cool game to watch. Yeah, I've been sticking with 2 gates and dropping a forge when pros tend to drop their 3rd gate. It seems straight up better in all cases, so I don't know why they stick with 3 gates. I guess they like having 3 gates in case they get caught off guard and need to ramp up production quickly. Still, faster upgrades seems much better than a security blanket that you'll never use. As for archons + observers vs storm + playing blind, I'm still not sure which is better. I've been doing the faster robo with later storm and I've done fine with that, but something just feels off when I do it. My army feels weaker and if my archon(s) get focus fired, I might just lose to the medivac timing. I think the problem might be trying to get charge too early or maybe I'm not cutting probes when I should be, but I never had this problem when I would skip the robo and get storm out faster.
I don't get the Robo sometimes until after the 3rd base. I don't feel that the information is that valuable when they gasless expand. I just add cannons so my Stalkers have to cover less surface area in the main. Sometimes my Archons are just a tad late, but I can buy time with forcefields if I need to.
However, I will get a Robo earlier if they take gas before expanding, since you basically need it to figure out what is going on. Then I will stay off Archons for a long time and prioritize charge and a big army instead. Both circumstances feel fine to me, since their medivac push will be a little later and little more marauder-heavy. It seems to me that players are a little more brave about keeping their army on the map if they opened gas into some kind of barracks pressure during their expand, so I get at least 1 Immortal out of the Robo and 2-4 observers by the time my 3rd base is up, so I can see attack and drop paths. My Archons sometimes don't come until my 3rd base starts in this case.
I don't think that getting an early Robo and spraying observers around if they gasless expand is really worthwhile. You just invest too much gas into information when you can get a reasonable amount of information by just using your own APM to hold watchtowers and position units cleverly to see what is going on.
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You just invest too much gas into information when you can get a reasonable amount of information by just using your own APM to hold watchtowers and position units cleverly to see what is going on.
Genius. You can handle gasless CC ==> cloaked banshee without observers by ringing T's base with units at the banshee timing. If you see a banshee leaving T's base, throw down a few cannons and a robo. Depending on the rush distance, you might need 2 cannons per mineral line to ensure that 1 of them finishes before the banshee gets across the map and starts DPS'ing them down.
I'm going back to delaying robo until I take my third.
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Italy12246 Posts
Ok that's fucking genius.
kcdc, would you mind posting a few replays once you get the positioning sorted out? It sounds really interesting.
@Sidewinder: when you play against gas openings, how do you transition into templar play? I always felt like holding off my forge/twilight until i can confirm no one base allin delays everything by far too much.
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I guess I should elaborate on why I feel observers vs gasless expand is a bad idea.
I think the biggest big problem is that the likelihood of you being pinned in your natural for a long time without Storm is much higher than if you had that money put toward actual units. This used to happen to me all the time when I'd open Robo before TC vs gasless expand, and I got frustrated and just had to all-in shortly afterward, or else my Nexus would get canceled over and over.
The cannons to hold medivac drops I think are quite important. I always feel I need at least 1 to reduce the amount of surface area that my Stalkers need to patrol so I can buy time and accurately judge how I need to split my army to deal with harass. I think this needs to happen if you skip obs, so you kinda play blind but you still play relatively safe and give yourself a chance to fix holes rather than just dying if you miss a couple medivacs.
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On September 27 2012 01:22 Teoita wrote: Ok that's fucking genius.
kcdc, would you mind posting a few replays once you get the positioning sorted out? It sounds really interesting.
@Sidewinder: when you play against gas openings, how do you transition into templar play? I always felt like holding off my forge/twilight until i can confirm no one base allin delays everything by far too much.
I actually delay upgrades quite a bit when I play against gas openings. +1 Marauders against Charge Zealots are really not very much better than +0 attack Marauders, so I don't think it's a very big deal. If you mix in at least one Immortal, it will be worth a lot more than the cost of a Forge and having to wait for the upgrade(s) to finish, IMO.
I think you need to do that Stalker + Zealot poke to see what is going on, and run a really optimized 1gate FE, chronoboosting units off the first gate quite a bit. If you see Marauders, then you already know what is going on. If not, you have to prioritize your Robo and kind of take a chance that they aren't tricking you. I think it's wise to be willing to position and/or lose units (probes) to see what is going on so you have time to react, so if a probe right outside their natural dies to some units, you know they are pushing and most of the time can see what is in the push. Mana does this a lot, too.
