Shield upgrades are massively underrated. When working out their value, people seem to forget that shields regenerate. With proper micro, you can benefit from the armour across a health pool of more than the shield value. You will only ever benefit from the standard armour upgrade for as much as the unit's HP. On top of that, interceptors regenerate shields when they return to the carrier, marines have high fire rate with low damage per shot, and Maplez had a load of shield batteries. Shield upgrades aren't just viable in this specific situation, they are significantly better than the standard air armour upgrade (though not as important as the attack upgrade - interceptor shots do 5 damage, a 20% damage increase is huge).
The problem is EMP and widow mines. 1 EMP or widow mine shot goes down and the shield upgrades are essentially worthless. Also, shield upgrades are simply not as valuable as armor upgrades unless the shields are given time to regenerate, and the shield upgrades are 50% more expensive than ground armor. Even taking into account batteries, any time damage is split between shields/hp, both armor values apply anyway, so when under pressure and healing under batteries, the value is essentially the same either way. The only reason to go for the shield upgrades in that situation was that he was only making air units and buildings, so the other forge upgrades were pointless, and building a 2nd cybercore just for armor upgrades isn't worth it over just getting shields or skipping the non-attack upgrades entirely for longer to get more production/units.
@@Matt-ln7lb "With proper micro" Good Protoss players take advantage of the fact that the first half of their HP is expendable and pull units away once those shields are low or depleted. Kind of their whole schtick, honestly. And the argument of "EMP" is dumb. You aren't always fighting against Terran.
@@NilruinThere are many instances where you can’t take advantage of the shield regen; y’know, any time your defending/ attacking something? Shields are great for skirmishes, but those don’t really determine the outcome of the game.
Shield is quite worth it vs marines as they benefit interceptors. Usually if you are against marines with +1 it has 7 damage and will take out 150 shields in 22 hits. +1 shield increase it to 25. On interceptor it take 12 shots (+1 marine) or 13 shots (+1 marine and +1 shield) to kill one that is 8.3% improvement and is the same with air armor. Actually protoss units can fight toe-to-toe against terran 3/3 units if you just have 3/3/3. However that is usually deemed too expensive to get. Because it is so easy to recharge shield with batteries shield upgrade has huge impact especially in defense or when batteries are warped in offensively, and they benefit cannons too.
Every time he thinks researching something or doing something small after the first 2-3 minutes is a mistake, he is wrong. There are always ways to make it valuable if you are capable of any original thought. He will pre-watch a game and exaggerate how "dumb" something was to make himself look like some type of savant, it's sad really.
To be fair, the primary reason protos don't research shields against terran is that shields don't actually exist if the terran has ghosts out, because EMP exists.
@@Santisima_Trinidad You know that shields recharge right? If you think you can write one sentence to prove something like upgrading shields isn't worth it, than you're too stupid to engage with.
What? So marines don't shoot up? Also viking transition takes time and if carriers ever won the fight vs marine medivac before the crit mass of vikings, terran would lose to counter attack. I'm pretty sure I saw a couple of turrets building up.
I would love to see this up against uThermal doing his Penguin Brothers challenge. Depending on numbers, either the Thor/Viking would demolish the Carriers or the other way around. Regardless of which way it goes, it will be a glorious game to watch.
Huum, looks like KingCobra builds, but he often uses his extra minerals in 2 nexus in his main base to chronoboost carriers if he can’t expand safely/under defensive pressure. But KingCobra don’t invest so heavily in upgrades.
I feel like the response from Terran here should just be pulling back and making vikings + adding a few ghosts once they see the carriers. Running in with the marines desperate to deal damage when both players are on 2 base just doesn't make sense, especially with the Terran economy being stronger on equal bases, and their army arguably scaling better into the late game.
