i loved how those ultras and blings just poof into thin air. this is really strong. all i would really add is a few hellions for a fit of extra splash damage but only if there are lings around.
watching roaches try to run away from HSM made me feel warm and fuzzy inside
hey OP great post. thanks for this. please lets not try to upset the mods because they are closing terran threads like no tomorrow.
anyway, alot of people suggesting drops... the drops arent necesarry b/c the marines are so mobile and the ravens are flying units already...
people arent realizing that this build has a very fast second rax followed by a fast ebay. if you go 1/1/1 then like the OP said you cant apply early pressure.
Also alot of people are suggesting hellions, which indeed are good against banelings and lings but are bad against roaches. plus if you just spend that money on marines, you are getting upgraded units that can also attack air. I think sticking to marines is best.
the OP likes to push out with about 16 - 20 marines early on then continues with small marine pressure groups, this strategy really does look like SK terran from BW.
One thing thats brilliant about this strategy is how many bunkers you build, LOL that is freakin hilarious.
the terran has sick macro, much better than my own ... that is why im worried maybe this build is too complex for me
Watched all the replays, and I gotta say, I'm amazed! Just a few helpful tips:
Watch the idle SCVs after building something, often times you forgot em for prolonged periods of time in the first few reps.
Second, also in the first few reps, there are some gaps when making waves of marines, and those few seconds can mean the game if the zerg attacks right there and then.
More on topic now. This strat gives me the hope I lost the moment I learned MMM, the sheer fun of the mass rine + ravens is just amazing. Feels like old times.
Thanks for making my day, the whole week, and my whole sc2 gaming expirience.
Unless you are expecting to be fighting Roaches you really should be getting +1 Armor before +1 Weapons. +1 Armor is very good against un-upgraded Zerglings. In fact +1 Armor is better than Combat Shield
Good on the experimenting. I loved BW ZvT in that the marine SV army was so fragile but even if you destroyed their marine army constantly, as long as they have the high SV count the zerg was screwed. Hopefully, Marine/Raven is the new standard of play in ZvT.
The thing I love most about this build is the distinct similarities between how Ravens and Science Vessels are used. For instance on Ultralisks, by themselves Ultra/Bling would annihilate a pure Marine comp. But with Ravens, specifically HSM, it's a whole 'nother story. PDD's take away, what, half the health of an Ultralisk and a fifth of those next to it? Gogo "irradiate", and if you're clever you can use them to kill off entire bling balls before they reach your marines and even put down turrets to block them. It's so fucking clever.
I tried it earlier (going to spare you the replay, it was my first time and it was so horrendous on my part I don't know how I won) in a TvZ. I was scared when I kept losing my army, but I went back to my base and got a huge banana grin when I had 50 more marines in my base waiting.
maybe, ghosts instead of ravens? snipe the mutas/ultras and all the other BIO lol emp infestors and get the nuke to prevent zergs backing off (i.e. cutting escape routes).
On October 26 2010 08:53 J-C-erloeser wrote: maybe, ghosts instead of ravens? snipe the mutas/ultras and all the other BIO lol emp infestors and get the nuke to prevent zergs backing off (i.e. cutting escape routes).
I already went over this. Snipe does next to no damage against Ultra's (45? Don't Ultra's have like 400 or 500 HP?)
Ravens are better in every feasible way. PDD's nullify Hydra's and Muta's, HSMs rape the shit out of Banelings, Lings, Hydra's, Muta's, and even take away 1/4th the health of an Ultralisk and Auto Turrets soak up damage from banelings and draw fire from zerglings and roaches while doing retarded DPS.
Oh, and one minute after this, they can just do it again. Ghosts are only good for EMPing Infestors and gimmicky mass snipes on Muta's, but a Raven could just send one HSM and one shot an Infestor or bring all the Muta health down to almost nothing.
I will be trying this. I really think the + Turret time will complement this build Nicely. Also Since your Medevac count will be kinda low, wouldn't the +Starting energy Upgrade would benefit you? Since your Main army will be only minerals you can afford to spend that Gas on the obscure upgrades
Played this against the computer a few times to get the timings and I'm eager to try it in gold league later on tonight.
One thing that I'm running into is that I'm incredibly mineral rich in the early game, right after I take my expansion. It's probably my terrible macro, but do you think it would be worth it to add marauders into the mix? I considered doing this with the tech lab rax to help spend my money and add a better cushion for banelings to explode into. I worry about losing a bit of ground to air though.
My micro certainly isn't up to the snuff of the player in the replays, but I've still got a pretty good feeling about this. At the very least, I'll surprise a few goldie zergs
Love the discussion - As a zerg it's great to see the competition evolving.
One of the key principles behind this strategy is to force the zerg to use gas heavy units (e.g. infestors/mass banelings/hydras) to counter big marine balls and to catch/snipe raven packs. During army clashes, zerg loses gas units while the terran loses mineral units, assuming the ravens are kept alive. (which is why infestors are needed to root the ravens since FG cannot be stopped by PDD)
Hence I pose a query to the OP and other readers: Have you considered the effect of mass queens as a defense? Queens are very good anti-air units that soak only minerals (150 minerals) and take 50 secs to build. (Compared to ravens that take 100 min, 200 gas, and 60sec to build). Queens have enough health to survive more than 1 HSM. With sufficient queens, you can spread creep aggresively (improving your ability to bring the queens to the frontline), and transfuse can be used to mitigate HSM. Their range 7 makes it a little easier to snipe ravens. And they do not use larvae to produce. 2 Hatch constant queen production should be able to compete with 2-base ravens.
Gas previously used for hydras/mutas/corrupters can be channeled towards two supporting builds:
1) Infestor/bling into Ultra. More infestors (which in turn gives more FG to root armies and bypass PDDs). Banelings clear the path of auto turrets and marines, giving the infestor/queen space to work. Teching to ultras and +armor eventually allows zerg to ignore auto turrets, because auto turrets do not benefit from +damage upgrades and are armored (i.e. die fast to ultras). Ultas function well against marines due to armor. Mass queens continue to support ultras through transfuse.
2) