• Log InLog In
  • Register
Liquid`
Team Liquid Liquipedia
EDT 22:21
CEST 04:21
KST 11:21
  • Home
  • Forum
  • Calendar
  • Streams
  • Liquipedia
  • Features
  • Store
  • EPT
  • TL+
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Smash
  • Heroes
  • Counter-Strike
  • Overwatch
  • Liquibet
  • Fantasy StarCraft
  • TLPD
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Blogs
Forum Sidebar
Events/Features
News
Featured News
[ASL21] Ro24 Preview Pt2: News Flash10[ASL21] Ro24 Preview Pt1: New Chaos0Team Liquid Map Contest #22 - Presented by Monster Energy18ByuL: The Forgotten Master of ZvT30Behind the Blue - Team Liquid History Book20
Community News
$5,000 WardiTV TLMC tournament - Presented by Monster Energy0GSL CK: More events planned pending crowdfunding0Weekly Cups (May 30-Apr 5): herO, Clem, SHIN win0[BSL22] RO32 Group Stage3Weekly Cups (March 23-29): herO takes triple6
StarCraft 2
General
Blizzard Classic Cup @ BlizzCon 2026 - $100k prize pool Weekly Cups (May 30-Apr 5): herO, Clem, SHIN win Rongyi Cup S3 - Preview & Info Team Liquid Map Contest #22 - Presented by Monster Energy What mix of new & old maps do you want in the next ladder pool? (SC2)
Tourneys
$5,000 WardiTV TLMC tournament - Presented by Monster Energy GSL CK: More events planned pending crowdfunding Sparkling Tuna Cup - Weekly Open Tournament RSL Season 4 announced for March-April StarCraft Evolution League (SC Evo Biweekly)
Strategy
Custom Maps
[M] (2) Frigid Storage Publishing has been re-enabled! [Feb 24th 2026]
External Content
The PondCast: SC2 News & Results Mutation # 520 Moving Fees Mutation # 519 Inner Power Mutation # 518 Radiation Zone
Brood War
General
ASL21 General Discussion Pros React To: JaeDong vs Queen [BSL22] RO32 Group Stage so ive been playing broodwar for a week straight. Gypsy to Korea
Tourneys
[Megathread] Daily Proleagues [ASL21] Ro24 Group F Escore Tournament StarCraft Season 2 [ASL21] Ro24 Group E
Strategy
What's the deal with APM & what's its true value Fighting Spirit mining rates Simple Questions, Simple Answers
Other Games
General Games
Stormgate/Frost Giant Megathread Nintendo Switch Thread Starcraft Tabletop Miniature Game General RTS Discussion Thread Darkest Dungeon
Dota 2
The Story of Wings Gaming Official 'what is Dota anymore' discussion
League of Legends
G2 just beat GenG in First stand
Heroes of the Storm
Simple Questions, Simple Answers Heroes of the Storm 2.0
Hearthstone
Deck construction bug Heroes of StarCraft mini-set
TL Mafia
Mafia Game Mode Feedback/Ideas TL Mafia Community Thread Five o'clock TL Mafia
Community
General
US Politics Mega-thread The Chess Thread Russo-Ukrainian War Thread NASA and the Private Sector Things Aren’t Peaceful in Palestine
Fan Clubs
The IdrA Fan Club
Media & Entertainment
[Manga] One Piece [Req][Books] Good Fantasy/SciFi books Movie Discussion!
Sports
2024 - 2026 Football Thread Formula 1 Discussion Cricket [SPORT] Tokyo Olympics 2021 Thread General nutrition recommendations
World Cup 2022
Tech Support
[G] How to Block Livestream Ads
TL Community
The Automated Ban List
Blogs
Loot Boxes—Emotions, And Why…
TrAiDoS
Broowar part 2
qwaykee
Funny Nicknames
LUCKY_NOOB
Iranian anarchists: organize…
XenOsky
FS++
Kraekkling
ASL S21 English Commentary…
namkraft
Electronics
mantequilla
Customize Sidebar...

Website Feedback

Closed Threads



Active: 1762 users

Protoss Workers Needed for Constant Production

Forum Index > Brood War Strategy
Post a Reply
Scarbo
Profile Joined January 2012
294 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-09-07 05:40:15
September 04 2014 10:43 GMT
#1
So... after reading some threads on when to stop worker production I couldn't find any calculations on Protoss units, so I used ix's data to come up with this spreadsheet:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1q3gHinLLnWLIFbfKi7-sRiI-uLa22akyrPA7mElUisk/edit?usp=sharing
(edit) I put together calculations for the other races as was asked by Cryoc
(edit2) Corrected major mistakes in my timers (mixed both normal and fastest game speeds). Everything should be fastest now
(edit3) Corrected spawn timer for Larva thanks to Cryoc. Liquipedia article had it wrong
(edit4) Put the morph timer in parenthesis for Lurkers and Guardian/Devourers, as tested by Cryoc. Liquipedia was confusing
Hopefully it helps some people.

