German 6-gate: Socke's crushing PvZ opener

Giacomo "Socke" Thüs is a veteran and often times underrated protoss player that has shown remarkably solid macro play since the beta. He was one of the first to showcase nexus first against terran in tournament play some time ago, doing it against players like Jung “Mvp” Jong-Hyun. He just recently took out Park "DongRaeGu" Soo Ho during his incredible MLG Anaheim run this past weekend. He has consistently shown strong, corner-cutting play, having balls of steel in any aspect of the game where he thinks he can take that extra step to get an advantage. 

Well, he’s taken that step in the PvZ matchup recently in a build in which he goes gasless 1 gateway nexus straight into cybercore and then forge last. And he doesn't even add a cannon. Wait, what?  How is this possibly safe, has the greedy macro-toss gone too far? Are those luscious German locks clouding his typical great judgement? Of course not! This build is incredibly powerful, especially against the current meta-game within the PvZ match-up. Also, it's not macro-oriented necessarily, just greedy at the correct points.

The main ideas of this FE opener are:
- Significantly quicker warpgate (roughly ~1:00)
- Low gas (at one point to pull probes off of gas entirely)
- Very powerful +1 zealot 6 gateway attack. This attack hits right around when the typical zerg has just completed his roach warren (~7:30).  Let's take a look at just how this build pans out (raw build order notes are at the end).

 

Sim-City and Early-Game Concepts

wall setup: pylon, cybernetics core, forge, and one zealot.

Here it is, the thinnest early-game defense you've ever seen in a PvZ FE build. That's his second pylon built on 17 acting as a main part of the wall, followed by the cybernetics core, and then the forge. The zealot sneaks in to complete the wall-off after being chronoboosted out of a 13 gateway. The timings are tight, but it's not as unsafe as it looks considering most zergs don't even take gas until ~6:00 and have three hatcheries before ~5:00.

But what if zerglings come up to poke? Well this is a scenario you'll get used to if you use this build. It requires a little bit of shuffling with your initial zealot, quickly chronoing out your second zealot to seal the wall as the first zealot ventures out to deal with them, and potentially rebuilding a pylon one hex back as the zerglings pick at the first one. Essentially, it'll cause you a headache, but unless it's more than 4-6 slow zerglings, it shouldn't do any damage beyond damage/kill the easily replaceable pylon. If for some reason you scout any signs of further aggression with your intial probe (gas being taken earlier than usual, no third hatchery), the cannons can still be placed down in time to defend. 

So now you decide the pokes are done and it's going to be standard play from the zerg. Great, time to put on the heat faster than he's use to.

German 6-gate

Much like the infamous Korean 4-gate, You get just enough gas for a few key upgrades and pull all probes off of the 2 geysers. Once there is enough gas to get WG, +1 attack on his forge, and has 1 stalker out on the field (200 gas), it goes into a full-out mineral party. This allows the 5 additional gateways to be built right on time, proxy pylons to be planted down, and zealots to be warped in with ease. 

Unlike the infamous beta build, you put probes in gas quickly after the gateways finish up to continue the follow-up, but this is what the zerg's third should be looking like initially if things go correctly.

unprepared third for the noms

If there is a lack of spines, a few roaches, and/or mostly lings, keep warping in. We're going for the most efficient trades possible, trading larva of the zerg (lings, roaches, and ideally drones) for our +1 zealots. If you properly time the gas, your next warp-in round can be with 3 zealots and 3 stalkers to deal with roaches more effectively. 

The third doesn't have to be taken down. Huge, huge damage doesn't have to be dealt. The reason we're able to hit sooner and with more units is not because we're going more "all-in" necessarily, but because we cut significant defensive corners in the beginning to hit faster. Technically, you could do the same opener, but only get three additional gateways while continually mining from the geysers. However, the power of 6 gateways means that just making a few roaches won't cut it, and it makes the follow-up of this build hit a little harder.

(Un)Familiar Territory

Blink Stalkers with +2 timing attack hitting at around ~10:30-11:00, something that top zergs are very familiar with and have likely faced 1,000s of times. They've become increidbly adept at handling such an attack. However, this build forces so many units much earlier on, that it actually puts them in kind of an awkward spot that they're not quite used to. Of course there are other builds that force units from zerg. The most popular is still a traditional FFE 4 gate +1 zealot attacks that usually hits ~1:00 later and weaker, being dealt with very effectively with just a few roaches, or a swell of lings and a spine-crawler if scouted. 

This G6Gate hits harder and ~1:00 earlier, leaving zergs scrambling to re-assemble their economy, upgrades, and infrastructure in order to handle the second on-slaught of +2 blink stalkers coming just ~2:00 after they've cleaned up your intial 6-gate pressure. 

the follow-up blink +2 attack and a dead DRG

 Note the time, it's 11:07. DRG is less than halfway complete with roach speed and +1 carapace (his only upgrade), with 3 spines in the making. Essentially, he's caught with his pants down, even though this is the same time this push would normally come, and Socke has a worse composition with maybe a few less stalkers and no sentry support. However, with good clean blink micro and just a little zealot support to tank any speedlings, Socke prevails. In this particular case, he ends up winning the game out-right, but if you do significant damage you can fall back and take a third. 

This build exploits typical early game passivity from the zerg to create a stronger and better attack timing. With practice on the timings, sim-city, and transition, you can have plenty of success with this efficiently brutal build. Here are some numbers for the opener:

note: chrono usage mostly on probes, the intial gateway for quick zealots, and the +1 upgrade, not warpgate

- 9 pylon (in main)
- 13 gateway (in main)
- 17 pylon (at natural)
- 17 nexus
- 19 zealot
- 21 assim
- 22 cyber (at natural)
- 22 forge (at natural)
- 22 zealot
- 22 assimilator
- stalker
- warpgate with next 50 gas
- +1 attack with next 100 gas
- pull probes off of gas briefly to power out 5 additional gateways when WG research is at ~50%

- put probes back in gas once gateways are built
- 1st wave of warp-ins: exclusively zealots
- follow-up: double gas at natural, twilight council, blink, +2 attack
- big blink +2 stalker push at ~11:00


Good luck!