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Well, I sat down to a small handful of games today, and tried something new out (for myself). I went 14 gas 14 pool in ZvT and then proceeded to double expand in the low 20s of supply. I got hit by early banshees, marine pushes, super fast stim and tank pushes, and I had a bit of an epiphany in the midst of my terrible play.
Zerg unit production is fantastic, but our tech structures are very fragile -- what I mean is that if you kill a Zerg's spawning pool they suddenly can't make lairs, lings, or Queens. Suddenly, everything is in the shitter. If you lose a hatchery a large chunk of your production is also lost. Losing bases can be completely game ending, simply because your units COME from those bases.
Based on this ideal, people make macro hatcheries after they saturate their bases -- but what if this is the wrong way to do it? I found myself expanding to new locations when I had 10-15 drones on a base (total) and I felt much more resilient against all forms of attack. Not only does this kind of play cover your ass if you don't respond well to heavy forms of harass like octodrops in multiple parts of the map, but it enables you to amass completely ridiculous amounts of drones and lings at the same time. Without making lost of hatcheries, mass ling strategies are hard to execute well and keep your money low -- so I spent my money.
I think that this is the right way to play. I think Zergs have taken the Terran and Protoss mentalities of "protecting your main" too close to heart. If you play Zerg, you have the power to produce both units and workers exponentially, so even if a hatchery doesn't pay off immediately and IS considered an investment like a Command Center or Nexus, it WILL pay off if you don't die. And, most of the time, Zergs don't "just die" (unless it's a 4 gate hurr hurr hurr).
I played a 38 minute game against an arguably bad Terran earlier, replay is here: http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/151306-1v1-terran-zerg-backwater-gulch
I know that my skills are terrible, I made tons of bad decisions, etc.etc. But the important thing is that he killed so much stuff and still ended up so far behind (before his game losing blunder of not having any workers or expanding and getting PFs up/upgrades). I was able to sacrifice bases more easily than with my standard play (only expanding when I found it impossible to spend money fast enough or when I hit a certain point of saturation where I wanted/needed more cash) AND build an economy and army more easily just because of the ridiculous amount of larvae that the hatcheries fed me.
I remember reading a thread a while back about how the 200 supply limit caps Protoss and Terran players (and maybe even Zerg) at a point where there maximum efficiency can be reached on 3 bases, no more. But the idea of expanding like an STD has really struck me as a Zerg player, because our economy can grow exponentially. With enough attacking, enough army trading, enough aggression, all those hatcheries start to pay off enormously as the endless swarm just chips away at the enemy. Could it be that this is the way Zerg is meant to be played? Is it possible that our aggression shouldn't come in the fashion of Protoss or Terrans (massing up forces behind iron walls and deathballs) and should instead just be relentless swarms?
It's near impossible to turtle effectively without "putting your opponent way ahead" against this style until you get your AoE tech units out, so early game aggression continuing in an unrelenting stream is a key part of it. Banelings, drop tech, nydus worms, and mutalisks all mean that we can penetrate the defenses of our enemies as games go on, preventing them from stabilizing and making a mass-hatchery strategy more viable.
Could this be the RIGHT way to play Zerg? Could this be the most efficient way to rack up wins compared to Roach army massing, and the like? Obviously, this strategy is much more restricted on a map like Scrap Station because of base placement and the power of 4-gates and the like, but I think this might be the right way to play and I plan to test it as I ladder up to masters over the next couple weeks.
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Capn, Signing Out.
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The zerg swarm playing as a swarm? Nope. Sounds absolutely wrong.
[/sarcasm]
As a diamond zerg, if I scout you fast expanding early, I can just hammer you with a 4gate or 3gate blink or something... how well does it hold up against 1base all ins?
also, do you have any reps?
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I posted one replay against a Terran player, but I've only been 4-gated once so far. I lost that game because he went super Zealot heavy and I'm a terrible player (I lost too many of my Zerglings before I had a critical mass of roaches, though he never reached my natural on Scrap Station). However, the 4-gate didn't hit anywhere near late enough to stop this kind of a build order.
It's not a specific BO, merely a philosophy. If you stop a 4-gate (which should be an issue before your third hatchery would be going down) then you're ahead by definition unless you took serious losses, and at that point a well executed roach/ling all-in would seal the deal, regardless of any third base.
The whole idea is to do everything at once. Instead of just taking your natural then teching and droning/massing off of two bases before expanding near saturation, you do your best to spend all of your early larvae from multiple bases on getting more bases and more map control and preventing critical masses of your enemies forces from arising (to where they have enough security to tech up to nasty shit before you're ready).
The extra expansions DO cost money up front, but I feel like they pay off in terms of stability (your economy is so spread out that one attack won't end your game) and they enable you to avoid that jaw clenching situation of waiting for larvae when you know you need units NOW.
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If you put your third hatch too fast you cant rely on spine crawler, it force you to make more lings.
If terran push you nat and sit there the game is over even if you have a third. Its possible that your third is too late in normal ''standart'' but taking it too fast make you vulnerable to any marine push and make hellion more efficients.
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I'm not a fan of spines in general, though the sheer number of Zerglings that I had at my disposal was ridiculous.
My normal 3rd timing is not before 5-7 minutes. 
The extra hatcheries cause you to rely on your speedlings sheer mobility, allowing you to attack, attack, and attack some more against any force that DARES move out. Obviously, you make banelings versus mass marines and use your lings to surround and crush his pushes. The whole point is that this style also pushes you towards an earlier 4th, 5th, potentially 6th and 7th base.
Your entire economy is more spread out, instead of the standard "I am mining 2 - 2 1/2 bases at a time" strategy that all races currently employ. I also think it makes Zerg's superior worker numbers even more effective because of saturation.
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To increase durability, you could perhaps try getting lair at the natural, seeing as it gives your base somewhat more survivability
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This kind of sounds like 12 nex. At a lower level, its killer and so hard to stop in PVP but pros can never do it cause they know how to punish so well.
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What level do you play at? A lot of stuff are viable at lower levels as you move up the options are more sparse and demanding.
The resilient fact is definitely true, you want to take and lose bases without feeling "painful", i.e. don't get depressed if you lose a base.
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I'm a Diamond player and I'd say that when I'm on my game I play at Masters level*. I have a decent sense of when certain timing attacks come and can defend the majority of them.
This isn't a Bronze league build, this is simply me trying a different approach to games. The replay I supplied also indicates my league, so I guess you didn't read the whole post.
* I can and have beaten masters players, somewhere upwards of 3k, I obviously don't face masters on ladder at present but once I work on getting in the "zone" more I should quickly climb the ladder, so then I can provide reasonable highest level feedback.
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Yeah I've beaten NBA players 3 on 3 when I'm in the zone too.
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On March 18 2011 15:50 Entropic wrote:
Yeah I've beaten NBA players 3 on 3 when I'm in the zone too.
Not to be rude, but this is my blog and I really don't need the dick comments from someone who obviously hasn't tested out this philosophy while playing Zerg. The idea of mass expanding and making it so you can afford more later is something that most Zerg players (from what I know) haven't tried. Not too long ago a mass ling strategy (heavy on expansions and upgrades) arose for ZvP from Xog I believe it was, with an emphasis on teching to Ultralisks to crush force fields and then dominate the Protoss army with your ridiculous ling army.
And to the 12 Nexus comment... you can't really punish this kind of play early game without going all-in, and even then 300 minerals isn't a huge sacrifice. If it pays off (which it will most of the time) you can do some crazy shit.
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EPT