Threads I read before coming up with this:
+ Show Spoiler +
ix calculations and a lot of detailed stuff on worker saturation: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/bw-strategy/111203-wandering-and-worker-saturation

Zerg/Terran econ management by w3jjjj: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/bw-strategy/78828-zerg-econ-management-bonus-terran-section

Zerg econ management for newbs by Birdie: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/bw-strategy/392000-economy-management-for-newbs

antrax's gathering review: http://www.yellowchrome.org/1com/sclegacy/final_review.pdf
Cryoc
Profile Joined July 2011
Germany912 Posts
September 04 2014 12:34 GMT
#2
Nice work. Could you maybe add the units for Terran and Zerg too? I know in that one thread they talk about it, but there is no organized information like you did for Protoss.
You should probably also include pylons in your calculations as your units need supply.
http://www.twitch.tv/cryoc
vOdToasT
Profile Blog Joined September 2010
Sweden2870 Posts
September 04 2014 15:08 GMT
#3
On September 04 2014 21:34 Cryoc wrote:
as your units need supply.


*Psi

Just sayin'

Have a good day
If it's stupid but it works, then it's not stupid* (*Or: You are stupid for losing to it, and gotta git gud)
FFGenerations
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
7088 Posts
September 04 2014 18:30 GMT
#4
love the thread title. sounds like a newspaper advertisement for new labour
Cool BW Music Vid - youtube.com/watch?v=W54nlqJ-Nx8 ~~~~~ ᕤ OYSTERS ᕤ CLAMS ᕤ AND ᕤ CUCKOLDS ᕤ ~~~~~~ ༼ ᕤ◕◡◕ ༽ᕤ PUNCH HIM ༼ ᕤ◕◡◕ ༽ᕤ
FFGenerations
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
7088 Posts
September 04 2014 18:37 GMT
#5
[image loading]
Cool BW Music Vid - youtube.com/watch?v=W54nlqJ-Nx8 ~~~~~ ᕤ OYSTERS ᕤ CLAMS ᕤ AND ᕤ CUCKOLDS ᕤ ~~~~~~ ༼ ᕤ◕◡◕ ༽ᕤ PUNCH HIM ༼ ᕤ◕◡◕ ༽ᕤ
Scarbo
Profile Joined January 2012
294 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-09-04 18:53:50
September 04 2014 18:51 GMT
#6
On September 04 2014 21:34 Cryoc wrote:
Nice work. Could you maybe add the units for Terran and Zerg too? I know in that one thread they talk about it, but there is no organized information like you did for Protoss.
You should probably also include pylons in your calculations as your units need supply.


Good points. Also, lol @ above :D
Scarbo
Profile Joined January 2012
294 Posts
September 04 2014 20:55 GMT
#7
Added the other races and made a bunch of corrections/improvements.
MysteryMeat1
Profile Blog Joined June 2011
United States3292 Posts
September 05 2014 07:33 GMT
#8
[image loading]

"Cause ya know, Style before victory." -The greatest mafia player alive
Cryoc
Profile Joined July 2011
Germany912 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-09-05 14:34:58
September 05 2014 14:32 GMT
#9
Nice, thanks.
I noticed some mistakes in the Zerg section. The spawning time for the larva is wrong. It should be 20*0.65. The larva Liquipedia article had a mistake there. Also if you include the build cost of a muta into the guardian/devourer you have to include the muta build time as well for the calculation, same thing for the lurker.
http://www.twitch.tv/cryoc
prech
Profile Joined March 2014
United States2948 Posts
September 05 2014 19:34 GMT
#10
Very interesting spreadsheet, Scarbo. Would you mind discussing your analysis? It looks like the workers needed column are the total (not per mineral patch or gas geyser) number of workers necessary for each unit to be produced, taking into account the minerals/gas consumed during their production process?

Just some random thoughts, not aimed at anyone in particular:
How do these numbers compare with ix's and others saturation/wandering numbers? For example, with one base and saturated workers on ~9 patches (or whatever standard number), how effective is that -- how many of each unit can be produced per given time? What would be a sample ground force composition look like?

