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@Endymion, here you go: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/bw-strategy/513900-zvt-how-to-play-vs-pure-mech
Endy says “I don't think we can see it as a new counter of the usual mech transition/current TvZ meta because the game was actually very unsual” See my previous posts. It is a new style but I agree this game is not a good one to draw conclusions from and if I had seen just this game in isolation I wouldn’t have thought it a new style.
Endy says “…ninja expo” Its not a hidden expo entirely, it’s a close 3rd base. See my previous posts, discussing cross spawn is better and stuff.
Endy says “Ssak's mech switch was much earlier than the usual mech switch” Er, ssak didn’t mech switch in this game.
Endy says “Ssak definitely made a mistake by not building any turret in his main due to the surprise effect of the muta switch.” Yes I agree. Pretty damn hard to scout though.
Endy says “[if ssak scouted the spire? muta? and made turrets in time] … the game would have gone in Ssak's favour” Not necessarily. Enough so for me to say not necessarily.
“Ssak was over confident” Not necessarily “which caused him to be way too aggressive” Not necessarily “he kept using small groups of units” Sort of “we all know that mech balls are exponentially stronger as their size grows” He didn’t go mech. Small tank armies can hit very hard if the timing is right. Similarly big mech armies can hit very weakly if the timing is not right. But yes I agree, but still he didn’t go mech switch anyway.
Endy says “A large enough mech ball is just invicible without defilers” No. Hydra queen can deal with mech switch, and ultra ling can, and ultra drops can. Defilers can sometimes mean too much to micro. But I agree in principal that defilers are always pretty useful. Check out my earlier posts if you want.
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You may call it a close 3rd, but it would have died easily if it had been scouted earlier, I don't see the difference with a ninja expo.
Very early two factories with vults+mines instead of starport for vessel is definitely a kind of mech switch, call it bio mech if you want because it's true that he kept producing m&m.
“which caused him to be way too aggressive” Not necessarily “he kept using small groups of units” Sort of “we all know that mech balls are exponentially stronger as their size grows” He didn’t go mech. Small tank armies can hit very hard if the timing is right. Similarly big mech armies can hit very weakly if the timing is not right. But yes I agree, but still he didn’t go mech switch anyway.
He was definitely overly aggressive. He never had more than a few tanks a time, he could have just waited for a slightly larger ball + 6 tanks and would have destroyed anything zerg could have thrown at him.
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I didn't see anything remarkable here. I figured he would GG before going hive, took some nice trades and won. I don't see any reason why he'd have gone defiler in this game. GTR posted a better example anyway.
Still, interesting to see. sSak didn't look too hot.
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1. The second factory came in response to the lurker opening, with the backbone of the army being bio until the gg. 2. In these positions, 3rd is an extremely easy to kill for terran. Of course that's why he didn't scout it and only realised when zerg reinforced from 6 (or at least I think so, maybe Ssak knew earlier) Overall, zerg opened lurkers and based on the fact that terran needs to save scans, went for tricky play (close 3rd to terran without an army, muta switch) He still lost the natural and only won because he took better engagements every single time catching his opponent out of position, losing any of those would make the terran army too much to handle with 2/3 base lair tech. Edit: the game on Rush Hour is a usual fast Hive with Jae switching to hydra lurk only after plague is done
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Here is an example game. Its Jiko vs Flash. Flash uses a valk opener. He then skips science facility and tanks. He makes 3rd cc at the 3rd, gets mines and mech switches. Jiko goes 3 hat muta to lurker then skips hive and makes hydra.
