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Hi there!
I am placed 6th in copper league and trying to move up. I manage ZvZ and ZvT quite well but I have had hard time with Protoss. Transfer from early game to mid-game is very hard for me. My standard BO in ZvP match up is "roach pressure":
10 Overlord
13 Pool
14 Gas
15 Overlord
15 Queen
17 Zergling
18 Roach Warren
18 Zergling
19 Zergling
20 Larvae Injection
20 Overlord
20 Roach
21 Roach
22 Roach
23 Roach
24 Roach
25 Larvae Injection
Continue Roach Production
The build is farily good, gives me some edge in early game and it allows an opportunity to make an expansion after roach harassment. Only problem is that when Protoss gets the Robotic facility, adds immortals to its army and pushes around 8-10mins I am pretty much gg.
Here is a replay, I hope you will get my point:
http://www.mediafire.com/?3njuyyighzw
So I would like to ask for a few things.
When I scout or assume villain is building the Robo and moving to immortals, how should I adjust?
- Should I make an expansion with another queen and try to outproduce him using still roaches?
- Should I go lair as fast as I can and move to Hydras?
- Muta???
- Should I go lair and upgrade Roaches?
Lair as fast as could --> Hydras seems to be the best option but I feel I am always late and Protoss runs over me.
Making an expansion and lairing at the same time feels too riskya and economically consuming at the critical moment while reducing my army production.
Help..!
GL
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immortals pretty much hard counter roaches, so if it were me i'd just stop roach production and switch to speedlings. you need to tech to lair at some point anyways, and i've found that with 15gas lair at first 100 gas you'll never have enough hydras to fight off the first push, so speedlings are pretty much a requirement even if you do switch to hydras after roaches.
also if i were to modify your build order i'd get lair and my second gas started before i start roach production.
alternatively try skipping roaches, going straight for lair, and expanding after you've got like 10 hydras or pushed back his first attack. my P opponents have pretty much attacked as soon as i put down my natural expansion (i don't FE zvp), but as long as you survive it you should be ahead, since they can't really pressure you with a ton of units AND expand at the same time.
what i basically do is 14 pool, 15 gas, 15 ovie, queen when pool is done, lair when queen is done and take second gas, ling speed at 100 gas, and then put down hydra den when lair is done. just keep a pair of lings on his ramp at all times to be sure when he moves out, with larvae injection you can afford to power drones almost nonstop and just make lings when you see him move out. i don't really know the exact timing when i start making hydras, but i stop drone production around 26ish supply and start making lings, then hydras when the den is finished. remember to power drones again from 2xqueens when your natural hatchery is up, i always end up with like 100 drones and triple my opponents income by the end of the game :3 try and take your third as soon as he takes his natural, but i don't think that keeping 1 base ahead of P is nearly as important as it is in BW.
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I dont like your opening, you have late lair, and a lot of roaches too early. I use this in platinum and has give me quite good results (28 ranked nowadays):
10 Over
14 Pool
17 Over
17 Roach Warren
16 Queen
18 gas ( these 3 things are at the same time, the roach queen gas)
17 Ling
18 Hatch at Expo
3 Drones on gas as soon as it pops
Make only drones (Overlord at 24 when the first larvae injection pops)
@100 gas ling speed
@100 next gas Lair
2nd gas
Start making like 4 roaches or 5
make a ton of lings (normally when the 2nd larvae injection pops)
His push should arrive just before your lair finishes, defend with queens a lot of lings and your 5 roaches. The number you need to defend it its crucial, normally 20 lings and 5 roaches plus 2 queens are enough, save queens mana to heal roaches or the queens.
If he expands, make more drones now and the 3rd gas in order to make 2 evo and upgrade missle + carpace
If he doesnt, Hydra Den and start roach + hydra + ling non stop beacuse there will be a 2nd push with a colossus that if you defend you have won.
This build fends off everything if you do it properly.
Vs 2 Gate:
You have your early roach and you can delay lair and ling speed (dont even need it) for roaches to push while getting more drones.
Vs 1 Gate Starport:
If he goes Phoenix you have 2 queens that should be enough till hydras are out.
If he goes Void Ray he will be at your base with 2 void rays at 7:45, your first hydras should pop at 8:10 or so, thats 25 game seconds that you need to hold off, i recommend saving some mana for queens whenever you get to lair in order to make each queen heal the other, maybe you lose one of them, no problem he has no ground army and you have hydras.
If he goes immortal push you can defend with your roaches and ling speed till your hydras are out, if he delays it, it's hydra roach ling vs 1 colossus 2 immortals and some zealots, you have more than enough units at that point and he is making an all in because he cant take his expo if he makes the colossus.
If he makes the immortals but expoes instead of pushing you can pump drone of 2 base 2 queen and upgrade properly. Hydra roach combo with upgrades melts protoss army, you can also make a spire at this point if you like the muta transition and skip the hydras instead.
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You should study the replays from Liquidbition or w/e it's called. Ret does a really nice and pretty easy to execute Roach build which allows for good economy and lots of roaches. With proper timing and positionining, you can own the Immortal push with even pure roaches.
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On March 17 2010 12:16 NonFactor wrote:
You should study the replays from Liquidbition or w/e it's called. Ret does a really nice and pretty easy to execute Roach build which allows for good economy and lots of roaches. With proper timing and positionining, you can own the Immortal push with even pure roaches.