You can also be smart about checking to see if they drop an expansion by putting a scouting probe somewhere in their natural to check for information that they might try to deny later, with that old frontal bunker with no CC behind it. Terrans that open gas are a little less worried about probes hiding around since they have the force to hold a tricky push or something. Of course, this might not always work.. hence the unit poking.
Anyway, so once I know what is going on, or if I can see an expansion or composition or something, then I will take double gas at the natural and get a TC down as soon as I know I am safe for a little while. If they are not expanding and have shown me Banshees or Hellions or something, getting a TC and taking the extra gas is pretty much suicide.
If it turns into something like gas opener into standard +1 medivac timing, I will try to have at least 1 Immortal in my composition and Charge done by the time they would normally push. Forcefields + Immortals are really, really good in the midgame against a more Marauder-heavy composition, so I don't feel that I need Archons or Templar to kill boatloads of Marines yet. Since you are a little more reliant on good forcefields, I think spraying observers around is very worthwhile so you can get perfect forcefields to cut off just a few units and slowly grind down the effectiveness of any attack they try to make.
Templar comes after that, without sacrificing any gas toward your observers, Immortals, Charge and Sentries. You kind of have to play it by ear, since you don't really know when you're safe to put that TC and double gas down until you see exactly what they are doing. Sometimes the Templar is quick because you figure out what is going on really early, and sometimes it's later. Just need to be active and make decisions based on what your information is delivering.
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When exactly do you put up your 3rd nexus? Didn't see any clear and consistent timing in the replays.
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Italy12246 Posts
You can start trying to take it when you have your first archons and the terran backs out after his medivac timing; you should be able to secure it easily when you get charge and +1. The PartinG vs Jjakji vod shows how to play if terran keeps delaying your third for a long time.
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+1 armor that is? And yeah if Terrran keeps delaying me I'll just add on 1 forge and keep upgrading and also get storms.
I'm a terran player (top master) who is making a switch to Protoss now and I was wondering if you think this build is good to learn for the PvT match up as a beginner, yet good player?
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Italy12246 Posts
+1 attack, which you get together with charge when +1 armor is finished and you have your first archons out. Storm is also a good idea yeah.
This build is definitely a good way to start; it's extremely safe, it should hold most timings confortably and it should make you used to having sentries as key defensive units, which is extremely important in protoss play.
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On October 04 2012 14:51 Thylacine wrote: +1 armor that is? And yeah if Terrran keeps delaying me I'll just add on 1 forge and keep upgrading and also get storms.
I'm a terran player (top master) who is making a switch to Protoss now and I was wondering if you think this build is good to learn for the PvT match up as a beginner, yet good player?
I think if you are just switching to Protoss, you need to be a little careful about picking a build and just running it. Every Protoss build has an optimal run condition that you need to be scouting for. If you see the Terran opening gas or tech with this build in mind, you need to change the build fairly dramatically to favor Robo (for observers), more units off your first gateway and more units during your first couple of warp-in cycles, until you know what is going on. If they are just 1-basing, you can't do this build at all - you'd be best off favoring Colossus vs a 1-basing Terran.
The optimal run condition for how this build is written is gasless expand, since you don't need to dramatically speed up any unit production or tech in order to not die or lose your Nexus. You can feel quite safe dropping a lot of chrono on probes once you've verified it's a gasless expand, and then you just need to be sure you are still making enough units for Keen-like Marine attacks while running the build.
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great write up, I really learned a lot of TvP from a Protoss's perspective of the game. Now I know to always check watch towers before moving out so you can't cut probes :D
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iv'e played against this many times, and i have to say that it's really easy to hold. You just go madman with your marine marauder ball kiting the zealots, and the ht won't even be able to get close to your army to storm, and even if they do get close enough, they'll probably tick 1 or 2 times a fourth or so of your army
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On October 05 2012 03:38 Silencioseu wrote: iv'e played against this many times, and i have to say that it's really easy to hold. You just go madman with your marine marauder ball kiting the zealots, and the ht won't even be able to get close to your army to storm, and even if they do get close enough, they'll probably tick 1 or 2 times a fourth or so of your army this is a defensive build. the protoss' you play are doing it wrong when they are trying to chase your army somewhere not in your base
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Italy12246 Posts
1) What do you mean "easy to hold"? This build is not aggressive for a long time. It's nowhere near similar to a 2base Storm timing attack, which is actually NOT easy to hold because you will be fighting at the terran's where the space to storm dodge is extremely limited 2) If for some reason you are implying that Templar openings (and Templar play in general) are not viable you couldn't be more wrong. Saying "lolol just storm dodge!" makes zero sense.
