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On September 26 2014 22:39 Salient wrote: What is the optimal response to the popular Terran cheese rush that hits at 7:20 with 4 hellbats and 6 marines + medivac?
Maybe you could say what race you play ?
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On September 26 2014 22:53 FFW_Rude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 26 2014 22:39 Salient wrote: What is the optimal response to the popular Terran cheese rush that hits at 7:20 with 4 hellbats and 6 marines + medivac? Maybe you could say what race you play ?
Z
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On September 26 2014 21:52 hatp wrote:Show nested quote +On September 26 2014 11:27 Zheryn wrote:On September 26 2014 10:42 hatp wrote: I'm losing my mind over zerg mirrors vs bane muta. The only way I can fight it is with bane muta. roach/hydra requires me to stay way too defensive while he out expands me. infestor hydra just doesnt work. Mutas dodge fungals too easily now and it always seems to be the case that they have way more banes than make sense. Id really appreciate a good way to counter this but I have a feeling most zergs just follow their opponent into bane muta. Id rather not do that. I do a +1 roach timing to try to kill their third while I drone my own third and go in to roach hydra infestor. Muta ling bane should not beat it, just be careful about your positioning and keep roaches in front and separate a few roaches to be "spotters" for baneling flanks. I find it more useful to try and separate a part of their army with fungal and fight another and be really careful with your army movement rather than trying to take one big fight and fungal as much as possible. Much appreciated. Any chance you or anyone else have a replay of something like this working?
Hm, this is a replay of me against a fast mutalisk build. It's around high diamond MMR and outlines somewhat of my gameplan if I identify mutas: http://drop.sc/386492 (note, I overmake drones a lot in the midgame, because I'm only watching my third saturation and don't transfer enough T_T)
The BO: 15 pool 16 hatch 15 overlord 15 queen 17 zergling - send straight to his main base to scout for his gas timing 18 extractor ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- in case of a normal expansion of your opponent you keep going below; else, flood lings, get a baneling nest if necessary and/or spine crawler(s)... whatever makes you win ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 21 queen (at main) 23 overlord @100% natural: queen @100 gas: zergling speed - if he plays gasless, pull out of the gas; else you might want to get a baneling nest (but not necessary) keep droning, unless you scout an early attack ~40-45 supply take your third and build 10-20zerglings, defend your third with it or try to deny his;
--> use your zerglings to find out whether he is roaching or going for mutas. The tells for roach play are roaches, a roach warren and double evo chambers at the front. (it's not 100% certain, but it's the closest you get to getting the information)
- back into gas, 2more gases, start your double evo, your roach warren, after double upgrades are started build a few roaches ~6 to be safe against lings, unless absolutly not needed start your lair
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- How to play against mutas from here: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- send your overlords back home build 1spore per base and 1 at your wall saturate your three bases start an infestation pit as soon as the lair is done pathogen glands --> infestors+roaches to be safe start 2-2
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) If he goes mutalisk based (like muta/ling/bling); identified by increasing muta numbers, banelings, baneling speed: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> hydralisk den --> hydralisks move out around 200supply *fungal on the banelings!!! --> easy win ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2) If he goes fast ultras; identified by melee ups + low muta count + many zerglings: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- move out around 150supply (not sure about that tbh)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3) If he goes into roaches ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- move out with roach/infestor or roach/hydra/infestor once your 2-2 is done; you have an upgrade advantage, use it!
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On September 26 2014 22:55 Salient wrote:Show nested quote +On September 26 2014 22:53 FFW_Rude wrote:On September 26 2014 22:39 Salient wrote: What is the optimal response to the popular Terran cheese rush that hits at 7:20 with 4 hellbats and 6 marines + medivac? Maybe you could say what race you play ? Z
Well if you do a roach opening you should have your wall, 2queens with one transfuse and some emergency roaches ready when the guy move out. This is the build on one base ?
But i think a more experienced and high level Z will answer your question better.