I dont recommend this, yeah ret does great in those games, but the game where he is fast pushed with immortals (3rd one i think) he get totally owned, because roaches are very bad against immortals. Speedlings are far more effective and you ar going to need them in the long run, even thoung you go for hydra-roach, if you expand properly you are going to have a lot of minerals and no gas, thats a ton of speed lings that can be used to harras, i like a lot the typicall nydus in main base and only send lings in it and when he reinforces you take the expo with your hydra roach army, it is quite effective
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Thank you very much for the answers! I will try both builds and post a replay if I succeed with them.
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im pretty sure the reason ret went 14 pool is because he expected standard play. If he would have got proxied i'm pretty sure he would have lost. I usually 13 pool, and vs proxy it can be pretty rough. I think 14 might be too late especially with chrono on a 2 gate.
also the reason the immortals aren't effective vs ret (except the games he loses) is because of the amount of pressure he applies forcing cannons and taking a 3rd. The game on KR was an example of how he didn't pressure enough and tried to take a 3rd and paid for it by losing.
I think mutas are a really good follow up because the protoss isn't going to have gas for a stargate/pheonix if they are going for early immortals and they are going to have at least 1 sentry so I'm thinking you can either pressure a ton and take 3rd or get a quicker lair which is what i'd do and get mutas because they are extremely good vs P and they have a bitch of a time trying to defend both sides. You just need to get your 3rd and 4th gas earlier if you're going spire is all.
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I've given up using roaches vs P. They are countered by immortals, collosus and anything in the air. The only thing they are good against are zealots, and really they're not even all that good honestly, it is just that you can mass them faster than the protoss can mass his units.
I strongly prefer to go speedling, and then pay due diligence and scout with them. There's plenty of time to throw down a roach den after your second expansion is up and toss out a couple dozen roaches when you know has no direct counter for them at that time and your economy is rocking. Plus you can afford the upgrades at that point.
But usually if I see a robo bay I go mutas/ling, and if I see anything else I go roach/ling/hydra or some such combination in the mid game. Protoss seems to have a really hard time with that in my divisions.
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I tried Rauks build based on ling/hydra. My opponent was quite poor though, but please, plug some of my leaks with Zerg and give me some feedback about accomplishing his buildorder and about my macro mngmt. Zerg Macro tips are welcome. Am I making my 2nd expansion too late btw?
Here is the replay: http://www.mediafire.com/?ooyzndmukzx
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I cant seem to win against this anymore. It doesnt even matter if they go immortal stalker or immortal zealot or a mix they just walk over me all day. 
Im rank #4 gold btw.
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Im top10ish platinum in europe, and i think the trick is to go expand on around 20, get 2nd queen insta, and then just check what hes doing and counter that until you can mass mutas.
If he goes zealots/sentries, get banelings, if he goes phoenix or voidray or mass stalkers, get hydras, if he goes immortals, you autowin.
no matter what your opponent goes, you always also add speedlings (from the 2nd 100 gas you have, except vs a big zealot force, you wanna go baneling nest first sometimes). With this build you simply cannot get overpowered before the midgame, and then its up to you to do whatever fits.
Mass mutas is very strong, especially on maps with alot of cliffs and where you can fly from the enemies natural to his main quickly, but groundunits take quite a bit longer to go back and forth.
Hydras/roaches/speedlings must be mixed with corruptors vs the colossi at some point, but with alot of upgrades this is a very good mix too. Getting your overseer out every single game, as soon as you can really afford it, is crucial too.
Note, that i almost never build roaches...they just suck, except for vs 3gate
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so... you're making roaches against immortals >.I'd recommend u using the BO the Battle offered, that's exactly the one I do it works pretty well (only diff I do 13 pool ;P).
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From what I've seen top players do, and from my own experience, you have two options once you scout a 1gate-tech -> immortals build:
-stay on 1 base, fast-tech to lair, get speedlings + roaches + muta or infestors
-fast expand, get 2 queens ASAP, drone whore until he moves out, counter the push with just a few roaches (like 3-5) and mass speedling, then go muta.
Btw, collosus does not counter roaches very well if you add corruptors (see Ret v Infernal on LT), so roach + corruptor is a great mid- or late-game army if protoss doesn't get any immortals.
DIMAGA counters 1base mass immortals with 1base infestors, it's really neat, you should check out his reps v Goodgameru from the SC2TV.RU tournament #2
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From a P point of view, Roaches are currently the strategy that gives me the easiest time. I know they are easy to just mass and A-move but Immortals destroy them so much it makes it ridiculous...
My problem is actually combinations of lings/muta/hydralisks - P have NOTHING that deals bonus damage against light armor... Only phoenix, and these lose a lot of harass power once Z gets hydra...
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On March 18 2010 03:29 zazen wrote:
From a P point of view, Roaches are currently the strategy that gives me the easiest time. I know they are easy to just mass and A-move but Immortals destroy them so much it makes it ridiculous...
My problem is actually combinations of lings/muta/hydralisks - P have NOTHING that deals bonus damage against light armor... Only phoenix, and these lose a lot of harass power once Z gets hydra...
thats true, but zealots are still pretty god damn strong vs zerg ground and so are colossi 
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I found the key to defend immortal rush is to get second queen ASAP pump drones, get 3rd hatch. Roach warren in case of mass zealots and tech to mutas. If you cant manage to get mutas before immortal get mass lings/roaches
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I found that Roaches with their Speed Upgrade are actually not that bad against Immortals if you can get in a nice Flank/Surround. No more Immortal-Dancing...
