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TvZ is basically unwatchable and unplayable in the current state of sc2. It's a joke of a matchup now.
The recent overlord speed buff and queen range buff have changed TvZ more than I think blizzard has intended and it's basically broken the matchup in my opinion. It wasn't at first evident after the buffs because many zergs were still playing how they normally played and we didn't really see the true problems. But now we're starting to realize Zerg can play extremely greedy every game vs Terran without risk, and since they will always see/scout with overlords at 6-7 minutes they can react to any possible Terran aggression or 1 or 2base allin. Especially if they just make a couple extra queens which zergs are already starting to do as a norm now. Many of the problems Zerg always had against Terran historically in sc2 was dealing with aggression and the various builds/options Terran had to throw at Zerg. Slowly things started getting worse/removed patch by patch. Banshees became easier to deflect with faster moving spores. 2rax and bunker rushing got harder with bigger maps and longer build times on bunker and rax. late game things that were good for Terran such as mules on gold, ghost snipe were removed or nerfed so much it became quite cost inefficient to consider anymore. These are just some of the bigger changes. All of this has added up to a point where the matchup just feels wrong now and isn't fun to watch, play or be involved with at all.
Zergs can just produce extra queens as a response to everything which doesn't even slow them down, plus having the extra queens serves more than just defensive purposes as well so it's not even a bad thing at all by forcing them. This makes allining from a terran perspective really risky without any chance of even damaging zerg to a point where it was worth it. There are extremely limited options now for Terran to slow a greedy Zerg down. The only games I'm really seeing Terran win consistently over the past few weeks are where Terran is allowed to do something extremely greedy or Zerg makes some really big mistakes either decision or tactical. I really hope Blizzard is watching and reviewing numbers (I'm sure they are) because it's pretty bad. Some of the best terrans I've been watching replays and vods of are doing extremely greedy builds vs zerg which are capable of keeping up with zerg (many super fast 3cc builds are quite good) but from the zergs perspective when they see or know the terran is doing a 3cc they have options to exploit that. They can either play even greedier or go for a build which can punish the terrans greed. Terran on the other hand can see the zergs greed and be playing with maphacks and still lose. As a Terran player when I'm working out any new build TvZ you have to ask the question "can it survive a roach ling bane allin, a roach ling allin, or any variation of bane ling allin?" Zerg does not ask those questions at all they simply just say "Make an extra couple spines/queens while continuing to pump drones." and you will always have overlords to spot for armies moving out. Terran will have hellions spotting but even these are repelled easier now that zerg is capable of pushing them around and back faster.
Some of the best terran players are playing 15cc builds quite often these days, Taeja and MKP come to mind, but these builds automatically lose to some zerg builds if they choose to coin flip, MKP lost to back to back 6pools the other day in TSL4 KR qualifier. When I was complaining about this one of my friends on skype said "well everyone knows MKP is one of the greediest mofos around." Why can zerg exploit the greediest terran mofo around but terran cant do the same to zerg anymore?
Most of these aggressive zerg builds don't even need to win the game and zerg can still get ahead. If terran does an equivalent build to a roach ling bane allin (hellion maraduer allin with scvs etc) the only way it might work is if zerg doesn't scout it, even if they scout it and it does some damage, terran is still behind if it doesn't win. In general we're still seeing Terrans beating Zerg in games but it's when zerg makes extremely bad moves or doesn't play/react properly to the terran player. When both sides play a "perfect" game I'm seeing zerg win most of the time. And we're not even seeing perfect games hardly at all from most players. We are not going to see Terran players winning any big championships anytime soon if they're playing vs zerg. Mark my words and please follow results on this but its been really bad already. Only two terrans in the top 16 of the recent TSL4 KR qualifier. I'm not saying all terrans are going to lose to zerg 100% of the time but it's going to be over 60% and late in tournaments I would not expect to see terrans winning at all as zergs become more comfortable with their autofree greed.
I've talked to lots of people about this from both sides, many zerg players are just telling terran players to micro better or figure out something new or play greedier, (pretty basic responses I get from many players who don't really have a deep understanding of the game) I'm scared about the "finding something new" path because if anything gets found new that helps SO much to change or skew balance back in terran favor it gets nerfed. Micro better is fine advice and definitely something terran players can work on to help in the matchup, but what if both players micro better? It almost feels like zerg players are telling terrans to just play 100x better than them to win which is what it feels like terran needs to do these days, is that good for a competitive game? If one player plays slightly better that player should win. It shouldn't require one of the players to make massive mistakes to lose games. I'm only seeing zerg lose with massive mistakes lately which is pretty sad.
