PvZ - Abysmal in its Current Form

General Discussion
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http ://aligulac .com/periods/latest/ (Why do the forums not allow links?)

Protoss is currently in the worst state of any race ever at the top of the pro scene (That’s the lagging/leading metric - it’s not the pro scene as a whole, just the top of it).

So something needs to happen. Overall protoss win rates are sub-50% in both match ups for the 3rd period in a row as well. The last time Protoss had a positive win rate in PvZ was July, and, in the periods before and after it was sub-50%.

I’d like to see some more targeted changes for making Protoss a bit stronger towards the top of the pro scene, and some targeted PvZ changes, like buffing FF somehow (or buffing Protoss gateway units in a way that makes them better vs lings without breaking PvT… like changing Adept damage to 10/18 on a faster attack rate baseline, so they’re a bit better as army units, or adjusting stalkers down to 5 range with more dps or a lower cost, and giving them the range back on an upgrade, or making zealots attack a bit faster - all changes that should affect PvZ more than the other match ups), or nerfing ravagers/banes a bit (and buffing Protoss late game - tempests and void rays probably being the main targets for buffs; maybe more range on voids/changing their damage to be better vs units like corruptors, and buffing Tempest DPS/nerfing range so they’re a bit less awful when the opponent decides to commit, and so you don’t need an amount that cripples the rest of your army to do meaningful damage).

Lately, it seems that Zerg are finally starting to realize that aggressive early-mid game play almost always works out in their favor vs Protoss (Almost like every PvZ finals in a tournament that Zerg wins has a majority of those wins off the back of some kind of all in/cheese…), and mass banes + ravagers can shut down anything Protoss tries to do in the mid game if they play it reasonably well.

I actually think the early game is the biggest problem in the match up. Zerg gets map control free, and there’s basically nothing the Protoss can do about it, since lings/queens > gateway units. Zerg eco also ramps up faster, which means Protoss is pigeon-holed into trying to snipe drones early with Adepts or Oracles, then going all in before Zerg hits hive tech with a superior eco, when their late game comp also happens to be stronger (if they don’t let their corruptors waste a bunch of time shooting interceptors)…

Zerg all ins that have a high chance of ending the game also hit way earlier than Protoss all ins, and the margin for error defending them is smaller. 1 missed forcefield, or not having batteries up early enough, or missing a wall behind and letting 10 lings in means a loss.

3 Likes
12

I respectfully disagree. There is a big difference between a slightly injured Viper with no energy and a …dead Viper. FB also used to keep in check the number of Infestors due to their low HP. In the current state Feedback would be balanced only if it lost all damage (it kills nothing anyway) and worked on AOE as an energy-drain.

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Protoss has never been able to beat Zerg late game, at any period that I played this game. Largely thanks to how useless the high templar has always been.

  1. If a guy has broodlords… high templars are already zoned out and dead. If a guy even has a couple broodlords… your extremely expensive investment in high templars is negated. You may as well go ahead and kill your templars to free up supply.

  2. It takes no time for Zerg to consume more energy for their vipers. And guess what other ability Zerg has? Invincibility. “Oh wow, now that I regained full energy in a few seconds and my queen buddy restored me to full health, let’s go try again.”

Here’s the gist. Zerg gets infinite tries at pwning you with vipers. The worst case scenario for Zerg is they have to try again. The best case scenario for you is… you’ve stalled the inevitable. You’re going to get wrecked by anyone with any micro whatsoever.

The only way to beat vipers is if the guy under made vipers. If the guy just made 2 or so vipers, you can win. You don’t need high templars for that, either.

It’s a bad unit that solves nothing, and to make matters worse… it completely overlaps with the disruptor, but… the disruptor is far better. It’s just a pointless unit that will only help you lose more games. The HT has always been a mythical unit. That’s all it is. No substance. This is no different than when people thought storm countered mutas, despite the speed racer speed and regen buffs.

In time, maybe when no Toss players are even in the top 30… people will realize high templars are part of the problem…

4 Likes
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Yes I’m with Playa on that, The infinite amount of energy Viper gets through Consume and it’s absurd abilities coupled with Queen Transfuse just make it a relentless spellcaster.

6 Likes
15

Finally someone else who understands

3 Likes
16

There is one good thing about Feedback back before its damage nerf - you were likely able to kill the Viper with it, instead of it retreating and just recharging its energy again. I did suggest a starting energy upgrade once, but not sure how effective it would be compared to energy regeneration:

One thng I always wondered about… should Vipers be able to abduct Massive units? Maybe because I studied physics at University, seeing a giant dragonfly be able to effortlessly pull a Battlecruiser to its location without moving or anchoring itself really broke the suspension of disbelief - if anything, the Viper would end up pulling itself towards the unit while the Battlecruiser would barely move. It might make for a funny interaction but may make mistakes too easy.

If Vipers were unable to Abduct massive units, they would still be able to Abduct common units like Siege Tanks, Queens, Ravagers, Lurkers, Immortals, Disruptors, and other Vipers, but I’m not sure how much that would cut down on their viability.

