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Hey all,
I've been having a lot of trouble (read: zero wins) against terran players with decent micro using a build similar to LzGamer's mass reaper opening (I'm playing Zerg).
You can see LzGamer using it to beat Machine and StrifeCro on HDStarcraft's youtube channel below.
http://www.youtube.com/user/HDstarcraft#p/u/8/FV49FKutcf0
http://www.youtube.com/user/HDstarcraft#p/u/7/acQAXGAMejc
For context, I'm playing mostly terrans in the top 20 of their diamond divisions.
I have two questions:
#1: what is the BEST way to counter this if you were intentionally playing from the start to defend against this build? 13 gas, 14 pool, speedlings? Fast roaches?
#2: Is there any realistic way you can survive this attack if you did a 14 pool, 16 hatch type opening (standard fast expand)?
I've heard a lot of people suggest roaches against mass early reapers, which I don't agree with. With good control the reapers can pick off and/or avoid the nitro reapers. Even on creep the roaches have trouble catching the reapers, and if you have two bases forget about it. Building an extra queen early or possibly burning energy on creep tumor might help, but it's still a micro nightmare compared to the comparatively easier job of kiting with the reapers.
I personally find speedlings much more effective, but the problem is that you need the gas super early in order to get speedlings out in time before you lose a critical number of drones/your queen/spawning pool.
I've considered spine crawlers too, but it's almost impossible to fully cover even a single base with anything less than 3 spine crwalers, and once he hits like 6+ reapers he can kill a spine so quickly that individual ones are basically useless. You have to build them in pairs, which would take a ton of drones and minerals early. It's not like this build screws the terran over economically, either. It's a stable build usually going from 12 rax into triple rax into expansion. If you go speed roaches to stop it he can easily crank marauders. If the reapers are forced back but survive (likely) you have a micro nightmare trying to expand a third time.
Thoughts? At this point I'm thinking of weird solutions like double early queens with a couple spines, and saving energy on one of them to transfuse.
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i just use tons of lings tbh, seems to work for me, im ranked 3 diamond on my division and everyone im playing is in the top30 in their divisions. also scout well with overlords in the middle field, reapers can't shoot up so you'll always know where they coming and when. also once you stop the reaper rush, terran is open for harrass and from my experience will try to expand, usually i just put constant pressure on T throughout game with lings and mutas as i tech into ultras, this will force him to go thors/marines. which ultras will eat through.
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United States7166 Posts
speedlings on creep slightly outrun speed reapers. spreading creep is the key, but it's tough vs a very active good player as they constantly poke around and snipe those
queens protect drones/buildings while speed researches
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On August 02 2010 11:39 tollz wrote:
i just use tons of lings tbh, seems to work for me, im ranked 3 diamond on my division and everyone im playing is in the top30 in their divisions. also scout well with overlords in the middle field, reapers can't shoot up so you'll always know where they coming and when. also once you stop the reaper rush, terran is open for harrass and from my experience will try to expand, usually i just put constant pressure on T throughout game with lings and mutas as i tech into ultras, this will force him to go thors/marines. which ultras will eat through.
Is this one or two base play?
I can handle myself once I can get to lair safely, that's not the issue, it's how easily I can instantly die in the beginning if I'm trying to get a later gas.
The problem with scouting is that he builds his barracks on 12, and then starts the tech lab on like 15 after the barracks finishes. I can scout and see the tech lab on 15, and then I know he's either going marauders or reapers.
If it's reapers and I haven't built my gas yet (because I FE for example) it's extremely difficult to hold out. No speed coming until I collect the gas and start research, or start a roach warren and collect enough gas for a few roaches which can't defend two bases and really aren't that good against reapers to begin with.
If it's marauders and I think it's reapers and go roaches (which some people seem to think are better at killing reapers than speedlings) I'll get slaughtered. Even if I see the first unit as a marauder I need to get speedling research and stop roach production.
