[nirvAnA]

For those familiar with Wings of Liberty and new to HoTS, this three part series will serve as a complete guide to get your familiar with all the new HotS units. You may be aware of your race's changes but understanding the other races too will help greatly with your understanding of the game. It will talk about their abilities, costs and how they are used in competitive play. It will assume you are already familiar with Starcraft and have played Wings of Liberty. Apart from the mechanical changes which make the game easier to play, HotS has made the game more micro intensive. The ability to cheese has been significantly reduced too. This article was written by Singapore's last Starcraft 2 WCG champion nirvAnA .

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New HoTS Protoss Units

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Cost: 100 100 30 2

The Mothership Core is by far the BEST new protoss unit in HotS. It is a mobile air unit that takes just 30 seconds to build. Although it has limited range and weak damage, its value is derived from its ability so scout easily and its spells which add significantly to your defensive and offensive abilities. You should always aim to get this ASAP.

+ [Abilities Explained] +

Time Warp is so damn strong

75 Time Warp: Costing only 75 energy, it creates a bubble that slows ground units to half their movement speed for 30 seconds. This is extremely powerful, its like a mass marauder concussive shell on an area and allows you to pick off units easily - and you usually have enough energy to cast two of them. In the middle and late game, it is extremely powerful when used with psionic storms and it makes forcefields easier to cast. You can also use it to slow down their mining rate slightly by casting it in their mineral line.

100 Photon Overcharge: Empowers a target nexus to deal 20 damage lasting for 1 minute with a super long range of 13. The same as a siege tank's range!

100 Mass Recall: Teleport your entire army around your mothership core back to your target nexus. This means your mothership core must be nearby your army, and you also need to individually click on the nexus you wish to teleport back to. It works great versus zerg in the middle game, allowing you to recall your entire army home if you've just sniped his third and are about to be overwhelmed by his reinforcements. Its good late game and it really helps against base trading or hit and run snipes.

300 300 Upgrade To Mothership: Upgrades your core into the mothership. You can still use time warp and mass recall in this mode. Note there is no more vortex spell in HotS.

+ [Use in competitive play] +

1. Scouting - It allows COMPLETE scouting and for you to exert some tiny pressure. You no longer have to play in the dark in the early game against all the races and you can know exactly what they are up to. Too many units? Don't move out yet, just chill in your base or perhaps even expand.

With the mofo core scouting you will know exactly when to move out and engage. Ran into a sticky situation? Just recall!

2. It is the anti-cheese. The Photon Overcharge ability helps tremendously against 1/1/1 plays, 4 gates and Baneling busts / Roach breaks. Fantastic all round anti-cheese spell.

It completely denies 4 gates and even proxy gates.
Even though my gates were a bit too far from my nexus, having this spell easily won me the game.

3. Offensive Ability - It gives you great defensive ability and at the same time is very powerful when used offensively as well. Firstly because of the Time Warp spell and secondly because you no longer need an observer to spot high ground, making offensive plays so much stronger. Every Protoss WoL timing is stronger and hits faster because of this. Will elaborate more on this and the exact builds to use in our TGM Starcraft 2 guide.

Most terrans have still not adapted and are building their depots at the ramp.
A mothership core with 3 stalker poke can easily kill 2 supply depots for free, even if there is a bunker between them.
This terran was decent and was able to use spider mines to protect his depots.

Cost: 150 150 50 3

The Oracle is a decent edition to HotS and works best as a harassment unit as it 2 shots all workers. With all the new HotS units being air units, it seems Blizzard really wants to push "Sky Toss". Although the oracle is seemingly fragile, it can actually beat a stalker 1 vs 1 and up to 5 marines because it 2 shots marines! It works best solo rather than in groups, because it has stupid pathing and requires the unit to completely stop before being able to attack, making its utility go way down in numbers.

+ [Abilities Explained] +

75 Revelation: Its a bit like Terran's scanner sweep but it must be cast on units or buildings. It gives you reduced vision of those units/buildings for a much longer period of 1 minute and your oracle must be at the location to cast it. Great for keep track of army movement and its other very important use is in conjunction with the tempest. The tempest's vision is much shorter than its maximum range so it requires units to spot for it and revelation is perfect for this.

Left pic shows the radius when casting, right picture shows the markers.
Units and buildings which you have vision of will have a marker on them for 1 minute

50 Envision: Gives the Oracle a 14 radius detection around it, lasting 1 minute . Don't be confused with revelation which offers no detection! You can use it immediately when it pops out of the stargate, making opening stargate in PvP a very viable option as it will allow you to deal with DTs easily.

When revelation is active, the Oracle will be illuminated like above.

50 Activate Pulsar Beam: The most powerful oracle spell, it can be a game winner against an opponent caught off guard when left in their mineral line. It deals 15 damage (+10 bonus to light) meaning it does 25 damage a shot to light units and two shots units like workers, marines and zerglings. It drains energy as long as its active to remember to deactivate it after you're done. Having only 100 life and 60 shields, it is relatively fragile.

+ [Use in competitive play] +

1. Harassment - This is its primary use, recently many protoss players like MC have been executing early game pressure by harassing the mineral line. Remember the oracle can take up to 5 marines at a time and this allows you to pick off stray marines easily, and if you have done enough damage or distracted his mineral line sufficiently you can actually break down his front. This forces the good terrans to get spider mines to defend against this.