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You can break the immortal push with speedlings only, while teching to spire. Just scout well and catch the protoss in an area as open as possible. He won't have enough sentries to build an efficient wall to cover everything so if you do a good surround with your speedlings, his push will get destroyed or severely crippled and you will finish him with ease.
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On March 18 2010 17:51 Sauron wrote:
You can break the immortal push with speedlings only, while teching to spire. Just scout well and catch the protoss in an area as open as possible. He won't have enough sentries to build an efficient wall to cover everything so if you do a good surround with your speedlings, his push will get destroyed or severely crippled and you will finish him with ease.
You know, everyone says this, but I find zerglings by themselves to be so suck vs toss that I need a bazillion of them to counter any push involving a decent number of zealots. While they are cheap, they also take up a ton of larvae so you can't drone whore near as hard as you need to in the beginning of the game if you are massing the crap out of speedlings.
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On March 18 2010 03:35 Viruuus wrote:Show nested quote +On March 18 2010 03:29 zazen wrote:
From a P point of view, Roaches are currently the strategy that gives me the easiest time. I know they are easy to just mass and A-move but Immortals destroy them so much it makes it ridiculous...
My problem is actually combinations of lings/muta/hydralisks - P have NOTHING that deals bonus damage against light armor... Only phoenix, and these lose a lot of harass power once Z gets hydra... thats true, but zealots are still pretty god damn strong vs zerg ground and so are colossi
actually, don't archons do bonus to light? (to be fair archons suck ass though)
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On March 20 2010 18:46 CharlieMurphy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 18 2010 03:35 Viruuus wrote:On March 18 2010 03:29 zazen wrote:
From a P point of view, Roaches are currently the strategy that gives me the easiest time. I know they are easy to just mass and A-move but Immortals destroy them so much it makes it ridiculous...
My problem is actually combinations of lings/muta/hydralisks - P have NOTHING that deals bonus damage against light armor... Only phoenix, and these lose a lot of harass power once Z gets hydra... thats true, but zealots are still pretty god damn strong vs zerg ground and so are colossi actually, don't archons do bonus to light? (to be fair archons suck ass though)
It's biological, so even better.
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On March 20 2010 18:46 CharlieMurphy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 18 2010 03:35 Viruuus wrote:On March 18 2010 03:29 zazen wrote:
From a P point of view, Roaches are currently the strategy that gives me the easiest time. I know they are easy to just mass and A-move but Immortals destroy them so much it makes it ridiculous...
My problem is actually combinations of lings/muta/hydralisks - P have NOTHING that deals bonus damage against light armor... Only phoenix, and these lose a lot of harass power once Z gets hydra... thats true, but zealots are still pretty god damn strong vs zerg ground and so are colossi actually, don't archons do bonus to light? (to be fair archons suck ass though)
no, biological
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you have to sacrifice an overlord to scout his tech pattern. if he goes super fast immortal it is necessary to defend with pure lings because any lair tech would be too late and roaches are too expensive. a mixed army of roaches/lings would do the same job but pure speedlings are more cost-effective and you can get into midgame with a better economy
if the robo is a little later but therefore the 2nd gate and maybe the 3rd gate are earlier, you have to mix in roaches. i cannot recommend muta techs but some zerg users seem to be succesful with it.
general advice:
try to face his army on an open battlefield. any narrow path will be really dangerous against well-placed force fields. expand your creep with your queen so that your units are faster which makes flanks more effective
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I think Battle has got it right. Ever since I started following that build I have done much, much better. Also Maple has it too, its worth the 100 minerals to sac an overlord for much needed intel. I just send one there from the start of the match and that will let me know which way hes going by the time he gets something out to kill it.
After that I just play counter the protoss' unit comp. I try to get and overseer or two in my base to snipe any observers which I can sometimes keep them a little in the dark when it comes to mutas or hydra tech. Another thing I will sometimes do is move like 6 or so overlords over top of the building (hydra or spire) so that in case they a quick glimpse they might not be able to actually see it.
The important thing here (I guess its the same with every game though) is knowing what he is doing. Because it really comes down to countering his units. With that said, try using the changeling. That little bugger has given me tons of info essentially for free.
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On March 20 2010 15:38 Antpile wrote:Show nested quote +On March 18 2010 17:51 Sauron wrote:
You can break the immortal push with speedlings only, while teching to spire. Just scout well and catch the protoss in an area as open as possible. He won't have enough sentries to build an efficient wall to cover everything so if you do a good surround with your speedlings, his push will get destroyed or severely crippled and you will finish him with ease. You know, everyone says this, but I find zerglings by themselves to be so suck vs toss that I need a bazillion of them to counter any push involving a decent number of zealots. While they are cheap, they also take up a ton of larvae so you can't drone whore near as hard as you need to in the beginning of the game if you are massing the crap out of speedlings.
The idea is that zealots are slow, so you should have a scout in front of his ramp to see when he moves out. Drone whore until he moves out, then switch to mass speedlings. With FE + fast 2 queens, you can get plenty of drones by the time he moves out.