Honestly Terran cant make a single mistake at any point in a TvZ or they're basically going to autolose all the while hoping their zerg opponent makes massive mistakes (sometimes takes 3-4 huge mistakes in 1 game for T to win) I mean zerg can literally throw away maxed armies and still be fine. what the fuck is this broodwar TvP all over again???
Terrans were dominating for a while in korea but it was more because it was easier for terran to abuse maps/positions and I always felt that some of the more skilled players that switched to sc2 at first were playing terran so it was hard to really judge results based purely off sc2 stats early on. I really felt things were fairly balanced before the queen/overlord buffs. As maps had gotten bigger there really didn't seem to be any blatant issues before the buffs, now it seems there ARE blatant issues in my opinion. Too early to tell still? Maybe for blizzard but not for me.
  
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Have you tried making ravens?
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I agree with Sadistx, I find that using more Ravens has allowed me to either punch through the zerg lines or at the very worst open up some doors with unexpected harassment.
I think you should just practice more outside the 'norm' and you'll likely find more success.
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i hear ravens are pretty good
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I don't think it's a joke, I'm just not really sure what I'm supposed to be doing.
Comparing it to TvP: I FEEL like i have to do a lot of damage in the early and mid-game. I feel like I really have to slow the protoss the fuck down. I feel like I have to out-position him and then out-micro the shit out of him if I go for a late-game, ESPECIALLY if i haven't managed to do enough harass to get a serious edge in the early or mid-game. I feel like it's almost a better option to go for some really really aggressive all-ins in the early game always. I can bitch about templar being ezpz and protoss deathballs and warp-in being bullshit and out-remaxing INSIDE the terran base faster than the terran can all I want, but i at least comprehend what went wrong and what I needed to do to stop it. But I understand that that's what I'm supposed to be doing right now, and I know the reasoning behind it and know and understand when I need to do what and how.
Against zerg right now...I actually just don't know. What was intended as a buff to help zerg stay safe against run-bys has allowed zerg to effectively TAKE map control and actually keeps them REALLY REALLY safe from a lot more than I think it should. I don't think it's broken; maybe a little too strong, but even that I wouldn't rule on right now. It actually interests me; I'm not really pissed off by it yet, I just don't know what to do. Currently I'm doing a lot of early mid-game pushes or straight all-ins. Whether it's a three rax + hellion + stim timing thing with no medivacs, or the same thing with two (non-reactor) medivacs, or something feeling retarded and going for a 2 base 3 rax MMTM or fucking MMBT stim thing like it's TvP. If I go into a "normal" game though, I'm just not sure what to do. I feel like the best thing I can hope for is randomly scout a fast greater spire and just all-in as soon as it pops and hope to catch broodlords, because BEFORE that point the zerg can almost get away with anything and any tech they want (I feel); in short: they're too free to do whatever they want and I can't effectively punish it.
But again, I want to underline that I don't know that the queen buff is over-powered so much as I really just don't know how to deal with it yet, and what I'm supposed to be doing at what times, and to me it seems silly that all of that happened from 1 buff. Protoss got immortal range and it allowed them to use a lot more stuff and use immortals differently; and really it didn't, it just encouraged them to be more creative. The queen buff actually i feel did a whole whole lot. I wouldn't conclude that it's overpowered though; I just don't know what to do. Really though, I'm okay with that for a little while; it's kind of exciting.
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what is raven? only terran unit i know is marin marander and medivach
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Fungals make me want to stab kittens.
And that's all that really needs to be said about late game TvZ. Zerg spams ultras, if you make an anti ultra army it dies to brood switch. If zerg spams broods you make vikings and die to ultra switch. The only general purpose unit that could keep the terran alive through these transitions is the marine, and fungal just melts them. Every single late game TvZ I've watched lately ends with the terran looking away for a split second at a critical moment and then his army melts.
Terran found the solution to this late game in the ghost, but snipe was nerfed to uselessness.
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yeint, first you complain about fungals. then you complain about snipe nerf. you realize infestors take 2 snipes to kill after the "nerf" instead of 3 right?
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On June 18 2012 07:29 yeint wrote:
Fungals make me want to stab kittens.
And that's all that really needs to be said about late game TvZ. Zerg spams ultras, if you make an anti ultra army it dies to brood switch. If zerg spams broods you make vikings and die to ultra switch. The only general purpose unit that could keep the terran alive through these transitions is the marine, and fungal just melts them. Every single late game TvZ I've watched lately ends with the terran looking away for a split second at a critical moment and then his army melts.
Terran found the solution to this late game in the ghost, but snipe was nerfed to uselessness.
I'm unfamiliar with TvZ late-game, so please don't take this comment to be intentionally clueless or anything, but what is stopping the Terran player from simply making more Ghosts to make up for the decreased effectiveness of Snipe? Is it an issue with supply? Insufficient gas? Not enough time to pump out the Ghosts needed before the Zerg makes their move?
