Starcraft 2 Thoughts: PvT play

I really liked Harstem's (P) play in this game vs FXOBratOK (T), cast by Duckvillelol.

My comments with spoilers below the VOD.






I like Harstem's style of Active defense, he does a very good job of scouting and preparing for drops during this game.

At ~11:14 game time (8:11 VOD time) he smoothly deflects a planned elevator attack with good scouting, by 1 of the 2 Observers he had out. and positioning Stalkers to 1 or 2 shot the Medivacs.

It cost him the Observer, but he instantly starts making a second.

He lost severl Observers in this game, which as a Coach I think is a VERY good thing, he was losing them because he was being very active in scouting with his Obs, almost aggressive level of scouting you might say.

Well into the middlegame he was keeping two Observers on the field, except for the brief amount of time it takes to make a replacement when one is killed.

Think about it this way, each of those Scans to kill an Obs cost the enemy a Mule, in addition to the information provided by the aggresive scouting.


I found Hartem's (P) base layout in his main interesting, not sure if I like it or not, I will have to do some testing to be sure.

I think part of the reason for the wall, never got to see for sure, is because he plans to rely on HT warp in & Feedback, vs Medivac, as a key part of his base defense.

The wall, pretty clearly shown by Duckville at ~17:00 game time, would allow him to warp in a HT, or two, on the opposite side of the wall from enemy's Drop, giving time to Feedback & then morph to Archon if needed.

Then at ~13:36 game time (9:52 VOD time), Harstem warps in a HT and Feedbacks Medivac, he was also using the Stalkers as support to cover the Main mineral line, while the slower Zealots stayed by the Naturel mineral line to defend those Probes.



At ~11:14 game time (8:11 VOD time) he smoothly deflects a planned elevator attack with good scouting and Stalker in position to 1 or 2 shot the Medivacs.

I really liked Harstem's HT play, he made them a useful part of his early base defense, and he also used them well offensively, even though BratOK had Ghosts out, he seems to favor having the HT trail the main army, and using Blink to try and snipe Ghosts, or scare them ^_^


I am biased in favor of HT though. 

I favor getting HT first, I don't like trying to make Colossus before 3 bases, generally speaking, I think HT make for a far smoother transition out of Gateway focused play.

A Phoenix opening is a different situation IMO, I like Robo Zealot Drop transition into Colossus for Phoenix openings.  For more of my thoughts on Phoenix PvT openings see Starcraft 2 Skills: PvT Beating Bio with Phoenix & Drop.

If you would like to see more posts like this one, click the label Starcraft 2 Thoughts, that label and others can be found in the Label Cloud at left side of the SC2 Blog.

Every post has labels at bottom left of the post as well, they allow for cross referencing, or narrowing of the broader categories found in the Label Cloud.


GL HF,

Cliff