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On October 05 2012 03:38 Silencioseu wrote: iv'e played against this many times, and i have to say that it's really easy to hold. You just go madman with your marine marauder ball kiting the zealots, and the ht won't even be able to get close to your army to storm, and even if they do get close enough, they'll probably tick 1 or 2 times a fourth or so of your army
I think you kind of missed the point of this build. It never asks people to move out on the map. It's primary intention is to get a 3rd base without dying.
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Going try this build I have horrible drop defense so I'm hoping this build helps with that.
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What should be the general timing for a colossus switch after taking a third with this build? Should I be looking to drop a second robo and robo bay after warping in a set number of templar (after the first two archons)? I've been having some difficulty timing it out, because I generally feel a bit gas starved in the period where I'm researching storm and warping in additional templar. I've run into a couple of instances where I get killed by a timing at my third with ghosts before I have any colossi out.
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Italy12246 Posts
There's not a general fixed timing like with 3 colossi into templar.
If you look at Startale players and/or guys like MC, they like to take their 4th before switching, staying on gateway tech for a long time. If you wanna do it faster, i think having a good templar count (like 8-10 spread between bases) is a good moment to go for the switch. In general though, it's possible to stick to templar a bit longer than with colossus since it's more about micro than viking/stalker count.
I'm not sure about this, but if you lose to ghost timings other than improving your micro or switching to colossus faster (like cut down on the number of templar you invest in before making the switch), you can actually delay your colossus tech and get a bunch of gates after your third. In one of my replays, i did that and maxed in 15 minutes (with fairly bad macro too), so when the terran's push hit me he was like HOLY WHAT THE FUCK THAT'S 40 CHARGELOTS. I'm not sure if that can be done consistently (plus i can't play right now to test stuff tt), but that's pretty fun to do
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On October 17 2012 05:20 Chandra wrote: What should be the general timing for a colossus switch after taking a third with this build? Should I be looking to drop a second robo and robo bay after warping in a set number of templar (after the first two archons)? I've been having some difficulty timing it out, because I generally feel a bit gas starved in the period where I'm researching storm and warping in additional templar. I've run into a couple of instances where I get killed by a timing at my third with ghosts before I have any colossi out.
Double Robo is too slow and too expensive, especially if that timing is killing you.
I play it out so that I am aggressive on the map when Storm is researching and attack the second it's done, and you should have a couple minutes of time before their Ghosts are on the field that you can force a lift on the 3rd base. On the clock, this timing is usually between 12-14 minutes at my level, and from what I can tell at the pro level. During that time, take your own 3rd, and just progress through Robo and Bay as soon as possible, after your 3rd is started.
Another option is that if you absolutely crush their +1 medivac timing, you can move forward with Zealot Archon immediately and forego Storm for a little while while you get your 3rd up. A lot of times this can just kill them, and even against the people I play they aren't super tight with their control during that timing, so I can hammer it really hard about 1/3 of the games.
I think you might be warping in too many Templar during the transition period, but the key is keeping his army size small while you switch tech routes. If you can deny any mining at all, it's even better.
If you're not as confident with that Storm timing, you can play more of a Rain style where you use just a few Zealots at one base and Storm drops at different bases to keep the Terran's army moving and his economy plodding while you switch into Colossus. I've done that in some games and it works really well, and it's quite fun.
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On October 17 2012 05:36 Teoita wrote:There's not a general fixed timing like with 3 colossi into templar. If you look at Startale players and/or guys like MC, they like to take their 4th before switching, staying on gateway tech for a long time. If you wanna do it faster, i think having a good templar count (like 8-10 spread between bases) is a good moment to go for the switch. In general though, it's possible to stick to templar a bit longer than with colossus since it's more about micro than viking/stalker count. I'm not sure about this, but if you lose to ghost timings other than improving your micro or switching to colossus faster (like cut down on the number of templar you invest in before making the switch), you can actually delay your colossus tech and get a bunch of gates after your third. In one of my replays, i did that and maxed in 15 minutes (with fairly bad macro too), so when the terran's push hit me he was like HOLY WHAT THE FUCK THAT'S 40 CHARGELOTS. I'm not sure if that can be done consistently (plus i can't play right now to test stuff tt), but that's pretty fun to do Yeah, I'm probably still in the mindset of defensive colossus builds, which I've been doing primarily for quite a while. I'm not too used to playing more of an aggressive/mass gateway midgame in PvT, but it does seem like a good idea with this build. I'll give that a try.
