TvP - Early game question

Ramza

Ok, so something I have been wondering about relating to the Protoss early game is, how much defense to they usually have?

I've seen and tried some new tactics, 2 barracks early push at about 4-5 minutes, timed for concussive shells to complete. It's neat and has worked quite well for me so far. I know in TvP a stalker is heavily favored over an early zealot from the first gateway. There's no real way to scout the Terran opponent is going for this, only by keeping control of watch towers will you see the oncoming attack

Which leads to my question ; how many forces could the Protoss player musker up if they see a small bioball coming for their base, consisting of maybe 4 marines and 2-3 marauders with conc. shells? I know the standard opening for Protoss is usually gate, c.core, and then first tech path (correct me if I am wrong)

All the times I tried this my opponent was chrono boosting warp gate tech and only had one stalker at his base. Sometimes they had no sentry at all, and warp gate tech wasn't up for a while so he was in a bad place when my push hit

Oh, and what's cool is, I expand under the push. If they do forcefield their ramp to stop you getting in, you can push for some damage to scare him, or just force him to waste energy, and by doing so scare him into a contain. This nearly always leads to an extremely safe expansion back home. No one has ever pushed back and even if they did I don't think it would do much

Any thoughts?

IRL_Sinister

I'm doing a similar push, only slightly more advanced.

My build is pretty simple.

I'm going depot -> rax -> gas as standard. However, instead of getting CC on 15 I'm getting an extra SCV and getting CC on 16 (Rine first from rax). Once I get the CC I'm cutting on one round of SCV's, getting a Tech Lab and putting up a second rax. I then place a second supply depot. From the Tech Lab I get a Marauder (to make 19/19 supply) and get Conc. Shells. From the second Rax I get 2/3 Rines. Once Conc. Shells is finished I get Stim immediately (you should be right on the button of 100/100 if you're keeping up in SCV production + Marauders) and push out around the time my third depot is up. However, I also bring 3 SCV's.

The main reason for bringing 3 is pretty simple. I generally send 1 SCV and 1 Rine up the ramp in case he has a Sentry out (ie; he CB'd Zealot/Stalker) to get vision and try and pick off the Sentry from low ground. At the same time, I get the other 2 SCVs to build Bunkers at the bottom of the ramp (not right at the bottom though as you don't want Stalkers to be able to focus them down) in order to get a soft contain.

At the same time, I get 1/2/3 further rax (depends on if he 4 gates or not) and my expansion up while he's still on one base. Once the expansion is up I salvage the Bunkers, return to my natural and push out soon after when he takes his expansion.

It's a build I'm working on, and don't do it if I've scouted a long rush distance/cross-spawn because it's just not viable. Also, if you see him making a Zealot first, don't run out with your SCV. Keep the SCV in his base and see if the Zealot comes towards your base (which is common with Toss these days). If it does, then the chances are he's going to CB a Stalker out in an attempt to early pressure. Keep your SCV near the Zealot so you can see the position and by the time it gets 3/4 of the way to your main you should have 2 marauder + 2 marine and the Stalker will be hot on his heels. With good micro you can get 2 free kills with Conc Shells and can lead to a very early GG.

Other than that, I find Toss by far the hardest matchup at the moment vs Terran but I'm also working on a Rax -> Reactor FE build, but struggling to find the appropriate transition. I only do this if I scout cross-spawn or don't see a second gas in his base with my SCV.

Hope it helps, good luck!

Orizio

Do you have that 2 rax early push then FE build Ramza? Is it a proxy build or what? I'm getting destroyed in TvP, unless I can get some advantage early game its automatic gg mid to late.

phisku

qxc did a beautiful build in the final of the TL open. you can find it on youtube + force starcraft did a "tutorial" video about it.

bunker contain + banshee very nice.

My strat is really close to yours but i open 1rax tech lab expand, My goal is not to win with my 3 first marauder but just make sure he doesn't expand.
if you feel that P is going for a 4 WG juste put some bunker at your ramp.

Ramza

Orizio wrote: »

Do you have that 2 rax early push then FE build Ramza? Is it a proxy build or what? I'm getting destroyed in TvP, unless I can get some advantage early game its automatic gg mid to late.

I can't find the link but it was on forcesc2strategy page, qxc was the one who did it. I'll edit my post later when I find it