EPT[D] Broodlords too good vs P? - Page 9
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Augury
United States758 Posts
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TSL-Lore
United States412 Posts
Brood Lords are agonizingly slow and cannot shoot air, thus they require a lot of support. It seems that psi-storm would counter these slow moving beasts pretty well. | ||
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BlasiuS
United States2405 Posts
On March 10 2010 03:34 TSL-Lore wrote: It seems that psi-storm would counter these slow moving beasts pretty well. I don't think storm is a good counter to brood lords. Brood lords have...275(?) health I think. Psi-storm does 80 damage. You do the math. Actually, I'll do the math; that's over 3 full storms to kill a brood lord. I think a storm can hit 2 or 3 brood lords. Regardless, it takes a long time to kill a brood lord with storm. It's not like SC where 1 storm can take a full-health guardian down into the red. | ||
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TSL-Lore
United States412 Posts
On March 10 2010 03:36 BlasiuS wrote: I don't think storm is a good counter to brood lords. Brood lords have...275(?) health I think. Psi-storm does 80 damage. You do the math. Actually, I'll do the math; that's over 3 full storms to kill a brood lord. I think a storm can hit 2 or 3 brood lords. Regardless, it takes a long time to kill a brood lord with storm. It's not like SC where 1 storm can take a full-health guardian down into the red. since smart-casting makes storm so easy to cast now, you should be able to blanket a good portion of his army, hitting both the Brood Lords and Hydras underneath. Obviously you don't JUST get storm, you'd use it in conjunction with a good army mix. Take care of most of the Hydras and weaken the Brood Lords with storm, then continue fighting. Brood Lords and Hydras move to slowly that they should take a lot of dmg from the storms. Come on, what happened to you scary Protoss's from SC1 that walked around in that unstoppable ball of fury? Nothing in this game should be "psi storm doesn't kill a brood lord in 1 cast, therefore it is not a counter." | ||
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Ecrilon
501 Posts
Maxed Archon/Reaver/Templar/Zealot vs Maxed Ultrahydra Defiler means that the blue ball is going to destroy the latter. However, it is really easy for a non maxed blue ball to be picked off unit by unit. Archons and Reavers die reasonably quickly to Hydra fire. Ultras can soak storms and will obviously outclass Archons under swarm so you can pick off bits of the blue ball, never actually letting it achieve Maxed status. Also, a Ultraling Defiler drop will kill an unwary Protoss that does not weaken his maxed army by placing parts of it at his expansions Maxed Zealot/Goon/Templar/Arbiter vs Maxed Mech Vessels is a pretty even fight depending on upgrades, stasis vs emp and storms, and just plain old mine craziness. Mech is obviously favored in a direct confrontation but Protoss might have a good shot turning the fight into an elimination race with Recalls. Alternatively, the Protoss can have maxed Carriers, and the mechanics of Carriers vs Goliaths are mostly map dependent. These three scenarios are what I tend to call "Even Endgames" in SC1, because it tends to occur only when the combatants take approximately equal damage. As you can see, while Zerg looks like it comes out on the short end of both matchups, they have very viable ways of dealing with maxed Protoss and Terran balls. So what happens in an even ZvP endgame for SC2? Maxed Broodlord/Hydra vs All Maxed Protoss unit compositions. It is fairly clear that air will be eaten by Hydras and that ground will be stopped from moving and eaten by Brood Lords before it is able to kill the Hydras. So Zerg comes out ahead on a head to head battle. Well someone has to, right? So let us examine the counters to coming out behind in we learned in SC1. Be a zerg: Outproduce and kill the army bit by bit. This might look like a great idea with warpgates and such but Broodlords over Hydras, due to their ability to spawn infinite hp, do not actually die. Unless your micro is absolutely stunning, it is difficult to throw enough waves fast enough at a Zerg so that a Broodlord/Hydra army doesn't die. Besides, your opponent is a zerg. A zerg which can now spawn larva. This plan is doomed. Be a zerg 2: Kill the army bit by bit as it tries to come up. Immediately we see a fatal flaw in this plan. Picking off hydras bit by bit is a stupid thing to say and when the Zerg spawns their 3 Brood Lords at once, they already have their necessary army composition where this plan no