Time stamped to 1h32m40s youtu.be
Some other little snippets that might interest people all taken from recent Jiko games: + Show Spoiler +In one game vs last, the zerg made 2 hydralisk dens and made hydras in the midgame, was funny. At 38.52 Last scans the double den: youtu.beIn the game after that one, on Circuit Breaker, terran uses a wraith opening. Zerg takes the 9 o clock as his 3rd. He makes hydras and drops them in terrans main. youtu.beIn a game vs Ssak on Circuit Breaker, zerg takes the 9 o clock as his 3rd: youtu.beIn this game vs Flash, zerg goes hydra guardian: youtu.be
@endy: + Show Spoiler +3rd location + Show Spoiler +I agree that the 3rd probably might have died if it had been scouted earlier (depends if we are talking pre tanks or not etc). And I agree that taking a 3rd at an unusual location is aided by being unexpected, so often scouted later. I agree that in these spawn locations, taking the close 3rd is not as strategically viable. I said in a previous post that if cross spawn in particular then taking a close 3rd with lurker opening can be quite successful (but I still don’t recommend it as the best). This can also be done more successfully if zerg spawns infront of terran, rather than behind like in the example game in the OP. Mech switch and biomech labelling blargh + Show Spoiler +At 19.34 ssak tries to make a 3rd factory. If he had made it, I would give you that ‘biomech’ tag for his lategame. The timing of the 2nd factory is significant yes so I guess I will give you the ‘biomech’ tag for the early midgame. It was a response to the lurker opening so its not a kind of wild deviation or anything but is very nice. Getting mines is not massively an indicator, but yes it technically is more mechy than not getting mines. But you can get mines from just 1 fac and still do a mnm based lategame and I wouldn’t call that biomech. For me biomech would really be 3 or more facs though. And for the indicators of mech switch: Ssak used a 4 rax midgame. We then have to see if he adds more rax after that point or not, if a 2nd ebay is made, and normally a 2nd starport too. He did indeed get more rax, he went to 6, then later 7. He didn’t get a 2nd ebay or starport though. This game was lower econ and volatile and lair tech though. Should he have made a 2nd ebay? Well that is connected with his long term gameplan which I touch on later, but also the lower econ nature of the game might have affected this decision too. To indicate a mech switch, tell tale signs are you dont get a 2nd star (almost always). You don’t get additional barracks after however many you used in the midgame (up to 5 normally). You don’t get a 2nd ebay (almost always). You do get an armoury, you do get a 2nd and 3rd fac. And you do lift your rax and go up to 7 facs. And obviously the main indicator is you don’t make mnm and you do make factory units lol. However, Mong in particular sometimes uses a style where he does a delayed mech switch. He continues making mnm from 5 rax, and he gets 2-1 marine upgrades (normally in a mech switch you only get 1-1). He stays on mnm for an extended time with the classic bit of tank vessel support, bit of vultures, bit of dropships etc. And he doesn’t do his mech switch until after zerg has been on hive and 4 base for a little while. But games like these are rare from most players. Most players when they do a mech switch, it is done in quite a specific order of buildings and amount of units every time. Now admittedly some terrans are pushing the boundaries again, and experimenting with cutting more corners again. The game I link at the start of this post, Flash skips science facility completely, and makes his 3rd cc at the 3rd, and doesn’t make any tanks. (skipping the tanks isnt such a new thing though). But Flash does it with mines first and defensively rather than speed first and pressuring the zerg 3rd base which is newer style. If you want to read more about mech switching and stuff, Ive recently written a load in these threads: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/bw-strategy/513244-tvz-axiom-build-orderhttp://www.teamliquid.net/forum/bw-strategy/418143-zvt-how-to-play-vs-mech-switch?page=2#38Overly aggressive at times: + Show Spoiler +I agree that Ssak was overly aggressive at times. Note there were times when he had 5 tanks. There were times when he moved forward at good timings. And there were moments where he was overly aggressive. There were moments where he was ‘outplayed’ and overall Id say he didn’t control as well as he could have and stuff like that. The first comment of yours was ‘way too aggressive’ which I felt was potentially a bit too strong, maybe misleading to people who are unsure which moments specifically, and maybe oversimplifying. I cant tell exactly what you are thinking without more details basically. But the example game in the OP is volatile and not the best game to warrant a huge amount of time analysing. So Im definitely not asking you for details, I don’t think its worth it. I went ahead a did a bit more though so I may as well post it anyway. T had killed 2 bases over time, and had taken his 3rd quite successfully, so even though he scouted the large zerg army, there is an argument to be made, a method to the madness in choosing to be very (on purposely sort of overly) aggressive. I don’t personally agree with it, but you have to give credit to the player that he might have known exactly what he was doing. For example, think about Game 3 of the recent ASL finals (SPOILERS, DONT OPEN IF YOU HAVENT SEEN YET) + Show Spoiler +Eyewater vs Sharp, Protoss first reaver gets 11 scv kills which is ok. The 2nd and 3rd reaver