However, if toss goes for straight zealots while teching to immortal, then you will need something else other than speedlings, either spine crawlers or roaches. However most toss will not make pure zeal, and will opt to mix in stalker/sentry, mainly sentry, so that they can block their ramp with force field. If they do this, you should be able to beat the push with pure speedling.
I've tried beating a 10-12 zeal + 1-2 immortal push with pure speedling, it doesn't really work too well
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I actually did some testing with my friend and the help of TorcH and we discovered that it's not a hard push to beat. I don't know the exact BO my friend used but the basic idea was this:
-13 to 15 pool
-get some lings and expo
-get lingspeed when you get the gas
-get that 2nd gas and get lair
-make 1-2 crawlers in your main (your natural has no creep cause it's not done)
-When lair pops make a spire
-Their first immortal pops around now, they should be moving out
-Backstab with those speedlings! It's amazing how many players forget this beautiful technique. -Think about 9 pool speed vs 2 gate zealots in BW worked. Same general concept.
-Pump tons and tons of speedlings, you don't want roaches vs this push at all. I'd say roaches in general are not useful in ZvP til midgame since it makes you so vulnerable to this push (with the exception of any FE).
-Either one of 2 things will happen, he goes back to deal with your backstab (which btw you should go for pylons to shut down his production! It forces probes to be pulled and really really messes up a protoss player) or he goes for the kill and hopes you don't have enough to hold him off. Just dance around with speedlings for as long as you can.
-If he goes for your natural you can try to pick off some units but it's ok to let it fall because you're killing everything in his base with lings so you don't need it to win.
-If he goes for your main just surround with super fast speedlings and you should be able to hold him off, you have the creepspeed bonus and flanking advantage which means you can do a lot of damage.
-When he hits you is when your spire should pop so make nothing but mutas. In the worst case scenario you'll lose a ton of drones/queens/and a hatch and be stuck with almost nothing at the end of that push BUT you'll have lings wrecking his main and mutas on the way there so you win.
Pretty much that's how it works.
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On March 21 2010 02:07 Floophead_III wrote:
I actually did some testing with my friend and the help of TorcH and we discovered that it's not a hard push to beat. I don't know the exact BO my friend used but the basic idea was this:
-13 to 15 pool
-get some lings and expo
-get lingspeed when you get the gas
-get that 2nd gas and get lair
-make 1-2 crawlers in your main (your natural has no creep cause it's not done)
-When lair pops make a spire
-Their first immortal pops around now, they should be moving out
-Backstab with those speedlings! It's amazing how many players forget this beautiful technique. -Think about 9 pool speed vs 2 gate zealots in BW worked. Same general concept.
-Pump tons and tons of speedlings, you don't want roaches vs this push at all. I'd say roaches in general are not useful in ZvP til midgame since it makes you so vulnerable to this push (with the exception of any FE).
-Either one of 2 things will happen, he goes back to deal with your backstab (which btw you should go for pylons to shut down his production! It forces probes to be pulled and really really messes up a protoss player) or he goes for the kill and hopes you don't have enough to hold him off. Just dance around with speedlings for as long as you can.
-If he goes for your natural you can try to pick off some units but it's ok to let it fall because you're killing everything in his base with lings so you don't need it to win.
-If he goes for your main just surround with super fast speedlings and you should be able to hold him off, you have the creepspeed bonus and flanking advantage which means you can do a lot of damage.
-When he hits you is when your spire should pop so make nothing but mutas. In the worst case scenario you'll lose a ton of drones/queens/and a hatch and be stuck with almost nothing at the end of that push BUT you'll have lings wrecking his main and mutas on the way there so you win.
Pretty much that's how it works.
I'd prefer a way to hold this push off that doesn't require me to sacrifice my base to do it though.
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then turtle? Mass spine crawlers instead of Lings? And who cares if u lose every worker if he has no workers and no base?
IDK sometimes you cant have your cake and eat it too? I mean by all means you could turtle up and make sure u dont die to his first push, but then your behind for the rest of the game. Its one of those risks v rewards situations, as all SC2 matches are.
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its easy to hold that push, just get a baneling nest from the next gas after lair, get 2nd gas aswell and make a baneling speedling mix. Banelings >>>>> zealots.
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The real problem is that if he goes Zealot heavy, you need the support of spine crawlers to hold it off. This means you are fighting at an area with narrow paths. Force fields will turn the battle to the Protoss' favor if he is semi decent every time. They own zerglings sooooooo hard.
I am still unsure if you can beat it at all, given the right protoss timing, unless he clusters his Zealots too much (so that banelings work) and fails with the force fields. Never beaten a protoss with only Speed-/Banelings when he used force fields and positioning properly.
If you did, replays please.
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"when he used force fields and positioning properly" is a pretty wide expression, but i havent lost to a push like this in quite a while and im above 1700 in platinum
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On March 17 2010 11:42 T3mpus wrote:
Hi there!
Help..!
My ELO in Platinum right now is 1500 and what I do vs toss is either fake roach mass speedlings or fake roach muta ling. Basically all you do for fake roach lings is do the standard build order for roaches and produce 3 roaches to deny scouting at your choke. From there get speedlings with +1 armor (Important!) and wait for his immortal push. You'll destroy him and then have more than enough units left over to push through his base. Also, in doing this strat you will be able to get an early expo as well as a lair and any T2 tech that you want in case you feel the need to switch to something.