How does the saturated worker model compare to production with fewer workers (like the ~1.5-2 workers/patch I sometimes see pro-gamers use)? And with some expansions, one base vs two vs three, etc. bases, how close does a player get to enabling the constant production numbers calculated in the spreadsheet?
Liquipedia
Scarbo
Profile Joined January 2012
294 Posts
September 05 2014 22:08 GMT
#11
On September 05 2014 23:32 Cryoc wrote:
Nice, thanks.
I noticed some mistakes in the Zerg section. The spawning time for the larva is wrong. It should be 20*0.65. The larva Liquipedia article had a mistake there. Also if you include the build cost of a muta into the guardian/devourer you have to include the muta build time as well for the calculation, same thing for the lurker.


Corrected the timer for larva. Thanks!
About the build time for morphing units, well, for one they aren't in the calculation because I'm using the larva spawn timer and morphing an unit from another one doesn't interfere with that so it doesn't apply. As for the number in parenthesis I was going to include both timers but as stated in the notes section below the liquipedia articles are confusing so I decided to let it be.



On September 06 2014 04:34 prech wrote:
Very interesting spreadsheet, Scarbo. Would you mind discussing your analysis? It looks like the workers needed column are the total (not per mineral patch or gas geyser) number of workers necessary for each unit to be produced, taking into account the minerals/gas consumed during their production process?

Just some random thoughts, not aimed at anyone in particular:
How do these numbers compare with ix's and others saturation/wandering numbers? For example, with one base and saturated workers on ~9 patches (or whatever standard number), how effective is that -- how many of each unit can be produced per given time? What would be a sample ground force composition look like?

How does the saturated worker model compare to production with fewer workers (like the ~1.5-2 workers/patch I sometimes see pro-gamers use)? And with some expansions, one base vs two vs three, etc. bases, how close does a player get to enabling the constant production numbers calculated in the spreadsheet?


My analysis was a starting point for Protoss players to calculate how many workers they need for constant production of something. I was wandering around threads about this and saw sample ground compositions for the other races so I decided to do that for P.

The number I used for minerals mined per minute per Probe were taken from xi's calculations (like it says so in the notes). It's assuming 1 worker per patch so it will decrease in efficiency per worker added. It may be possible to come up with a better number, it's just that this subject has not that much info about and as I said I just wanted a quick Protoss spreadsheet to work with.

Not sure how does the saturated worker model compares since xi only talks about maximum saturation (zero wandering) which goes from 2.4 to 3.3 workers per patch, depending on the patch disposition. I don't think you should be fully saturated ever in a real game so I'm not going to calculate anything using those. I may look around those threads again and try to find info on that but for now this is the reason of what I did.
Cryoc
Profile Joined July 2011
Germany912 Posts
September 06 2014 09:34 GMT
#12
On September 06 2014 07:08 Scarbo wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 05 2014 23:32 Cryoc wrote:
Nice, thanks.
I noticed some mistakes in the Zerg section. The spawning time for the larva is wrong. It should be 20*0.65. The larva Liquipedia article had a mistake there. Also if you include the build cost of a muta into the guardian/devourer you have to include the muta build time as well for the calculation, same thing for the lurker.


Corrected the timer for larva. Thanks!
About the build time for morphing units, well, for one they aren't in the calculation because I'm using the larva spawn timer and morphing an unit from another one doesn't interfere with that so it doesn't apply. As for the number in parenthesis I was going to include both timers but as stated in the notes section below the liquipedia articles are confusing so I decided to let it be.

Yeah, you are right, the numbers seemed so high, I thought the pre-state has to be integrated. Zerg can really dump a lot of resources really fast. Seems like the cocoon page used a rounded number for ingame seconds (40*0.65~25). I tested it ingame, the basic value is 40 for morphing guardians/devourer, same goes for morphing lurker.
http://www.twitch.tv/cryoc
vanatir
Profile Joined May 2008
Germany355 Posts
September 06 2014 10:42 GMT
#13
i dont get what the excel sheet could tell me. what is the magic number where you should stop probe production?
aka EnjoYmE - streaming on http://www.twitch.tv/myprobe
Cryoc
Profile Joined July 2011
Germany912 Posts
September 06 2014 17:24 GMT
#14
It is a good estimation for your needed worker count, if you want to exploit some sort of timing window and don't know when to stop worker production for it.
http://www.twitch.tv/cryoc
DarkNetHunter
Profile Joined October 2012
1224 Posts
September 06 2014 18:00 GMT
#15
This is actually a resource that has been lacking for ages, so thanks for compiling it all in a great format Scarbo!