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On August 02 2010 11:46 Zelniq wrote:
speedlings on creep slightly outrun speed reapers. spreading creep is the key, but it's tough vs a very active good player as they constantly poke around and snipe those
queens protect drones/buildings while speed researches
I agree, once you get speedlings and if you haven't lost too much you can USUALLY handle the reapers, but as you said yourself, if they just skirt the edge of creep you'll have a lot of trouble.
would one base roach into mutas work? going 3rax reapers is a heavy commitment
One base roach will probably keep you alive with minimal losses, but it allows him to expand safely and building marines and missile turrets to shut down your mutas is easy since reapers are so cheap on minerals. If you watch the Strifecro game, he FEs and goes roaches to stay alive (even though many of them are picked off), then gets mutas which are denied any harassment by the missile turrets. He's also way behind in worker count. You could make a good argument he still had a decent shot at winning the game if he hadn't done that failed attack near the end, but I don't like the idea of a counter strategy that gives me 33% fewer workers than my opponent and no lead in army, bases or tech.
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the build is really gimmicky and entirely too easy to use and micro reapers. the answer is spinecrawlers that are well placed with roaches, but the issue is that tech labs provide a smooth transition into marauder. funny that terran tech lab produces units that counter light and armored -__-
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Hi guys, My first post here but I found the original post very interesting. I am only a Plat player currently but I have had some luck surviving many reapers and fast expanding. I usually try to either go a 13 or 14 pool and then 15 hatch, after that I place my drone on gas and pump drones to 16. I then go queen and ling speed and continuously pump lings from this point on. I think the key point that helps me however tho in defending both bases is I skip the first spawn larvae when my queen pops and I place down a creep tumor. Then I walk the first queen toward second base and build a second queen in main. When my second hatch pops I make a queen there. So I basically have creep spread and 3 queens and I keep massing lings until I can get into lair tech. I usually die during lair tech tho due to extremely huge maurder/marine/medivac balls that I tend to fight sloppy against. Anyway try that out and let me know if it helps with the reapers at all. I haven't played in diamond and I'm no where near as good as you but just my two sense =)
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Depending on the rax timing and map an early reaper will be at your 15hatch before it has 100%. There won't be any creep where you can outrun the reaper till you have speed.
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Based on your scouting you can usually tell it is coming. Build a spine crawler at one of the entrances to your mineral line and place your queen amongst the drones, then try to tech to roach. Soon as his reapers are dead take control of the middle of the map with a handful of roaches/speedlings and start expanding/tech to lair. Granted, I have never played against an established diamond level player but I believe the strategy still holds true regardless. The only difference would be execution.
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Basically they're invulnerable until you get speedlings or a decent spine crawler spread around you're mineral line. You've got to micro you're queen/lings/drones until the speed is up. The spine crawlers should be a plan b after speedlings though. You've got to scout early for the reapers and respond quickly. Good luck!
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speedlings + spine crawlers or speedlings + roaches. I prefer roaches because they can at least move. You need like 2-3 crawlers per base to defend reapers.
2 roaches + queen per base should easily defend, especially if you have some speedlings to surround/force him to stay near cliffs.
the nitro reaper opening is specifically designed to punish zerg who skip roaches. Just a few roaches and you'll be safe from any amount of reapers.
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On August 02 2010 14:04 BlasiuS wrote:
the nitro reaper opening is specifically designed to punish zerg who skip roaches. Just a few roaches and you'll be safe from any amount of reapers.
In my first post, the 2nd link is to a game between LzGamer and Strife, the latter of whom goes roaches to counter.
While he doesn't flat out lose like Machine does, by the time he hits Lair he's already down a ton of workers (like 46 to 35).
Do you think that you can roach against a solid reaper player and not be way down on worker count? I haven't done enough of these games to know for sure, but it feels like the micro for zerg is insanely intense while terran can just kite with a single group over and over again. Obviously this build isn't as useful on maps like Scrap Station or Steppes, but on Metalopolis, LT or even Blistering it's so hard to cover your bases with roaches.
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well reapers are faster than roaches and outrange them, but they do shit damage to roaches and roaches kill reapers in 3 hits; so it requires very good micro to be able to actually do decent damage with a handful of reapers. so against an extremely skilled player like LzGaMeR, well it comes down to micro. But against a "solid reaper player" yes you can, as long as you're at least a "solid roach player".
Obviously if you see like 8-10 reapers you can afford to get a few more roaches. 8 reapers is 400 gas so terran will be late in getting tech, 400 gas is 16 roaches, and you really probably only need like 12 roaches; you can almost always defend against reapers more gas-efficiently if you use roaches. if terran takes too long in teching, muta will do serious damage before he can get thors out.
