Actually, I have the problem the P either:
-cannon rush on my 2 or 3 and take his 2 base sicehr.
- or starts turtle directly.
1st problem is when I want to punish him and go ravager-> hard counter void + cannon.
Queens are too slow.
My first question would be is there a build to punish toss directly in the mid/early game?
In my experience this doesn’t work that well.
Harass in general is counted by mass cannon. I can’t find any way to do damage.
2. problem is if he uses voids to nerfen with hydra it is hard to get behind (map high low ground) and corruptor will be counted (later carrier+void ). if you want to push cannon + sb + air unit …
3. problem switch or direct to carrier. i can’t stop them anymore.
What is the ratio corruptor to carrier?
4. What’s your play if ht / archon + air toss is involved?
currently i only see a very passive play style (which i am not good at).
-> take bases
-> spread your creep
-> build nostop drones and build from them static def (mostly spore and spine for dt/zaelot runby)
-> corruptor + infestor or viper.
very long game
In general i have a problem when i play against air that has ata /atg and is combined with ground. you win air. but corruptor is no use against ground. you win ground is no use because air units are too strong.
Nydus queen ravager maybe lings too. It’s the best followup vs. cannon rush, but can be defended if you fell behind in teching up.
The important part is scouting.
early game:
- Identify a cannon-rush early AND identify if you should pull probes or not - killing the probe is more important than destroying / denying cannons.
–> also a key thing is to plant a creep tumor asap (skip first inject) so there will be creep towards the ramp / natural to plant a spine or rush the natural with ravagers.
–> If it’s a cannon-rush, I would always rush at least one ravager (2 gas asap when you see the first cannon in your natural) and if it’s proxy gateway / robo/whatever, be extremely active with your ravagers and creep spread (only inject, if you really need units - rather get queens non-stop than injecting) because once protoss has too many units out, you lost. (be it 2+ immos & a warp prism or 3+ voidrays with shield batteries & cannons)
–> Be aware of the economical situation:
a) Is it a commited cannon-rush? (also commit hard on 4+ ravagers (4 vs. cannons and as many ravagers as possible vs. proxy robo; queens non-stop with overmins and also rush 2 spines rather than building a macro hatch)
b) Is it an “economical cannon-rush”? (only one cannon - rest is cancelled / well timed & cancelled after you cancel your 2nd hatch in the natural?
–> I would also rush 4 lings before anything else to defend your 3rd hatch vs. cannons and maybe catch the probe but mainly keep them alive at all costs because they can also scout hidden bases / tech and force a lot of effort to take the 2nd base (like 1 ling to toss natural asap and 3 to your 3rd: 1 ling chasing the probe, 2 to destroy cannon/pylon/block good spots)
- Go for hatch, pool, hatch (3rd hatch asap after 1 base mineral saturation) and cancel the hatch in the natural (use your 2nd overlord to see the incoming probe - usually a 16 hatch is fine but some protosses on some maps will even block that (or terrans; but then you automatically know it’s 99% cannon-rush and / or turtle play and it can also be a 2-base allin).
mid game (2nd & 3rd hatch / base saturation):
- A CatZ strategy would probably be to go for 1 base mutas or 1 base swarm hosts (after you defended the “economocial cannon-rush” or a failed cannon-rush)
–> IMPORTANT: I’m not very good at timings so something like a fast ling/bane/hydra maxout i.e. with nydus or 1, 2 or 3 base swarm hosts can be really deadly (a source would be Rogue I think - at least for swarm hosts; the last but more so the 2nd last big tournament he won - he did like 4 games of sh/nydus afaik).
Also keep that in mid in regards to taking gas and pulling out of gas (2 gas is extremely bad if you don’t cheese / rush an attack vs. a protoss that expands.)
-
I like pulling out of gas and droning up 3 bases and defend with 4 ravagers and non-stop queens.
–> I like fast burrow because you can save your drones vs. a surprise oracle, block bases and have lings burrowed on ramps to spot move-outs even if 20 phoenixes or voids roam the map or you have lings in the toss base and at least force detection / more cannons so later push.
–> The 4 ravagers are also nice vs. void rays: You kinda play queen/ravager vs. voidrays like you play roach/ravager vs. roach/ravager (don’t use all biles at once but every second or a little less than every half a second to zone out the voidrays while your queens heal and mostly just shoot. SAVE your ravagers at all costs though! Toss will try to snipe them and hatcheries if he goes for a voidray-follow-up so creep and possibly 1-2 speed overseers will be a great tool to spot the voidray movement (deny hatch sniping or drone loss) and scout the follow-up.
–> Scout a lot! Army positioning and knowing what upgrades to get and what army comp to tech to is very important unless you are mechanically way better than the toss. You don’t want to end up with 4k minerals and 50 gas, 20 upgrades on the way and a chargelot/archon or chargelot/immo all-in heading your way
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Being in position with queens + few ravagers is key in mid-game vs. voidrays & phoenix (burrow helps to deny bases and save any units like drones, ravagers or queens that are alone/off creep/body-blocked by other units); protoss rarely has detection with the void rays very fast and if there’s an observer, snipe it asap while you zone out the voids with your ravagers. Creep spread helps a ton to delay ground pushes, get new bases and plant spores).
