EPTZerg Timing Pushes? - Page 2
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MoreFaSho
United States1427 Posts
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Sixes
Canada1123 Posts
I'm just worried a fast tank comes out before you can ever get 5 roaches with a decent econ. | ||
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TSL-Lore
United States412 Posts
On August 11 2010 05:49 Chill wrote: The only obvious timing attack I can come up with would be just when the Nexus / CC finishes, or when the Templar Archives / Robotics Support Bay finishes. That being said, Zerg usually plays expansive rather than setting up for timing attacks. Timing attacks negate Zerg's speed and flexible production, which are their core advantages. Yes, and the real reason why Zerg plays expansive is because they need the economy to power their flexible production. When you get your economy going and your "zerg war machine" churning, you can then be aggressive through tech switching and quanitity. You can essentially keep your opponent off balance by constantly switching between tech options, eventually making the opponent crumble. However, you can't do this without a strong economy. | ||
GMarshal
United States22154 Posts
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Demi9OD
United States56 Posts
His push was stopped in the first game but well timed burrowed roaches crushed the Terran counter. The second game push was proceeding defense of a marauder push on his expo, so Terran did take initiative in this game. http://sc2casts.com/cast368-KawaiiRice-vs-Machine-Best-of-3-All-games-in-1-video-ITL-Grand-Prix-Round-of-8 | ||
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drona
United States8 Posts
On August 11 2010 05:50 Chill wrote: It's not really semantics. It's important we preserve the language if we want to have any sort of high level discussion. I've rarely seen Artosis, idrA, or Dimaga ever do a timing push before 200 food. I've seen speedling harass early in the game and muta harass in the mid-game but not a specific attack that I remember. Personally, I've tried moving out with 1-base roaches but find that it tends to be more of an all-in approach since it doesn't transition well. (13-gas, 13-pool, 16-queen, 18-roach -> 6 roaches off of first larva spit and attack) side note: As recently as his daily #162, day[9] has used the phrases "timing push" and "timing attack" interchangeably: see minute (23:50). As someone who is relatively new to the SC scene, there appears to be very little consensus on what all of these words mean. Clarification is totally helpful. Condescension is not. | ||
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fdsdfg
United States1251 Posts
On August 11 2010 05:40 Jagged wrote: Im saying a timing push to refer to an attack that I can plan to execute regardless of whether he pushes out or not to put pressure on him. I don't like always being so passive and waiting for my enemy to attack me first. This gives him all the initiative. Sorry, but you're playing the wrong race. | ||
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fenster
United States73 Posts
But outside of that, I will agree that Zerg is the wrong race to want to execute a timing attack. By nature (at least currently), Zerg is a reactive race and you have to know what is coming and be able to survive it. Once you do that, then you attack. | ||
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epik151
312 Posts
Because he doesn't want to play a game where he's just supposed to wait for the opponent to attack and then react with 100x more skill just to die slower? Zerg is broken. You must be able to see that when someone tells you you're playing the wrong race because you want to actually ATTACK. Jesus christ. The lurker was the one unit that could cause havoc to T or P early on if they didn't have detection. It was also the only unit that did ranged aoe damage. BOTH ARE GONE. Replaced with... wait for it... Yeah a worse version of the hydralisk in the roach. A nerfed hydra that moves ridiculously slow everywhere and is more fragile. And here's your aoe unit, it's melee now and incredibly horrible cost-effectiveness. You have to waste your lings and they go explode haha and they don't work on anything but marines. Oh this is fantastic, tell me more. Okay! The Terrans and Protoss get big aoe ranged units like the Siege Tank and Collosus. They kill your multiple units very easily with no micro at all they just attack automatically when the ai sees you :D Oh that's awesome, so awesome, anything else? Yeah, you know how Zerg has no ranged AoE unit now? Well, haha we're goin to give Terran another one! A huge repairable unit that hits ground and does massive AoE ranged dmg to air. ahahahaha wtf is going on. is blizzard trolling the world? Zerg is so incredibly broken how can anyone even deny it. I have 40 upgraded speedlings and planned to attack after your toss ball moved out. Great! I spotted it with burrowed units and here I go... oh crap one zealot is held position so I can't do shit. Awesome. Back to my base where oh... 50 energy from a skill that isn't even upgraded prevents me from saving my base. Also, my 8 banelings didn't manage to kill a single stalker. How's that for cost-effectiveness? Do you guys like the sound of this game? Well it happened in the WTA Takedown Korean pro sc2 tourney. The last zerg got knocked out like that by a passive toss who just built units and then attack moved. Here it is: Watch the other zerg matches against terran. They're stupid as hell too. The zergs are micro'ing like crazy, triple expanding, using infestors and roaches and control groups, harass, but no matter, Terran sets up tanks, kites with bioball medivacs ez win. The commentators are genuinely perplexed and constantly say how the zerg seems to have no chance. How the hellions seem a bit harsh with their ling damage and how the bioball/medivac is too ez to micro. In another game the commentator is surprised the zerg couldn't hold off a T push when he seemed to be ahead. | ||
