I can never stop masses of Roaches or Vikings. My typical strategy revolves around getting a bunch of Warp Gates extremely quickly, coupled with a fast expand, and then spamming the Warp-In, usually with Stalkers or Zealots. Any advice?

EDIT: I don't see ANY counter whatsoever for Roaches. I've tried Zealots, Stalkers, and a mix against them, and I usually have at least 75% as many Stalkers as the enemy has Roaches. It doesn't work. The only thing I can think of is fast Stargate and mass Void Rays, but then Mutalisks or Corrupters will destroy them...

Collosus for roaches and stalkers for vikings.

Collosi for Roaches? I seriously need to get a tier 4 (I think) unit to avoid being rushed by a tier 2 unit? That seems rather imba... Getting Roaches takes much less time than getting Collosi...

Stalkers don't seem to work against Vikings for some reason. Whenever I try it, the opponent somehow gets a huge number of Vikings much faster than I can get Stalkers. That is bizarre, but true. And don't say "You need more Gateways". I had five Warp Gates the last time I died to this, which were building Stalkers almost constantly.

Immortals tear up roaches if hes massing them, using senties and force fields can also work, since you can easily push them out of their short attack range. Zealots can tear up roaches pretty good as well, but you have to put force fields behind the roaches so they cant kite zealots. Overall, pure roaches should not be an issue, roach/hydra is the true problem. Colossi will work, but you need quite a few of them to be effective against roaches, and usually the attack is coming before you can get enough. Overall, I think immortals are the best way to counter roaches.

Vikings should not be as much as a problem, if the terran is making a lot of them, either get stalkers with blink to focus them down or just not make colossi. Vikings are pretty useless if they don't have air to fight, as immortals/stalkers tear them apart if they try to land. If you want an air option, the new phoenix can stand toe to toe with vikings. Even though vikings have range on phoenix, the phoenix is much faster and can attack while moving. The downside to phoenix is that they can be focused down easily if you are fighting the terran's ground at the same time, since the vikings can sit back and fire and your phoenix will have to move over the terrans army to get close to the vikings. Overall, if the terran is massing vikings, just don't make colossi and rip them apart when they land. If they are harassing your mineral line or something, a few cannons will remedy that issue, but since they take so long to switch between land/air, you can usually get to them before they do much damage.

I hope this helped.

Edit: After re-reading my post, I don't think I made the ideal unit comp clear. Here is what I would do:

Mass Roaches: Get a robo up quick, get immortals/stalkers/senties. Throw down force fields into the roaches' arc, cutting the number that can attack at once. Just get a handful of sentries and focus on immortal/stalker, since they get the +armoured bonus.

Mass Vikings: I'd continue with a ground army with a mix of immortals/stalkers/senties/zealots. If hes harassing my mineral lines when my forces aren't there, get a forge and build a cannon on the mineral line. Warp in stalkers if he ever lands and tries to kill the cannon. Attack him since he wasted money on anti air he cant use.

Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on May 13 2010, 10:41 pm by Valug.

Immortals are still a lot higher on the tech tree than Roaches... I doubt I'm a good enough microer to use Sentries at all, but I guess I could try.

I've only lived long enough to get a Robotics Facility once, and I didn't even unlock the Collosus before dying, and I've never gotten far enough for a Stargate (except once when playing my brother, who has never won a game except against me). I've tried Stalkers, but as I said, somehow the Terran player always has a huge army of Vikings compared to my relatively small force of Stalkers. I have no clue how this happens: As I said before, last game I had /five/ Warp Gates making Stalkers as fast as they could, and I had many more workers than my opponent, according to the scoreboard at the end of the game.

Immortals are very easy to tech too, its only one more building then you get already to get warp gates. Try using the build I posted here. Even having 1-2 immortals on your ramp when the roaches attack will make a huge difference, and I mean HUGE. Immortals tear roaches up, I believe they kill roaches in 3 hits. Roaches also only do 10 damage to Immortals due to their shields, instead of 16, which means it takes ~22 attacks from roaches to kill one immortal. If you are still having trouble getting immortals out in time, and you really shouldn't, you can delay the roaches with force fields on your ramp.


