BTW if you build your gateways like RtP|DEV's pic, you can block entrance using a single zealot.

If you can rush stalkers to defend behind your wall, you can make a single zealot + sentries to dps+FF when your zealot's shields are up. In fact, you'll have more since the zealot can be started when your core is warping in.

If you wall off completely, it just means you can't expand later without breaking your pylon or making a warp prism.

I don't know if you misread me or just don't know. If you build the gateways like in the pic without the in between pylon, a zealot and probe can cross between the gateways. A stalker can't. Try it.

Why don't you try it out? Make the gateways adjacent and diagonal to each other like in the pic posted earlier without the pylon in between. Then test move your units.

Or if you look at the pic, see the arrow pointing from the probe?

Sigh. Why don't you screenshot what you did here? I'm posting from my mobile and can't get into the game now.

2 diagonal gateways is not zealot/ling tight. That's why he used the pylon in between the gateways.

This is from liquipedia
http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Wall
Under building placement

If two buildings are placed diagonally so that only their corners meet, only small sized units can pass between them. To see which units can pass between diagonally placed buidings see the #Units that can pass through semi-walls

This post has been edited by nexous: Aug 25 2010, 12:06 AM

Against Terran you should go 10 pylon 10 gateway. Core and gas asap after gateway is up and queue your stalker quickly. This will keep you safe against early reaper rush.

You can queue 1 zealot when your core is warping in. By the time the core is up, zealot should be done and stalker can be made asap.

10gate can make a stalker 20t faster than 13 gate, and is only 35 minerals behind at the 2:30 mark. Gas is also faster with 10gate if assimilator is always timed with core. 10gate is also faster tech.

10gate's 1st stalker (chrono'ed) comes out at 3:50
11gate's 1st stalker (chrono'ed) is at 4:10

terran 10rax turbo reaper is at 3:23.
So yes, 20t is very important.

Also 1 zealot is very important vs early marauder. Having Stalker + Zealot allows your stalkers to hit Marus while your Zealot tanks. Remember: Marus win vs Stalkers straight up. Also, Zealots have a higher dps than Stalkers so if Marus just ignore your Zealot, they die even faster.


EDIT to add:
Maru ball will of course be creamed by VRs/immortals, but with gateway units, just make a balance of zealots and stalkers. The thing is, zealots do more dps than Stalkers but a Stalker light army will be kited to death. A Stalker heavy army will be eaten alive by Maru's higher dps.

This post has been edited by nexous: Aug 25 2010, 08:55 PM

12gate is superior, a tiny bit. Like I said, 35 minerals (lol) at the 2:30 mark. Whether this gap widens or closes depends on chronoboost strategy.

Zealot is almost always a must vs Marus. Reason again and again is Stalkers suck vs Marus. You say Stalkers have 10hp more than Zealots but do you know they take bonus damage from Marus? Marus will obliterate any pure Stalker army. Stalker's only use is to take pot shots at Marus when they're kiting Zealots. That's what I said in earlier, read it again.

The reaper strat used in the IEM especially by Morrow is NOT a turbo reaper strat typical in TvP. It's a delayed reaper build where you go for more reapers instead of faster reapers.
Delayed reapers suck vs protoss as Stalkers > Reapers.

Just to add numbers:

Marus do 10 dmg (+10 to armored)

9 hits to kill a Stalker
16 hits to kill a Zealot

This post has been edited by nexous: Aug 25 2010, 09:38 PM

VRs and Immortals are not answers to a Maru timing push. There's no reason a Terran pushes with only Marus well into stargate/robotics tech. They can also push in the timing window before your immortal/VR is up, when you've just invested a ton of mins/gas on tech and have a lesser army.

The numbers I gave above already accounted for armor and shields.
Sentry shield is rather useless vs large hits like those from Marus. They are great vs Marines and lings though.

I'm not sure if you've seen a 2/3 Maru push/harass. Essentially only 2/3 Marus knocking at your door. If you have 1 zealot/2 stalkers, you'll have an easy time against this as opposed to a pure 3 stalker composition. Marus eat Stalkers for breakfast.

Stalkers do crap dps btw. Zealots do more dps to armored units than even Stalkers with their +2 bonus. Don't believe me? Take the unit's damage multiplied by the inverse of their attack speed. Stalkers are about the most crap damagers in the game, with exception to sentries.

This post has been edited by nexous: Aug 25 2010, 11:22 PM

What's a tech switch?
Getting the tech buildings up duh. You can't chrono those structures.

Read the sentry shield tooltip again, and tell us what do you understand from it. Here's a tip:
from a 50 dmg attack, the shield reduces 2 dmg, only 4% of damage mitigated.
from a 6 dmg attack, the shield reduces 2 dmg, a whopping 66% of damage mitigated.
See a relationship? Larger hits are less affected by GS.

Stalkers do actually have the lowest dps, bar Sentries. Rather than think about why people do things like massing stalkers, why don't you tell us what Protoss unit has an even lower dps?
Stalker heavy army is not a strong composition mid game onwards unless your opponent is massing marines or roaches only. They are usually used to support Colossi and being the only non-stargate anti-air.

DPS is kinda important and is the main reason why a pure Stalker army will lose in a straight up with Maru and Hydra.

Yea I missed the ranged thing sigh. Didn't realize it till today.
Random player here.

That was no where near what's called massing Stalkers. You see him abusing Stalker mobility to circumnavigate the wall-in with blink but even then they can't stand up to terran bio without a VR or other t2/t3 unit support.

And if you noticed the vid, Tester made 1 zealot before the stalker.


Watch today's day9 daily. day9 talked about how 4gating breaks a teching player easily because of the window before your tech is available. Terrans can make an MM timing push which is very deadly to a teching player as well. bratok is especially famous for his stim marine early pressure. Zerg has roach/ling.

Haihz lazy wanna argue with you already.

Chargelots can be considered t2 (zealots t1) since charge is a huge upgrade. Anyway I was mainly referring to the VR. The 1 VR early on thinned stc's army considerably. If it was just stalkers (talking about the ledge harass), tester would have gotten rolled over.

The one zealot is like what was discussed earlier btw, just in case of maru harass, 1 zealot is good to have. And yea, guess why he made zealots rather than only stalkers?

Blink isn't for combat while charge is. You can blink to save staplers only if your opponent isn't focus firing.

Are you saying you're better than tester to suggest another comp? Tester must have known that bar more VRs or further teching, zealots and sentry FFs were the best answer to the Inc Mary army. I happen to agree with him. He lost because he didn't tech faster or outproduce his opponent. The composition was fine.

Yeah you better check how pros are actually using stalkers.
Blinking and picking up SMALLER groups. Just check what happened when tester blinked up stc's main for the 2nd time; he was forced to retreat to what seems like an equal or smaller army even!

Stalkers have a niche, ranged weak dps with a lot of mobility. If you think they can form the backbone of your army, you're going to lose to the basic MM again and again.
Remember that this discussion started because you think protoss vs Maru aggression, zealots are not needed. Think again. Marus cream Stalkers, and they're actually cheaper even.

Did tester outproduced stc? Hardly. The stargate was idle midgame onwards and it's difficult to say that the VR did enough damage to justify the tech. The DT shrine hardly paid for itself. The DT didn't do much damage. HTs could have changed it all but they came too late. All the while stc only made MMM. Solid MMM. Tester didn't have a larger army to deal with the MMM, and was slow on the tech (HTs).

What's your IGN anyway?