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United States10141 Posts
On November 29 2023 02:08 mtcn77 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 28 2023 05:52 FlaShFTW wrote:On November 24 2023 06:33 mtcn77 wrote:On April 05 2018 02:53 Bakuryu wrote:
understanding how the matchup play out is really good.
having a game plan until lategame is really good.
adjusting to your enemy based on situation is really good.
following build orders is really good.
there always seemed to be a misconception about build orders among the newcomers and i never liked how Day9 addressed that in the vods i remember from him.
following BOs is not bad. "Strictly" following a BO in a wrong situation is bad. following BOs does not mean that you dont react to your opponent.
a (good) build order is a highly optimized way to play the game in certain situations. This optimization will lead to specific timings (like 10s attack timing window) which you can only hit using that build order.
build orders enable you repeatability on your side, making it way easier to learn the required actions because they "always" happen at the exact same time.
If the current executed build order (FFE +1 corsair +1 2 gate speedzeal) is up against something that needs adjustment (3 hatch hydra), you can play a build order variation (add cannons while still going corsair first) or you change your build order completely (responding with +1 4 gate speedzeal).
out of all the races/matchups, Zerg players in ZvP are the people most lacking good build orders, or build orders at all.(around C/C+ level). those zergs are lacking lots of timings and are somehow producing out of 4-5 hatches, which is still enough to keep up with similar skill level protoss player, because those protoss players are also lacking macro/timings beyond the 1st attack.
the key point about all of this is Timings.
you can have extremly good macro and extremly good micro, but if you have no timing you will always be fighting against more units of the enemy than normal which will always give you unfavorable battles.
And especially as T/P against Z, not hitting Timings is even more brutal, as Z can easily get more drones/units quickly.
in PvZ if your attack is late by "only" 14 seconds, zerg (5 hatch hydra) will have 5 more larva to make units and he will have lets say 20 hydras instead of 15 hydras. the difference is so big, that zerg would not need to add 1 sunken per entrance, and instead can use this money for faster 6th hatch while easily defending your attack.
(this was mostly attack Timings, but it also applies to defensive Timings, where you get the defense right when you need it and not, for example, randomly building cannons too early in fear of vulture harass)
I'm looking for a general comparative guide for building times, this is the closest comment related to the subject that I could find. Timings are important, but I noticed something else. I haven't seen much discussion as to how fast buildings and units can be made, but Protoss seems to have a general early game advantage in comparison to Zerg. Zerg larva regeneration time is 14 seconds in the fastest game speed. Protoss Gateways build dragoons every 31 seconds. That is 4.5 spawns per hatchery per minute. Considering it is a 350 mineral building, it is really slower than a Protoss Gateway. Gateway makes every zealot even faster by 1.25x. So in total a single Protoss Gateway can reach the same supply a hatchery makes until lair and every gateway is cheaper than a hatchery by 200 minerals, at less than half the cost and time it takes to build one. Protoss absolutely does not have early game advantage vs zerg. They are scared playing against potential hydra bust and must play safe until +1 and legs finish for zealots. That is what I'm struggling with. Zerg should not be able to macro up against a decent Protoss. The Hatchery is even slower than a Nexus and Protoss has a seperate building the Gateway that has equal production rate to a Hatchery and you can build two at a time for the same cost. That is like having one more Hatchery since one is busy making drones. Two in fact, I calculated the timing the other day: you need to have a 2 Hatchery build to make 20 drones at the same time the protoss does it, 4:12. 1 Hatchery time is 5:08, 3 Hatchery time is 3:48. You can alternate 20 drones for 20 zerglings, or hydralisks, but I don't think the game will end before 20 larva unit spawns.
You are thinking way too deeply into this. If you are losing in the early game as Zerg, you are either getting 2 gated all the time and are responding incorrectly, or you're doing something seriously wrong. The only time that Protoss should be able to pressure zerg off a standard build order is when +1/legs hits. At which time if you're droning hard, you're adding a sunken per base with lings/hydras or lings/mutas to come support and defend.
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technically if you open with a gate forge opening protoss has a chance to pressure zerg with the first 2-3 zealots. its not insignificant either because you can straight up win games off this pressure alone
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Comparing assymetric races straight up makes no sense. They'll have different amount of bases for income and different ratio of workers per mineral; you're not including cost of supply in unit costs; unit strength comparison is not linear(e.g. zealots start strong but do not scale as not all at the same time can get surface area).