That timing hits around the time that terran is expo'ing to their third, which means they are at a lull in production- while the toss is going supply high... pretty nice timing.
haha the number of low level games I cast where a low level player scouts an empty main base and just goes "well I don't see anything unusual here" and then dies 2 minutes later to the proxy, then proceeds to rage
Pig, can you please respond to the following: Watching this, I was tilted by how simple-minded and stubborn pros can be. I guess, endless repetition can be as much of a blessing as a curse, so I shouldn't be overly critical of them. But in that last game, a week after exposure to that carrier build and already having confirmed it is two-base carrier turtle, Vindicta went for 5-rax, +1 weapons, then ghosts. All idiotic choices. He breaks the core rule of expanding and teching against hyper turtle (it's 2-base protoss, come on Vindicta), he makes weapons which doesn't makes sense considering that armor would reduce the carrier dps by 25% and would also make the medivac healing more efficient (a core game dynamic that RTS pros forget, that armor makes healing better and terran have the most consistent healing), and goes for ghosts cause he is used to making ghosts in any TvP situation even though carriers have low shields, high health and 2 fricking armor. I appreciate that you have always put effort in making people conscious about the fact that pros can also be not just imperfect, but rather stubborn or afraid to innovate. That being said, would you recommend that a casual or intermediate player makes their own way in learning and experimenting, rather than imitating pros? Or is it simply about the guarantee that you will make less false assumptions imitating pros than trying to figure things out yourself?
Nobody says you should imitate pros. Their strategies depend on having high apm, perfect map awareness and high tier micro. At lower leagues you do other stuff. Also, armor wouldn't have helped with healing in that last game because the medivacs were the first things focused. Plus marines do no damage to carriers without upgrades so even if they die slower they won't kill anything.
Imitating pros is always the best option you have up to a certain point of skill level for every skill you're trying to learn. Doesn't matter if it's SC2 or Guitar or Cooking, if you have a good teacher then mastering that skill will go much faster and smoother. Once you reach a certain level of ability you're able to make your own choices and add nuance with the knowledge you gained. Nobody is perfect and everybody makes mistakes, professionals are people too which you should never forget. Everybody can be wrong about something, so you should always question something you think is wrong. But be willing to accept your assumption was wrong too. Looking at these games as an observer it is easy to forget the circumstances around like what time was it, how exhausted were the players, etc etc. People look at 1/1000 games and go "Oh, so this is how this guy plays" which is like saying I'm better than Serral because I beat him once with a cheese.
Works extremely well with turtling around batteries too. Shield armor gets countered by ghosts but when you're rushing carriers out this early you're probably not going to run into very many of them.
I've actually been trying this after the classic MaxPax opening just for added memes, so it's funny to hear that MaxPax likes the concept! th-cam.com/video/g9tDT2YZLVs/w-d-xo.html
The fact that this guy actually prioritizes the shield upgrade makes me respect him more. Every time i told people this is a SLEPT on upgrade especially if you have to play defense and hide behind a battery. its unreal clutch compared to actual armor. Obviously the up front damage you can tank would make you want to invest in armor. But armor cannot be restored where shield can. so effectively over the course of a few minutes. You would block ALOT more damage with shield upgrades then armor. if you traded efficiently and didn't feed units for free.
I've managed to make a carrier rush build order, completely forgot about it tho lol. I think it was 3min+ that carrier 1 comes out, and you'll have 6 by 5min mark. Just against elite AI tho, I'm too chicken to go comp.
@@sharpie11112I have a build where I go +2 air weapons mothership recall 2 carriers into enemy main that hits at u minutes. YES. That can be done. Is it good? Nope 1 adept cant hold vs terran for 4-5 minutes.