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On August 02 2010 14:32 BlasiuS wrote:
Obviously if you see like 8-10 reapers you can afford to get a few more roaches. 8 reapers is 400 gas so terran will be late in getting tech, 400 gas is 16 roaches, and you really probably only need like 12 roaches; you can almost always defend against reapers more gas-efficiently if you use roaches. if terran takes too long in teching, muta will do serious damage before he can get thors out.
I definitely agree that the terran will be way behind on gas, that's clearly the weakness in the terran build as I see it.
However, what to build once you hit lair is not so clear to me. I think that it seems natural to go for mutas... Strife did it, lots of other people have suggested it, and I thought so too immediately (after all, reapers can't hit air, he has no reactors or thors, how is this even a question?).
But after watching that strife game and thinking about it from the terran side, I feel like the terran would LOVE for me to go mutas. They're flush with minerals because reapers are so mineral cheap. They fast expanded and have a ton of workers with double MULEs. With three barracks w/ tech labs an engineering bay makes sense to have anyway, and a few turrets in the right spots will completely shut down muta harass unless I get a huge number of them. On the other hand, mutas allowed me to hunt down the reapers if they stay in the open and make it harder for the terran to expand.
I'm considering other possible lair tech that works well against a delayed gas terran, like hydras (which would tear up reapers and marines if he thinks i'm going mutas) or infestors (fungal growth marines/reapers/hellions and can potentially nerve tendrils if they get caught off guard) transitioning into hive tech like ultras or broods. What do people think about that? Mutas, hydras, infestors (possibly into hive tech quickly), something else?
I'm also not sure how much of a gas advantage the Z player has if he's trying to keep his worker count up. It's difficult to pump drones AND tech AND build roaches. Do you think that I should get gas earlier (say, all four extractors up before lair finishes) or later (to allow me to save minerals for drone pumping) or "normally" (typically 2 extractors by the time lair finishes, then 2 immediately after)?
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Personally I've only lost 1 game to it and I zerg isn't my main race.
Proper OL positioning will allow you to know where to be at all times.
I personally get a large number of speedlings through fast gas and delayed expo.
Get 3 queens and tech to lair as soon as you can. Throw down hydra den make hydras, then balance out hydra drone production and eventually get roaches with speed for your push.
Most people power drones way too hard and don't have problem scouting.
When you do push leftover lings roach hydra demolishes infantry.
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I've been dropping games like crazy against this build. Speedlings somewhat work, but if they edge off creep with reaper counts going up, the speedlings drop rather quick. Same with spine crawlers, they go down in such few hits from reapers. Without taking too much damage getting Roaches work well, but usually Terran at that point will have expo and start pumping marauders since they already have Tech lab.
But I believe if you defend this sufficiently you'll come out ahead. It looks like roaches are the answer though.
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roaches on strategic cliffs seem to work, 5 dotted around the base, when they pop up just hit them so they run away or pull the other ones near by to give them a hand, try to spread the creep early on to help when they have speed.
Going lings is to be avoided the T streamers want you to do that because they are denying you drones and getting free kills plus your microing them and neglecting the base. If you can hold with the roaches best thing to do is also get ling speed, Once you have about 8 roaches and ling speed almost done pump out mass lings go for counter he wont have much especially if he decided for expo and you can break the suppy or tech lab quite easily and run the speed lings in to swarm the maruaders he'll build for the roaches. if more reapers continue with roaches and harras his production.
Alternative a 1 base muta play works, 3 spine crawlers in triangle with queen can hold the reapers, once mutas pop double expand and harras his lack of marine AA, stop his expo and eventually you'll steam roll him with a change up to Roaches.
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14 gas, 14 pool, and ling speed. That will take care of it. If he committed hard to it you will have a huge advantage. Its not like getting ling speed sets you back at all, but his choice does.
Transition to quick mutas and make him pay.
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That was horribly managed by Machine. A few things that I noticed.
1) He assumed, like any player that he might see 1 or 2 reapers. 6 non-speedlings where he had them to attack was exactly what he needed to do for 1 reaper
But once he saw 3 he never made more lings until it was too late. Even 6-8 more would have more than shut this down.
2) That spine crawler was in a terrible spot, not in range of his mineral line.
3) When those initial 3 reapers were in his natural, he should have run those lings up to this main and prevented them from jumping up there. OR, if he had made another 6 lings when they first came in he could have had those just chilling up there, and the 6 below.
Cutting off those remaining 2 reapers would have cut that second group in half.
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EPT