Not accounting for mixed unit compositions or things like being forced to make extra hydras to split them to cover all passages vs a zealot/sair mobile blob; or effect of wall-ins or static defense; or P having to spend resources on stargate and corsairs and so on.
Zergs would have a difficult harder time of facing P in straight up macro if mutalisk threat didn't exist, or if P could build cannons twice as fast and produce them reactively vs moving out hydra, but neither is the case.
If we talk early game, P may have advantage in production building cost / availability / efficiency, but they have disadvantage in the zergling being a better for-cost unit in a straight up fight, and also being faster which means for P even being able to move out requires leaving some things at home. All of that gives Z enough time to be able to drone; they only really take damage if something avoided their vision, or if they decided to defend with the bare minimum but made a micro mistake.
And of course going heavy on gateways early and delaying tech can give P a power spike, but things such as sunkens, walls, drone drills can deal with that, and then Z tech capacity in mutas should be able to deal critical damage.
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Protoss always has the early game advantage as they don't lose a worker to make a building like zerg or lose nearly as much mining time like terran does when making a building. It's what you choose to do with this advantage that matters. This is why I love Mini's style as he is always on the map and always pressuring to the max with every single unit. Mini understands the power of protoss.
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On November 30 2023 00:13 EndingLife wrote:
Protoss always has the early game advantage as they don't lose a worker to make a building like zerg or lose nearly as much mining time like terran does when making a building. It's what you choose to do with this advantage that matters. This is why I love Mini's style as he is always on the map and always pressuring to the max with every single unit. Mini understands the power of protoss.
In PvZ protoss has the advantage in the middle game, not in the early game. This is mainly because zerglings are a lot more powerful than zealots, which negates the issue of having fewer initial workers. Zerg expands quickly and generally has an economic advantage. Protoss overcomes this advantage for a certain period by pressuring zerg with higher tier tech.
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On November 30 2023 00:35 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2023 00:13 EndingLife wrote:
Protoss always has the early game advantage as they don't lose a worker to make a building like zerg or lose nearly as much mining time like terran does when making a building. It's what you choose to do with this advantage that matters. This is why I love Mini's style as he is always on the map and always pressuring to the max with every single unit. Mini understands the power of protoss. In PvZ protoss has the advantage in the middle game, not in the early game. This is mainly because zerglings are a lot more powerful than zealots, which negates the issue of having fewer initial workers. Zerg expands quickly and generally has an economic advantage. Protoss overcomes this advantage for a certain period by pressuring zerg with higher tier tech. With gate first becoming more standard, I think only overpool gives zerg the early game advantage. Zerg has to produce so many lings instead of drones while protoss is making workers the whole time given they can micro zealots and make probes at the same time.
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On November 30 2023 01:30 EndingLife wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2023 00:35 Magic Powers wrote:On November 30 2023 00:13 EndingLife wrote:
Protoss always has the early game advantage as they don't lose a worker to make a building like zerg or lose nearly as much mining time like terran does when making a building. It's what you choose to do with this advantage that matters. This is why I love Mini's style as he is always on the map and always pressuring to the max with every single unit. Mini understands the power of protoss. In PvZ protoss has the advantage in the middle game, not in the early game. This is mainly because zerglings are a lot more powerful than zealots, which negates the issue of having fewer initial workers. Zerg expands quickly and generally has an economic advantage. Protoss overcomes this advantage for a certain period by pressuring zerg with higher tier tech. With gate first becoming more standard, I think only overpool gives zerg the early game advantage. Zerg has to produce so many lings instead of drones while protoss is making workers the whole time given they can micro zealots and make probes at the same time.
I understand the logic, but the data proves that zerg is better in the early game. For roughly the first 10 or so minutes they have a much much higher winrate. After that protoss catches up and wins more often, and in the late game it's again zerg with an advantage, this time less than in the early game.
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United States10141 Posts
On November 30 2023 01:30 EndingLife wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2023 00:35 Magic Powers wrote:On November 30 2023 00:13 EndingLife wrote:
Protoss always has the early game advantage as they don't lose a worker to make a building like zerg or lose nearly as much mining time like terran does when making a building. It's what you choose to do with this advantage that matters. This is why I love Mini's style as he is always on the map and always pressuring to the max with every single unit. Mini understands the power of protoss. In PvZ protoss has the advantage in the middle game, not in the early game. This is mainly because zerglings are a lot more powerful than zealots, which negates the issue of having fewer initial workers. Zerg expands quickly and generally has an economic advantage. Protoss overcomes this advantage for a certain period by pressuring zerg with higher tier tech. With gate first becoming more standard, I think only overpool gives zerg the early game advantage. Zerg has to produce so many lings instead of drones while protoss is making workers the whole time given they can micro zealots and make probes at the same time.