longer applies. Learn from ZvP and PvT: Drop expansions and force a mobility issue. This is, I feel, the only viable strategy in an Even Endgame. Motherships can mass recall troops everywhere. Phase Prisms lets you warp stuff in at various places. Brood Lords are slow. If they're halfway across the map, you might destroy half their base before they either get to your base or go back to theirs. Of course, I feel that this is still somewhat unfair. There were viable ways, in SC1, to engage Endgame armies as other races. If you got up to close to mech, you could whittle it down. If you caught the blue ball growing, you could snipe key units. Neither of these methods are viable against Hydra/Broolord. The moment the Broodlords pop, you have no choice but to force an elimination race. It is an unengageable army. Or at least an army that is far less engageable than equivalently sized armies of SC1. Besides, even if the army were engaged, Zerg is not Terran. Zerg produces units very, very quickly. So it seems that Zerg managed to gain the ability to create an invincible army without losing their production capabilities. I dunno. It seems unfair. | ||
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amoeba
United States283 Posts
1st, broodlords take 2 supply compared to the 6 supply of the carrier. 2nd carriers take another 200 minerals to build interceptors. 3rd of all, that period of time where you had the use of the corruptor (one of the best anti air units/counters to collosi in the game) can't be discounted. Like if I can upgrade phoenix to carrier by paying 200/150 with interceptors already built, there would be no end to calls of overpowered. so Broodlords costwise is much cheaper than carrier. | ||
rotinegg
United States1719 Posts
On March 10 2010 03:56 Ecrilon wrote: Be a zerg: Outproduce and kill the army bit by bit. This might look like a great idea with warpgates and such but Broodlords over Hydras, due to their ability to spawn infinite hp, do not actually die. Unless your micro is absolutely stunning, it is difficult to throw enough waves fast enough at a Zerg so that a Broodlord/Hydra army doesn't die. Besides, your opponent is a zerg. A zerg which can now spawn larva. This plan is doomed. this infinite hp thing is being thrown around too casually. So is the spawn larva argument. You can spawn larva all you want, but with your main mined out and potentially having your nat almost mined out, 300 gas per BL is not by any means an easy investment to make, so no, they are not infinitely replenishable as ultra/lings were in SC1. As for the infinite hp thing, as someone pointed out, the effective number of broodlings active at any given time is 6 per BL, so 3 BL x 6 = 18 broodlings, and killing 18 broodlings every few seconds with a lategame terran/toss army I dont think is such an impossible feat to accomplish. Be a zerg 2: Kill the army bit by bit as it tries to come up. Immediately we see a fatal flaw in this plan. Picking off hydras bit by bit is a stupid thing to say and when the Zerg spawns their 3 Brood Lords at once, they already have their necessary army composition where this plan no longer applies. What? I dont understand what you said here... it just seems like you said engage zerg and try to kill them little by little... not a very brilliant tactic by all means. Learn from ZvP and PvT: Drop expansions and force a mobility issue. This is, I feel, the only viable strategy in an Even Endgame. Motherships can mass recall troops everywhere. Phase Prisms lets you warp stuff in at various places. Brood Lords are slow. If they're halfway across the map, you might destroy half their base before they either get to your base or go back to theirs. Yea, there we go. Of course, I feel that this is still somewhat unfair. There were viable ways, in SC1, to engage Endgame armies as other races. If you got up to close to mech, you could whittle it down. If you caught the blue ball growing, you could snipe key units. Neither of these methods are viable against Hydra/Broolord. The moment the Broodlords pop, you have no choice but to force an elimination race. It is an unengageable army. Or at least an army that is far less engageable than equivalently sized armies of SC1. Besides, even if the army were engaged, Zerg is not Terran. Zerg produces units very, very quickly. So it seems that Zerg managed to gain the ability to create an invincible army without losing their production capabilities. I dunno. It seems unfair. Starcraft is one big elimination race, don't see why you are trying to avoid it, especially when you will most likely win it given the dps of MMM armies. If engaging an army head on seems stupid, dont