Personally when I do this strat I am usually the aggressor but you could do just as well if you let him come to you. Just make sure you are always scouting because he may send an observer to your base that will find the lings and then switch to a good ling counter.
When you muta ling you basically do the same thing just produce muta's (Duh) Also, once you have around 4-5 mutas you should be harrassing his probes and forcing static defense. Just be ready for a HT switch and switch tech to whatever will counter his army. (For instance if he is heavy on stalkers/sentries you should focus on ling/roach since you'll have 2 bases to his 1 you can really out produce and win at macroing)
The key component to these strategies, like in all other upper level SC play, is scouting. Always know what your opponent is doing and you will go far.
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On March 21 2010 19:40 Perseverance wrote:
The key component to these strategies, like in all other upper level SC play, is scouting. Always know what your opponent is doing and you will go far.
How am I supposed to do this?
I am a gold zerg player and I rape every zerg/terran on my level and slightly above, but protoss are hard as hell.
If I rush for mutas, he just attacks me while my mutas are hatching, so I can defend but lose a craplod of stuff or even my natural. Also my economy is crappy because of the tech and the larvae spent on lings in order not to die.
Any kind of ground units just get countered by immortals and/or colossi, because they are so damn cost effective and zealots are cheapass blockers made of hardcore. Any intelligent use of sentries seals my loss, especially on maps like scrap station there everything is so tight. Also the toss is allways prepared because of maphax obsevers while I sit in the dark.
Am I missing something huge? Are there any ground army unit mixes that dont melt to the protoss robo units?
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youre missing, that speedlings own immortals, banelings own zealots, so that combo wins vs the first push. And you can easily get mutas out before he has colossi, since colossi are further down the techtree compared to immortals.
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On March 22 2010 04:10 Viruuus wrote:
youre missing, that speedlings own immortals, banelings own zealots, so that combo wins vs the first push. And you can easily get mutas out before he has colossi, since colossi are further down the techtree compared to immortals.
How do banelings own zealots? If I am not mistaken, you need 6-7 banelings to kill a zealot. Even if you kill like 4 zealots with 7 baneling, this is still a pretty bad trade.
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Here is a replay of a game I played today against a high rated (1800 ELO) Platinum protoss player.
What you'll see in this replay:
My standard start up of striking a conversation to try and get my opponent to forget something
Fake Roach Warren with early lings at choke to deny scouting/early expo for mass ling production
Decide midway through not to get +1 armor based on the timing of my attack
Him see my speedlings with an observer, but not being able to do anything with that information in time.
And finally, me cheese through his zelot wall due to ling pathing (Is that here to stay or will blizz change it?)
I Hope this helps you with your struggles against protoss
http://www.mediafire.com/?idqzwnmimnz
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I have similar problems atm and I'm a bit at a loss of what to do.
It's not your average timing push.
Basicly, P makes 2-3 gates and does some early agression with zealots, I almost have to go roaches, because lings don't cut it.
Then after that I try to tech as fast as possible to lair, get something else, but then a bit afterwards he just pushes in with like 6 zealots - 4immortals - 6 stalkers.
And i'm at a loss of what to do, roaches/lings get owned, because I just cannot get trough to the immortals, muta's come out to late (they basicly pop when he arrives, but not enough to fight off the stalkers, and so on.
(I'm in bronze, and currently that is the only thing I lose to and have like no clue on how to handle except for some cheesy roach rush/speedling rush so he doesn't get so far)
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On March 25 2010 05:53 FictionJV wrote:
I have similar problems atm and I'm a bit at a loss of what to do.
It's not your average timing push.
Basicly, P makes 2-3 gates and does some early agression with zealots, I almost have to go roaches, because lings don't cut it.
Then after that I try to tech as fast as possible to lair, get something else, but then a bit afterwards he just pushes in with like 6 zealots - 4immortals - 6 stalkers.
And i'm at a loss of what to do, roaches/lings get owned, because I just cannot get trough to the immortals, muta's come out to late (they basicly pop when he arrives, but not enough to fight off the stalkers, and so on.
(I'm in bronze, and currently that is the only thing I lose to and have like no clue on how to handle except for some cheesy roach rush/speedling rush so he doesn't get so far)
I'd say play more aggressive, keep him busy, delay his tech.
Roaches are for harras until immortals arive imo
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Just mass speedlings with your roaches and attack from both sides. It's suprising how many people JUST pump roaches, find themselves with not enough gas, but extra minerals, but then DON"T spend those extra minerals on lings. A group of 20+ lings with your first 8+ roaches will counter perfectly. Attack from the front with roaches and then bring the lings up the rear to take out the immortals.
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On March 25 2010 08:41 FREEloss_ca wrote:
Just mass speedlings with your roaches and attack from both sides. It's suprising how many people JUST pump roaches, find themselves with not enough gas, but extra minerals, but then DON"T spend those extra minerals on lings. A group of 20+ lings with your first 8+ roaches will counter perfectly. Attack from the front with roaches and then bring the lings up the rear to take out the immortals.
This is so true. I'm 1st in gold, pretty sure about to go into plat, and i had real trouble with this push. I used to just pump roaches like mad and hope my muta tech was up, but now i realise you just mix in lings and probelm solved. Scout him, seem what balance of untis he has, ie how many imortals, if he has lots of imortals get more lings, if he only has a few make few lings and lots of roaches. Also try and get a realtively early expand, play defensive, and get muta tech out.