Zerg units are cheaper anyways. Yes, they want to make drones as much as possible, but making lings still gives them pressure and counter potential against an overly aggressive Zerg. Mini style is erratic and high variance, and definitely not recommended for us mere mortals to play.
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Most good P openers tend to have strategies that apply pressure to Z every few production rounds. Scouting, limiting drone production, etc.
Prolonged passive play from P tends to work much worse, and the few options that do work tend to be banking energy on many HTs, going double forge, that type of stuff.
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I saw that pros go 12 hatch, then later pool, then 12 gas and upgrade lair vs. Terran
But when I tried this build I got my Lair started at 3:01 which meant it popped before 4:05 where I would get another larva. I was literally short one larva (Lair morph triggers the larva timer). How do people deal with this? Just make 12 gas later than 50 minerals?
Why even go 12 hatch anyway?
I propose 11 hatch which slows you down by a second on the Lair, but speed up your 2nd hatchery larvae by like 4 seconds.
So my proposed build is something like this:
11 hatch
11 pool
12 gas
17 overlord
18 hatch
zergling speed
the extra fast larva at the expansion will get you more mining time from a drone, and delaying your lair timing to 4:05 lets you first spawn a larva, then immediately spawn a second one
why do people do 12 hatch anyway?
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On December 04 2023 21:36 iopq wrote:
I saw that pros go 12 hatch, then later pool, then 12 gas and upgrade lair vs. Terran
But when I tried this build I got my Lair started at 3:01 which meant it popped before 4:05 where I would get another larva. I was literally short one larva (Lair morph triggers the larva timer). How do people deal with this? Just make 12 gas later than 50 minerals?
Why even go 12 hatch anyway?
I propose 11 hatch which slows you down by a second on the Lair, but speed up your 2nd hatchery larvae by like 4 seconds.
So my proposed build is something like this:
11 hatch
11 pool
12 gas
17 overlord
18 hatch
zergling speed
the extra fast larva at the expansion will get you more mining time from a drone, and delaying your lair timing to 4:05 lets you first spawn a larva, then immediately spawn a second one
why do people do 12 hatch anyway?
I drafted a long reply and noticed you could spare all the details. Long story short, 8/9 is the best time for a Hatchery first, and 9/9 is best after an Overlord if we can count on the "Ideal mining thoughts" thread.
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is this the ideal mining thoughts thread?
https://tl.net/forum/brood-war/89939-ideal-mining-thoughts
I don't know why 8 hatch would be better, is it because you get the most larvae?
edit: with 8 hatch you get larva blocked for 19 seconds, but the hatch is like 12 seconds earlier than 9 overlord hatch, not sure why that would be any good since 9 overlord hatch BARELY gets any larva block (like 2 seconds)
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On December 05 2023 22:29 iopq wrote:is this the ideal mining thoughts thread? https://tl.net/forum/brood-war/89939-ideal-mining-thoughtsI don't know why 8 hatch would be better, is it because you get the most larvae? edit: with 8 hatch you get larva blocked for 19 seconds, but the hatch is like 12 seconds earlier than 9 overlord hatch, not sure why that would be any good since 9 overlord hatch BARELY gets any larva block (like 2 seconds)
Yeah it wouldn't be good if you are larva blocked. I was estimating the Hatchery plus new drone to be spawned at 44.5 seconds. I have to try it out myself.
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Slight tangent, but are there any guides/threads discussing larva optimization? I saw iopq talk about it slightly in threads, and I have heard several other people discuss it, but I actually did not know there was a certain thing you could do between hatch/lair upgrading that nets you an extra larva. Is it an easy enough trick to explain?
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On December 06 2023 11:00 Kodan wrote:
Slight tangent, but are there any guides/threads discussing larva optimization? I saw iopq talk about it slightly in threads, and I have heard several other people discuss it, but I actually did not know there was a certain thing you could do between hatch/lair upgrading that nets you an extra larva. Is it an easy enough trick to explain?
