Hello. I occasionally play on the ladder, and I lose a lot to cannon rush. Because I am a protoss player, it takes a while for my army units to come out (~2:00 mark) is there any viable way for me to defend against a cannon rush?
Yes - actually build everything on time and defend the high ground.
Best thing to do is watch some videos (catz, vibe who defend cannon rushes with either workers or as protoss).
You can sout near your ramp when you start your gas after gate or something like that. Try to block the “best spots” for cannons.
Vibe defended a cannon-rush very well with SCVs but I can’t find it.
2 workers were following each of the 2 probes and 1 worker was zoning out the best spot so there was always the possibility to only allow cannons that have a ton of surface area.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5rOZleIGsw&list=PLFeZeom2b4Dm_PXPREvPRAJVa6dijv0FF&index=7&t=0s
Feel free to post a replay so we can actually see why you delay your units / buildings.
Easiet way for us non-pro gamers to defend a cannon rush is with cannons. Cannon rush happens enough that I always send an early scout (after the first pylon) in PvP. If I see my opponent has a forge then I build one of my own and start scouting around my base to find where he’s putting the cannons up. A few well placed cannons of my own will kill any of his before they get too close to my building, and I don’t loose too much mining time from all my probes trying to kill the cannons and pylons. Then I can proxy something (usually a Stargate) with that early scouting probe that can usually take them out since their economy is so low.
I rarely loose to cannon rush anymore using this strategy.
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pull probes to kill cannons, you need 4 to stop a cannon from completing if you pull early enough (red hp), have 1-2 probes follow the building probe around. The probe will take damage every time it stops to build something and eventually die unless it is microed extremely well. Once your gateway finishes, get 1-2 zealots out to start killing pylons and any cannons that are building. You can start slowly returning probes back to mining at this point. Once your Cyber core finishes and you build a stalker, the rush effectively stops. The biggest thing to pay attention to, is not letting the probe wall itself off (most of the time behind your mineral line) with double pylon to prevent you from chasing it.
Don’t overreact, don’t waste dps on pylon because they build faster+ have more hp, for less mineral cost. DO NOT SLIP ON YOUR MACRO and stay calm. What ends up killing people are getting supply blocked at 23/23 because they panic so hard they forget their second pylon.
Alternatively, I’ve seen people succeed by putting up nearly zero resistance at their main and just take a secret expansion near the 3rd of your opponent, conserve probes and maximize mining time, and then when the Nexus finishes, they recall all of their probes out. This in theory will put you way ahead, as long as your opponent doesn’t realize you’re doing that, because if they notice you putting up no resistance they will leap frog their cannon deep into your mineral line with just 1 cannon, and then go back to macroing.
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