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Ok, so while The beta was down I practiced a lot with the yabot maps and other build order testers and did a build that seems to be pretty legit. What I'm talking about is a 6 zergling 7 roach rush that finish at 3:45 seconds in and will arrive at their base at 4 minutes or so (I should say this is better on closer maps and not usable on desert oasis.
9 ovie
Scout on 12
13 pool
15 extractor, ovie
15 2x zergling, queen
19 1x zergling
20 Roach warren
20 queen
Roach warren will pop and shortly after there will be 3 eggs for first batch of roach's; Shortly afterwords the first batch of eggs will pop and you can make 4 more Roach's for a total of 34/34 and do your attack.
After your First roaches pop and you have enough for the next make a 2nd extractor, ovie, lair and another drone (or you can take drones off gas and expand here, but I found that inefficient). When the ovie pops drone to 39 -x (where x is the number of army lost) and make a hatch with your next 300 minerals. By this point your timing attack will have done a massive amount of damage and you will be sitting on 2 base with multiple options
1. tech to muta and further harass
2. take a third and play it safe
3. Go for the kill
This leads to a huge advantage for you any way you go about it because you start out with a semi all in build and then spring forward in economy and quickly pass the opponent because of zergs larvae production. While this isn't "Breaking the game" (and I wouldn't treat it as such) it is very powerful if your opponent doesn't wall in or messes up on their wall in. If you do scout wall-in then you should do a hatch at 20 instead of a roach warren and get zerg speed with first 100 gas (you can switch around the hatch and the army for hatch on 16); Or you can go for extractor at 13 w/ pool and go for quicker speed and transition into a ling harass or baneling shenanigans. The emphasis I am trying to make is that this is not an all in strategy but has the brute strength similar to one.
Questions? Comments? Things that are improvable?
http://www.sc2rc.com/index.php/replay/show/7768
This is the only replay I have at the moment. I have work tomorrow, so I hope that suffices for now.
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is awesome32273 Posts
Did you try this out? Do you have replays?
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Will try it 
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Seems like Protoss would have some trouble holding this off, although I think a walled in Terran would be pretty safe unless they skimped on early marines.
One base Roach was very popular before Roaches got nerfed.
I think a good follow up would be expanding as you're attacking, possibly building some spine crawlers in case they have a strong counter-push, as Zergs have trouble on one base without that second larva producing building.
Also, you should read the strategy forum guidelines before posting:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=113479
Threads should have a bracketted tag and threads with specific builds should have replays where the strategy is used.
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On July 16 2010 17:36 Number wrote:Seems like Protoss would have some trouble holding this off, although I think a walled in Terran would be pretty safe unless they skimped on early marines. One base Roach was very popular before Roaches got nerfed. I think a good follow up would be expanding as you're attacking, possibly building some spine crawlers in case they have a strong counter-push, as Zergs have trouble on one base without that second larva producing building. Also, you should read the strategy forum guidelines before posting: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=113479Threads should have a bracketted tag and threads with specific builds should have replays where the strategy is used.
I started employing it against protoss first but moved to terran as well. I doubt it will work terribly well against walled in terran but your scouting should have seen that anyway.
Because the drone count is only 16 until you attack at 4 mins in, I preferred to expand after I got my drone count up by at least 5. The problem with a counter attack on this build is that it is only 4 minutes into the game, Even if you 2 base as toss you can't really hope to beat 7 Roaches and 6 lings; And in the hypothetical situation where your opponent sticks a couple zealots outside your base hidden and has a wall up you can just retreat and pressure his expansions.
I will indeed peruse the guidelines. I would post a replay but I just reformatted my computer and don't have any (and no beta atm)
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On July 16 2010 17:39 teamsolid wrote:
Is this for ZvP or ZvT?
Primarily ZvP but it works against Terran as well (not as efficient against wall-ins as baneling busts are though).
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I've tried something similar and it works very well vs meching terrans that uses a supply in their wall-off. If the terran goes for MMM it is pretty much not working at all though (at least that's my experience).
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I will give this a try, I was looking for some zerg early pressure builds.