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Italy12246 Posts
While i'm at it, i'll second what Sidewinder said: you can also chrono out a couple of warp prisms and storm drop/warp in zealots to keep the terran back in his base to buy time for your colosssus transition, if you go for it after you have estabilished your third.
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On October 17 2012 08:09 Teoita wrote: While i'm at it, i'll second what Sidewinder said: you can also chrono out a couple of warp prisms and storm drop/warp in zealots to keep the terran back in his base to buy time for your colosssus transition, if you go for it after you have estabilished your third. 3rded. I like to get a prism after I've already traded well, either early on or at the 10 minute attack. I feel like if you don't trade well earlier, then putting 1-2 HT in a WP while you are transitioning to colossus is a bit of a gamble.
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How should a terran play agaisnt this build? Drop to the main no matter what with 4 Medivacs full with stuff like MVP did in the semi finals? Take a quick third and 4th? Do both? How do you guys lose with this build? I having trouble against terrans who drop me all the time even though I have 4-6 stalkers around my base they can find a hole...
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Italy12246 Posts
Assuming i don't fuck up, this build is safe vs drops and timings. Because of the investment in robo/observers and the delay on charge and storm however, it's hard to be aggressive until about 13 minutes into the game. This means i can't really punish a fast 3cc or double eng bay opening.
It's also very safe for terran to take their third off 3 rax and a starport rather than going up to 5rax first, since again i can't really attack for a while (assuming he doesn't donate all his units with his medivac timing).
Overall though, this is just a very solid, standard style of play, and it doesn't have any "hard" counters.
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I believe HotS is a good reason to bump this thread, as I would still like to go 2 base templar in the expansion.
Is this build and playstyle still viable in HotS? Do the speedmedivacs make it impossible? Does the Mothership Core allow for any improvements to the way this is played? An update to the guide for Heart of the Swarm would be sweet.
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Italy12246 Posts
2base templar is definitely viable.
This specific build with its various timings, especially when it comes to cutting units for tech/prodution, very likely doesn't work vs a ton of builds (as in the widow mine drop every terran is doing would kill you horribly since you cut so many units at that point in the game).
I'll try to update this with the rest of the tl strat team, but for now there no pro games of P going 2base templar so it's not easy to do.
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On March 18 2013 19:09 Teoita wrote: 2base templar is definitely viable.
This specific build with its various timings, especially when it comes to cutting units for tech/prodution, very likely doesn't work vs a ton of builds (as in the widow mine drop every terran is doing would kill you horribly since you cut so many units at that point in the game).
I'll try to update this with the rest of the tl strat team, but for now there no pro games of P going 2base templar so it's not easy to do. I understand, and I'll experiment a bit myself but I'm only diamond so my contributions only mean so much. Thanks anyways, looking forward to an update
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We definitely need some revised builds for hots. Especially with the help of MC maybe we can be more greedy with some builds or get earlier timings with all ins...
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Teoita i tried this in WOL with fair results - can you share some reps of how its done in HoTs ? Ive tried and it hasnt worked out too well for me. thanks
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Italy12246 Posts
I haven't done it in HotS yet. Plus you really, really don't want to see my HotS PvT anyway, it's god awful
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Italy12246 Posts
FUCKING
PARTING
imma add a link to the vod later. Not exactly the same build but holy shit. PLus this was the prominent 2base templar thread so i figure it's nice to add the vod.
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Works in HotS too. Even more working than ever because of the Nexi cannons
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Italy12246 Posts
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I bought the season pass just to watch this group, and more specifically, how Parting used templar instead of colossi. Some freaking amazing control.
I definitely prefer going 2-base templar before transitioning into colossi later on, but my winrate PvT dropped dramatically ever since HOTS came out. IMO, it's easier for me to defend drops with templar than colossi (maybe I'm just horrible at splitting my army - and I love being liberal with observers), but I often die straight-up to a medivac timing attack.