At the very least, even if you do minimal damage you force him to make turrets or leave his units in his mineral line. You should then use the oracle for scouting purposes, using revelation to keep an eye on his army. Meanwhile look for holes in his expansion mineral lines where you can sneak in and do damage. Never lose your oracle because having a single one should force him to make defense at all his expansion mineral lines making it well worth the investment.

2. Opens tech paths - It was originally designed to give protoss players more tech choices, allowing them to open up with stargate play instead of the typical robo / collosus against all races. In PvP the problem of detection against DTs is solved making the matchup have much less variance. It is not as popular against Zerg as Phoenixes are still the default choice and versus Terran it does decently when used in combination with collosi.

Cost: 300 200 60 4

A capital ship meant to directly counter the brood lords composition that was to replace the carrier. Fans pleaded with Blizzard to keep the carrier so we ended up with both. It has an insane range of 15 and it does an incredible +50 damage to massive air units like broodlords and battle cruisers. It moves extremely slow and has no abilities. Its vision is much shorter than its maximum range so it requires units to spot for it and the Oracle's revelation is perfect for this.

You should never see this in a competitive game until late game, and only versus a zerg who is camping into that dreaded WoL spine / infestor / broodlord combination. Update: Blysks adds that Tempests are used in Pvp to fight aginst colossus as well, and in pvt if Terran is going mech Tempest are used in conjunction with the revelation spell on the oracle.

Other Protoss Changes

• The Dark Shrine now just costs 150 150 making it extremely cheap and a must make in many matchups for more flexibility.
• Sentries now start with the hallucination ability already researched. Tip: Hallucinating probes creates 4 of them.
• Phoenixes now start with 5 range, no longer needed the range upgrade to be able to "kite" mutas. You can still upgrade it further at the fleetbacon!
• Low ground pylons are no longer able to power buildings or warp in units on higher ground areas.
• The mothership now builds from the mothership core instead of a nexus. It cannot be chrono boosted but its build time has been reduced.
• Void Ray's have been redesigned and they now cost 4 food. Instead of a "charge" their bonus attack now starts off "fully charged" in the form of a ability called "Prismatic Alignment". It last for 20 seconds and has a bonus damage of 6 to armored units and buildings, which also means the ability is useless against non-armored units like hydras. The cool down is 60 seconds so make sure not to overuse it. This makes void ray / collosi a very popular combination as the voids melt corruptors and the collosi anything on land.

What to expect in the updated TGM:

+ [Teaser] +

My protoss brothers! A few weeks ago I blogged about an 'unbeatable' build I was having success with, when got me to the #1 GM spot really quickly. I ended up getting a sick win rate with it! Will be sharing this in TGM very shortly!

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This article was written by Singapore's last Starcraft 2 WCG champion nirvAnA who is one of the authors of the Starcraft 2 Guide - The Grandmaster Manual, along with mOOnGLaDe , PiG and iaguz . This will be the start of our TGM guide revision which will be updated with all the latest strategies for HotS and later Legacy of the Void. All new subscribers will also receive access to our earlier WoL TGM content too. Check out the glowing testimonials we have received!

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- A complete guide to Starcraft 2 HotS changes for each race -

Protoss HotS Changes | Terran HotS Changes | Zerg HotS Changes

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[syfRize]

Great stuff nirvAnA ^_^

Keep it comin'!

[Blysk]

Tempests are used in Pvp to fight agnst colossus as well.
In pvt if Terran is going mech Tempest are used in conjunction with the revelation spell on the oracle too.

Tips to all tosses and nirvana

[nirvAnA]

oh thanks, added! I haven't played that much late game PvP yet.

Do you think tempests are better than void rays in dealing with collosi tech? Mass voids seem so strong too.

[Blysk]

yea tempest like 4-5 shot colos or smth ridiculous. and they can shoot from relaly far, and cant be countered by just blink and storms so easily like vr's can be

Quick Comments

nirvAnA:

nice!

[ToRFutureBoy]

I did not know you could Hallucinate probes, or that they created 4 of them. Not a bad option for ground scouting.

[Dox]

Originally Posted by ToRFutureBoy

I did not know you could Hallucinate probes, or that they created 4 of them. Not a bad option for ground scouting.

If you bind your Hallucinate key to 'E', you can hold it down on multiple sentries to create an instant army of 40+ Hallucinated Probes. With the correct application of Hold Position, they can be better than Forcefields.

Quick Comments

	FLuX:	genius
	ToRFutureBoy:	That's pretty awesome!

[ToRFutureBoy]

Oh, also, perhaps add in the max energy for the mothership core?

[wλveLength]

Thanks nirvAnA! Looking forward to the next TGM...

Also looking forward to some ridiculous fake probe pull all ins!

[eCKo`Tazerenix]

Tempests can be combined with map-wide 20-gateway gateway walls in any matchup of your choice to annoy and destroy your opponents.

Quick Comments

pXAero:

Interesting, will have to try

[Makuly]

The best section (protoss) hasnt been updated yet. I'm assuming you're saving the best for last =P?
Lookging forward to what you have to say about HotS protoss!

[nirvAnA]

will try my best to get it out by end of the month! there will be two bos for each protoss matchup. one set will be macro based the other set would be.. umm.. "fast games"

and right now i'm all fast games! lol