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I must try this as well
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I do about the exact same build to roach rush, only I use it mostly for 2V2. My 2V2 partner is Terran, a Zerg/roach + MM early game push can be hard to stop 2V1. I don't really have a follow up though. Most of the time we just push on through to the second opponent.
I would think a quick lair is a good idea after a roach push. Pretty much all the opponent's counter pushes will require lair units to counter, be it air or immortal or something else.
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Just giving instructions usually isn't the ideal. You should post some replays too.
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Since I don't have the beta to play against other people, I went into the Build order tester and went for a heavy force to show how effective this attack would be if they don't wall in.
+ Show Spoiler +
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Netherlands19130 Posts
Edit that to your OP with more then one replay. Else I'm closing this down.
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Someone did this vs me yesterday.
[url blocked]
It was RvR so I didn't wall with gate/core I did it with 2nd/3rd gates. Rush arrives with 1 zealot 1 sentry and 1 stalker up, maybe 2 zealots.
I lost a stalker and zealot to poor micro and still held it off easily, having nearly double his workers because I wasn't really diverting chrono boost at all. (Helped get the 4 gates up though, not sure exactly if i should have cut probes at 16/3/3 just to be safe)
Can't be described as anything but all-in, like all agressive early game zerg plays, because you can't keep up in worker count if you want to be agressive, especially vs protoss. Terrans just need a few marauders and you won't have ling speed in time to defend.
If you want to be agressive as zerg it should be after you secure 2 bases.
And no you can't spring forward in economy because if your rush is defended he will be able to outmass you and will already have way more workers than him.
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@OP your replay doesn't work with my version of SC2 (latest). I'm on EU though, could this interfere?
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On July 16 2010 20:48 Slayer91 wrote:
Someone did this vs me yesterday.
[url blocked]
It was RvR so I didn't wall with gate/core I did it with 2nd/3rd gates. Rush arrives with 1 zealot 1 sentry and 1 stalker up, maybe 2 zealots.
I lost a stalker and zealot to poor micro and still held it off easily, having nearly double his workers because I wasn't really diverting chrono boost at all. (Helped get the 4 gates up though, not sure exactly if i should have cut probes at 16/3/3 just to be safe)
Can't be described as anything but all-in, like all agressive early game zerg plays, because you can't keep up in worker count if you want to be agressive, especially vs protoss. Terrans just need a few marauders and you won't have ling speed in time to defend.
If you want to be agressive as zerg it should be after you secure 2 bases.
And no you can't spring forward in economy because if your rush is defended he will be able to outmass you and will already have way more workers than him.
I watched your video and noticed that your opponent was doing the attack a lot slower and you guys were on a map that I would not recommend. The differences cost him a minute or so and at the time he should have been attacking you hadn't made your semi-wall in. If he had used the exact same timing attack I am proposing he probably would have left you w/ very little to no probes.
You said that you didn't do your normal PvZ wall in which is why this isn't a good example of this because if you had the scout on 12 instead of 10 would have seen it and I would have transitioned to a ling w/ speed and hatch play.
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On July 16 2010 20:55 ayadew wrote:
@OP your replay doesn't work with my version of SC2 (latest). I'm on EU though, could this interfere?
I don't know, It might be because the build order tester was made prior to Beta phase 2 was brought back but aside from that you should be able to watch it. I'm sorry 
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Going Roaches really early (often before Lingspeed. Sometimes before FE) is the Korean style atm afaik.
Even if you FE before, you have a timing (and an option) to attack the opponent. With just Lings, you can't break a Wall off.
Transitions from this Roaches style are also very wide because Roach is such a versitile unit and a great addition to any army.
-Banelings into Overlord Drop for carpet bombing against Terran.
-Roaches and Infestor Burrow for harrass and against Tanks.
-Roach Hydra (solid early upgrades style) against Toss
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the only problem vs T is that marines outrange roaches so any terran that walls will prevent this. at the same time roaches are slow to deal with hellions which come out at about 5 minutes to roast your mineral line.
its all theory and micro dependent though... it could be a good early harass technique to keep the terran in his base.
