The Zerg Help Me Thread - Page 19

On September 25 2010 17:33 Eazypeezy wrote:


Hello Saracen, Iv'e been using a similar build all along to defend 4 gates. slings + spines and maybe some roaches seems to be working just fine for me. My question is this. Im on Blistering sands, I have used the above build so im sitting on 2 bases and ive got a decent # of drones + 2 spines at my natural. The protoss player shows up at my front door and pokes in and out but dosent really engage me, instead he is forcing me to make more lings. So basically this protoss delayed his 4gate untill he got a few collosus out and crushed me. I was caught off gaurd because I didnt scout very well. The only scouting information was with my 1st sacraficial overloard around 30 supply seeeing 4gates + 1 robo and when he was poking in and out with his gateway force I managed to get a few lings to his natural and see that he had a Nexus warping in. I guess I assumed that sense he was expanding I was safe to drone up further but clearly I was wrong. Given the information I had, or say you knew "ok this guy is delaying his 4gate push until he gets a few collosus and hes expanding. What would you have done differently?

EDIT: also I need to work on my multitasking, I had a spire up with some mutas but I kindof blindly teched to them and wasnt sure if it was the right choice. I think if i was smoother with my timings I coulve easily had more mutas out and maybe stopped the attack.However, im not even sure if they were the right choice. Thanks so much for your help

On September 25 2010 17:13 Saracen wrote:

Mass lings or ling/hydra. If you're losing to mass blink stalker, it's probably more the fault of your opening than your response.

On September 26 2010 00:15 Euriti wrote:

2) ZvT Thor/Blue Flame Hellion Rushes - I end up having 6 hellions and 4-5 thors with scvs following hitting me around 11-12 minutes. Lings are useless and I cant get a critical mass of roaches in time, even with spine crawlers out.

On September 26 2010 00:15 Euriti wrote:
I have 2 major issues right now

1) ZvZ 6 pools - I get 6 pooled in about 60% of my ZvZs (diamond level) with a spine crawler or 2 put in my base and i just cant do anything against it. I scout it, throw down a 12/13 pool but the amount of lings + crawlers he gets is overwhelming

On September 25 2010 23:58 Rahlekk wrote:
When making Banelings, can you just hold E to transform them all en-mass, instead of tapping E a bunch of times?

On September 26 2010 02:43 sooch wrote:
All the dedicated SC2 replay sites aren't working for me, so I linked my replay here: http://www.mediafire.com/?kkda4u7oj2lkinn

In this replay toss expands quickly following my 15 hatch. Ignoring the fact that perhaps he could have lost to mass ling off 2 hatch due to his unsafe expansion, what do you did I do wrong? I need help, in general, with economic protosses. I already shared this replay with slained, and he pointed out that I probably should have 4 gassed earlier for more mutas, pressured his rocks earlier, and delayed upgrades until I got map control. Besides that, do you (saracen + others) see anything else that could have been done differently?

On September 26 2010 02:51 MrBitter wrote:


I feel like muta is the hands down best way to punish a Toss for expanding too early. Lings are great for defending, but if you take 30+ of them and try to break down the Toss front, you really need him to make a mistake (ie: letting them get up his ramp) for that trade to be worthwhile.

Muta, on the other hand, can be safely massed after Toss FEs (he's not going to have the units to pressure you) and can then harass really well by bouncing back and forth between expos, picking off probes and stray tech structures.

Even if you do minimal economic damage, Toss is going to have to spend so much on defenses, that you're going to be ahead anyway.

Remember, you still want to squeeze in a third, but after that, if you spend all your gas on mutas, and the rest of your excess minerals on lings, you should be able to handle toss pretty easily once he decides its time to leave his base.

On September 26 2010 03:18 sooch wrote:


Did you watch the replay? D:

On September 26 2010 04:47 MrBitter wrote:


Not initially... But I just did, just for you. =D

The first, and biggest thing that jumps out at me is pretty poor scouting. You didn't make any real effort in the first 6 minutes of the game to scout HIM with lings. As a result of this, you didn't know he had fast expanded until after you blindly dropped your roach warren.

You have to, have to, have to scout constantly. Especially as a Zerg player. Had you seen his FE around the time that he planted it, you'd have been able to do several things differently:

1.) Get gas sooner. Your gas was soo late. Your first gas, and your next three were all very heavily delayed.

2.) Start your lair sooner. If I see a toss FE, I'll often delay speed in favor of a faster lair.

3.) Have mutas faster, and in greater numbers from the extra gas.

Another thing to note:

If you're going to go muta, GO muta. If you're going to go roach, GO roach. You went spire, +1 attack, +1 carapace, and roach speed. That's 550 gas going down two seperate tech paths, very early in the game. (Not to mention you never built any roaches)

As a result of this, when you guys fought, you had 7 mutas (too few) and 33 lings (could have done a little better here too) against his 11 zealots, 11 stalkers, and 5 sentries.

If you cut out some of the indecision, and truly commit one way or another, I think you could realistically have 10-11 mutas and about 50 lings for that fight, in which case, I think you'd clean it up no problem.

One last small, but important thing: You supply blocked yourself right before you guys fought, and had 7 unused larvae. This is nitpicking a bit, but 14 more lings would have certainly helped.