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United States4883 Posts
On September 27 2014 00:35 FFW_Rude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 26 2014 22:55 Salient wrote:On September 26 2014 22:53 FFW_Rude wrote:On September 26 2014 22:39 Salient wrote: What is the optimal response to the popular Terran cheese rush that hits at 7:20 with 4 hellbats and 6 marines + medivac? Maybe you could say what race you play ? Z Well if you do a roach opening you should have your wall, 2queens with one transfuse and some emergency roaches ready when the guy move out. This is the build on one base ? But i think a more experienced and high level Z will answer your question better.
It's a two base build. You can find it in The Return of Hellbats.
The best way to deal with this is simply to scout with an overlord around 6:00-6:30. If you spot ANYTHING other than super standard 3CC, go ahead and put down a 6:30 roach warren or baneling nest. When the pressure hits a minute later, just make sure to delay upgrades so you have enough gas units (banes/roaches) to deal with it. If you do this (with a bit of micro), it should be an easy hold.
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This build is why I started to build roach on my ZvT openings. And they're so good to get a lot of survivability later on when you want to push with your lings / banes / mutas.
Also, off topic, but it's quite funny that you emphasize the upgrades more on this matchup than the ZvP. I really need to find the appropriates times to get my evolution chambers in this ZvP, because it's killing me a lot more than I could think T_T
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United States4883 Posts
On September 27 2014 02:16 RaiZ wrote: This build is why I started to build roach on my ZvT openings. And they're so good to get a lot of survivability later on when you want to push with your lings / banes / mutas.
Also, off topic, but it's quite funny that you emphasize the upgrades more on this matchup than the ZvP. I really need to find the appropriates times to get my evolution chambers in this ZvP, because it's killing me a lot more than I could think T_T
If you're going +1/+1 lings, get the evos before lair (@150 gas with 2 gases). If you're going roach/hydra or something similar, get a single evo + roach warren @50% lair and start +1 ranged attack. You can also do double ups, but that's a little greedier and more dangerous (not to mention not incredibly useful) against 2-base all-ins. Usually double ups roach/hydra are for a timing. If you go single evo, just build a second one later on and start +2/+1 together.
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Ok, i also decided to open up with roaches in zvt now but if im facing bio/mine i would like to transition into muta/ling/bane later on. There was meantioned Hyuns build some pages ago but thats a pure roach style right, I would like to have a build for roach opening (optional push?) into muta/ling/bane, what exact build do you recommend for this? Maybe also with some benchmarks and scouting decisions, im rly new to the idea of opening roach in zvt;p
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United States4883 Posts
On September 27 2014 22:25 NiDoXiD wrote: Ok, i also decided to open up with roaches in zvt now but if im facing bio/mine i would like to transition into muta/ling/bane later on. There was meantioned Hyuns build some pages ago but thats a pure roach style right, I would like to have a build for roach opening (optional push?) into muta/ling/bane, what exact build do you recommend for this? Maybe also with some benchmarks and scouting decisions, im rly new to the idea of opening roach in zvt;p
If you want to use roaches in ZvT, it's generally used as a timing to do damage, as the value of roaches goes down exponentially as the game goes on. Therefore, I would suggest either a roach/bane bust opening (TangSC recently wrote a short guide to one) or just a roach/ling push without banelings (with ~8 roaches). You can actually also do HyuN's Roach King Build and just transition into muta/ling/bling after the first roach poke at 10:30. Instead of placing down a hydra den and getting +2/+2, you'd just throw down a spire and baneling nest while starting +1 melee and +2 carapace.
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nidoxid, hyun actually did exactly what you're talking about (heavy 1/1 roach aggression into lings and ling/bane/muta transition) and beat taeja with it on merry go round in WCS.
Here is the vod
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How to defend a 9/10 Pool in ZvZ perfect when going 15 Pool 15 Hatch 15 Overlord? I always Pull 4 drones and build 3 sets of Zerglings? i mean the Micro aspects of this Hold
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On September 28 2014 04:54 DERASTAT wrote: How to defend a 9/10 Pool in ZvZ perfect when going 15 Pool 15 Hatch 15 Overlord? I always Pull 4 drones and build 3 sets of Zerglings? i mean the Micro aspects of this Hold You need at the very least 2 drones per zergling for an even battle, so with six lings versus ten, four drones might be enough, but then you really can't make any mistakes going into the engagement. I usually pull more than four, at least around six or seven (not quite sure, actually). I don't see why you would want to try to be overly parsimonious here since 15 pool puts you ahead versus 9/10 pool even if you over-pull drones. So better safe than sorry!
