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Okay I've seen a lot of posts about ZvZ recently and most of them don't seem to quite understand the state that the matchup is in. So let me break this down very simply: speedlings rule all.
Okay why are speedlings so dominant in ZvZ in SC2? Let me explain this for you, a proper speedling build off of two hatcheries is able to force the Zerg player going roaches to be too defensive to do anything except trying to break out with Mutalisks. If he tries to get hydras the player with speedlings will laugh as they get surrounded and destroyed even faster than the roaches did. While the roach player is being defensive the one going speedlings is able to deny any expansions with the insane map control that speedlings offer.
Normally there is a breaking point where if the Roach zerg gets enough roaches he's able to move out and counter attack but all that's really needed to stop this by going speedlings is keeping drones on gas for longer and upgrading +1 Melee attacks. Speedlings with +1 kill roaches so much faster that a good surround basically means it doesn't matter how many roaches they have.
If the roach zerg goes for mutalisks hes going to have to cut roaches and the speedlings will break into the base and tear down the spire. Basically the only way to fight mass speedlings in ZvZ is to go speedlings yourself. So basically Zerg vs Zerg has degenerated into speedlings and just speedlings.
Try it and tell me that if you lose to roaches it wasnt because you accidentally got supply capped or didnt keep up with your larva. Hell I've done this on Kulas and Desert Oasis while accidentally getting supply capped and still won.
Build Order - 14 Hatch at natural
- 14 Pool
- 16 Gas
- Zergling speed on 100 gas
- ZERGLINGS
- +1 melee attacks on 100 gas
- MORE ZERGLINGS from 2 queens
Your hatch and pool will finish at the same time so even if your opponent went with a fast pool you can hold with pumping lings before adding drones or adding a spine crawler, the only real danger is a <10 pool and your overlord scout should be able to pick up on this on a 2 player map at which point you go for a 14 pool before the hatch and make sure he can't take his expo.
Seriously that's all it takes, if they went roaches and you can use your first 4/6 zerglings to get a good look inside his base to see if he did you've basically already won. If he's going for speedlings check out his natural expansion if it's still building attack once your 2nd queen larva have started spawning and you have a huge advantage in lings to take out his natural hatchery. Then running off two hatch two queens you'll outproduce him so heavily that it's not even funny.
If he did the same build well then it's going to come down to some actual zergling control like in SC:BW but the problem with in SC2 is if either player tries to go mutas they'll lose in the zergling war before the Mutas ever get to show up.
All of the above is why I have come to the conclusion that this matchup is BROKEN it stays at Tier 1 the entire game while teching only punishes the player trying to tech. The main problem is theres no real way to fix this without messing with the good balance of the other matchups as I like how ZvT and ZvP are balanced as it takes not just good unit composition but excellent control to win as well.
edit: [url blocked] 2 games of me doing it, 2 games of Dimaga and a korean zerg in the PlayXP this patch.
For clarity DIMAGA's games were in the semi finals and the finals of a $100 tournament, the PlayXP game was from the Round of 16 out of 256 so those 3 replays are vs good opponents. If both players are going speedlings the one who gets a 2nd hatch up and running first wins due to more larva.
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well.. I do a 10pool everygame pretty much (unless i have an ovie in their base, then I just purposely build my pool 10-15 secs later than him to get an advantage, but thats only on small maps where ovies get there fast, like desert oasis)
Im skeptical that it would work. I think I beat this strat actually, cause I do remember his speedlings beat my initial attack once i found out he was lings/fast expo, but my 2nd attack just dominated him, once I had roach speed.
im unbeaten in ZvZ so far, and was top 8 in Platinum div 4 last time I played 1v1s (saturday) so next time I do a 1v1 sitting of games, ill see. Until I lose to it with my fast upgrade roaches, im skeptical speedlings is anything but another strat, def not "broken".
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As I said in another topic, +1 carapace roaches counters +1a speedlings, but yeah, overall, +1a speedlings are terribly underrated early game against roaches, they give you total map control.
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+1 carapace roaches make it harder for the speedling zerg but the roach player still has no ability to move around the map. If he does manage to keep you at bay by getting +1 armor all you have to do is add a third base and take him out by either more speedlings than he's capable of dealing with or going to mutas. The problem is the slow as sin roaches will get run by the moment they try to leave the base and suddenly the roach player has no economy and running off of 2/3 bases I've seen a zerg player just put literally 20 spine crawlers in their choke so they dont even have to worry about the roach player going all-in.
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seems like roaches replaced with zerglings. still broken. still needs fixing.
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Run-by? You just gotta leave 3-4 roaches at your choke and you're set.
The problem is that without the +1a advantage, the kill ratio for lings to kill a roach is about 5:1, roaches are just stronger in every way except for speed. Sure, the ling player can build 10 spine crawlers to defend his expo, but I don't see how investing 1500 minerals in static defense puts him ahead.
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A replay showing this off sure would help!
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This makes me think again of what the game would be like if overlords could pull themselves down to the creep. That would give zerg the ability to wall in fairly easily, blunting the power of early speedlings.
Anyway, what about spine crawlers? A spine crawler or two behind a line of unupgraded zerglings at your choke should give you a pretty strong defender advantage, especially if you have time to waddle your queen over there before the line breaks. Maybe narrow your choke with an evolution chamber?
Can you just not get that set up in time to defend? You'd need an early creep tumor, right?
(sorry, not in the beta, just guessing wildly here)
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Roaches + infestor is way better then trying to go mutalisk.
With all the chokes current maps have, its almost impossible to make insane surrounds
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I mean, what we're really talking about here is an imbalance between zerg attack and defense in the early game, right?