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i just tried this vs a "very hard" comp Protoss & i cant win lol
first time he had zealots & stalkers got owned by his production
second time he had zealots & actually had an immortal up so enouph said :s
this was both on steppes of war
& in my match history it shows the last roach poppe at 4.30 something so it dont think its 4min gametime but realtime wich is fast but, i don't like it very much tbh :x
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On July 16 2010 20:48 Slayer91 wrote:
Someone did this vs me yesterday.
[url blocked]
It was RvR so I didn't wall with gate/core I did it with 2nd/3rd gates. Rush arrives with 1 zealot 1 sentry and 1 stalker up, maybe 2 zealots.
I lost a stalker and zealot to poor micro and still held it off easily, having nearly double his workers because I wasn't really diverting chrono boost at all. (Helped get the 4 gates up though, not sure exactly if i should have cut probes at 16/3/3 just to be safe)
Can't be described as anything but all-in, like all agressive early game zerg plays, because you can't keep up in worker count if you want to be agressive, especially vs protoss. Terrans just need a few marauders and you won't have ling speed in time to defend.
If you want to be agressive as zerg it should be after you secure 2 bases.
And no you can't spring forward in economy because if your rush is defended he will be able to outmass you and will already have way more workers than him.
I dont see a timed push like this as an all-in, and he you played against was nearly 2 minutes late with his attack, and that with a smaller force then he should have had ready at the 3.45mark.
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I play Protoss and all I'll say is this:
PLEASE try to attack me with early roaches.
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Just tried this, attacked him and killed all his probes, he had 4 left only, and killed a robotics fascility (he didnt get immortal out in time). Then I just macroed up and killed him with 200/200supply army, at the time he had 90 supply. Still did damage, with Colossus + Forcefields (damn chokes in Kulas  ) But was not nearly enough to hold the eco I gain from this build, If it fails and he counters, he is either zealot heavy (roaches), or stalker heavy (speedlings), so you are fine either way and got your expo on your way (or you should atleast!).
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On July 16 2010 22:57 Prae wrote:
i just tried this vs a "very hard" comp Protoss & i cant win lol
first time he had zealots & stalkers got owned by his production
second time he had zealots & actually had an immortal up so enouph said :s
this was both on steppes of war
& in my match history it shows the last roach poppe at 4.30 something so it dont think its 4min gametime but realtime wich is fast but, i don't like it very much tbh :x
Nah it is 3.45 in the QXC build order tester I think (atleast thats what I manage in it). was 5ish minutes in game on kulas, still completely destroyed him. Think I could have killed him outright but didnt take chances so just killed his probes.
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Shouldnt it go:
20 Roach Warren
20 Overlord (you currently have a second queen) and then never mention making the third ovy to get you to x/34 supply.
Just want to make sure.
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Around the first attack the roaches are unupgraded? No speed, no fast regen, no burrow? Shouldn't the timing be such that there's at least speed, or burrow? They are also going to be off-creep there.
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Early roaches against a protoss who make a cybernetic core is auto lose for me.
Stalker just decimate them with hit & run (they don't have speed uppgrade).
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I've been doing something similar:
9 ovie
14 pool
13 extractor
@100 gas, speed
17 roach warren
16 queen
18 ovie
then I make 6 roaches. After the roaches are leaving my base, I rally to them and start pumping zerglings, because they can catch up so easily.
not sure what you guys think of that - I'm fairly new to the game
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This sounds similar to the vod posted in this thread
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=136532
The difference is that it incorporates going FE in the build, which probably is a fairly good idea.
I think with practice one could develop a sense about when to go FE or not with this build for maximum benefit.
I guess it should do pretty much damage against protoss that goes gate, cyber and then waits for 3 more gates. Think you can hit it fairly hard there. Transition to hydra ling.
Very interesting I will play around with this. Would be awesome with replays! But please mod do not close it yet, this is a very valid topic considering its fairly identical to play by korean Z as already mentioned
Early roaches against a protoss who make a cybernetic core is auto lose for me.
Stalker just decimate them with hit & run (they don't have speed uppgrade).