I think you get an extra larva at each upgrade if you have already spawned all of them into units. In case you used all your larvae, you get a 12.6/14 second advantage.
My general issue with common Zerg meta is with zerglings and how much production time they delay the Zerg, except in mirror matchup. It really throws Zerg off its development when in the time 1 Zealot and 2 probes take for the Protoss, Zerg only makes 4 zerglings and no drones. You should absolutely stick to sunkens and drones in the early game if you worry about macro. Even Hydralisks are only 25 seconds away. Someone has to figure this out.
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On December 06 2023 15:17 mtcn77 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 06 2023 11:00 Kodan wrote:
Slight tangent, but are there any guides/threads discussing larva optimization? I saw iopq talk about it slightly in threads, and I have heard several other people discuss it, but I actually did not know there was a certain thing you could do between hatch/lair upgrading that nets you an extra larva. Is it an easy enough trick to explain? I think you get an extra larva at each upgrade if you have already spawned all of them into units. In case you used all your larvae, you get a 12.6/14 second advantage. My general issue with common Zerg meta is with zerglings and how much production time they delay the Zerg, except in mirror matchup. It really throws Zerg off its development when in the time 1 Zealot and 2 probes take for the Protoss, Zerg only makes 4 zerglings and no drones. You should absolutely stick to sunkens and drones in the early game if you worry about macro. Even Hydralisks are only 25 seconds away. Someone has to figure this out.
you get an extra larva at Lair always
so don't have 3 larvae, and it resets the larva timer so if you're about to get one and Lair pops, the Lair one will reset the timer (make sure your larva pops RIGHT before Lair and not RIGHT after it)
the larva timer is a little over 14 seconds, while the Lair is 63 seconds so figure it out
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Can I have my theory tested out in the CNSL6 semifinal and final game? You can watch the ArtosisCasts replay: ArtosisCasts replay
In the first example, Zerg rushes heavily into macro, defends with drone drills and Sunken Colonies. The Protoss also fails in the understanding of the early game advantage Protoss has over Zerg by not exercising some uncounterable build, anything more than 2 Gateways are out of the scope of Zerg to counter, and Zerg coasts to victory.
Compare that to the second game @18:00. Zerg makes zerglings, tries to defend with them instead of Sunken Colonies. Protoss Zealots come in, kill a few drones and now you are even further behind in economy than Protoss when you started making the zerglings.
I think Zerg players should consider Hatchery larva management as a key strategy. 1 Sunken Colony takes only 1 drone time - 3 times less time than 6 zerglings. That is literally not having the time to make 1 drone every time you make a pair of zerglings when you needed to make the most drones in the early game. Protoss on the other hand can make Zealots and probes without halting each other's production.
There is a big incentive to expand with Zerg because mineral patches start out nearly as efficient as the Vespene Gas to harvest, but are 2.4 times more worker intensive at 3 workers per patch. Vespene Geyser harvesting is less worker intensive instead. That drives Zerg players to expand more since Vespene Geyser is cheaper to harvest and more mineral patches mean less intensive mining. It can grow into a big midgame advantage for Zerg if you have the same number of workers at two bases for every base Protoss has.
Suppose you have 9 drones mining and 3 drones Vespene Gas harvesting each in two bases and Protoss has 21 probes mining and 3 probes harvesting Vespene Gas in one base. There are the same number of workers, but the Zerg is gathering ~1062 minerals per minute while Protoss gathers ~903. Zerg would be making 17.6% more minerals eventhough Protoss would be using 16.6% more probes to mine. Zerg also has double the gas income. That is the impetus for Zerg to expand.
The barrier for Zerg is Zerg cannot make units faster than Protoss Nexus and Protoss can warp Zealots at Gateways separately. A good Protoss has 2x production speed the second the first Gateway warps in. On the other hand, zerglings paint the Zerg into a corner since each drone matters in the early game. For defence in the early game unless you are closing off the game, zerglings are the most time consuming units to make for Zerg.
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On December 04 2023 21:36 iopq wrote:
I saw that pros go 12 hatch, then later pool, then 12 gas and upgrade lair vs. Terran
But when I tried this build I got my Lair started at 3:01 which meant it popped before 4:05 where I would get another larva. I was literally short one larva (Lair morph triggers the larva timer). How do people deal with this? Just make 12 gas later than 50 minerals?
