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I have been getting really frustrated with ZvP and going roach/hydra/corrupter. Even when I am ahead on supply and economy it just feels so wrong to watch my army get trapped by FF and melted by the toss deathball. I am sure there is a better composition for zerg in a 200/200 vs. 200/200 situation against protoss, even if it is impossible or too difficult to actually build.
One such composition is ultra/bling/infestor, inevitably with mass lings thrown in the mix to help soak up the surplus of minerals. The thing is, while banelings are not cost effective against protoss armor, they can still wipe it out if you have enough of them, something roach/hydra/corruptor will never do. When you are in a 200/200 vs. 200/200 fight, and you are piling up thousands of minerals and gas - you don't necessarily need to be cost effective, it would be nice to just completely obliterate your opponent's army and still have a good portion of your own left standing. As long as a big enough portion of your army is leftover, he will never be able to reinforce fast enough to defend his expos and tech buildings after his first deathball is destroyed - something this composition makes possible. It is really pretty straight forward, fungal everything which will remove most of the shields and keep the army in place, rush in with baneling/ultra, ultras will break through any FFs and finish off whatever the banelings don't explode. If they have stargate units in the mix (they usually do) these can be NP'd but mostly ignored. The zerg ground army will roll over the toss ground army and as long as you plan ahead and throw down a hydra den when you are 200/200 you can reinforce with tons of hydra to deal with the leftover stargate units.
Mothership can make it difficult as well, whenever I've gone up against mothership with this build I tried to NP it but still didn't have enough detection to win leaving most of his ground army intact, I'm not sure yet if I just need more detection or if it just doesn't work against mothership. It does seem like with enough detection the zerg ground army will be able to still roll over the toss ground army while ignoring the mothership. I've also been practicing this with a sort of tunnel vision to work on the build, so I'm not exactly looking for openings to punish them while they are teching too hard.
As I have been practicing this on the diamond ladder and the main problem with the build by far is actually surviving to a max army situation. Since it is ladder sometimes toss will just sit back and let me max out, thinking they will be able to max out their deathball and easily win - this turns into an easy win for my deathball. The real bitch is surviving a 5 or 6 gate attack, and even heavy sentry "pressure" can be game ending when you are trying to defend with ling/bane. Regardless it is still something I am working on because I think it has potential. I have been winning some games and losing several, but I still have plenty of room for improvement with my execution and timings.
If I can just find a good way to hold off that gateway pressure I think this will be a solid build. I need to find out if it is viable to get infestors out in time, find the right time to take a 3rd, maybe even defend with roaches and and then switch to bane later on - I've only been trying to defend with ling/bane to make use of my upgrade path. Also I need to work out the exact timing for a macro hatch and maybe add a second macro hatch after taking a 3rd. Sometimes I lose to gateway pressure but I am sitting on 2k minerals and no larva.
Comments from my opponents have been humorous, everything ranging "wtf zerg is so op" as I roll over their deathball and "what league are you in noob?" as I helplessly try to defend 6 gate with ling/bling. It's also hilarious to see shattered temple completely covered in creep with the protoss death ball trapped in the middle with MASS banes circling around waiting for the ultras to hatch. Once you get enough banes they are terrified to step away from the FFs.
Either way, success or fail, it is really a blast to play SC2 in this way, actually trying new things and experimenting with the game instead of focusing on the "right" way to play. I highly recommend it.
 
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Posting replays will help prove your point. Interesting thought but personally it feels like the players letting you max out are very few
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There is no point to prove, the composition works if you can get it like I said. If I figure out a good way to get it against an opponent who is pressuring, I might just keep it for myself.  This is a blog about experimenting in SC2.
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That sounds effective. I'm definitely going to have to try that.
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This is probably working on the sheer fact your opponent not knowing how to macro once he obtains his death ball as he never loses. Should sub out ultra's and use baneling bombs -- With the baneling landing in the middle they hit the max number of units and with most protoss using 1 hotkey, their sentries are also balled up and normally go down so no need to worry about FF. I've had some fun luck with Roach/Infestor/Bombs.
Nothing i enjoy more then getting to play SC2 all Friday night; seeing a mineral like depleted in the main, mining in the natural and thinking which one do I take0? But in all seriousness, you can generally get more damage done off a mineral line depleting as more Workers are stacked; where as you do immediate damage if you hit where they are mining.
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I want to keep bombing as an option but it isn't needed once you have ultras to break the FFs. It is too risky against heavy stalker as the ovies will get kited and sniped and suicidal against blink stalker, but there is probably a timing against mass sentry where bombs are preferable because of how long it takes to get the ultras. Something else to work on for sure, I really want to know if you can get bombs in time to defend a 6 gate, though it seems unlikely. If you can get them ultras are much are better because the whole purpose is that most of them will survive the fight, leaving you in a situation with 6-8 ultras and an insane amount of 3/3 cracklings to reinforce with, which he can't deal with after the colossus and sentry numbers get decimated. It's not that he doesn't know how to macro, you come out way ahead in suppy and can reinforce quicker.
