So I play Zerg and my friend plays Toss, and he base rushes me(building photon cannons in my base about 2 minutes into the game) before I even have time to build a defense. Suggestions?

PULL ALL THE WORKERS

Uninstall the game.

I guess if he keeps doing it... early pool with quick zerglings?

I dunno, or listen to Wunder. That's never bad advice for anything.

Post a replay. It's easier to help if we can watch the game. But getting a 14 pool and using about 4-6 drones hitting the cannons should be enough to defend until zerglings come out.

In general, when I first see the pylon/cannon building (assuming no cannons have finished yet) I'll take about 6 drones and start chipping away. That seems to be the sweet spot number for dealing damage without losing too much mining time. At the same time, I'd say throw up a couple spine crawlers. If you saw the pylon soon enough you should be able to get one up before/when a cannon finishes, and a spine crawler will murder a cannon in an equal fight. I like this response because it takes minimal deviation from what you would have already been doing (basically just one or two spine crawlers)

So I play Zerg and my friend plays Toss, and he base rushes me(building photon cannons in my base about 2 minutes into the game) before I even have time to build a defense. Suggestions?

He has a build a forge first so if you're watching your own base and scouting properly, you should be able to easily pump out a few lings to deal with his proxy pylon pretty quickly.

Don't be an idiot and pull all of your drones. You can ignore the pylon, just make sure to take out the cannons. 3 drones per cannon(More if you can't respond to it quick enough) as soon as you see the cannon going up should be enough. You also want to take out the probe if you have the oppurtunity, so if you can surround it do so.

Just keep holding it off until you've got your spawning pool up and then clean up with your lings. Then you can try to attack him with your lings, but if he's smart he'll wall in with Forge+pylon+cannon(s). Just back off and expand unless you see an option to baneling bust. Most common follow up after the cannon rush is Voidrays, so just make 3-4 Queens and make sure you keep them together while fighting the Voidrays. (Ofcourse it could be something else, but that's why you send an overlord into his base. A Protoss who's only got cannons is really easy to scout so that shouldn't be a problem.

how does cannon runnishg a zerg even work?? If he rushed ur natural, just 1base it up and go for roaches...

pull workers dude. cannon rush is probably the easiest cheese to stop!

how does cannon runnishg a zerg even work?? If he rushed ur natural, just 1base it up and go for roaches...

@baldgye said:

how does cannon runnishg a zerg even work?? If he rushed ur natural, just 1base it up and go for roaches...

I thought cannon rushes usually mean they wall off your main ramp, not your natural expo. Unless you're expecting it and preempted with very early lings (like 11pool or earlier), roaches are going to be far too slow.   Every time I've been cannonrushed, it was because I opened 13pool or 14pool; the proxy usually drops before I can expo with the (mostly) walled off ramp, hence the worker pull.  EDIT: My earlier solution to tech to mutas is if the guy goes nuts with dumping cannons in your base. If he puts few enough cannons that you can rush and shut down the pylon quickly, then you can just build a normal army and be ready to stomp it and the guy's army. But, every cannonrush I've endured involves him literally surrounding my base in cannons, so mutas just wreck his crap. Kill his pylons, nexus and workers and it's instant gg. Worse comes to worse, if he decides to use his lone probe and expo into your natural, then you should be able to snipe his mineral line and nexus from around without submitting to cannon death. 

As others have said pulling all your workers is ABSOLUTELY NOT what you should be doing. 4-6 workers max and attack the probe and kill it. then work on the cannons before they warp in. Once they are in, there is not much you can do until you get several roaches and can bust/nydus/overlord drop your way out.

The best defense against a cannon rush cheese is to scout and see it happening before anything finishes warping in and you can hold it off easily.

@Aus_azn said:

@baldgye said:

how does cannon runnishg a zerg even work?? If he rushed ur natural, just 1base it up and go for roaches...

I thought cannon rushes usually mean they wall off your main ramp, not your natural expo. Unless you're expecting it and preempted with very early lings (like 11pool or earlier), roaches are going to be far too slow.   Every time I've been cannonrushed, it was because I opened 13pool or 14pool; the proxy usually drops before I can expo with the (mostly) walled off ramp, hence the worker pull.  EDIT: My earlier solution to tech to mutas is if the guy goes nuts with dumping cannons in your base. If he puts few enough cannons that you can rush and shut down the pylon quickly, then you can just build a normal army and be ready to stomp it and the guy's army. But, every cannonrush I've endured involves him literally surrounding my base in cannons, so mutas just wreck his crap. Kill his pylons, nexus and workers and it's instant gg. Worse comes to worse, if he decides to use his lone probe and expo into your natural, then you should be able to snipe his mineral line and nexus from around without submitting to cannon death. 

yeah if they cannon rush ur natural... then go 1base roaches expand and pressure/kill the fuck out of them.. cannons are shit vs mass roach

Stop playing with your dickhead mate and start laddering.

Edit: whoops got confused between another thread about almost the same thing, 
 
but yah, just pull workers

@baldgye said:

@Aus_azn said:

@baldgye said:

how does cannon runnishg a zerg even work?? If he rushed ur natural, just 1base it up and go for roaches...

I thought cannon rushes usually mean they wall off your main ramp, not your natural expo. Unless you're expecting it and preempted with very early lings (like 11pool or earlier), roaches are going to be far too slow.   Every time I've been cannonrushed, it was because I opened 13pool or 14pool; the proxy usually drops before I can expo with the (mostly) walled off ramp, hence the worker pull.  EDIT: My earlier solution to tech to mutas is if the guy goes nuts with dumping cannons in your base. If he puts few enough cannons that you can rush and shut down the pylon quickly, then you can just build a normal army and be ready to stomp it and the guy's army. But, every cannonrush I've endured involves him literally surrounding my base in cannons, so mutas just wreck his crap. Kill his pylons, nexus and workers and it's instant gg. Worse comes to worse, if he decides to use his lone probe and expo into your natural, then you should be able to snipe his mineral line and nexus from around without submitting to cannon death. 

yeah if they cannon rush ur natural... then go 1base roaches expand and pressure/kill the fuck out of them.. cannons are shit vs mass roach

Or even better, if you have a scout drone out just take a different base as your natural then kill him by building units from that base because they won't expect as they won't see anything leaving your base.  I find the optimal  base to take to be their main and the optimal location for a hatchery to be that spot in their main where they won't be checking because they suck (they did cannon rush you, didn't they.  Doing logical things like SCOUTING will not be on their agenda).  Even better, build a queen at said proxy hatch to spread creep and deny them building in their base.  It works well because even if you don't successfully kill them, they'll be so occupied with that base in their base that they're likely to make a lot of mistakes because they suck.  From there just make any unit and kill them.  I have had much success with this strategy in response to cannon rushes. 
 
Here's a replay: 
 
http://www.gamereplays.org/starcraft2/replays.php?game=33&show=details&id=217049

Scout it, pull drones to kill the probe (not all of them though), get your pool out faster than normal (if you scout forge first in an area that doesn't suggest Forge FE), make spine crawlers, then when it's over make shitloads of lings, kill him, profit.