Again: 1-2 overseers (+ changelings of course) with speed help a lot with scouting the next attack and tech follow-up.
late mid-game and late-game:
- roach/ravager/infestor is solid if toss is getting a “mixed” army (ground/air)
–> funal & biles, baby! Snute-style!
- If you scout a fleet beacon…
a) VS a lot of phoenix (double stargate follow-up), I’d always rush like 10-20 corruptors to get rid of the phoenix and caustic spray nexii asap if you have the chance.
b) VS void rays, being in position with queens + few ravagers is key in mid-game and once protoss gets more than 3 voidrays…
–> roach/ravager/infestor vs. voidrays + ground
–> viper (6-ish)/corruptor + your initial queen/ravager vs. mass air
(important: Corruptors win a fight vs. equally upgraded/supply-heavy amound of voidrays. Voidrays win the fight ONLY if they use their overcharge - and then it’s a massacre; especially in combination with a few archons). So if you always have 3 vipers with you and 3 vipers recharge, you can stay out of range of the voidrays and use parasitic bomb. If they fight, they can’t split (pull back /stack your corruptors a bit to make them clump and if they don’t fight, parasitic bomb will destroy them over time).
late-game and late-late-game:
golden armada…
… once your vipers: go parasitic bomb the toss army every now and then just to be annoying and possibly destroy a lot of observers as collateral damage (no chance to see burrowed infestors, lurkers or deny creep spread)
… with. archons: infestors with neural; max 5-6 infestors
… with voidrays: vipers (max 6 though vipers are always great vs. golden armada)
… with mothership: spores! 3+ vipers! (or die probably)
… with carriers: armor upgrades! Corruptors with armor upgrades wreck mass carrier really hard - even more so with like 10 infestors & neural parasite.
… with high templars: broodlords or lurkers (lurkers near spores are great and brood lords are also great vs. archons/immortals)
… oracle (revelation): spores, burrowed infestors with neural or vipers (vipers can be an easy target though and same goes for infestors with no spores around)
… with chargelot harrass: 2-3 lurkers on (both) outer bases and some spines (like 3 well-placed spines tugged in between gas & mineral blocks with 2-3 queens. You don’t want too many queens in late-game so if you have your 4-6 queens on the outer bases, they can also re-spread some creep when there is no chargelot attack and else heal spines/other queens. If you want to get fancy, you can also build 2-3 evo chambers per outer base to wall off the spaces between hatch & gas, put your queen, a lurker and 1-2 spines there on each side.
Remember that you can train your viper micro (abduct, parasitic bomb, refill / heal) on the arcade map “unit tester online lotv”.
(get like 8 hatches on the left and 8 stargates on the right, 10-15 queens, 20 vipers, 100 corruptors, choose your army comp/army size and then build up the other army with carrier/tempest/voidray or a mix.
You could also train queen/infestor/viper/ravager vs. mass voidrays there.
(or roach/ravager/infestor vs. a mixed toss army for that matter)
I find that most turtle toss are pretty susceptible to Hydra timings, especially when they try to take a 3rd. There are a few that go mass battery that I’ve had trouble with, and the best chance I’ve had against them is to either allin before they get too established, or tech straight to corruptors, broods, and vipers. Broods can whittle away at cannons and batteries indefinitely and eventually take down static def. The corruptors and vipers run around the sky toss and pick off anything they can Abduct. Preferably not voids, it’s better to hit them with a couple PB’s. 2 PB’s will bring them down to about 20-30 hp, so a fungal in there is perfect to finish them off, though it is difficult to keep infestors with this army and not get them lost or killed. Corruptors will still win as long as the 2nd bomb hits.
Upgrades are critical, so don’t hesitate to put down a second spire when you can afford it. Ling and Hydra runbys are good for denying expos, maybe on 1 side of the map while broods attack the other, corruptors and vipers following the sky toss.
thanks for all the feedback.
Some sound good. some i have heard of people like neuro or pig. others sound very risky (nydus).
@Shuuragksh: i have to read your text again, because it was so much 
I didn’t need the cannon part, but still good to see what else is possible.
the part with late and air fight is interesting, thanks for the time/ tips.
Nydus is not risky, it used to be the chosen counter against cannon rushes. Especially back when they were invincible. The moment you see a cannon rush, you can just ditch your nat, cancel ling speed, go straight to lair and nydus with queen/roach. At most levels, the Protoss will just straight up die.
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spore/creep out of the nydus and spores at home?
for the void rays
i like the roach/ravager/queen nydus suggestions in the thread ill try that and see how it goes
You should be hitting fast enough that he can’t use air units both at home for defense and at your base. Nydus hits really fast if you’re not doing anything else but droning, and the Protoss has delayed his tech a lot to get a successful cannon rush off.
Yeah but CatZ is a ridiculously strange player who is very resourceful. I remember him winning a game he had no business staying in because he already “lost.” But he had 4 infestors and somehow dismantled a late game opponent over about 10 minutes with them lol. I’ve never been able to replicate his strategies