If I survive long enough to tech-switch to colossi, I usually win - I just need to figure out a way to survive before then.
I don't recall at what time Parting gets storm? Should we be getting it sooner in HOTS now, or later, vs. WOL?
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On May 03 2013 22:13 Squiggles wrote: I bought the season pass just to watch this group, and more specifically, how Parting used templar instead of colossi. Some freaking amazing control.
I definitely prefer going 2-base templar before transitioning into colossi later on, but my winrate PvT dropped dramatically ever since HOTS came out. IMO, it's easier for me to defend drops with templar than colossi (maybe I'm just horrible at splitting my army - and I love being liberal with observers), but I often die straight-up to a medivac timing attack.
If I survive long enough to tech-switch to colossi, I usually win - I just need to figure out a way to survive before then.
I don't recall at what time Parting gets storm? Should we be getting it sooner in HOTS now, or later, vs. WOL?
I don't know why you're being liberal with observers. They're the best thing since sliced bread. If you're dieing a lot just try getting 1 col with no range before getting storm. It's much safer than this build. This build is super technical and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone below mid masters. I wouldn't even expect anyone below high masters to do it correctly. Partings storm depends on what his opponent is doing. If he feels he can take his third safely without getting storm then he usually does.
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On May 03 2013 22:23 -HuShang- wrote:Show nested quote +On May 03 2013 22:13 Squiggles wrote: I bought the season pass just to watch this group, and more specifically, how Parting used templar instead of colossi. Some freaking amazing control.
I definitely prefer going 2-base templar before transitioning into colossi later on, but my winrate PvT dropped dramatically ever since HOTS came out. IMO, it's easier for me to defend drops with templar than colossi (maybe I'm just horrible at splitting my army - and I love being liberal with observers), but I often die straight-up to a medivac timing attack.
If I survive long enough to tech-switch to colossi, I usually win - I just need to figure out a way to survive before then.
I don't recall at what time Parting gets storm? Should we be getting it sooner in HOTS now, or later, vs. WOL? I don't know why you're being liberal with observers. They're the best thing since sliced bread. If you're dieing a lot just try getting 1 col with no range before getting storm. It's much safer than this build. This build is super technical and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone below mid masters. I wouldn't even expect anyone below high masters to do it correctly. Partings storm depends on what his opponent is doing. If he feels he can take his third safely without getting storm then he usually does. I'm gonna give that a try. I think I have to get over the mental block over how much I'm investing on tech if I get both robo/colo and templar on 2-base before my 3rd.
Oh, and liberal = I get a lot of em, getting colossi cramps my observer production (not sure if you got it the first time around - sorry!)
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On May 03 2013 22:27 Squiggles wrote:Show nested quote +On May 03 2013 22:23 -HuShang- wrote:On May 03 2013 22:13 Squiggles wrote: I bought the season pass just to watch this group, and more specifically, how Parting used templar instead of colossi. Some freaking amazing control.
I definitely prefer going 2-base templar before transitioning into colossi later on, but my winrate PvT dropped dramatically ever since HOTS came out. IMO, it's easier for me to defend drops with templar than colossi (maybe I'm just horrible at splitting my army - and I love being liberal with observers), but I often die straight-up to a medivac timing attack.
If I survive long enough to tech-switch to colossi, I usually win - I just need to figure out a way to survive before then.
I don't recall at what time Parting gets storm? Should we be getting it sooner in HOTS now, or later, vs. WOL? I don't know why you're being liberal with observers. They're the best thing since sliced bread. If you're dieing a lot just try getting 1 col with no range before getting storm. It's much safer than this build. This build is super technical and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone below mid masters. I wouldn't even expect anyone below high masters to do it correctly. Partings storm depends on what his opponent is doing. If he feels he can take his third safely without getting storm then he usually does. I'm gonna give that a try. I think I have to get over the mental block over how much I'm investing on tech if I get both robo/colo and templar on 2-base before my 3rd. Oh, and liberal = I get a lot of em, getting colossi cramps my observer production (not sure if you got it the first time around - sorry!)
You can get 3 observers before either collossi or templar tech. Get both gas at around 6:45 at your natural and you'll have tons of extra gas.
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On May 03 2013 21:07 Teoita wrote:http://www.gomtv.net/2013wcs1/vod/80085Game 1 shows a variant on this build. While it's not the same exact build, it's close enough. Also it's the best goddamn PvT i have ever seen.