Why even go 12 hatch anyway?
I propose 11 hatch which slows you down by a second on the Lair, but speed up your 2nd hatchery larvae by like 4 seconds.
So my proposed build is something like this:
11 hatch
11 pool
12 gas
17 overlord
18 hatch
zergling speed
the extra fast larva at the expansion will get you more mining time from a drone, and delaying your lair timing to 4:05 lets you first spawn a larva, then immediately spawn a second one
why do people do 12 hatch anyway?
You realize you don't have to make lair exactly when you have 100 gas right? I suggest you watch more pro ZvT. They are very often delaying making lair even by 2-3 seconds after they have 150/100 to hit a bonus larva lair timing. If you really want to refine it so you have 100 gas exactly @ bonus larva timing, then yes you can just delay making the extractor a bit, or send drones a little slower to mine gas.
As for the reason for 12/12/12, its mostly used to allow making 3rd hatch while Lair is building (aka 2.5 hatch) and still afford spire when Lair finishes. Now you have a 7 muta timing instead of a 6 muta timing.
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On December 11 2023 04:52 fearthequeen wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2023 21:36 iopq wrote:
I saw that pros go 12 hatch, then later pool, then 12 gas and upgrade lair vs. Terran
But when I tried this build I got my Lair started at 3:01 which meant it popped before 4:05 where I would get another larva. I was literally short one larva (Lair morph triggers the larva timer). How do people deal with this? Just make 12 gas later than 50 minerals?
Why even go 12 hatch anyway?
I propose 11 hatch which slows you down by a second on the Lair, but speed up your 2nd hatchery larvae by like 4 seconds.
So my proposed build is something like this:
11 hatch
11 pool
12 gas
17 overlord
18 hatch
zergling speed
the extra fast larva at the expansion will get you more mining time from a drone, and delaying your lair timing to 4:05 lets you first spawn a larva, then immediately spawn a second one
why do people do 12 hatch anyway? You realize you don't have to make lair exactly when you have 100 gas right? I suggest you watch more pro ZvT. They are very often delaying making lair even by 2-3 seconds after they have 150/100 to hit a bonus larva lair timing. If you really want to refine it so you have 100 gas exactly @ bonus larva timing, then yes you can just delay making the extractor a bit, or send drones a little slower to mine gas. As for the reason for 12/12/12, its mostly used to allow making 3rd hatch while Lair is building (aka 2.5 hatch) and still afford spire when Lair finishes. Now you have a 7 muta timing instead of a 6 muta timing.
You can see I also throw down a 2.5 hatch before researching speed.
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On December 14 2023 15:03 iopq wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On December 11 2023 04:52 fearthequeen wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2023 21:36 iopq wrote:
I saw that pros go 12 hatch, then later pool, then 12 gas and upgrade lair vs. Terran
But when I tried this build I got my Lair started at 3:01 which meant it popped before 4:05 where I would get another larva. I was literally short one larva (Lair morph triggers the larva timer). How do people deal with this? Just make 12 gas later than 50 minerals?
Why even go 12 hatch anyway?
I propose 11 hatch which slows you down by a second on the Lair, but speed up your 2nd hatchery larvae by like 4 seconds.
So my proposed build is something like this:
11 hatch
11 pool
12 gas
17 overlord
18 hatch
zergling speed
the extra fast larva at the expansion will get you more mining time from a drone, and delaying your lair timing to 4:05 lets you first spawn a larva, then immediately spawn a second one
why do people do 12 hatch anyway? You realize you don't have to make lair exactly when you have 100 gas right? I suggest you watch more pro ZvT. They are very often delaying making lair even by 2-3 seconds after they have 150/100 to hit a bonus larva lair timing. If you really want to refine it so you have 100 gas exactly @ bonus larva timing, then yes you can just delay making the extractor a bit, or send drones a little slower to mine gas. As for the reason for 12/12/12, its mostly used to allow making 3rd hatch while Lair is building (aka 2.5 hatch) and still afford spire when Lair finishes. Now you have a 7 muta timing instead of a 6 muta timing. You can see I also throw down a 2.5 hatch before researching speed.
12/12/12 can go 3:02 Lair > speed with next 100 gas, then 3rd hatch in main. 3rd hatch will still be done before Spire if you execute it well.
I'm not saying your build is necessarily bad, but there are always tradeoffs.
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EPT