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On September 28 2014 04:54 DERASTAT wrote: How to defend a 9/10 Pool in ZvZ perfect when going 15 Pool 15 Hatch 15 Overlord? I always Pull 4 drones and build 3 sets of Zerglings? i mean the Micro aspects of this Hold
If you are trying to be extra safe vs early pool on 2 player maps, you should go 14 overlord so then you can get 6 lings right away.
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On September 26 2014 22:53 FFW_Rude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 26 2014 22:39 Salient wrote: What is the optimal response to the popular Terran cheese rush that hits at 7:20 with 4 hellbats and 6 marines + medivac? Maybe you could say what race you play ?
I've been getting very early baneling nest just in case by keeping my drones on gas after speed. I feel like it is a small investment that could potentially prevent a loss, plus I will be getting it anyway in a few minutes.
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I am completely baffled by this ZvZ: http://ggtracker.com/matches/5470049
The game starts relatively tame, but then I'm attacked with ling-bane as my Lair is midway. I successfully defend losing only a few drones.
At that point I'm certain I've won because I already have 8 mutalisks starting to kill his overlords. But to my surprise, not only does he also have mutalisks, he even has a saturated third base. I'm eventually overwhelmed by mutalisks.
Looking at the replay, he is constantly above me in both drones and supply, despite the fact he went for pool first vs my hatch first. At 5:30 he has 10 supply on me (29 vs 39) even without any interaction or engagement between us.
I don't think I've done any obvious macro errors. I wasn't supply capped, I didn't miss injects at the beginning of the game, I didn't make too many lings...
Am I blind to my own mistakes? Or is my beginning build bad?
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Topic: Swarm Hosts vs Entrenched Siege Positions
I have recently been thinking about Swarm Hosts and their use in ZvT. Specifically, verses Mech. We all know how you can become a sitting duck after Terran gets their position up. Siege Tanks, Planetary Fortress, maybe the first few PDDs are up already. You feel pressured because you have to keep Terran away from getting their maxed out ball of Ravens rolling. You use the Swarm Hosts to prevent a moveout to your bases and whittle away at the terran, but after a certain point in time, that just doesn't cut it anymore.
How to increase Swarm Host utility in this situation? A game that quickly came to mind was SKT1_Dark verse CJ_Bbyong in GSL Season 2 Code S Ro32 + Show Spoiler +. Dark uses a spread of swarm hosts, methodical creep spread and small groups of Zerglings to make life easier. The idea is that the Locust take the hits, but they'll not get deep enough into the Terran line to deal damage. This is where the spread out Zerglings come in. They are supposed to run through the ranks and cause massive friendly fire on the Terran. Dark doesn't damage the Siege Tanks with his locust and zerglings directly, he forces them to Friendly Fire themselves!
This is one of the most creative uses of Swarm Hosts I have yet witnessed. Sadly, it is also reasonably situational (requires an open space to run the lings through) and hard to control (anybody has any tips on this?).
How to protect your Swarm Hosts? Swarmhost are very fragile and easy to snipe from the skies. Terran players have tried Seeker Missile or surprise Banshee switches to cause massive, game ending damage on the Swarm Hosts. I see a lot of players try to minimize this damage by getting a high count of Spore Crawlers to buffer and using Vipers to deal with the fleeing thread. I also like using Queens for this purpose. Queens have the additional benefit of being mobile (reasonably), spreading creep rapidly, and having Transfuse. A reasonably succesful 'kill-move' I found is using the aforementioned Zergling tactic with Ultralisk and Queens support. Use the Locust to close in and wreak havoc with Ultra Queen. Because of the Queens pretty long range AA attack, you can even force Ravens and Vikings back which might allow you to offensively use Vipers.
