Storms, Reavers, and Mutalisks.

Introduction: This is my first battlereport ever. Constructive critisism is welcome. I am sorry for the lack of pictures, but due to ennu, I did not save the replay. So, if you are only here to see the pictures, click back immediatly, or I will turn you into Fred. Don't ask who Fred is, I won't say a word.

After mutalinging a zerg on temple (He went down faster then Deon in a turtler's main), and owning my friend with a wraith force on dire straits (who is definatly not as skilled as he believes), I decided to play one last game for today.

Now, the hard part. Finding a game. After wading though about 40 comp stomps, 50 2v2 on BGayH, and maybe 3 2v2s on Temple, I found what I was looking for. 1v1 temple. This guy seemed to have an ok rating, 58-38-9. He picked random, and I picked protoss. After an exchange of Gl, Hf, the game commenced.

My nexus was there, alone on the wastelands of Lost Temple, a giant pyramid, protruding on the horison of the 12 main. After cloning my 4 probes, and ordering one more, thoughts raced through my head. What will I be facing? Tanks sieged above my natural? A 6 pool? Or the dreaded reaver drop? Because of him randoming, and knowing my race, I would have to scout him early. My 7th probe was pulled of mining when I had 50 bonus minerals, and arrived at my ramp just in time to warp a pylon. He then continued on to the 3 main. At 10, another probe was pulled off mining, and a beacon for a gateway was placed. The probe quickly ran back to the minerals, to continue mining. My scouting probe went to the 3 main, and my opponent was there. It appeared that he had sent a drone to his natural, and, was powering hard. Just as I was placing my second gateway, my probe attempted to harass his mining drones, but was surrounded, and destroyed. The probe's last transition was a report of a spawning pool being nearly complete in his main. I knew that the time to act, was now. As my zealot came out of the gateway, he headed off to his main, with plans to slaughter some drones. Unfortunatly, 6 zerglings quickly ended his misery.

Where there were six zerglings, there would be more. While continuing probe construction, I kept up the zealot production. After getting around 7 zealots, I stormed his expansion. For some reason, because one was falling behind, halfway to his natural, I paused to let them group up. Just at that moment, about 24 zerglings hit me. They aparrently had high discipline marks in school, as they marched in a single file line. After losing about 10 of their number, with no zealot losses, they retreat. I send a badly damaged zealot to chase them, and to scout his base. Unfortunatly, he runs right into 3 sunken colonies. My hopes of mineral line raping were dashed, as the sunkens were well placed, covering the minearal line. My 5 zealots ran back to my base, just as my opponent sent his 12 lings, and about 12 more as reinforcements. My 6 zealots, with my new 6 zealots, easily fended off the assault, again with no losses, and only 3 of the lings lived to tell their tale. During the pauses between battles, I warped in a cybernetics core, a forge, and another gateway.

Something smells fishy...

Hmm. 3 sunkens, early expand, 36 lings. What can that mean. My god, Why didn't I know before! He was going mutalisks! And I have 1 dragoon. Now, I'm in deep shit. Shit, shit, shit. A forge, and a citadel of adun was ordered. 2 plyons were constructed in my mineral line. As soon as the forge completed, 3 cannons were warped in. A templar archives was started, and my exess gas went to goons. Psi storm was ordered, as well as a high templar. Seeing as I had about 500 minerals, I warped in a nexus at my natural, an assimilator, and 2 pylons. By now, I have about 12 zealots, 2 dragoons, and 1 high templar. A scouting zealot spots a queen, before getting broodlinged. Then, it hits me. 10 mutalisks go for my natural suppy line. Aparrently, they had hold position, or something, as when I pulled back my probes, they attacked the assimilator. After storming all of them, He retreated them into my main supply line. Smart move. 3 photon cannons + 10 9 hp mutas= 10 dead mutas. I might have lost maybe 3 probes in the attack. I tried to counter-attack, but, unfortunatly, my zeals were slaughtered by his sunkens. I pulled them back, and decided to tech. An robotics bay was warped in, as well as a robotics support bay.After loading up 2 templar, and a goon into the shuttle, It headed for his main. I saw a greater spire, and spore colonies, so I pulled back. Dropping the payload at his natural, 2 storms later, only 3 drones were left mining. I then loaded up, and returned to base. Seeing the advantage of expanding, I sent 2 goons, and a probe to the 6 main. Bad idea. He had an expansion there both at the natural, and at the main. After sending about a dozen more goons, the exxpansion fell, but then the dragoons quickly fell to about 40 hydras. Things were looking bleak. fortunatly, my probe survived, and warped in 2 gateways in the corner of the 6 main.

Your forces are under attack. Guardians were lobbing their acid balls at my natural. Fortunatly, 2 storms, and 3 goons later, they were beaten off, with the loss of 4-8 probes, and 1 templar. Unfortuantly, that was just a diversion for his attack of at least 40 hydras. Storm was used quite freely in this battle, but he destroyed ALL of my dragoons. 10 probes were forced to pull off mining to deal with the remaining 2 hydras.

Feeling vengefull, I loaded up one reaver, and a goon to send to his 3 natural. 20 dead drones, and 15 hydras later, the reaver, and the goon were dead. I loaded up 2 high templar this time, and sucsessfully wiped out 7 more drones. The templars were sent to the 6 main where they took care of 8 more drones, untill chased away by hydras. Unfortuaanly, I lost track of the shuttle, and it just dissapeared.

Where are his minerals coming from then? A scouting goon was sent to the 9 main, and it spotted 2 frunctioning expansions. The natural was lightly defended, so I sent in a control group of goons. Unfortuanly the sunkens, and some hydras held, killing all the goons. I naked expanded to my mineral-only.

Then, another wave of hydras hit me. Again, almost all my goon forces were destroyed, with storm being my main weapon. His expansion had to be brought down now, as his other bases were almost empty. 3 reavers, and 3 goons were dropped, but he sent about 30 hydras, and a lot of lings at the reavers. They were just overrun ( we all love the part where the scarab flies all the way around the mineral line, don't we? At this point, I was starving. Then, it hit me. A wave of around 30 more hydras. While storm held for some time, my templars didn't have the energy, and the ones with the energy got killed. Good games were exchanged, and after seeing his bases, whitch were, 3 main, 3 natural, 6 main, 9 main, 9 natural vs my 12 main 12 natural 12 mineral and a hidden 6 natural, I conceeded the game. Lessons learned: 1. Scarabs are stupid. 2. Take pictures. 3. Deny expansions. 4. Storm > hydras 5. I should stick to zerg