do it. Guerrilla warfare is a legitimate strategy and I see no reason why you are just counting it out. An sc1 corollary would be cracklings+defilers going for expansions rather than trying to engage a maxed out army in the middle of the map. Furthermore, as far as production capability goes, as I've outline above, having to spend 350/300 min/gas on each unit that take time to spawn+morph does not constitute a quickly replenishable army. One immediate strategy i can think of as P is utilizing vortex: disable BL's and a significant portion of hydras, it's like a shorter version of stasis. You will no doubt have a mothership by then as it is lower on the tech tree than brood lords, and there is no reason to not go stargate when you see a spire going up after lair. No offense intended, just wanted to dissect your post to the nitty gritties so generalizations like "infinite hp" and "infinitely replenishable army" dont get thrown around too often without actually thinking it through, | ||
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rotinegg
United States1719 Posts
On March 10 2010 04:13 amoeba wrote: I'm not sure if broodlords are overpowered or not but I think the assertion that they are just 50 minerals cheaper than a carrier is a faulty one. 1st, broodlords take 2 supply compared to the 6 supply of the carrier. 2nd carriers take another 200 minerals to build interceptors. 3rd of all, that period of time where you had the use of the corruptor (one of the best anti air units/counters to collosi in the game) can't be discounted. Like if I can upgrade phoenix to carrier by paying 200/150 with interceptors already built, there would be no end to calls of overpowered. so Broodlords costwise is much cheaper than carrier. well first off theyre not cheaper than carriers, they are the same price without intercepters. I can see why just carrier vs BL would seem unfair, but first of all the tech tree for carrier is gate->cybernetics->stargate->fleet beacon, compared to broodlord's spawning pool-> lair->spire->infestors pit->hive->greater spire. You can't just discount that. Second, carrier has 300hp and 150 shield, compared to BL's 275hp, no shield. Not to mention they are slow as shit. Finally, comparing carrier to BL unit-to-unit is meaningless, as you're never gonna see a game where it's both players teching to BL and carriers asap, and then squaring off with a pure BL/carrier army. edit: spelling | ||
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amoeba
United States283 Posts
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rotinegg
United States1719 Posts
On March 10 2010 04:29 amoeba wrote: my point still stands that broodlords are much cheaper than carriers. ok, point acknowledged. are you implying you would square off against a BL-hydra army with carriers then? | ||
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Ecrilon
501 Posts
It seems like you're telling me that there is a Protoss army composition that IS able to beat a Broodlord Hydra army. This is a claim that has been refuted again and again in this thread. For point 2, Refer to my second point about how a Zerg will deal with a Protoss ball before it gets to max. The rudeness is unecessary. For the rest of your point, I never said inifinitely replenishable. You did. But a Zerg army with BLs will now crush a Protoss army cost for cost. And their units will produce faster. I don't care how much it costs for you to MAKE a BL. How much does it take for me to kill it? It costs more. And Zerg will replenish faster than a Protoss. | ||
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amoeba
United States283 Posts
On March 10 2010 04:31 rotinegg wrote: ok, point acknowledged. are you implying you would square off against a BL-hydra army with carriers then? no, where did I say that? my whole point is to counter those who were saying broodlords deserve to be powerful because they are a late game unit and comparing them costwise to carriers. | ||
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rotinegg
United States1719 Posts
An army composition that is able to beat a hydra/broodlord army, maybe not, but whats an army composition to beat the giant blue ball of death with a zerg? your argument was that zerg should snipe off key units before it grows to critical mass, which doesnt necessarily translate to a way zerg can beat a maxed blue ball of death protoss army. Rather, it sounds more along the lines of the "dont let your opponent get there" arguments. I exaggerated when I said infinitely replensihable; perhaps a better word choice would have been an army more quickly replenishable than the other two races'? The only reason it is so is because of the cost effectiveness of hydras and BL's with a maxed army, but saying that is talking about a very specific game mechanic without taking into consideration many other factors that could weigh in to the bigger picture, such as economic damage you could have inflicted early on to not let Z have enough resources and time to climb up the full tech tree to begin with. I am in agreement with you about the cost-effectiveness of zerg units, it's just that it's not fair to zerg to just throw out provocative claims like "BL's imba" | ||