How df is Protoss air not OP?… I hate playing against them bc if you don’t manage to read the game and see what your opponent is building.. you lost the game
Tempest transition. The build is flexible, see how he even brought out colossus w/ lance in the last game because of how aggressively the terran pushed bio?
yep, protoss most broken race in all of SC2, theyve been winning pro tournaments consistently, non stop since SC2 was first released, as we all know. Blizz never nerfs them, only buffs, I cant even remember the last time protoss was nerfed. /s
the best counter to that strategy, no matter the variant, is a proxy racks marines early push while building 3 depots at home to block scouting and you hit before the first oracle is out. Sure it's a cheese but that's how you beat Maple's carrier strategy.
Against that maples is literally playing regular ass protoss. Its just a cheese where you try to kill toss before they get out tech units/ actual units. Not a counter to maples's build, just a regular cheese.
@@snowdrop9810 ever seen Maple scout his surroundings ? also doesn't have shield battery in his natural for a while. So while you may say it's "just a regular cheese", it is not. because proxy marauder wouldn't beat the early carrier, they can't shoot up. same for zergs although ling rush are pretty rare against toss. So that would leave only 1 other cheese, the 6 stalker rush proxy gateway but they are not as early as marines proxy, require more resources and wouldn't win vs 2 adepts 2 stalkers and a carrier. I specifically mentioned mass pure marines proxy for a reason, which even if it's cheesy is still a strategy, very easy to defeat if you see it coming but as per Maple's games replays he/she wouldn't spot it before marines show up in the natural, so big problem. Also, "regular protoss" as if rushing carrier was not also a cheese in and out of itself.
This is just a normal build into carriers on 2 base later on. He would scout that there is no gasses and that something was up and figure out that it's proxy marines and adjust his build like he was in all of these replays.
@@MareHazyDawn look, I'm just pointing out the biggest weakness of his build because he doesn't scout around his base, and whether you like it or not a carrier rush is a cheese build. Another way to just massacre him would be mass vikings or even BC. there are ways to counter that build very easily but the one thign Maples doesn't do is building many ground units because the first carrier is costly to get out.
Shield upgrades are massively underrated.
When working out their value, people seem to forget that shields regenerate. With proper micro, you can benefit from the armour across a health pool of more than the shield value. You will only ever benefit from the standard armour upgrade for as much as the unit's HP. On top of that, interceptors regenerate shields when they return to the carrier, marines have high fire rate with low damage per shot, and Maplez had a load of shield batteries.
Shield upgrades aren't just viable in this specific situation, they are significantly better than the standard air armour upgrade (though not as important as the attack upgrade - interceptor shots do 5 damage, a 20% damage increase is huge).
The problem is EMP and widow mines. 1 EMP or widow mine shot goes down and the shield upgrades are essentially worthless.
Also, shield upgrades are simply not as valuable as armor upgrades unless the shields are given time to regenerate, and the shield upgrades are 50% more expensive than ground armor. Even taking into account batteries, any time damage is split between shields/hp, both armor values apply anyway, so when under pressure and healing under batteries, the value is essentially the same either way. The only reason to go for the shield upgrades in that situation was that he was only making air units and buildings, so the other forge upgrades were pointless, and building a 2nd cybercore just for armor upgrades isn't worth it over just getting shields or skipping the non-attack upgrades entirely for longer to get more production/units.
@@Matt-ln7lb "With proper micro"
Good Protoss players take advantage of the fact that the first half of their HP is expendable and pull units away once those shields are low or depleted. Kind of their whole schtick, honestly.
And the argument of "EMP" is dumb. You aren't always fighting against Terran.
@@NilruinThere are many instances where you can’t take advantage of the shield regen; y’know, any time your defending/ attacking something? Shields are great for skirmishes, but those don’t really determine the outcome of the game.
Can't wait for MaxPax to pull this build out in a tournament match. Should be very interesting.
I showed a few games to MaxPax and he actually likes the build!
Hey Maples! That was absolutely disgusting.
I loved it!
He’s to obsessed with his stalkers
Shield is quite worth it vs marines as they benefit interceptors.
Usually if you are against marines with +1 it has 7 damage and will take out 150 shields in 22 hits. +1 shield increase it to 25.
