Protoss= game over?

[Daemonite]

I don't think protoss is dead in the water against zerg. The cheese rush is pretty ridiculous, but I haven't had anyone try it against me. I could only hope that in the time they have 10 marines, I have/am close to a sentry or two, but who knows.

Zerg are another issue, immortals solve almost all my zerg issues. Heavy muta hasn't happened to me as I put pressure on early to try and restrict their economy. With double gw + core and a proxy pylon I can usually just outproduce them. Granted I haven't played any PvZ since hitting platinum, but the only thing I may try to add is high templar to try and weaken them or force retreats while I go for workers.

Overall, however, this patch is literally only days old - there are likely more tweaks in the works.

[SoFool]

phoenix are inf act really good vs mutas, but the problem I see is that the the zerg just switches to mass lings/hydras, and owns the toss army. the phoenix are next to useless without enemy air units to kill, except for overlord and queen harass.

I don't think protoss would rush to phoenix tech (for now), a good mix of zealots/stalker/sentry is good enough to counter hydraling. If the zerg player is teching up to muta first it's good to pressure him early on forcing to spend additional minerals on def & ground units. And if he switches to mass roach in the middle of a phoenix muta air battle, the phoenix is not useless because it can anti-gravity some of them.

In addition to counter mutas other than using phoenixes, I think stalker + sentry combo is a good one with the guardian sheild ability.

[DemolitionSquid]

Stalker/Sentry is too gas heavy. I've tried it many times and it's simply not viable. Especially when you need that gas to get Observers and Immortals.

[Gifted]

pheonix are in fact are NOT good against muta lol
u'll see that 1v1 pheonix vs muta = pheonix wins
but the as number increase to 3v3 6v6 12v12..etc
pheonix cannot win

@Demo: my expirience is 3v3 = pheonix, 6v6 = pheonix, 12v12 = pheonix (with 6 pheonix micro, or 1 armor advantage without micro)

@Ernesto: Show me a replay or online VID link so I can find out the exact timing, I'll show you a replay of what counters it, you haven't seen this build.

[Gifted]

Stalker/Sentry is too gas heavy. I've tried it many times and it's simply not viable. Especially when you need that gas to get Observers and Immortals.

That's interesting, as I find it very easy to pull off, just don't over-extend your resources by creating more gateways than you can afford and use the surplus minerals to get your expansion going without concern. Allowing you to make more gateways and cannons to defend it.

[GRUNT]

Stalker/Sentry is too gas heavy. I've tried it many times and it's simply not viable. Especially when you need that gas to get Observers and Immortals.

What Gifted said - this is what I keep running up against as Zerg .

I think that once Mutalisks became the flavour of the week against Protoss, the metagame shifted, and now I see a Stalker/Sentry core in a LOT of Protoss armies. Protoss used to come at me with something like a 5:1 ratio of Zealots and Stalkers, which I could beat with Muta. Now the standard army composition seems to be something more along the lines of 1:1 with a couple of Sentries, which is much tougher for Zerg to crack, since it provides such a great balance.

Because of this change in tactics, I no longer see Mutalisks as a unit I can use to 'brute force' my way through Protoss armies.

It's actually less gas-intensive than what Zerg need to do.

Look, Zerg need to get a Lair, that's 100 gas, Spire, 200 gas, and to just get 6 Mutalisks is 600 gas. And that's a 'bare-bones' breakdown - it doesn't take into account early upgrades like Zergling speed or getting Roaches or Burrow.

For 900 gas, you can get your Warp Gate tech, 9 Stalkers, and 4 Sentries. That's more than enough to trash 6 Mutalisks, and I think that Warp Gate, Stalkers, and Sentries are usually the first thing a Protoss player spends their gas on.

I love this Protoss transition so much - it feels so organic because Stalkers and Sentries are units which you get vs Zerg ground in the first place (with some Zealots to take some hits, of course). Force Field just kicks SO much butt against both Zerglings and Roaches, and the maps in SC2 have so many chokes that Stalkers and Sentries can be used to very good effect against Tier 1 Zerg ground, with some micro. Then if the Zerg tries to mass Mutalisks, you already have a Stalker/Sentry core in place to deal with it.

[Norfindel]

I always looked at the Phoenix and Stalker stats, and thinked "How the hell are they even cost-effective". Seems like i have the answer here.

Also thinked that T1 is a mess with unclear counters.

[KDraconis]

Just to add on to the Phoenix vs Mutalisk debate, on 1v1 the Mutalisk only gets that first 9 damage. in 2v2. each Mutalisk gets 9 damage and another 3 damage from glaive worms. in 3v3 each Mutalisk gets 13 damage total. I know it's still not greater than the 20 attack that Phoenixes get against Mutalisks, I'm just throwing this out there.

I'm personally on the side that Protoss can win against Zerg... But I don't play much Protoss, so I can't really say anything from personal experience.

[Gifted]

Kdrac, you forget that Pheonix has base 1 armor, versus the mutalisk base 0 armor. That alone does significant changes to the bounce mechanic once the shields are gone. Something to further support ya

[Draco]

The problem is that Zerg has map control the entire game. Roach with burrow pushes Toss into his base until obs, by then he has mass mutas, so time to barely defend the Muta harass. By the time you have ample AA, he can tech switch so now you have to build something else up. After he gets Hive, uber health regen Roaches will rape just about anything. Zealots/Stalkers/Storm are completely useless at that point.

The MU is more about Zerg sucking than Protoss doing anything.