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Andtwo
United States126 Posts
In ZvP I've noticed there's a window open if they FE where you can have hydras out before they get one of their anti hydra units out that you can sometimes push in with like 1/1 or +1 and enough hydras to do a lot of damage/take them out. The only problem if you have to be ready to transition quickly afterwards. In ZvT there's sometimes a window open after the initial harass if they expo where you can do a roach attack. In general if you commit a lot to an early attack on terran before they have one of everything you can do ok. There was a d9d a few days ago that showed this with madfrog I think... | ||
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SpaceYeti
United States723 Posts
My advice, just if you want to try some timing attacks, just pick a time that seems reasonable, try it out, and see if it works. Later, watch the replay, and see if there wasn't a better time to make your attack. Revise your plan and try out the new one. Trial and error really, but watch your replays and focus on only the key upgrades. Oh, and let us know what you discover! | ||
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archwaykitten
90 Posts
I'll usually get an early lair, and then immediately build an overseer and a spire. I use the overseer to scout to make sure Terran hasn't been going mass marine (if he has I'll switch to defensive baneling play instead). If it looks like my mutalisk plan is still a go, I'll also use the overseer to cast corruption on whatever building looks like it provides the biggest anti-air threat (usually a factory producing a thor or a reactored barracks). Then I'll attack with my first seven or so mutalisks and do whatever damage I can, trying to focus specifically on taking out a couple marines or even a Thor if I can. When my mutalisks start taking heavy damage, I'll run them back home to be healed by my ever growing army of queens. Then I'll immediately fly them back in to continue the fight, along with my next wave of mutalisks that has spawned in the meantime. I'll keep sending larger and larger waves of mutalisks until I either overwhelm Terran's anti-air and win the game, or until he builds up a critical mass of anti-air and it becomes impossible to actually break him. If my attack fails, I'll still have an army of mutalisks left (assuming my micro was good enough to prevent any catastrophic muta losses from occuring) which I can still use to harass and keep him pinned in his base while I expand. This is a very micro-intensive strategy, and things can go wrong very, very quickly. But it does bypass that wall (and tanks, hellions, and marauders), allowing Zerg to actually be the aggressor. I've also been trying to support my mutalisk attacks with a group of overseers using corruption to slow down anti air production. I think there's definitely a point where adding another overseer becomes more effective than adding another mutalisk. Unfortunately, my micro is not good enough to harass with mutas, heal with queens, macro, and continually cast corruption. Not yet, anyway. | ||
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KrUtiAL
United States41 Posts
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GosuSheep
United States119 Posts
Timing attack in ZvP: I would suggest going FE in every game that the toss does not 2gate. Even against 2gate, you may be able to FE. I personally favor 15hatch/16pool if I feel like I can get away with it. Macro will, harass a bit without losing units, yadda yadda. At some point, you'll probably want to go roach/hydra. Now, this is only if they are not going voids or phoenixes: Get roach speed, burrow, tunneling, nydus network. If you can master a build and a gas allocation such that you can get these really fast, then you'll be in good shape for the following timing attack. Because those upgrades are pretty gas heavy, you may find yourself with more minerals, spend them on lings. And of course you'll have ling speed. You can never afford not to. Once you have all the upgrades ready, put in a decent amount of roaches into your nydus network and nydus somewhere creative. Their natural, their main, their mom's house, whatever. Think for a little bit where you want to put it. Then, get your lings to go somewhere else. This should cause a good amount of damage. If they start attacking your roaches, you've got tunneling! yay! Why is this a timing attack? If you got the lair on the first 100 gas after lingspeed (no reason not to), then you should have the roach upgrades relatively quickly. This means that you may have tunneling before they switched to robo. If not, you may have a shit load of roaches before they have a colossus. And with those upgrades? Pshhhh, ownage. Not to mention, the 2 sides attack with the lings certainly doesn't hurt. Timing attacks in ZvT: Not really a timing attack... Just harass with lings, drops, or nydus network when they push out. Sorry for poor input. Timing attacks in ZvZ: I got nothin | ||
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FabledIntegral
United States9232 Posts
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barbsq
United States5348 Posts