Abusing Dat Mutacloud I also heard of (and saw a tiny few games of) people using a heavy Mutalisk + Viper combination, greatly using mobility and Viper Spells for surgical strikes. It looks very hard to control and pretty fragile (given Thor range), but does support the Swarm Hosts reasonably well by opening multiple fronts and blocking the aerial weakness.
In short I'm looking for some discussion on how to make Swarm Host useful in ZvMech. Currently, they're mostly a set and forget stepping stone unit, but I think that with some support, Swarm Host could be a lethal weapon! What do you guys think? Discuss :D!
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Hm, I usually have no trouble beating Mech. The zergling/SH combo you talk about is really nice (assuming there arent 50PFs yet). A crux of this is to move your SHs around and acquire central positions from which you can attack various locations with the SHs. That spreads tanks thinner and makes it so that the locusts dont evaporate immidiatly, allowing the zerglings to close the gap. Otherwise I prefer corruptor/viper over muta/viper past a certain point. They just tank more and once the building upgrades are through and enough statics/thors are around mutas become pointless anyways.
Imo, anytime you are just rallying with SHs you are losing. They dont do any damage at all if the T is prepared, so the way you must use them is to dictate where he must be moving and to decimate the lines by "riding the waves" with vipers and pulling into corruptor/locust/spore/spine.
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On September 30 2014 05:34 Wiwiweb wrote:I am completely baffled by this ZvZ: http://ggtracker.com/matches/5470049The game starts relatively tame, but then I'm attacked with ling-bane as my Lair is midway. I successfully defend losing only a few drones. At that point I'm certain I've won because I already have 8 mutalisks starting to kill his overlords. But to my surprise, not only does he also have mutalisks, he even has a saturated third base. I'm eventually overwhelmed by mutalisks. Looking at the replay, he is constantly above me in both drones and supply, despite the fact he went for pool first vs my hatch first. At 5:30 he has 10 supply on me (29 vs 39) even without any interaction or engagement between us. I don't think I've done any obvious macro errors. I wasn't supply capped, I didn't miss injects at the beginning of the game, I didn't make too many lings... Am I blind to my own mistakes? Or is my beginning build bad? Your hatch is way late, you transfer drones needlessly, you don't spend your larvae quickly enough, and your minerals go criminally high (>1000) around 7:30. Those are the biggest macro mistakes, which result in slow saturation. On top of that, your opponent is quite greedy with a very late gas.
You also don't react well to the ling/bane aggression. You transfer drones again for no reason, stop that! Also don't wall off with evos if you have speedlings and banes to defend, it's expensive and does almost nothing. And try to continue spending your larvae even during the attack.
Overall, your bases are below saturation for too long (almost all the time, actually), and you don't seem to have a problem with that. You shouldn't be so lenient, though. Expect your opponent to have two-base saturation if no attack hits before roughly 7:30. If you don't match that, you'll likely lose.
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United States4883 Posts
On September 30 2014 06:07 SC2Toastie wrote:Topic: Swarm Hosts vs Entrenched Siege PositionsI have recently been thinking about Swarm Hosts and their use in ZvT. Specifically, verses Mech. We all know how you can become a sitting duck after Terran gets their position up. Siege Tanks, Planetary Fortress, maybe the first few PDDs are up already. You feel pressured because you have to keep Terran away from getting their maxed out ball of Ravens rolling. You use the Swarm Hosts to prevent a moveout to your bases and whittle away at the terran, but after a certain point in time, that just doesn't cut it anymore. How to increase Swarm Host utility in this situation?A game that quickly came to mind was SKT1_Dark verse CJ_Bbyong in GSL Season 2 Code S Ro32 + Show Spoiler +https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTCxJ1D-ce8 . Dark uses a spread of swarm hosts, methodical creep spread and small groups of Zerglings to make life easier. The idea is that the Locust take the hits, but they'll not get deep enough into the Terran line to deal damage. This is where the spread out Zerglings come in. They are supposed to run through the ranks and cause massive friendly fire on the Terran. Dark doesn't damage the Siege Tanks with his locust and zerglings directly, he forces them to Friendly Fire themselves! This is one of the most creative uses