As far as the vikings, are they beating you when they are on the ground? Vikings are not really the best unit on the ground and any combination of protoss ground forces should have no problem making short work on vikings.

And to talk about sentries, force field is the main reason that protoss is even a viable race. Being able to use force fields is going to make or break your early game in tons of situations.

Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on May 13 2010, 10:58 pm by Valug.

Hm... I guess I'll try that. Though, I don't know how to read those build orders... What do all the numbers mean?

You don't get it... He had at least three times as many Vikings as I do Stalkers. And I had a lot of Stalkers. This has also happened in several other games.

... qq

The numbers in the build are food count, or basically, the number of probes you have (including the one building) when you place the building.

Could you attach a replay of you losing vs mass vikings? I can help you much better that way. A terran should not be able to make more vikings then you make stalkers unless he has like 2 starports with reactors pumping them out, in which case, you easily have time to make some immortals. Again, Immortals demolish vikings on the ground, they kill vikings in 3 hits and it takes about the same amount to kill them as roaches (vikings attack faster but do less damage).

Okay, I try to get a Robotics Facility down quickly, and get Zergling or Marine rushed. Somehow, they always know what I'm doing. (Probably coincidence.)

You need to constantly scout and keep an eye on what the enemy is doing, react according to what they are building. You can't get away with rushing to a robo if they are rushing with t1 units or cheesing.

Attach some replays and I will attempt to help you further.

How do you scout? Whenever I try I either do it too early and don't get any useful information, or the scout gets killed before getting anywhere near the base.

Well, if they are rushing you, you can get an idea with your first scout (just to note, I scout after my first pylon, many protoss wait to scout after their first gateway) by seeing the timing on their buildings. If your first probe arrives and a spawning pool is already underway when you havent even started your gateway yet, hes likely going to rush. You can compare the timings of spawning pool/gateway/barracks to your gateway and determine if they are going for a build to attack you early.

For a terran, an early gas (before the barracks completes) usually means reapers or an early marauder, either way, they will be getting to your base early. Early gas for a zerg (before the spawning pool finishes) usually means hes trying to get speedlings very quickly, which is likely going to be an early attack. Zergs often fast expand, watch for a drone leaving the mineral line going down the ramp. If a zerg fast expands, you are likely safe to tech, but keep an eye on his expo and make sure hes making drones there, not units. A protoss with multiple gateways before CC is usually going for a rush, see what the toss is chronoboosting. Is he using it on probes? Is he saving it for his gateway? If he gets a CC after one gate, and nothing really before that, you are likely safe to tech to immortals.

Try to keep your scout alive as long as you can, hopefully until the first combat unit comes out. See what they are making, take note of things like reactors/tech labs/roach warren/fast expansion/chronoboost/gateway numbers.

After your first scout dies, you should still send a probe from time to time to see what the enemies army comp is. Even if you can't get into his base to see his tech, most players do not hide their army at their ramp, and you can see what types of units they are making (and I think you should strive to be a player that does hide what hes doing, keep a stalker or 2 at your ramp and the rest of your army back, so he can never scout you.)

Always try to control the watch towers as well, so you can get some extra time to prepare when you see him moving out.

Immortal + Sentry/Stalker.

With the recent supply increase of Roaches, it's even easier to defend your base. If playing more defensively, a sentry and one photon cannon can do a lot. Actually, one or two sentries and just about any ranged units come in handy when you get roaches running up your ramp.
Abusing Guardian Shield is useful. Abusing Force Field is useful. Added to the fact that you can chrono boost Immortals with ease, Roach rushes shouldn't be much of a problem. Not only that, but it only takes three shots from an Immortal to kill a Roach.
Get three immortals. Split his roach army. Win.