If you ever want to design build orders maybe for map specific timings this is a helpful resource
Learn from the mistakes of others. You can't live long enough to make them all yourself.
Scarbo
Profile Joined January 2012
294 Posts
September 07 2014 05:38 GMT
#16
On September 06 2014 18:34 Cryoc wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 06 2014 07:08 Scarbo wrote:
On September 05 2014 23:32 Cryoc wrote:
Nice, thanks.
I noticed some mistakes in the Zerg section. The spawning time for the larva is wrong. It should be 20*0.65. The larva Liquipedia article had a mistake there. Also if you include the build cost of a muta into the guardian/devourer you have to include the muta build time as well for the calculation, same thing for the lurker.


Corrected the timer for larva. Thanks!
About the build time for morphing units, well, for one they aren't in the calculation because I'm using the larva spawn timer and morphing an unit from another one doesn't interfere with that so it doesn't apply. As for the number in parenthesis I was going to include both timers but as stated in the notes section below the liquipedia articles are confusing so I decided to let it be.

Yeah, you are right, the numbers seemed so high, I thought the pre-state has to be integrated. Zerg can really dump a lot of resources really fast. Seems like the cocoon page used a rounded number for ingame seconds (40*0.65~25). I tested it ingame, the basic value is 40 for morphing guardians/devourer, same goes for morphing lurker.


I put that in there. Thanks for testing.
Please log in or register to reply.
Live Events Refresh
PiGosaur Cup
00:00
#76
PiGStarcraft582
EnkiAlexander 58
davetesta47
Liquipedia
[ Submit Event ]
Live Streams
Refresh
StarCraft 2
PiGStarcraft582
RuFF_SC2 187
StarCraft: Brood War
GuemChi 6162
Artosis 666
Jaeyun 48
Noble 13
Terrorterran 8
Dota 2
LuMiX0
Counter-Strike
taco 584
Coldzera 169
Super Smash Bros
hungrybox1530
C9.Mang0376
AZ_Axe230
Other Games
summit1g15709
Maynarde122
ViBE74
CosmosSc2 19
Organizations
Other Games
gamesdonequick1018
BasetradeTV82
StarCraft 2
Blizzard YouTube
StarCraft: Brood War
BSLTrovo
sctven
[ Show 13 non-featured ]
StarCraft 2
• AfreecaTV YouTube
• intothetv
• Kozan
• IndyKCrew
• LaughNgamezSOOP
• Migwel
• sooper7s
StarCraft: Brood War
• BSLYoutube
• STPLYoutube
• ZZZeroYoutube
Dota 2
• WagamamaTV927
League of Legends
• Doublelift4510
Other Games
• Scarra992
Upcoming Events
Replay Cast
6h 39m
Kung Fu Cup
8h 39m
Replay Cast
21h 39m
The PondCast
1d 7h
CranKy Ducklings
1d 21h
WardiTV Team League
2 days
Replay Cast
2 days
CranKy Ducklings
3 days
WardiTV Team League
3 days
uThermal 2v2 Circuit
3 days
[ Show More ]
BSL
3 days
Sparkling Tuna Cup
4 days
WardiTV Team League
4 days
BSL
4 days
Replay Cast
4 days
Replay Cast
5 days
Wardi Open
5 days
GSL
6 days
Liquipedia Results

Completed

CSL Elite League 2026
RSL Revival: Season 4
NationLESS Cup

Ongoing

BSL Season 22
ASL Season 21
CSL 2026 SPRING (S20)
StarCraft2 Community Team League 2026 Spring
Nations Cup 2026
PGL Bucharest 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 1
BLAST Open Spring 2026
ESL Pro League S23 Finals
ESL Pro League S23 Stage 1&2
PGL Cluj-Napoca 2026
IEM Kraków 2026
BLAST Bounty Winter 2026

Upcoming

Escore Tournament S2: W2
IPSL Spring 2026
Escore Tournament S2: W3
Acropolis #4
BSL 22 Non-Korean Championship
CSLAN 4
Kung Fu Cup 2026 Grand Finals
HSC XXIX
uThermal 2v2 2026 Main Event
RSL Revival: Season 5
IEM Cologne Major 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 2
CS Asia Championships 2026
IEM Atlanta 2026
Asian Champions League 2026
PGL Astana 2026
BLAST Rivals Spring 2026
CCT Season 3 Global Finals
IEM Rio 2026
TLPD

1. ByuN
2. TY
3. Dark
4. Solar
5. Stats
6. Nerchio
7. sOs
8. soO
9. INnoVation
10. Elazer
1. Rain
2. Flash
3. EffOrt
4. Last
5. Bisu
6. Soulkey
7. Mini
8. Sharp
Sidebar Settings...

Advertising | Privacy Policy | Terms Of Use | Contact Us

Original banner artwork: Jim Warren
The contents of this webpage are copyright © 2026 TLnet. All Rights Reserved.