On interceptor it take 12 shots (+1 marine) or 13 shots (+1 marine and +1 shield) to kill one that is 8.3% improvement and is the same with air armor.
Actually protoss units can fight toe-to-toe against terran 3/3 units if you just have 3/3/3. However that is usually deemed too expensive to get.
Because it is so easy to recharge shield with batteries shield upgrade has huge impact especially in defense or when batteries are warped in offensively, and they benefit cannons too.
Every time he thinks researching something or doing something small after the first 2-3 minutes is a mistake, he is wrong. There are always ways to make it valuable if you are capable of any original thought. He will pre-watch a game and exaggerate how "dumb" something was to make himself look like some type of savant, it's sad really.
To be fair, the primary reason protos don't research shields against terran is that shields don't actually exist if the terran has ghosts out, because EMP exists.
@@evrythingis1 let me guess, you've written multiple paragraphs on why EMP is imbalanced.
@@Santisima_Trinidad You know that shields recharge right? If you think you can write one sentence to prove something like upgrading shields isn't worth it, than you're too stupid to engage with.
personally I think shield armor gives much more value than life armor, as shields do in fact regenerate
Mind you that it's clear that the Terran players are doing the "no-Viking-no-Turrets-no-Antiair" challenge
at lower levels, just pump voids out and vikings thors get obliterated
What? So marines don't shoot up? Also viking transition takes time and if carriers ever won the fight vs marine medivac before the crit mass of vikings, terran would lose to counter attack. I'm pretty sure I saw a couple of turrets building up.
Terrans: "Why would I build anything else but MMM"
It's about time terrans started getting abused for their lack of strategy
Turrets are useless against carriers
I would love to see this up against uThermal doing his Penguin Brothers challenge. Depending on numbers, either the Thor/Viking would demolish the Carriers or the other way around. Regardless of which way it goes, it will be a glorious game to watch.
Finally, a build that forces terran to adapt and not have a Swiss knife build
12 leash range is for sc1. Its 14 leash for sc2
Huum, looks like KingCobra builds, but he often uses his extra minerals in 2 nexus in his main base to chronoboost carriers if he can’t expand safely/under defensive pressure.
But KingCobra don’t invest so heavily in upgrades.
I feel like the response from Terran here should just be pulling back and making vikings + adding a few ghosts once they see the carriers. Running in with the marines desperate to deal damage when both players are on 2 base just doesn't make sense, especially with the Terran economy being stronger on equal bases, and their army arguably scaling better into the late game.
That timing hits around the time that terran is expo'ing to their third, which means they are at a lull in production- while the toss is going supply high... pretty nice timing.
King Koopa Troopa..lol16:30 Pig Your Amazing
haha the number of low level games I cast where a low level player scouts an empty main base and just goes "well I don't see anything unusual here" and then dies 2 minutes later to the proxy, then proceeds to rage
"Supply blocked at 46 before" Well, barely...Really only every other game...In total I'd say about 120% of all my games or so. No biggie! 🙃
At what point does it stop being a build order and become a style?
There is something about carriers and battle cruisers . I always click.
please more of the maples series this was a treat to watch
When you graduated from Flo's school of sciences
Pig, can you please respond to the following:
Watching this, I was tilted by how simple-minded and stubborn pros can be. I guess, endless repetition can be as much of a blessing as a curse, so I shouldn't be overly critical of them. But in that last game, a week after exposure to that carrier build and already having confirmed it is two-base carrier turtle, Vindicta went for 5-rax, +1 weapons, then ghosts. All idiotic choices. He breaks the core rule of expanding and teching against hyper turtle (it's 2-base protoss, come on Vindicta), he makes weapons which doesn't makes sense considering that armor would reduce the carrier dps by 25% and would also make the medivac healing more efficient (a core game dynamic that RTS pros forget, that armor makes healing better and terran have the most consistent healing), and goes for ghosts cause he is used to making ghosts in any TvP situation even though carriers have low shields, high health and 2 fricking armor.