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I know this will be a short post, but will some Zerg players build banelings. They are dead nasty against anything really. you should come in w/ 14zerglings and 14banelings. Hotkey the zerglings to 1 and the banelings to 2.
Bring the zerglings to take the auto fire and destroy everything w/ the banelings. They are dead nasty again'st anything that doesn't have range.
Most likely they have stalkers as well which is why you avoid the autofire.
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On March 25 2010 09:13 t3hw0lf wrote:
I know this will be a short post, but will some Zerg players build banelings. They are dead nasty against anything really. you should come in w/ 14zerglings and 14banelings. Hotkey the zerglings to 1 and the banelings to 2.
Bring the zerglings to take the auto fire and destroy everything w/ the banelings. They are dead nasty again'st anything that doesn't have range.
Most likely they have stalkers as well which is why you avoid the autofire.
zealots, sentries and buildings are the only units they'd be doing decent damage too this early. They do pretty crappy damage to anything not light and not a building.
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one hatch muta FTW <-- 24th gold started playing 3/21
only against toss
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On second thought i actually cannot win this matchup now, toss just seems so OP. Lings don't really work as he can just sentry his ramp, and it seems that in sc2 toss can just go all the tech they want, mass pheonix with 2-3colssi and sentires, stalkers, zealots imortals, dam near everything, and nothing i try beats it. If i try and mix my untis i loose, if i try and mass any one unit i loose, i just can't win this matchup at the moment at all. Any tips?
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On March 25 2010 20:40 UdderChaos wrote:
On second thought i actually cannot win this matchup now, toss just seems so OP. Lings don't really work as he can just sentry his ramp, and it seems that in sc2 toss can just go all the tech they want, mass pheonix with 2-3colssi and sentires, stalkers, zealots imortals, dam near everything, and nothing i try beats it. If i try and mix my untis i loose, if i try and mass any one unit i loose, i just can't win this matchup at the moment at all. Any tips?
Don't use lings to try and attack him in his base -_-
use lings as defense for when he attacks you. And don't use only lings, you need a mix of ling/roach until you get spire up.
A very rough guide for countering toss units:
More zealot/sentry -> you make more roaches (or hydras if you have a den)
More stalker/immortal -> you make more lings
If he goes robo-bay -> get mutas
If he goes stargate -> get hydras
If you see colossus -> get corruptors
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On March 25 2010 09:13 t3hw0lf wrote:
I know this will be a short post, but will some Zerg players build banelings. They are dead nasty against anything really. you should come in w/ 14zerglings and 14banelings. Hotkey the zerglings to 1 and the banelings to 2.
Bring the zerglings to take the auto fire and destroy everything w/ the banelings. They are dead nasty again'st anything that doesn't have range.
Most likely they have stalkers as well which is why you avoid the autofire.
If the toss player isn't paying attention to his choke in the early game, a zerg player can very easily bust it open with banelings and then clean up with speedlings. Even if you can't break his choke with the banelings, you can still contain him very easily with the banelings, allowing you to expand. The problem for toss is that banelings totally trash both zealots and sentries (both have light armor). The only early game toss unit that does not have light armor is the stalker, and we all know how good those are.
Frankly, I'm surprised that more zerg don't abuse baneling/ling in the early game against toss. Toss really don't have a particularly good answer for banelings early on because their backbone early game units are zealots -- light-armored, melee units.
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On March 25 2010 23:58 BlasiuS wrote:
A very rough guide for countering toss units:
More zealot/sentry -> you make more roaches (or hydras if you have a den)
More stalker/immortal -> you make more lings
Sometime i prefer to make roach rather than hydras because hydras are fucking slow. Unless you use them to defend. 2 roaches 1 hydra seems like a very good ratio.
For glings, definitely don't cut roach production. Glings are just too weak to do any decent of damage to immortals (but does good against stalker. It's just we see them way less often).
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Man the advice in here is terrible. Do not stop roach production against an immortal timing push. Mix your roaches with speed lings, try to get roach vs sentry/zeal and ling vs immortal situations by flanking and timing your stuff. If you switch to pure ling good force fields are going to demolish you.
Also try to use your speedlings to kill the proxy pylon he builds to get more units to his army.
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I find speedlings incredibly good especially because they can rape a protoss retreating army. I completley bypass roaches in my current ZvP build. Which is relatively greedy. Mind you I'm around ~1450 right now but I steadily increase my score everytime I log on... haven't hit a plateau yet (I'd love as well for someone to point out the flaws in my build!).
15 pool (unless on a small map like Steppes then it's 13)
17 gas
16 ovie
16 queen
18 ling
18 hatch at natural
Ling speed at first 100 gas
Lair at next 100 gas
I just stay on about 6 lings total if the protoss is expanding and pump pure drones.
as soon as lair is done I make a spire. by now I'm on four gas and still drone pumping.
When the spire is about a quarter done I pump out another 12-14 speedlings as the immortal timing push usually comes right before the spire is done. I use these units to delay the immortal push (which seems to come no matter what despite me not building roaches, as I've completely delayed all scouting thus far). I actually don't have enough speeldings to hold off the push, but it buys time until around 6 mutas pop and rape the push as he has like 2 sentries and a stalker or whatever hte unit combo is (I don't really pay attention). Then he's contained after. This has also countered the void ray build. Although recently I DID get scouted once before the mutas popped and the guy went fast phoenixes and RAPED me and I couldn't do shit. One of my only losses thus far besides early early games in the beta.