don’t achieve much, only 1 goliath kill really and they do buy some time but not loads. P attacks with 9 goons, 10 zealots and kills 4 tanks, a few scv and a vult or two. P drops 2 ht and gets 5 scv kills. P drops another 2 ht and gets only 2 scv. He loses 5 goons to mines. At this stage you might think he shouldn’t be aggressive. However, he commits to a frontal bust and is very successful. This is maybe sort of kind of comparable to what ssak is doing in this game in the later stages. Terran might have thought if he can whittle down the zerg army, he will be able to overpower the zerg eventually. It can be a style choice to quickly re-apply pressure and attempt a continued fighting style. But ofcourse once things start going badly and you lose units, it can be unwise to continue that. I personally don’t recommend continuing it. But at the same time, it is sometimes ok to decide ‘Im going to enter into a kind of ‘battle mode’ rather than use a management style. Hmm this is quite hard to explain. Sometimes a player will choose to continue a full aggression style even when its not absolutely best to do so. And yet its still a good decision to sometimes do this just to be an unpredictable player in the long run, or to gain initiative, and things like that. When you have 7 rax, 2 fac and a star, and you are going up against a zerg who lost 2 base over time, and is choosing not to use defiler but instead a hydra and mass lair unit lategame, it can be a good decision to really get in their face. With all that said, yes I do totally agree that Ssak was overly aggressive at times. Here are some moments in the game where he may or may not have made a good move. @19.04 Terran moves out with 2 squads of mnm and 5 tanks. The army gets wiped. @20.05 Terran pokes out and has 3 tanks supporting. Doesn’t lose too much. @20.32 Terran moves out with 4 tanks supporting. Terran army gets halved. @21.36 Terran forces join up, he has 5 tanks and an acceptable size army overall. @21.48 Terran presses his attack too far. @22.16 Terran army gets killed, ssak’s fault. @22.56 Terrans army is not united and takes losses. @23.16 Terrans army is small from all these lost battles. @23.55 Terran moves forward, he has a good number of marines but not enough tanks. A bit spread out and some tanks get sniped and a vessel. @24.30 Terran pushes north and chooses to leave 2 tanks on the bottom path. He doesn’t have enough marines quite. @24.50 Zerg attacks and is successful.
@zyce: + Show Spoiler +While the game isnt amazingly remarkable, it is worth filing just incase other games start to show a trend developing. GTR’s example game is from 2009 which is pretty old, lots has happened since then. Secondly and most importantly its on Rush Hour which is a very nonstandard map with wide open nats. Thirdly, JD uses muta then lurker ling and continues using lurker ling until he gets defilers. He doesn’t make speed hydras before defiler. He continues making lurker ling with darkswarm for a long while too. And lastly, Flash kills 2 bases, a lot of drones, and resnipes a base not long after too so its quite volatile which is not what we want ideally. But mainly it rush hour which is nonstandard map. There are lots of random legacy games, Jaedong, July etc where we can watch hydralurk no hive etc. The thread is about a possible new trend that is being experimented with again.
ortseam: + Show Spoiler +ortseam says “1. The second factory came in response to the lurker opening, with the backbone of the army being bio until the gg.” Yes it was certainly not a mechswitch. And while I conceded you could in some ways call it biomech, personally I wouldn’t really do that. How would I label it? Well honestly I call it 7 rax 2 fac 1 star, but Im boring like that haha.
ortseam says “2. In these positions, 3rd is an extremely easy to kill for terran.” I agree these are the worst spawns to take a close 3rd. ortseam says “zerg only won because he took better engagements” I agree. ortseam says “losing any of those fights would have made the terran army too much to handle” Well, he did lose some of the fights sort of.
ortseam says “the game on Rush Hour is a usual fast Hive with Jae switching to hydra lurk only after plague is done” Well, JD took an unusual third, and he took a 4th before hive, and simultaneously took a quick 5th, all spread out. So it wasn’t standard. And he didn’t get plague before speed hydra.
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like others said he was more forced into low eco build with hes nat destroyed early, but at the same time jd is know to go for hydras when vsing mech rather than ultraling defiler.
jd did a good job with speed hydras to snipe the low tank numbers then pull b and lure the mm into the lurkers. Also a good mid game flank from jd eating up ssak's army.
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what im saying is he was forced not to spend money going hive, wats the point of going hive? to get defilers with no army? jd choose to stay on lair tech and end the game there, ssak helped him do that by sending out small forces out to get eaten.
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First off, jd was on 2 bases, he cannot support hive tech so I look at it as he is forced to stick to lair, defilers with few lurker is not as effective as mixing in speed hydras, its a much slower push and less mobile, on top of that defilers can easily get sniped by vessels, its essentially throwing away money.
secondly, guardians are not an option, most of hes mutas were wiped from the base trade, and 2 base gas cannot support lurker guardian, and naked pure guardians get owned.