I appreciate that you have always put effort in making people conscious about the fact that pros can also be not just imperfect, but rather stubborn or afraid to innovate. That being said, would you recommend that a casual or intermediate player makes their own way in learning and experimenting, rather than imitating pros? Or is it simply about the guarantee that you will make less false assumptions imitating pros than trying to figure things out yourself?
Nobody says you should imitate pros. Their strategies depend on having high apm, perfect map awareness and high tier micro. At lower leagues you do other stuff.
Also, armor wouldn't have helped with healing in that last game because the medivacs were the first things focused. Plus marines do no damage to carriers without upgrades so even if they die slower they won't kill anything.
@@emissarygw2264 "the medivacs were the first things focused"
they should have been, but they weren't.
@@nathangamble125 idk about every fight, but definitely saw at least a couple where he clicked down every medivac
Imitating pros is always the best option you have up to a certain point of skill level for every skill you're trying to learn. Doesn't matter if it's SC2 or Guitar or Cooking, if you have a good teacher then mastering that skill will go much faster and smoother.
Once you reach a certain level of ability you're able to make your own choices and add nuance with the knowledge you gained.
Nobody is perfect and everybody makes mistakes, professionals are people too which you should never forget. Everybody can be wrong about something, so you should always question something you think is wrong. But be willing to accept your assumption was wrong too.
Looking at these games as an observer it is easy to forget the circumstances around like what time was it, how exhausted were the players, etc etc. People look at 1/1000 games and go "Oh, so this is how this guy plays" which is like saying I'm better than Serral because I beat him once with a cheese.
This is my favorite video in a long time. I love this.
+1 Shields is the only upgrade in the forge for air. For this build it's valuable.
Works extremely well with turtling around batteries too. Shield armor gets countered by ghosts but when you're rushing carriers out this early you're probably not going to run into very many of them.
@@quickdraw6893even if you do the battery overcharge undo any emp and can't be countered by a new one
This is incredible. Love this stuff, and PiG in rare form 😂
I've actually been trying this after the classic MaxPax opening just for added memes, so it's funny to hear that MaxPax likes the concept! th-cam.com/video/g9tDT2YZLVs/w-d-xo.html
Why do terrans just charge up ramps when protoss is turtling on 2 base? They need to learn the way of zerg.
The problem with this against zerg is protoss might die with 4 min ling runby
we are seeing a Nexus outside that Terran's base.
I want to see this build in action against a mech player
We all know that NA GM's don't respond to scouting information anyway. Might take them a while to adapt.
Thys work only PvT ?
I was looking for a reason to get back into the game, Ape strong together. Technology is the answer.
So…. This is just a standard Diamond 3 build but with good micro? ;)
Well d3 usually camps over cannon battery until they get to 200/200 with a mama
Is there a reason none of these Terrans are making vikings?
The fact that this guy actually prioritizes the shield upgrade makes me respect him more. Every time i told people this is a SLEPT on upgrade especially if you have to play defense and hide behind a battery. its unreal clutch compared to actual armor. Obviously the up front damage you can tank would make you want to invest in armor. But armor cannot be restored where shield can. so effectively over the course of a few minutes. You would block ALOT more damage with shield upgrades then armor. if you traded efficiently and didn't feed units for free.
I've managed to make a carrier rush build order, completely forgot about it tho lol. I think it was 3min+ that carrier 1 comes out, and you'll have 6 by 5min mark. Just against elite AI tho, I'm too chicken to go comp.
It's literally impossible to get multiple carriers before 5 minutes
Its 3:30 for the becon (at the earliest) then first carriers after that builds. Go double star gate with 2 stalkers and walk across the map. GG'z
@@sharpie11112I have a build where I go +2 air weapons mothership recall 2 carriers into enemy main that hits at u minutes. YES. That can be done. Is it good? Nope 1 adept cant hold vs terran for 4-5 minutes.