I have no freaking clue how Parting surivived, but it really shows that this build is extremely viable in the right hands, even in the age of turbo-vac drops. Parting looked like was going to lose the entire time, but the storms and army control let him keep his 3rd base.
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yeah if you arent parting that warp prism needs to delay so you can set up your third/let storm finish
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Italy12246 Posts
I've always held with chargelot/archon and no warp prisms tbh. The prism itself is nice but i don't think it's mandatory.
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On May 04 2013 07:08 Teoita wrote: I've always held with chargelot/archon and no warp prisms tbh. The prism itself is nice but i don't think it's mandatory.
It's way way way way way way way harder than holding with collossi. There's really no point not getting 1 collossi first if you're not going to get a warp prism.
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Italy12246 Posts
1 colo no range is a wholly different build...it's not THAT much harder to hold tbh. Chargelot/archon does pretty well vs low medivac counts, it always did.
I went 3gate robo>single forge templar in about 80% of the PvT's i played from July 2012 until Januray 2013.
PartinG got a warp prism in his game vs flash, did absolutely nothing with it, and still estabilished his thir succesfully (even though he lost it later, that has nothing to do with getting a warp prism or not). Please show me all these PvT's you seem to have seen where the Protoss goes 3gate robo/warp prism/templar, in which he holds a medivac timing exclusively thanks to the prism.
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Sometimes i just hate myself for not having access to the vods i really liked the build in wol since i found this guide ive never really touched colossi openings in WoL again^^ Maybe i try messing around with it again once i have my current build down good enough to be satisfied ^^ But really nice to hear templar openings start appearing in the scene again, maybe i get the pass of a friend to watch it
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Especially if any oracle buff is coming this type of build will pick up imo. Stargate harassment followed by templar play is pretty good, you won't be needing robo at all as oracles are better scouts than observers anyway if they get a small speed buff.
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Been playing this build after Parting kicked Flash's ass yesterday. I like it- it's working better than ever before with the MsC to help holds. Plus I find that stylistically Storms are way cooler than colossi
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Italy12246 Posts
It's not the same build though. Parting went for much much faster charge, got a warp prism out (he never did in WoL), got storm a bit faster, and changed his gateway timings slightly.
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If i am allowed to ask when did he start his twilight / storm / charge? I hope i don't create any extra trouble still trying to get to the vods somehow QQ
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Italy12246 Posts
Twilight at standard 7/8 ish (dont remember exactly), charge as soon as twilight finished together with +2 armor, storm at around 11:00/11:30 i believe.
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Thank you very much, shortly after reading your reply i finally found the game and this was indeed one of the best PvTs i have seen for a long time! I think i'm going to rewatch it and start using it on the ladder. I also like the warp prism it seems kind of interesting
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Italy12246 Posts
Re watching it: storm after first archon and +2 is started, twilight council is also really fast as Parting stays on just 3 gateway units forever.
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I'm so glad that people are dissecting Parting's build against Flash. I've written copious notes on it, but it seems extremely delicate. He throws his third base around 10:40 and gets storm up a minute later, at 11:40. It's so stressful.
Can you imagine how much confidence you need to pilot this build against Flash? lol. Insane.
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On May 06 2013 11:45 Teachings wrote: I'm so glad that people are dissecting Parting's build against Flash. I've written copious notes on it, but it seems extremely delicate. He throws his third base around 10:40 and gets storm up a minute later, at 11:40. It's so stressful.
Can you imagine how much confidence you need to pilot this build against Flash? lol. Insane.
Didn't Parting do a 2-base zealot/archon all in without storm against flash?
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Italy12246 Posts
On May 06 2013 14:07 JSK wrote:Show nested quote +On May 06 2013 11:45 Teachings wrote: I'm so glad that people are dissecting Parting's build against Flash. I've written copious notes on it, but it seems extremely delicate. He throws his third base around 10:40 and gets storm up a minute later, at 11:40. It's so stressful.
Can you imagine how much confidence you need to pilot this build against Flash? lol. Insane. Didn't Parting do a 2-base zealot/archon all in without storm against flash?
He did that in game 2, not one.
Regarding his third timing: flash doesn't drop nearly as much as others do, which is why Parting got away with that third (more or less). I highly doubt he would have thrown down that nexus if he had played against, say, Gumiho.
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