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Anyone suggesting ravens against late game zerg is on crack. They're slow as shit, fragile, and HSM is useless against anything but unprotected broods.
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On June 18 2012 07:31 Archas wrote:Show nested quote +On June 18 2012 07:29 yeint wrote:
Fungals make me want to stab kittens.
And that's all that really needs to be said about late game TvZ. Zerg spams ultras, if you make an anti ultra army it dies to brood switch. If zerg spams broods you make vikings and die to ultra switch. The only general purpose unit that could keep the terran alive through these transitions is the marine, and fungal just melts them. Every single late game TvZ I've watched lately ends with the terran looking away for a split second at a critical moment and then his army melts.
Terran found the solution to this late game in the ghost, but snipe was nerfed to uselessness. I'm unfamiliar with TvZ late-game, so please don't take this comment to be intentionally clueless or anything, but what is stopping the Terran player from simply making more Ghosts to make up for the decreased effectiveness of Snipe? Is it an issue with supply? Insufficient gas? Not enough time to pump out the Ghosts needed before the Zerg makes their move?
Ghosts build too slow and require too many tech lab rax. Also they're useless against cracklings. Pre-snipe-nerf it was possible to slowly build up ghosts but you'd see a lot of people die on the way there.
Note that I'm not commenting on my own play, I'm talking about what I see in tournaments. I'm nowhere near good enough for any balance issues to affect me personally.
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On June 18 2012 07:31 Archas wrote:Show nested quote +On June 18 2012 07:29 yeint wrote:
Fungals make me want to stab kittens.
And that's all that really needs to be said about late game TvZ. Zerg spams ultras, if you make an anti ultra army it dies to brood switch. If zerg spams broods you make vikings and die to ultra switch. The only general purpose unit that could keep the terran alive through these transitions is the marine, and fungal just melts them. Every single late game TvZ I've watched lately ends with the terran looking away for a split second at a critical moment and then his army melts.
Terran found the solution to this late game in the ghost, but snipe was nerfed to uselessness. I'm unfamiliar with TvZ late-game, so please don't take this comment to be intentionally clueless or anything, but what is stopping the Terran player from simply making more Ghosts to make up for the decreased effectiveness of Snipe? Is it an issue with supply? Insufficient gas? Not enough time to pump out the Ghosts needed before the Zerg makes their move?
No terrans can get ghosts and lately I have been seeing ghosts again but not mass ton and it's used to emp/snipe infestors. infestors are what make the broodlord army so strong, if you can get rid of the infestors or take out the energy the broodlords aren't so scary anymore.
I have been seeing it on korea anyway lately and I imagine eventually terrans will realize that ghosts are still good you only need 3-5 again just to get rid emp/snipe infestors before engaging. Since terrans have tech labs anyway it's not like they have to go out of their way, instead of making 3-5 marauders you make 3-5 ghosts one time. I have found it a lot stronger then not getting them (I still think zvt is zerg favored, but not as bad as some people are saying).
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On June 18 2012 07:31 aRRoSC2 wrote:
yeint, first you complain about fungals. then you complain about snipe nerf. you realize infestors take 2 snipes to kill after the "nerf" instead of 3 right?
That's not the problem, the problem is snipe not being effective against Hive tech units anymore. Unlike in TvP (or HTs in PvZ), ghosts are utterly useless against the main army.
Terran builds too slowly and requires too much specialized infrastructure to afford a one trick pony unit.
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What also sucks is how Z can go gasless FE, 4 queen, and either go fast third, or drop 3 gas and go into roach bane, and it's somewhat hard to tell the difference at times. Sure you can scan main, but you also have to know if the third has dropped yet or not, otherwise it could be third -> roach defense off 3 base.
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I'm trying to figure out why this is a featured blog. Is it because of the poster? Or because of general entertainment value?
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I, too, have noticed recent issues in my TvZ as well. I'd like to bring attention to what you specifically said, "Zerg can do really greedy builds with no risk." While I believe that there is still some risk involved, the risk involved isn't nearly enough to discourage Zerg from being greedy. Recently I've had to rely on very gimmicky builds that revolve around starport tech in order to catch my opponents off guard.
The bright side to current TvZ: it has made me try some less-standard play, and on the off-chance I win with a standard build I feel that I thoroughly earned my victory.
The darker side to current TvZ: Most of what I've understood behind risk/reward in the match-up isn't valid anymore, I feel as though if I don't have an immaculate opening I will certainly lose.
With any luck soon Terran can find (don't ask me how, through all my experimentation I've yet to find a timing/strategy against the current meta-game that has yielded consistent results) a way to combat this. Some people here have recommended Ravens, a unit I've wanted to use for a while, so it's worth a shot!