How df is Protoss air not OP?… I hate playing against them bc if you don’t manage to read the game and see what your opponent is building.. you lost the game
I will fund a tournament held in the sewers between Florencio and Mape the ape.!!! 🎉 LFG🎉
This build seems weak if terran turtles with turrets at home, which I’d expect pros like Maru and Spirit would do
Tempest transition. The build is flexible, see how he even brought out colossus w/ lance in the last game because of how aggressively the terran pushed bio?
Turrets are useless against carriers
Turrets thors viking wreck airtoss
Maybe not in your league
Book of Filth FTW - bless your holes!
This is what kills me in PvZ 😅
+2 air is really reasonable, as carriers deal very little damage
This just looks like some of my ladder games, except hugher mmr.
Can’t wait to try this lol. I’ve been doing a tempest rush against Terran with a proxy stargate with batteries but i like this better lol
Can you please actually do the math on the plasma shields instead of just saying its bad.
Widowmines. May you live forever.
really great video
That was glorious!
easy to do this vs terran and zerg. but not vs protoss
Everyone always knew that carriers are op...
k 👍
yep, protoss most broken race in all of SC2, theyve been winning pro tournaments consistently, non stop since SC2 was first released, as we all know. Blizz never nerfs them, only buffs, I cant even remember the last time protoss was nerfed.
/s
@@Valsoriel yes
i cant wait till hero starts doing this build
Not aggressive as hero likes
This is the protoss I know and love
Wow this ain't new every toss infight does this imba carriers
This guy his strategy is B I G
SC2's knuckleball
Love it!!
Omg that second game
MillforGG!
oo oo AH AH
the best counter to that strategy, no matter the variant, is a proxy racks marines early push while building 3 depots at home to block scouting and you hit before the first oracle is out. Sure it's a cheese but that's how you beat Maple's carrier strategy.
Against that maples is literally playing regular ass protoss. Its just a cheese where you try to kill toss before they get out tech units/ actual units. Not a counter to maples's build, just a regular cheese.
@@snowdrop9810 ever seen Maple scout his surroundings ? also doesn't have shield battery in his natural for a while. So while you may say it's "just a regular cheese", it is not. because proxy marauder wouldn't beat the early carrier, they can't shoot up. same for zergs although ling rush are pretty rare against toss. So that would leave only 1 other cheese, the 6 stalker rush proxy gateway but they are not as early as marines proxy, require more resources and wouldn't win vs 2 adepts 2 stalkers and a carrier.
I specifically mentioned mass pure marines proxy for a reason, which even if it's cheesy is still a strategy, very easy to defeat if you see it coming but as per Maple's games replays he/she wouldn't spot it before marines show up in the natural, so big problem.
Also, "regular protoss" as if rushing carrier was not also a cheese in and out of itself.
This is just a normal build into carriers on 2 base later on. He would scout that there is no gasses and that something was up and figure out that it's proxy marines and adjust his build like he was in all of these replays.
@@MareHazyDawn look, I'm just pointing out the biggest weakness of his build because he doesn't scout around his base, and whether you like it or not a carrier rush is a cheese build.
Another way to just massacre him would be mass vikings or even BC. there are ways to counter that build very easily but the one thign Maples doesn't do is building many ground units because the first carrier is costly to get out.
Is Maple he? Why did I think it was she
Ummmmm excuse me sweaty, please don't be transphobic... especially not during PRIDE MONTH MMMMKAY??!
Shut up
First??
Cheap second - thanks bud!
NA GM is Diamond EU
Mmr translates roughly equally. But not leauges, 4.9k ish is GM on Na while gm on eu is like 5.5k iirc
@SC2_Sepheron Sounds like a cope
hating encountering this. broken :/
carrier,thor,Battlecruiser must be nerf..
There is no way they are GM