of Swarm Hosts I have yet witnessed. Sadly, it is also reasonably situational (requires an open space to run the lings through) and hard to control (anybody has any tips on this?). How to protect your Swarm Hosts?Swarmhost are very fragile and easy to snipe from the skies. Terran players have tried Seeker Missile or surprise Banshee switches to cause massive, game ending damage on the Swarm Hosts. I see a lot of players try to minimize this damage by getting a high count of Spore Crawlers to buffer and using Vipers to deal with the fleeing thread. I also like using Queens for this purpose. Queens have the additional benefit of being mobile (reasonably), spreading creep rapidly, and having Transfuse. A reasonably succesful 'kill-move' I found is using the aforementioned Zergling tactic with Ultralisk and Queens support. Use the Locust to close in and wreak havoc with Ultra Queen. Because of the Queens pretty long range AA attack, you can even force Ravens and Vikings back which might allow you to offensively use Vipers. Abusing Dat MutacloudI also heard of (and saw a tiny few games of) people using a heavy Mutalisk + Viper combination, greatly using mobility and Viper Spells for surgical strikes. It looks very hard to control and pretty fragile (given Thor range), but does support the Swarm Hosts reasonably well by opening multiple fronts and blocking the aerial weakness. In shortI'm looking for some discussion on how to make Swarm Host useful in ZvMech. Currently, they're mostly a set and forget stepping stone unit, but I think that with some support, Swarm Host could be a lethal weapon! What do you guys think? Discuss :D!
Swarm hosts are the ONLY thing that kills mech. There's no question that SH is like the key proponent to beating mech. But to make it more effective?
I HIGHLY HIGHLY suggest something KawaiiRice showed me. As he's teching up to hive, he adds on a nydus network and begins to build an extensive nydus network while rallying with the SHs and doing non-committal harassment with the mutalisks. The nydus network allows you to rapidly change the angle of attack so that the Terran can't just plant tanks in one location and forget about it. You can literally burrow, unleash a wave of locusts, then unburrow and load back into the hive and be on the other side of the map by the time the next wave is ready. When you get hive, you add on vipers and use blinding cloud to break turret rings and nydus in the main. Once the main is breached, the Terran defense usually starts to crumble since you can already be back on the other side of the map by the next locust wave. And the best part:
Loading a unit into the nydus worm cancels seeker missile.
I have not lost with this style yet, and I honestly don't think it's possible to beat it unless the meching player gets insanely ahead earlier in the game. I personally think that relying on abduct for ravens/vikings/thors is a mistake and that blinding cloud is a much better spell for a plethora of reasons. I also don't think corruptors are better than mutas at all since they literally can't do anything except for kill ravens. But I think it might be a good idea to do something like a 3-4 BL morph on the other side of the map as the mutas to take down turret rings more quickly. All in all, muta/SH/nydus is the strongest combination that I've seen; ground based armies that trade resources are NOT good.
EDIT: Also, really aggressive bases are awesome. I literally take my 5th and 6th bases at the Terran's potential 4ths and start mining gas every game. Not only does it force your opponent to have to walk over and kill the hatchery (usually with a fairly substantial amount of units to avoid just dying to mutalisks), but also gives the creep effect and steals gas from the Terran's late game.
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On September 30 2014 06:46 velvex wrote: Your hatch is way late, you transfer drones needlessly, you don't spend your larvae quickly enough, and your minerals go criminally high (>1000) around 7:30. Those are the biggest macro mistakes, which result in slow saturation. On top of that, your opponent is quite greedy with a very late gas.
You also don't react well to the ling/bane aggression. You transfer drones again for no reason, stop that! Also don't wall off with evos if you have speedlings and banes to defend, it's expensive and does almost nothing. And try to continue spending your larvae even during the attack.
Overall, your bases are below saturation for too long (almost all the time, actually), and you don't seem to have a problem with that. You shouldn't be so lenient, though. Expect your opponent to have two-base saturation if no attack hits before roughly 7:30. If you don't match that, you'll likely lose.
Ouch. Thanks a lot, that opened my eyes.
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