I havent watched the replay of jiko vs flash will get b to u on that.
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Will this work strategically? Yes, considering how difficult it is for Terran to constantly move around and defend their bases. The idea behind this is to just out-macro and out-trade while the Terran is doing the tech change. Ssak stayed bio but also on "two" bases the entire time, as his 3rd was very late and his main basically mined out.
Not only was Ssak's army constantly being sniped, he also never expanded his production beyond ~6rax, 2facs, and 1 starport (he also fell behind in upgrades I believe). Trying to maintain your army off 6raxes, 2facs is not going to be easy against at least 5 hatcheries.
Even if he had kept his army alive better, he would've lost eventually. The entire game he was denied and unable to move beyond the middle of the map...losing the first hatchery was pretty good for the terran, but he was cut off by the mutas and unable to press his advantage. Losing the 2nd hatch was nothing, as he had already gotten so much value from the 6 o'clock expansion and he probably already had another expansion set up 3 oclock and planning to set up the 2 o'clock base as well.
If you stay hydra/lurk/muta the entire time while the Terran gets his bases set up and is able to keep up in macro with you, then you're just wasting money and are better off with ultra/ling/deflier/muta, as the extra 25/25 for every hydralisk versus a pair of zerglings will is quite noticable in the long run, hence why 424 decided to just surrender early as his last army got killed by unsieged tanks. He also may have done that against Flash only as he figured he would die to the incoming timing push as he tried to go for hive tech.
As far as how many bases does the zerg have to be on to do this? It's not that difficult to sustain a hydra/lurker army if you aren't investing gas into hive tech and defliers. All you have to do is drop an extra hatchery, preferably at an expansion, and just make sure you're always on 3 gases. Hell, you could do it off two gases if you're really good at engagements and aren't losing every engagement.
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Based on ZvP you need 3 gas for proper hydralurkerling, on 2 gas you can only morph the odd lurker here and there .
In one game vs last, the zerg made 2 hydralisk dens and made hydras in the midgame, was funny. At 38.52 Last scans the double den: youtu.be LOL 2 hatch hydra zvt was hilarious, guess he was hoping for 1 rax ebay
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Really?! Is this a thing? I would never expect a defilerless zerg play versus terran.
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On September 23 2016 04:03 Atom[Bomb] wrote: Really?! Is this a thing? I would never expect a defilerless zerg play versus terran. I think personally I'd rather play vs Defilerless zerg any day i welcome this style.
it would be interesting to see if there is a meta shift after all these years away from it though.
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I recently saw Miso's FPV Stream with something similar, but can't find the VOD now :/ It was just a couple of days ago.
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Terran never switched to mech during this game. A mech switch means adding on a full infrastructure of factories and lifting your barracks. Ssak here only made a few vultures with his tanks and never made more than 2 factories, and continued pumping out of 4-6 barracks to the end. As several people have pointed out, this is an unsual situation for many reasons. But it's also not a mech switch at all. It's just two factory tanks with infantry support.
This is something that might confuse some newer players because it isn't popular anymore. But if you look back to older games like around the Savior era and earlier, terrans used to go 2-fact tank to support their first major infantry push (excluding early pressure on zerg's natural at pre-lair timings), all the time. That phased out of popularity when terrans started favouring 2-port vessels right into the endgame a lot more, and eventually started doing the Flash late game thing of taking a second main and adding two factories there for 4 factories total producing tanks with infantry/vessel support, and finally the modern era of moderate 4 barracks 1 port pressure, into double containment with spidermines, into full vulture/tank/goliath late game. Totally different beast.
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Terran should have went mass ghosts from 3k gas.
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Without defiler, I think queens need to be added to the mix. they're cheap and really mobile, Ensnare needs to be used more often, it's so underrated. Especially ZvP where toss has no restorations and more expensive units, broodlings parasite and ensnare are way better than muta ht snipe.
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On October 07 2016 20:44 toadtoad wrote: Without defiler, I think queens need to be added to the mix. they're cheap and really mobile, Ensnare needs to be used more often, it's so underrated. Especially ZvP where toss has no restorations and more expensive units, broodlings parasite and ensnare are way better than muta ht snipe. but the range of broodlings is more short than parasyte and the angle is very important too,what i mean is broodlings ht is not so easy.
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