In theory. Cant you use the lings (and maybe early ling speed, dont know if it can finish in time) to try and stop the stalker from kiting? Maybe you can make extra lings instead of like 1 or 2 roach to manage this more easily. Deserves to be tested I think. I'm definitely gonna play with this a bit.
've been doing something similar:
9 ovie
14 pool
13 extractor
@100 gas, speed
17 roach warren
16 queen
18 ovie
then I make 6 roaches. After the roaches are leaving my base, I rally to them and start pumping zerglings, because they can catch up so easily.
not sure what you guys think of that - I'm fairly new to the game
This makes so much sense! Roach first, counter the zealots easily. Lings with speed reinforcing in response to stalker production. But I dont know if its economicly viable in the long run and that it manages to do enough dmg to warrant it, but I'm gonna try it out or variations off it. Problem with toss is that he can just FF and your push will become nullified probably setting you back economically, but with constant pressure you will force him to not tech using that gas on sentries. And you can probably expand safely. All theory here. But Im excited to try it out
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What level are you guys trying this at? any early rush strategy works really well against less than good players, but you need to test it against someone with smooth builds who can continue to macro while getting pressured to know if it's an actually good build. Also, it seems like you are put back a lot if you don't do a lot of damage, seeing as in the rep you really couldn't have feasibly expanded until you had about 40 food, which is pretty bad as zerg.
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On July 16 2010 21:04 ixi.genocide wrote:Show nested quote +On July 16 2010 20:48 Slayer91 wrote:
Someone did this vs me yesterday.
[url blocked]
It was RvR so I didn't wall with gate/core I did it with 2nd/3rd gates. Rush arrives with 1 zealot 1 sentry and 1 stalker up, maybe 2 zealots.
I lost a stalker and zealot to poor micro and still held it off easily, having nearly double his workers because I wasn't really diverting chrono boost at all. (Helped get the 4 gates up though, not sure exactly if i should have cut probes at 16/3/3 just to be safe)
Can't be described as anything but all-in, like all agressive early game zerg plays, because you can't keep up in worker count if you want to be agressive, especially vs protoss. Terrans just need a few marauders and you won't have ling speed in time to defend.
If you want to be agressive as zerg it should be after you secure 2 bases.
And no you can't spring forward in economy because if your rush is defended he will be able to outmass you and will already have way more workers than him.
I watched your video and noticed that your opponent was doing the attack a lot slower and you guys were on a map that I would not recommend. The differences cost him a minute or so and at the time he should have been attacking you hadn't made your semi-wall in. If he had used the exact same timing attack I am proposing he probably would have left you w/ very little to no probes. You said that you didn't do your normal PvZ wall in which is why this isn't a good example of this because if you had the scout on 12 instead of 10 would have seen it and I would have transitioned to a ling w/ speed and hatch play.
It didn't matter what wall I used. Gate/core is the same as gate/gate. I didn't even scout it. I only scouted it with my second probe when his roaches killed it from high ground. And I think you're confusing the game time and real time. He got the roach warren EARLIER than you did and I had I think 3 maybe 4 units out when it came. 1 minute earlier = maybe I have my first zealot out. If you look at my unit count and the screen shot you had of protoss from yabot you'll find they're pretty much the same. The difference is I had 1-2 zealots 1 sentry and 1 stalker instead of 3 zealots and 1 sentry.
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what timing is this trying to exploit? just because it hits at a "time" does not make it a timing attack. vs what race? vs what build? is it strong enough vs a fast expand?
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This counters 2 gate well, but I wouldn't use it against any other build. You have a good opportunity to kill a gate and get your rallied speedlings into their mineral line if the P builds too many zealots (= doesn't get cannons in time) or doesn't have a tight wall, and you can easily just switch back to drones if they do cannon up.
I prefer to play this build getting only 2-4 lings before the roaches, and dedicating the rest to drones. Running your lings and queen around your base prior to roaches vs the first zealots is pretty much the same whether you have 2 lings or 6, and getting those extra couple drones earlier really helps the transition to 2 base lair (and gives you a larger margin of error for overproducing zerglings in a situation where you can't manage a runby).