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I like using this style, especially with drops.
Theorycrafting a bit, I think adding extra hatcheries/queens will let you reinforce much much faster with mass ling.
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Papua New Guinea152 Posts
I feel that, like in BW, the main advantage of zerg is to mass produce lots and lots of cheap units. This means that even though terran and protoss can build stronger and more durable deathballs, zerg can mass produce units that usually die quickly but have a lot of mobility. The zerg macro means that they can reinforce more quickly, to help in battles or drops. The zerg army should be all over the map, as opposed to the other two races as well. The name deathball implies that the units are concentrated, but zerg in comparison has units all over the place
Also many spells are used to compensate for the relatively low unit count of protoss and terran in comparison to zerg. (in bw the biggest spell for toss against zerg was storm, to minimize the zerg mass units)
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On April 06 2011 01:44 Treemonkeys wrote:
I want to keep bombing as an option but it isn't needed once you have ultras to break the FFs. It is too risky against heavy stalker as the ovies will get kited and sniped and suicidal against blink stalker, but there is probably a timing against mass sentry where bombs are preferable because of how long it takes to get the ultras. Something else to work on for sure, I really want to know if you can get bombs in time to defend a 6 gate, though it seems unlikely. If you can get them ultras are much are better because the whole purpose is that most of them will survive the fight, leaving you in a situation with 6-8 ultras and an insane amount of 3/3 cracklings to reinforce with, which he can't deal with after the colossus and sentry numbers get decimated. It's not that he doesn't know how to macro, you come out way ahead in suppy and can reinforce quicker.
Well you aren't really rushing Ultra's anymore so you can become more roach heavy to defend the 6 gate. Additionally you do the drops while you engage with roaches; it basically works the same way EMP's do is PvT -- You do as big of a burst as you possibly can and pray they fall; if they survive their higher sustained DPS will rofl stomp you.
The problem with that is as you mention early defense is hard; you are preparing against their late game death ball and if they don't do it your composition isn't nearly as strong. Back to what I said earlier; you are winning because the Protoss is failing to macro. Basically, you are wiping both of your forces with mass blings and engaging in a reinforcement game. As deathball generally wins games, many Protoss don't have the unit production to engage in this game and lose.
However, there is nothing wrong with it as long s you are having fun -- kudos for working Ultra's in.
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Yes you still have to reinforce but you come out waaaay ahead. Check out this game. I get ahead by defending a 4 gate. Then I throw away my lead by trying to win with a baneling bust. We both almost max out but he actually move out to attack at 190 supply. My 200 vs. his 190 and I come out at 160 him 108, with me still having 6 ultras. The game is over at that point but I still have to build shit to mop up.
Also please notice how TERRIBLE my infestor usage is. Most never get off a fungal growth, the fungals I do land are very late, and all the infestors die. Terrain is also terrible for me, with his colossus on the high ground. I still roll over his composition and would have been even further ahead with most of my infestors alive had I microed better.
http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/159709-1v1-protoss-zerg-backwater-gulch
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You say that stargate units can typically be avoided, but what do you do if the Protoss mixes in a critical mass of voidrays? It's been getting more and more popular lately and Neural Parasiting just two or three of them wouldn't cut it. Infested Terrans, perhaps?
Also, could you provide some more replays for us? I'm just as sick and tired of having only Roach/Hydra/Corruptor to answer deathballs with, and I'd absolutely love to finally get Ultras in a game for once.
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Depending on the number of void rays this probably just wouldn't work. But if it's not too many, the banes will kill everything before they can really charge up leaving you time to mass up hydra. This is definitely for a ground heavy protoss army and as long as he only has a few stargate units you can just ignore them at first. If all depends if you will be able to get enough hydras to kill X number of void rays before they are charged up in your base.
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How does ling/bling fare agaisnt those 5 gate + 1 robo buidls? That maybe more of a problem.
I was thinking against 6-gate just incorporate burrowed banelings.You can just scare him off and force him to make a robo first and observer before attacking. That "delay time" can give you time to put up defenses etc.
4-gate will be a problem though, but i guess you can solve that by making mass spines + defending with just pure speedlings (take off drones off gas)
All theorycraft.
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4 gate actually is no problem at all, you don't even really have to commit to this at that timing. I defend 4 gate with spine crawlers, mass speedling, and 20 drones. If you want to transition into this style you can do the same thing and also throw down a baneling nest which is really powerful if he goes zealot heavy. If not, just don't morph banes.
5 gate robo is a bitch.
