So I've been playing the beta for about a month now and I'm getting a lot better. I'm ranked pretty high in gold league at the moment but i can't seem to move any farther because of my late game. I can win pretty often with early rushes and mid game timing attacks, but as the game moves into tier 3 units and >130 supply I start to fall apart. I'm wondering if anyone has any general advice, my issues seem to have to do with everything after getting the 3rd expansion. Anyway thanks in advance.
In the late game, from what I've seen, the keys are good unit mixes designed to counter your opponent's mix, and effective micro in your use of spells and abilities. You need to use EMP, psi storm, infest, etc. effectively and focus down spellcasters (Feedback is helpful for Protoss here). Sometimes, if the game goes on long enough and you have more expansions or make more efficient use of resources, you can win by resource attrition alone. I recommend going to Crota's shoutcasts (http://www.youtube.com/user/BlizShouter) and looking for any games consisting of 3 or more parts (e.g. 146, 132, 129, 123, 115).
depends on what the enemy is using, stalkers immortals and a few collosi + high templars, DTs are quite absurd to use at this point because the opposing army has detectors with them, they'll just die, this mix will be powerful enough to sweep terran mech/bio and zerg ground pretty easy, bring in some carriers, interceptors will disrupt their units AI, forcing them to micro more while you just micro psi storm, only problem will be if it became so late game that the opposing army has massed 24+ brood lords and 24+ corruptors, you're done in seconds if that happens, I mean, c'mon, before you could hit psi storm, your HTs will be dead via brood lords' 9.5 range, corruptors will demolish your air and corrupt your immortals, you're mostly screwed if he has suicidal infestors just there for fungal growth as well, so don't let this happen against zerg against terran, immortals and collosi will rip thru their bio and mech pretty easy, although your collosi... hmm think about it coz terran late has lots of vikings, otherwise just use immortals and psi storm, micro the stalkers so that they don't get raped by tanks
Are you getting upgrades (Weapon/armor upgrades from the forge or cybercore)? The longer the game goes on, the more important those upgrades become.
Darn it RushSecond, you beat me to it. UPGRADE UPGRADE UPGRADE. In a large battle that has 130+ units, even +1 upgrade against no upgrade can help you a lot. And like I always say, scout your opponent. Scouting will help you get units that can counter the enemies, know when they are going to attack, and know how big of a force he has to know when to attack and get more troops.
Key things for late game: Upgrades- best done early with one forge unless you're planning to rush in for the kill or if your opponent is particularly aggressive. If you haven't gotten upgrades, and you're on your 3rd base, u need to drop down 3forge and pump them out fast. More units=more attacks= more damage saved. Warpgates- Have 4 per mining base at least, if you have low APM do even more with your spare minerals. Trust me, when your two huge army collides, most of the time the person who wins is the one that builds up the fastest Countering- Late game mass are either one single unit (void rays, mutas, broods) or a composition of units. IF you're facing Toss, i suggest you mirror your opponent's compo so that your armies cancel each other out. Then warp in stalkers (with those warp gates) and go for their mineral line, or kill them. I find Late game success depends on a player's intuition of whats right, rather than any real tactics. The best strategy for Late game tho is KEEP PUMPING OUT UNITS.
late game is about map control. hit and run on his expos, keep him on his toes. force his army to be divided against these raids, and destroy =] (If he's not splitting his army use bigger hit and runs on the undefended bases... it's a matter of time) I suggest putting a decent amount of cannon towers on your expos.. and an obs/pylon at every expo. Upgrades are EXTREMELY important. Get them early. Use sentries, hallucination and force field are amazing and under-used abilities. I've seen a lot of games won mostly on map control. ________ silversurfer vaporizer
About the upgrades. I know they are super good, but when should I start getting them? With all thats going on the first 10 minutes of the game, I'm spending every last resource I get on buildings and units, and I seem to forget about the upgrades. How early is it worth investing in them? Cuz Protoss upgrades are expensive as hell.... Also, is it ever a good idea to get 2 extra forges to upgrade faster? I sometimes do this, but I dont know if its very smart.
I start upgrading the minute I get a forge.... I know it's expensive, but it's worth it. and yeah, I usually end up with 2 forges. I'm constantly upgrading... however, my strats are set mostly for 2v2 (Upgs are slightly more important), I can't say for sure about 1v1. ________ cheap glass pipes
Well Macro alone can get you a win, so I would work on macro, like you said getting a third expo is a tough thing for you, work on locking down your opponent's expo and you wont have to stress about getting that third expansion and if you get it, he wont have the unit build to send out to your expo anyways. Once you get an expansion over him, harass him. Keep him below you at all times and dominate the macro game. Also get on that high yield and capitalize on it with some warp gates, to warp in last second units (this can determine the battle), and like a few people said before get your upgrades. If you are going against Terran I wouldn't really focus too much on the protoss shields as much just in case you have some ghosts in the mix, in which case your upgraded shields mean pretty much nothing.