On August 11 2010 22:44 drona wrote: I've rarely seen Artosis, idrA, or Dimaga ever do a timing push before 200 food. I've seen speedling harass early in the game and muta harass in the mid-game but not a specific attack that I remember. Personally, I've tried moving out with 1-base roaches but find that it tends to be more of an all-in approach since it doesn't transition well. (13-gas, 13-pool, 16-queen, 18-roach -> 6 roaches off of first larva spit and attack) side note: As recently as his daily #162, day[9] has used the phrases "timing push" and "timing attack" interchangeably: see minute (23:50). As someone who is relatively new to the SC scene, there appears to be very little consensus on what all of these words mean. Clarification is totally helpful. Condescension is not. hate to be that guy, but honestly i think day9 is largely responsible for the widespread misuse of the word push. it isn't a huge deal, but having clearly defined vocabulary helps with communicating ideas. i think in terms of zerg timing attacks you generally want to be looking for the point when your opponent is weakest, as opposed to when you are strongest, because as the op pointed out, zerg doesn't necessarily have any critical upgrades/units that are low enough in the tech tree to make a viable, consistent timing attack. | ||
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Laggy
United States385 Posts
If done correctly you can just win right there, if not you should have been macroing this whole time and have another army about the same size to defend or attack again. By now the Terran will be on to your burrowing tactics, and you'll want to have an Infestation pit before you move out once it's done immediately tech to hive then Ultras. This is a very loose guide I didn't mention everything that should have been mentioned, from evo chambers, to how to defend against air. But you should want to have 2 queens at each hatch to spawn larva and tumors and to defend against air. If you are worried build 2-3 sporecrawlers at each hatch, at 3 hatches go for your tech buildings you left off. Sorry for digressing a bit (A lot more than a bit). So very on the point to sum it up, when he wants to expand he is vulnerable. | ||
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homegrown.vt
11 Posts
That being said, Zerg has access to almost no units which are particularly devastating by themselves. Our timing pushes revolve more around upgrades and the like. My personal favorite "timing push" involves simply throwing down an early gas (14gas then pool) and getting zergling speed ASAP. This is a pretty common opening obviously but your "timing push" should occur right after zling speed is done. I like to go take the tower closest to their base with slow lings in advance. Although there are obvious counters to a speedling push (read: blings, wall-in, zealots in hold position) you can often cause substantial damage as well as gain valuable scouting information. At the very least it keeps both sides on their toes. Other examples of Zerg "timing pushes": right after hydra range upgrade, roach speed, ~4-6 mutas are up etc etc. | ||
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FabledIntegral
United States9232 Posts
On August 12 2010 02:15 homegrown.vt wrote: I think the term "timing push" is often misunderstood. Like Day9 says in one of his dailies (cant remember which) it is simply a well timed attack. One that occurs immediately after you get +1 attack qualifies as a timing push, not necessarily a timing push that revolves around a particularly devastating T2+ unit. That being said, Zerg has access to almost no units which are particularly devastating by themselves. Our timing pushes revolve more around upgrades and the like. My personal favorite "timing push" involves simply throwing down an early gas (14gas then pool) and getting zergling speed ASAP. This is a pretty common opening obviously but your "timing push" should occur right after zling speed is done. I like to go take the tower closest to their base with slow lings in advance. Although there are obvious counters to a speedling push (read: blings, wall-in, zealots in hold position) you can often cause substantial damage as well as gain valuable scouting information. At the very least it keeps both sides on their toes. Other examples of Zerg "timing pushes": right after hydra range upgrade, roach speed, ~4-6 mutas are up etc etc. Unfortunately I'm going to have to say I disagree (and so will most people) with Day9's position on the term. First of all, none of those would be defined as a push, but possible a timing attack. Typically a timing attack is to exploit some weakness in the enemy during a specific timing window. This might be in ZvZ when you go for a quick speedling attack and try to kill him before he gets speedlings himself. Etc. A typical timing attack in BW ZvZ is when Mutas first get +1 armor because there's a timing window when you have +1 armor and he has 0 armor. It would not be considered a timing attack if you had +1 armor and he also had +1 armor because you're not exploiting any particular weakness in his army. Hydra bust exploits the timing window right as the econ is kicking in, but before you can scout or pump out enough units to hold it off. Baneling bust accomplishes the same thing, it attacks when Terran is still relying on a wall to survive and doesn't yet have enough units to hold off mass speedling. A timing attack as you describe when an upgrade finishes would mean you were massing that unit prior and moved in right as the upgrade finished, typically where you research the upgrade earlier than usual. | ||
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MoreFaSho
United States1427 Posts
On August 11 2010 05:17 Bair wrote: When to push: after beating a T or P army. Zerg has few resource effective way to beat a wallin, and 1 before t3. Timing pushes are not really viable in ZvZ really unless it is cheese. Ummm, well ZvZ has a timing attack, it's right when you get your lings, then that timing window exists until he gets banelings (hopefully you get them first). Then you get your banelings and that's another timing where you try to attack his lings and mineral line. Then there's another timing when you get your first Mutas. I'm so confused ZvZ is 100% timing attacks until the early game is over, this is part of the reason many zerg players hate this matchup. Other matchups are a fine balance between drones and units and getting information from scouting, but not ZvZ. | ||
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