In the Starcraft style, there are few units in the early game, which tends to make the early game in mirror matches rather uninteresting. In a non-mirror match, it is possible for each faction to have only 2 unit choices, but still have a rock-scissors-paper things going on, which enhances the defender advantage (normally reinforcements will be a counter to the attacking units, if one is available, and the defender gets faster reinforcements). In a mirror match, if one of the units is a counter to the other, then it only makes sense to make the one that kicks the other's ass when you're attacking, meaning the defender has no superior counter-unit to produce.
If there is an answer to the early game ZvZ attack/defense imbalance, then it must lie in something other than the choice between zerglings or roaches, which is why I'm looking at the defensive structures and queen abilities.
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On March 30 2010 07:39 Funchucks wrote:
I mean, what we're really talking about here is an imbalance between zerg attack and defense in the early game, right?
In the Starcraft style, there are few units in the early game, which tends to make the early game in mirror matches rather uninteresting. In a non-mirror match, it is possible for each faction to have only 2 unit choices, but still have a rock-scissors-paper things going on, which enhances the defender advantage (normally reinforcements will be a counter to the attacking units, if one is available, and the defender gets faster reinforcements). In a mirror match, if one of the units is a counter to the other, then it only makes sense to make the one that kicks the other's ass when you're attacking, meaning the defender has no superior counter-unit to produce.
If there is an answer to the early game ZvZ attack/defense imbalance, then it must lie in something other than the choice between zerglings or roaches, which is why I'm looking at the defensive structures and queen abilities.
Its rather some maps being way 2 big, meaning if you start walking with 9 roaches while your opponent has 4 of them in his base ,before you get to his base he will have 10-12 ( plus next coming right away on the place of battle ). That forces rather defensive style, and thats exactly why ZvZ is such a shit.
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has anyone thought of going banelings? the most obvious hard-counter to zerglings in the entire game since banelings do exactly 35 damage to light? especially since they were buffed this patch? I play cheating AI's that go mass speedling with extra minerals and larva to make up for lack of micro, and banelings work wonders. 1 baneling vaporizes 5-6 lings easily
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What I want to say is, this is a hard problem for the designers to solve, due to the fast, aggressive nature of zerg, which inherently reduces defender advantage, and makes it less likely for the game to survive to the point where there is enough unit diversity full of rock-scissors-paper counters to make strategy interesting.
ZvZ ended up being the least interesting, most predictable SC1 matchup, with very little deviation from the basic strategy of hurrying to zerglings, then hurrying to mutalisk/scourge being feasible. The queen strikes me as an attempt to solve that, and I think the improved, movable defensive structures are another.
Are skilled players trying turtle ZvZ? Because I'd expect the designers to be trying to give you the tools to make that an option.
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Added replays in the OP: 2 games of me doing it, 2 games of Dimaga doign it, and a game of a korean zerg doing it in the most recent PlayXP tournament.
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I can't imagine this being true. All players I've played still go roaches as do I, and I've crushed every speedling build I've encountered. I'm aware many playres are better than me but then better players would also have better roach control. I'll take a look at the reps when I get off work.
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The main problem here is how fast zerg can power econ if they have map dominance for a while. I'd like to see this toned down across the board. Make the queen hatch 2 eggs on a hatchery, 3 on a lair, and 4 on a hive, or give the egg increases as upgrades at lair/hive. This will reward teching instead of punishing for it. Ofcourse this will unbalance the other match-ups, so there will need to be something added to zerg defense, but it might actually be alright because zerg can always just build another hatchery at your main like in sc:bw.
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On March 30 2010 07:52 Defrag wrote:Show nested quote +On March 30 2010 07:39 Funchucks wrote:
I mean, what we're really talking about here is an imbalance between zerg attack and defense in the early game, right?
In the Starcraft style, there are few units in the early game, which tends to make the early game in mirror matches rather uninteresting. In a non-mirror match, it is possible for each faction to have only 2 unit choices, but still have a rock-scissors-paper things going on, which enhances the defender advantage (normally reinforcements will be a counter to the attacking units, if one is available, and the defender gets faster reinforcements). In a mirror match, if one of the units is a counter to the other, then it only makes sense to make the one that kicks the other's ass when you're attacking, meaning the defender has no superior counter-unit to produce.
If there is an answer to the early game ZvZ attack/defense imbalance, then it must lie in something other than the choice between zerglings or roaches, which is why I'm looking at the defensive structures and queen abilities. Its rather some maps being way 2 big, meaning if you start walking with 9 roaches while your opponent has 4 of them in his base ,before you get to his base he will have 10-12 ( plus next coming right away on the place of battle ). That forces rather defensive style, and thats exactly why ZvZ is such a shit.
That doesn't sound like a problem to me, unless nothing shows up later in the game to break the defensive deadlock. It keeps scouting important. It makes strategic choices interesting (if your opponent's being defensive, then neglecting your own defenses will give you an economic/tech advantage).
You generally want to keep one player or the other from winning in the first few minutes, not as an impossibility (which would make the game less interesting), but as something that is fairly easy to prevent for someone of similar skill. That way the game has time to open up, and people get a chance to play with a bigger variety of units.
It could be that ZvZ has a very different character depending on the map size, and I don't see that as a terrible thing either, just an interesting topic for strategic discussion.
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dont tell the americans how to play zvz 
This strategy isnt out on american servers yet.
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On March 30 2010 08:07 _rdm_ wrote:dont tell the americans how to play zvz This strategy isnt out on american servers yet.
I'm an american zerg and I'm getting tired of winning by default just because they try to go roaches and with over 60% of my games being ZvZ on average it gets old after a while.
edit: Seriously to the doubters TRY IT like I said in the OP I gave you a BO use it and tell me it doesnt work then.
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United Kingdom10 Posts
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EPT