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On June 18 2012 07:31 Archas wrote:Show nested quote +On June 18 2012 07:29 yeint wrote:
Fungals make me want to stab kittens.
And that's all that really needs to be said about late game TvZ. Zerg spams ultras, if you make an anti ultra army it dies to brood switch. If zerg spams broods you make vikings and die to ultra switch. The only general purpose unit that could keep the terran alive through these transitions is the marine, and fungal just melts them. Every single late game TvZ I've watched lately ends with the terran looking away for a split second at a critical moment and then his army melts.
Terran found the solution to this late game in the ghost, but snipe was nerfed to uselessness. I'm unfamiliar with TvZ late-game, so please don't take this comment to be intentionally clueless or anything, but what is stopping the Terran player from simply making more Ghosts to make up for the decreased effectiveness of Snipe? Is it an issue with supply? Insufficient gas? Not enough time to pump out the Ghosts needed before the Zerg makes their move?
All of the above. You also have the problem with zergs getting to hive tech in a better position nowadays because of the queen/ovie buff and just generally understanding timings/what they can get away with.
I've said from day 1 that if you have a race that depends on timing attacks to win, once people figure out the timings u will never win again. Having to rely on timing attacks is a horrible idea for a game/race and can leave you SEVERELY crippled by metagame shifts. Basically timing attacks make it feel like its not you who decide whether you win the game, but your opponent. If they know how to defend the timing attack theres basically nothing you can do to win the game and you are fucked.
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it has been pretty long and people still don't know how featured blogs work?
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On June 18 2012 07:43 Adersick wrote:
I, too, have noticed recent issues in my TvZ as well. I'd like to bring attention to what you specifically said, "Zerg can do really greedy builds with no risk." While I believe that there is still some risk involved, the risk involved isn't nearly enough to discourage Zerg from being greedy. Recently I've had to rely on very gimmicky builds that revolve around starport tech in order to catch my opponents off guard.
The bright side to current TvZ: it has made me try some less-standard play, and on the off-chance I win with a standard build I feel that I thoroughly earned my victory.
The darker side to current TvZ: Most of what I've understood behind risk/reward in the match-up isn't valid anymore, I feel as though if I don't have an immaculate opening I will certainly lose.
With any luck soon Terran can find (don't ask me how, through all my experimentation I've yet to find a timing/strategy against the current meta-game that has yielded consistent results) a way to combat this. Some people here have recommended Ravens, a unit I've wanted to use for a while, so it's worth a shot!
I don't think so. In order to combat the greediness of the zerg you need to be greedy yourself. The problem is roach/bane/ling attacks are so fucking strong its retarded. You really need godly defense/zerg fucking up/or to have tanks. Problem is if you get tanks they put you behind and you get stuck in your base and zerg just drones drones drones anyway.
Its sick that the roach/bane/ling attacks aren't even all in.
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On June 18 2012 07:43 Sadist wrote:Show nested quote +On June 18 2012 07:31 Archas wrote:On June 18 2012 07:29 yeint wrote:
Fungals make me want to stab kittens.
And that's all that really needs to be said about late game TvZ. Zerg spams ultras, if you make an anti ultra army it dies to brood switch. If zerg spams broods you make vikings and die to ultra switch. The only general purpose unit that could keep the terran alive through these transitions is the marine, and fungal just melts them. Every single late game TvZ I've watched lately ends with the terran looking away for a split second at a critical moment and then his army melts.
Terran found the solution to this late game in the ghost, but snipe was nerfed to uselessness. I'm unfamiliar with TvZ late-game, so please don't take this comment to be intentionally clueless or anything, but what is stopping the Terran player from simply making more Ghosts to make up for the decreased effectiveness of Snipe? Is it an issue with supply? Insufficient gas? Not enough time to pump out the Ghosts needed before the Zerg makes their move? All of the above. You also have the problem with zergs getting to hive tech in a better position nowadays because of the queen/ovie buff and just generally understanding timings/what they can get away with. I've said from day 1 that if you have a race that depends on timing attacks to win, once people figure out the timings u will never win again. Having to rely on timing attacks is a horrible idea for a game/race and can leave you SEVERELY crippled by metagame shifts.
tvz was the same way though in bw for example. Terran always had that marine timing they would do and it would force zergs to make lings or creep colonies to make them into sunkens. Terran was always on the attack, if he wasn't zerg would be just the same as in sc2 with defiler/ultra/ling and a lot more of it then if terran sat back with bio and did nothing.
Mech was a different story obviously, but same with sc2 if you go mech you don't push early like you do with bio. If you are going to go bio yes you have to put pressure or at least force units. I have found terrans doing a MM timing but not committing to be the most effective. Just forcing zerg to make units and then pulling back (unless you see you can kill him or something) is very effective.
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EPT