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On March 26 2010 01:02 FabledIntegral wrote:
I find speedlings incredibly good especially because they can rape a protoss retreating army. I completley bypass roaches in my current ZvP build. Which is relatively greedy. Mind you I'm around ~1450 right now but I steadily increase my score everytime I log on... haven't hit a plateau yet (I'd love as well for someone to point out the flaws in my build!).
15 pool (unless on a small map like Steppes then it's 13)
17 gas
16 ovie
16 queen
18 ling
18 hatch at natural
Ling speed at first 100 gas
Lair at next 100 gas
I just stay on about 6 lings total if the protoss is expanding and pump pure drones.
as soon as lair is done I make a spire. by now I'm on four gas and still drone pumping.
When the spire is about a quarter done I pump out another 12-14 speedlings as the immortal timing push usually comes right before the spire is done. I use these units to delay the immortal push (which seems to come no matter what despite me not building roaches, as I've completely delayed all scouting thus far). I actually don't have enough speeldings to hold off the push, but it buys time until around 6 mutas pop and rape the push as he has like 2 sentries and a stalker or whatever hte unit combo is (I don't really pay attention). Then he's contained after. This has also countered the void ray build. Although recently I DID get scouted once before the mutas popped and the guy went fast phoenixes and RAPED me and I couldn't do shit. One of my only losses thus far besides early early games in the beta.
guarantee you'll lose as soon as someone who is decent with force fields goes pure zealot/sentry and attacks you before your mutas are out. You can't skip roaches against a good toss. Good toss won't go for immortal push if he sees you are going speedling -> muta or if he sees that you don't have a roach den.
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On March 26 2010 01:02 FabledIntegral wrote:
I find speedlings incredibly good especially because they can rape a protoss retreating army. I completley bypass roaches in my current ZvP build. Which is relatively greedy. Mind you I'm around ~1450 right now but I steadily increase my score everytime I log on... haven't hit a plateau yet (I'd love as well for someone to point out the flaws in my build!).
15 pool (unless on a small map like Steppes then it's 13)
17 gas
16 ovie
16 queen
18 ling
18 hatch at natural
Ling speed at first 100 gas
Lair at next 100 gas
I just stay on about 6 lings total if the protoss is expanding and pump pure drones.
as soon as lair is done I make a spire. by now I'm on four gas and still drone pumping.
When the spire is about a quarter done I pump out another 12-14 speedlings as the immortal timing push usually comes right before the spire is done. I use these units to delay the immortal push (which seems to come no matter what despite me not building roaches, as I've completely delayed all scouting thus far). I actually don't have enough speeldings to hold off the push, but it buys time until around 6 mutas pop and rape the push as he has like 2 sentries and a stalker or whatever hte unit combo is (I don't really pay attention). Then he's contained after. This has also countered the void ray build. Although recently I DID get scouted once before the mutas popped and the guy went fast phoenixes and RAPED me and I couldn't do shit. One of my only losses thus far besides early early games in the beta.
You're going to have a bad time with this build if the toss player has 5-6+ sentries/stalkers when he pushes with his first 2 immortals, or even if the toss foregoes immortals altogether and goes pure zealot/sentry. Even if you manage to kill off the sentries/stalkers with your mutas, the zealots/immortals are going to cripple your economy before your remaining mutas are able to bring things back under control.
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I have similar problem with tosses, basically good protoss will do a 1 gate tech to fast obs and then proceed with another 3 gates in to warp gates.
From this point, protoss have huge knowledge about zerg's army and can properly counter everything Z will do.
If Z does zerglings toss will add more zealots + sentries
If P wont kill you in 1st push he will expand ( even twice )
Ps: Sorry for my bad english.
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Calgary25996 Posts
Updating your thread title based on my sig.
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i forgot to add, that with this build Protoss army is huge, and in later stages he can simply add colosuss and type GG for Z 
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Actually I just realized my build was off... I don't even get ling speed I get lair ASAP and never actually get ling speed. The mutas come wayy before he could possibly manage six stalkers with sentries and have immortal tech as well... as said though it's only around ~1500 points but it's been working for me... the lings are only buying time, because they aren't speedlings and he can't scout because lings as so goddamn good at preventing it, I can effectively threaten him enough to keep him in my base.
So no speed even 
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On March 26 2010 01:12 Different[GD] wrote:
I have similar problem with tosses, basically good protoss will do a 1 gate tech to fast obs and then proceed with another 3 gates in to warp gates.
From this point, protoss have huge knowledge about zerg's army and can properly counter everything Z will do.
If Z does zerglings toss will add more zealots + sentries
If P wont kill you in 1st push he will expand ( even twice )
Ps: Sorry for my bad english.
thats my prob basicly.
he gets a fast robo with only some zeals+1stalker+1sentry and adds warpgates.
i need to put quite some larva/ressources into lair,lingspeed,constant ling/raoch pump to be rdy for his attack. even if i can fend his 1st attack off he expos meanwhile and just goes macro mode and runs me over few minutes later cause if cant counterattack.im behind on eco,at best equal in tech and most likely behind in army supply as well.
it seems that nomatter what i do a well timed immortal attack puts me behind always cause i have to spent so much stuff just to survive and he can play his game and puts pressure on me keeping me from getting a serious pump out.