Edit: that depends on the rush distance though. It's pointless to build those drones if you're going to lose them, so if there are going to be 4 zealots in your main before you have any roaches, you need some extra lings.
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On July 17 2010 03:02 SigmaSin wrote:
This counters 2 gate well, but I wouldn't use it against any other build. You have a good opportunity to kill a gate and get your rallied speedlings into their mineral line if the P builds too many zealots (= doesn't get cannons in time) or doesn't have a tight wall, and you can easily just switch back to drones if they do cannon up.
It absolutely does not counter 2-gate. A decent 2-gate will have at least 3 zealots and 2 cannons to defend the nexus warping in at the natural and will have stalkers mostly done on gateways. In other words, Zerg is screwed if they go for an all-in like this against a competent 2-gate opening.
Remember, 2-gating doesn't involve giving away your zealots for free. You kill lings and drones with the zealots until the roaches are about to pop and then you run them away to defend your cannons.
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On July 17 2010 03:46 kcdc wrote:
It absolutely does not counter 2-gate. A decent 2-gate will have at least 3 zealots and 2 cannons to defend the nexus warping in at the natural and will have stalkers mostly done on gateways. In other words, Zerg is screwed if they go for an all-in like this against a competent 2-gate opening.
Remember, 2-gating doesn't involve giving away your zealots for free. You kill lings and drones with the zealots until the roaches are about to pop and then you run them away to defend your cannons.
Sorry, let me reword. It counters 2 gate if the toss produced 5-6 (or more) zealots or doesn't have a tight wall. Aside from that, the overlord will see exactly how many zealots are produced and the timing of the cannons, so you can decide whether to break a gate and run by with speedlings, or to skip the lings and drone up.
I think it's pretty effective in that the threat of the attack forces defense. If the toss doesn't cannon, you can break in and kill probes. If he does, you can just expand without ever producing those lings. You can see everything P is doing while he's in the dark after his zealots retreat.
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On July 17 2010 01:02 Fydor wrote:
Shouldnt it go:
20 Roach Warren
20 Overlord (you currently have a second queen) and then never mention making the third ovy to get you to x/34 supply.
Just want to make sure.
1 queen and X/34 supply.
On July 17 2010 01:27 figq wrote:
Around the first attack the roaches are unupgraded? No speed, no fast regen, no burrow? Shouldn't the timing be such that there's at least speed, or burrow? They are also going to be off-creep there.
I am calling it a timing attack for lack of a better description. The "Timing" part of it has to do with when your first set of eggs pop and you get the 7 Roach's.
I would not recommend this against a wall in opponent unless they wall in late. For this reason the later scout (scout on 12) is really important because you will know if they are going to wall in by that point. If you scout a wall-in build a Hatch at 20 instead of a roach warren and push for speed upgrade.
The problem with zerg speed is that to make this attack as quick as possible you can't afford zerg speed. Making the roach's prior to the zerglings doesn't work either because your lings are important for their first zealot and their scout.
Saying that the toss should be able to handle this with proper micro is irrelevent because you should have equivalent micro (If you aren't as good as your toss opp then that's a different matter). It was late last night when I saw your replay Slayer91 and you are right, I was mistaking game time for real time; Having said that I don't think it would have mattered too much because if you look at the 4 minute mark on both races you will see 3 zealots, 1 sentry vs. 7 Roaches, 6 zerglings. Even if your opponent Force fields for another cycle it still won't be enouph to have our roach push be negated.
Technically it should be an adequate counter to 2 gate (you wouldn't even need more than 4ish roach's) but that is kind of irrelevant. The point I was trying to make is that the opponent can do very little against this except wall in and if they wall in then you should scout that and go for a FE style game.
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Looks great I'm going to try it !
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On July 17 2010 02:17 Chronocide wrote:
I've been doing something similar:
9 ovie
14 pool
13 extractor
@100 gas, speed
17 roach warren
16 queen
18 ovie
then I make 6 roaches. After the roaches are leaving my base, I rally to them and start pumping zerglings, because they can catch up so easily.
not sure what you guys think of that - I'm fairly new to the game
Why get ling speed when you're not going to be using lings early? I do a similar build but get gas on 15 so that I have 100 gas when my queen pops out to start my lair.