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Often times this kind of thing just goes down to forcefields if you don't have a good number of roach / hydra. The old transition into ultra / broodlord in ZvP was going fast speedlings then 2base muta, trying to secure a third before teching broods, but early sentry pressure seems to shut down any ling/bling -> muta opening that I try.
200/200 ultra broodlord (+ a few corrupters) is definitely very strong, and a good surround will completely destroy a protoss ball. The hard part is getting to 4+ bases where you can actually get that much stuff.
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I watched the replay, and I have a few comments. The big battle that occurred was not indicative of a normal deathball fight, as his army was completely out of position. His colossi were caught away from his stalker/sentry ball, and you were able to focus them down at melee range. I'd like to see another replay where this build is successful when dealing with a protected group of colossi. The reason you see corrupters in ZvP is because you need to focus down the colossi and ground units can't get close enough.
Also, just in terms of your game:
-When you're pumping out expensive units like ultras, make sure to invest more resources in upgrades.
-You didn't protect your tech from observers. A smart opponent would have poked around in your base and seen ultras coming. I'm curious to see how a group of immortals would have dealt with the ultras. Put down a few spore crawlers in your base to keep pesky observers away.
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The point of a deathball is that you lose minimal units when you engage. Having a large baneling contingent kind of ruins that. :/
You've made a strong unit combination but it's not really a deathball...
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On April 06 2011 03:39 Frobert wrote:
I watched the replay, and I have a few comments. The big battle that occurred was not indicative of a normal deathball fight, as his army was completely out of position. His colossi were caught away from his stalker/sentry ball, and you were able to focus them down at melee range. I'd like to see another replay where this build is successful when dealing with a protected group of colossi. The reason you see corrupters in ZvP is because you need to focus down the colossi and ground units can't get close enough.
Also, just in terms of your game:
-When you're pumping out expensive units like ultras, make sure to invest more resources in upgrades.
-You didn't protect your tech from observers. A smart opponent would have poked around in your base and seen ultras coming. I'm curious to see how a group of immortals would have dealt with the ultras. Put down a few spore crawlers in your base to keep pesky observers away.
You have to admit though, the position was not good for zerg either, or not "ideal" at least. If ultra/bling/infestor catches that army out the the open it will only kill it faster and with less losses. The main reason he was out of position was because he was trying to run away from my ball and two of the the colossus were on the high ground but killed by single file banelings with nowhere to run. It looked like a situation he didn't even know how to react to. If he tries to micro his colossus out of the way that just buys zerg more time while they aren't firing.
Also immortals would be good against this but by the time you get ultra tech out I believe he will have already had to invest heavily in colossus. Once you throw down the ultra cavern and he spots it he has until the building itself, plus the armor upgrade, plus the ultras finish building before you can go destroy him, I don't think toss can react in the time frame to mass up immortals when he is already going to be at 150+ supply and already committed to certain tech.
Also I want to refine it and work on more upgrades, but the priority is just to get the ultras out on the field ASAP so you can break FF allowing the banes to make contact. So I favored armor over attack for the sake of survivability. I'll have to work out how many upgrades I can squeeze in before hive tech, but I really need to work out surviving mid game first.
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On April 06 2011 01:59 qzmpwxno wrote:
I feel that, like in BW, the main advantage of zerg is to mass produce lots and lots of cheap units. This means that even though terran and protoss can build stronger and more durable deathballs, zerg can mass produce units that usually die quickly but have a lot of mobility. The zerg macro means that they can reinforce more quickly, to help in battles or drops. The zerg army should be all over the map, as opposed to the other two races as well. The name deathball implies that the units are concentrated, but zerg in comparison has units all over the place
Also many spells are used to compensate for the relatively low unit count of protoss and terran in comparison to zerg. (in bw the biggest spell for toss against zerg was storm, to minimize the zerg mass units) Zerg has the two fastest units(after vults) in the game;
Agreed. It is all about exploiting the speed advantage when playing as zerg, hence the ball vs ball balance dynamics play less of a role as the game revolves more around protoss and terran armies lategame trying to keep up zerg attacking everywhere.
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Here's another game I just played. Protoss tries to cheese off two base while harassing with phoenix and building up a void ray/colossus/sentry/stalker army with tons of sentries that turn out to be useless. He got completely outplayed but infestor/baneling/ultra is a nice way to deal with the cheezeball. Some rage at the end as well.
http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/160839-1v1-protoss-zerg-shakuras-plateau
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Another replay showing the power of ling/bling/infestor against the protoss deathball. He moves out at just under 170 supply going all in off two bases, because I am able to fungal his army before he is ready by the time he is able to cast FF it is way too late. I survive the battle with plenty of lings and infestors left over after completely crushing his army and easily clean up the game from there.
http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/166569-1v1-protoss-zerg-gutterhulk
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EPT