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On March 26 2010 00:25 xDaunt wrote:
Frankly, I'm surprised that more zerg don't abuse baneling/ling in the early game against toss. Toss really don't have a particularly good answer for banelings early on because their backbone early game units are zealots -- light-armored, melee units.
zealots/sentry work just fine vs banelings. Banelings are slow until t2 and it takes 5 of them to kill a zealot.. so all you have to do is a little bit of micro to make sure you don't have all your zealots attack the banelings. If he hits 1-3 zealots, who cares? Normally I can hit a lot of them, but those that are good easily make me hit only 1 or 2.. or none.
You can force field your own zealots when you see banelings and it'll split them up for you.
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You should be able to have an expo with two colonies, 7-10 roaches, a spire building, a bunch of gas saved for muta, and a lot of zerglings if you do your build right. Your expo might not have an insane amount of drones but it really doesn't matter because once he loses the push he loses the game because you can pump like 12+ muta once the colonies and roach/ling own his push.
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On March 26 2010 06:56 Newguy wrote:
You should be able to have an expo with two colonies, 7-10 roaches, a spire building, a bunch of gas saved for muta, and a lot of zerglings if you do your build right. Your expo might not have an insane amount of drones but it really doesn't matter because once he loses the push he loses the game because you can pump like 12+ muta once the colonies and roach/ling own his push.
i really wanna see how u have enough zerglings,roaches and sunkens to def the attack while also expoing,teching to mutas AND saving up 1k+ gas and 1k+ minerals without atleast losing ur expo
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Alright I'd like to contribute with a couple replays from my perspective. I'm not the best, my opponents are at least decent (I saw them in the top X europe list)
vs ParanOid
[url blocked]
(Earlier in the beta so neither of us were too clued up on build efficiency I think, my early build is awful here, compare 9 minute unit count replay time to the next one)
vs TassM
[url blocked]
(bit more up to date though he had bad macro I clearly had enough units to stop even him even if he had a couple more units)
As random I've been trying to sort out a timing to fight this push in ZvP but obviously it's only 1/9 chance to get this match up, so its hard to get it down perfectly. It's still a work in progress.
Ideas:
-Combination of roach/speedling, roaches are excellent against zealots and lings are very good dps'ers + good soakers against immortals. (They survive 2 hits vs immortals, roaches live 3, 3x mineral/time to live)
-Make your main force off 1 gas, and 1 queen using speedlings to reduce gas cost. No need to make too many drones. If you have 4 gas and 16 drones mining mins per base (i.e, capped out efficiency) you will die to this push, which is silly because toss is operating off 1 base 2 gas and ~16 (or any more makes no real difference) probes mining, and just building an army.
-At least 24 mineral drones and 3 on gas. Squeeze in more if you think you need it, but you might end up building up minerals anyway and need another queen.
-Taking a late first gas and double gasing I tried on the same map vs TassM 4 days earlier, and I got killed at (he arrived at my nat at) 7:30 by 7 lots, 1 sentry and 1 immortal. I had like 3 roaches and 14 lings, while at the same point in the above game I had 9 roaches and 12 lings, so I think you should be pumping units starting from 6:30 or 7 game time. We also got matched RvR --> PvZ the very next game and I won doing the exact same strat on desert oasis, except he went roach/ling into muta, suggested here, but he lost his main and pheonix stalker sentry stopped his muta so I don't think it's a great strat)
-Army should keep up with his. Trickle in lings so you can have enough to react to an early zealot attack (i.e, if you scouted it and converted all larvae to lings afterward, you'd need some extra to survive). If he has too many zealots roach tech should be available.
-Once you feel you have enough minerals/army start to make more drones/take another gas etc. Often this will happen after you defeat his push.
-Roaches micro vs lots until he commits. Use lings to flank to hit weak sentries and take immortal damage. They are also more efficient taking down immortal shields. (and +1 lots if he went forge are deadly to your lings)
Observations:
-In PvZ 90% of my wins result from immortal attacks off only 2 gate 1 robo into expand if I can't kill him. What does not work:
-DONT go mass speedlings. Forcefields will just counter this.
-Mass roaches is not something you really want to do because you need lots more gas and drones than with roach ling. (Think infernal vs ret on scrap station)
-Spire CAN work but it's basically all-in. Often my obs just checks spire hp and attacks at like 300/600 and breaks him, even 3-4-5 sunkens can just drop dead to immortal fire. I usually follow up with 1 stargate phoenix + chrono boost with stalker sentry if he kills my army with muta. (After I take down his nat or around that)
HAVE NOT TRIED:
Speedlings banelings:
-Banelings take down zealots to almost nothing and lings finish off the rest, anyone tried this?
BALLSY:
Going hydra. If you rush to hydra and he doesn't attack you at an earlier timing this could be very effective, but hydra aren't absolutely amazing vs zealots so you do need quite a few, especially after the nerf.
WHAT I WANT TO KNOW:
What is the absolute best build you can get away with maximising economy while being fairly safe (Assuming you scout it when he leaves his ramp) against an attack at any time. (Since his obs can see you)
i.e
-How many drones until you switch to full units?
-1 or 2 gas? 1 or 2 queens?
-How many "safety" lings/roaches while you are still droning?
I do know micro will play a big part but this is having a reasonable to good chance of beating his army while trying to get an healthy economy.
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EPT