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rotinegg
United States1719 Posts
On March 10 2010 04:40 amoeba wrote: no, where did I say that? my whole point is to counter those who were saying broodlords deserve to be powerful because they are a late game unit and comparing them costwise to carriers. well in that case my point also stands that they take longer to spawn and are significantly higher up on the tech tree, and I am in agreement with those that say they deserve to be powerful, and I think their costefficiency compared to carriers as late-game units is warranted. | ||
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amoeba
United States283 Posts
So while it seems like oh, just go to starport -> fleet beacon, realistically you aren't going to do a 1 starport carrier pump. In real game situations, broodlord armies won't come out later than carrier armies. | ||
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Ecrilon
501 Posts
In an Even Endgame situation, both of you take even economic damage. The power the Protoss is able to produce on even footing with the Zerg is less than that of Zerg now that Zerg has BLs. | ||
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Teejing
Germany1360 Posts
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rotinegg
United States1719 Posts
On March 10 2010 04:56 amoeba wrote: yes they are higher up the tech tree, but you get the use of a very good intermediate unit in the meantime. This is huge. Its also much much easier for zerg to switch tech. To throw up a carrier army, protoss has to put up multiple starports. So while it seems like oh, just go to starport -> fleet beacon, realistically you aren't going to do a 1 starport carrier pump. In real game situations, broodlord armies won't come out later than carrier armies. ^ that is true, tech switching is easier for zerg because their production facilities are already in place, but that's just the nature of zerg.. to be versatile and have an all-over-the-place feel. about the real game situations, I don't really know what to say because I have never had a protoss go carriers on me, even in late game situations. Maybe it has to do something with the fact that I'm only in silver league, but I have had plenty of games where I was in the middle of trying to climb up the tech tree to get to BL's but lost the game simply because I didn't have enough hydras when they popped or died to a timing push/drop harrass. It's not a walk in the park to fend off early-mid game aggression while reserving enough resources to steadily climb up the tech tree. | ||
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amoeba
United States283 Posts
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amoeba
United States283 Posts
On March 10 2010 05:02 rotinegg wrote: ^ that is true, tech switching is easier for zerg because their production facilities are already in place, but that's just the nature of zerg.. to be versatile and have an all-over-the-place feel. about the real game situations, I don't really know what to say because I have never had a protoss go carriers on me, even in late game situations. Maybe it has to do something with the fact that I'm only in silver league, but I have had plenty of games where I was in the middle of trying to climb up the tech tree to get to BL's but lost the game simply because I didn't have enough hydras when they popped or died to a timing push/drop harrass. It's not a walk in the park to fend off early-mid game aggression while reserving enough resources to steadily climb up the tech tree. yes that is the nature of zerg. But this argument has no place in a balance discussion. as to why you haven't had any protosses go carriers, its because protoss is forced to go robo to counter the rest of the zerg army namely roach push followed by mass hydra and honestly carriers suck against zerg. assuming protoss avoids the many zerg tech switches like midgame muta, etc, and reaches lategame, they run in to broodlords. In pvz it is typically the protoss that is reactionary and the zerg that is proactive. | ||
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