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On July 17 2010 23:15 synapse wrote:Show nested quote +On July 17 2010 02:17 Chronocide wrote:
I've been doing something similar:
9 ovie
14 pool
13 extractor
@100 gas, speed
17 roach warren
16 queen
18 ovie
then I make 6 roaches. After the roaches are leaving my base, I rally to them and start pumping zerglings, because they can catch up so easily.
not sure what you guys think of that - I'm fairly new to the game Why get ling speed when you're not going to be using lings early? I do a similar build but get gas on 15 so that I have 100 gas when my queen pops out to start my lair.
If you don't get ling speed you can be kited by Stalkers or Hellions, and it also means I can get more lings to reinforce the front faster. Also needed vs reapers. I used to cut speed as well but I just felt too vulnerable.
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I've been playing with fast roach attacks in ZvP a lot lately, they are pretty fantastic... will have 2 try this one out!
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This sort of pushes work better vs. terran imo. Dunno, it just feels they skip units early more often, and use lots of time building techlabs&reactors and eventually they have no beneficial units coming out from any of them against roaches.
Toss on other hand should have some stalkers up by then. If he doesn't, there's lot of time to stall by walling with gates and such.
I don't think 1base speedling+roach build can have followup. It's all-in, you might just go for standard FE if you want to play longer game. The push works if it throws opponent offguard, and you better use all your time to finish him off, not just kill most of his army.
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Why is every attack a "timing attack" nowadays?
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On July 18 2010 12:40 PJA wrote:
Why is every attack a "timing attack" nowadays?
Because it is a specific time in which the attack takes place to maximize it's utility.
"If I push now, he won't have defilers for adequate defense" is not too different than "If I push now, he won't have units for adequate defense"
It would be a bad time to attack if you thought "I'm going to build up a bunch of units, than drone hard for a minute than get supply blocked, and then attack."
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I tried this twice. Once I killed a diamond toss trying to blink stalker me.
Other time managed to weaken a terran that i finished off with mutalisks
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Stalkers with micro shut down roaches quite hard if you see this coming. Especially if they can get a sentry up for some FFs.
If someone builds too many zealots or doesn't see it coming-- yeah, very effective.
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What maps do you find this build to be beneficial on? Short rush distances like Steppes? or some of the large 4 player maps?
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On July 19 2010 02:11 Brazen[six] wrote:
What maps do you find this build to be beneficial on? Short rush distances like Steppes? or some of the large 4 player maps?
Well since you don't get speed on either the roaches or lings and the roaches pop at about 4:30 game time, it'll take at least another minute for them to get to a cross-position base on something like Kulas. If that were so and there was any sort of stalker resistance, the push would be immediately shut down.
Seems like it's only viable in maps like Steppes.
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I tried this four times last night and got myself three wins. I beat 1 terran on steppes and 2 protoss on lost temple and scrap station, and lost to the toss on metropolis. The time I lost was because toss went early stalkers and by the time I got there he had 4 stalkers and 1 zealot and shorty after we started fighting 2 more stalkers popped and my rush got shut down. However this was my first attempt at this and I didn't have a gameplan after. Now I do, you transition into hydras vs toss for sure. If, during my toss loss I macrod better and got a lair/hydra den going while the attack was happening while pumping drones I would have had 6 hydras before his stalkers showed up maybe some lings also. As it was, I had about 600 minerals and I saw him coming so I made 2 spincrawlers and as many roaches as I could. If it was hydras I think I would have been fine.
In the other three games the force was just too large and they were crushed. The terran just had a few marines and a hellion. I just killed his supply depot and destroyed him. The tosses had a mix of zealot/stalkers but if it's only 2 or 3 stalkers it isn't a problem for 7 roaches. I am going to keep using this, I really enjoy it.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i810.photobucket.com/albums/zz25/ixi_genocide/Screenshot2010-07-1603_37_17.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://i810.photobucket.com/albums/zz25/ixi_genocide/Screenshot2010-07-1603_22_29.jpg)