1 Like
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Now, it only apparently breaks the Basiic Laws of Physics (inertia, mass etc) but one way of explaining this hypothetical ability is to assume that Viper fools the propulsion system of her victims and force the (Carriers/Thors/BC) to use their own energy to perform the Jump.

I made some posts ago a proposal for moderating the Abduct. What’s your opinion?

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PvZ is bad…….perhaps…
PvT is horrible

2 Likes
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It’s an interesting one that I admit I’m not sure will work in practice - it depends how close you have to get to the unit. Against multiple Battlecruisers I can see it getting killed by their standard AtA Laser Batteries and otherwise Abduct not actually having any meaningful effect once it activates. Similarly with the Mothership, once it drifts into its cloaking field, it will just get shredded by the Stalkers and Archons below. But it may work… it’s hard to visualise. It would be something that I would have to see tested for real.

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Now, i did not propose to change the casting Range of Abduct, just the Jump distance of the victim to be Supply-dependent. Asking for reducing the cast-range of the Viper’s abduct would be an inacceptable nerff.

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Oops, my mistake. So would the unit still be allowed to reach the Viper’s location below a certain supply count?

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I guess up to Supply 4 the Abduct would work as is, beyond Supply 4, the jump would be gradually decreased (up to Supply 8 that is Mothership).

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lol, whining about a 53% winrate and acting like no Protoss won.

1 Like
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Protoss is just a trash race.

If you stop to think about it for a minute, every possible(realistic) unit composition scenario is a complete LOL on protoss. Zerg units are cheaper, faster, absurdly more damaging and easier to produce.

There is literally ZERO advantage for the protoss vs zerg in any aspect/stage of the game. Every unit is trash, every unit that wasn’t pure garbage has been nerfed. Oh yeah they also cost more LOL.

This matchup has always been bad for protoss(then again what isn’t?), it’s just that it’s gotten so mentally retarded absurd that it’s hard to believe someone ever had a job balancing the game.

Zerg is too strong overall yes, but the real issue is that protoss is straight up absolute garbage.

Barf.

7 Likes
25

protoss does need some love for sure, in both matchups. you can’t just go nerfing zerg without consideration for the TvZ matchup though.

6 Likes
26

This one I agree 100%. This is getting out of hand really. Mapmakers should remove these and put them near to the 3rd base. Not near the natural where it can see the gas. Its both bad for Terran and Protoss but I feel like the adverse effects of this unnecessary advantage is worse for Protoss.

I think we can all agree that nobody likes this unit for good reason. Its not fun to play or to play against. I think there is a design problem with its insane burst damage and cost efficiency. Its synergy with the Nydus worm is still insane in maps like Golden wall.

I agree with your sentiment here. Where I differ is I think the HT feedback needs to be buffed back to 1:1 damage or its range buffed. Voidrays now have a place at lategame PvZ but they are too weak, they need a straight up buff add 1 armor as base and +25 health for upgrading flux vanes might be a good change

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I think Lategame from 2018 onwards was 60:40 in Zerg’s favor but when Blizzard for some reason, decided to nerf the carrier by removing graviton and Nerf feedback in conjuction with the infestor being ridiculous at 2019. It essentially removed the lategame of Protoss. Right now looking back I don’t think Blizzard considered the effects of nerfing the feedback damage. Before Vipers with energy for 2 abducts would just die to feedback. Now, whats the trade ? If Zerg does not click first he loses 100hp at worst but if Zerg clicks first he gets a carrier/Mothership/Tempest/Vodiray/Archon. Its absurd of how anyone can excuse this.
That being said I don’t think Lategame is easy for Zerg. The player needs to juggle between managing the Corruptor, Infestor, Viper, Broodlord. But problem is if ur like 6.8k ++ in Zerg you have all the advantage and Protoss does not have a winning condition at all.

The matchup has potential of being interesting. With 2 split armies 1 (skytoss vs Viper, Corruptor,Broodlord) and 1 runbuy army being (Zealot archon vs Baneling,Zergling,Ravager.) Thing is though, a good Zerg will always win both fronts. A secondary problem that i see as well is that Zerg can camp and slowpush with spores and sort of put Protoss in a corner where winning is almost impossible.

To get to the point, Something needs to change within the PvZ matchup overall. Mapmakers can start by removing pervert spots off the naturals and Blizzard should give the feedback damage back or 1 range advantage over abduct.

2 Likes
28

This is absolutely spot on. Also, every Zerg player that i see on streams seems to be comfortable against Protoss and has close to 0 complaints. The same can’t be said the other way around. If anything this kinda reveals the state of ZvP at the moment.

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29

As a minimum, Mothership needs to be immune to Abduct to stop Protoss from being bled out in every little engagement in lategame

I can’t believe they still haven’t fixed this! seriously, what the hell did they have in mind when they thought the tongue of a big bug could pull a spaceship as big as a large city (and I mean a very large city)?? BUT ultralisk is immune lol

9 Likes
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Probably because Zerg is the only race without undeniable detection. Can’t make the mothership immune without making Zerg’s detection harder to stop.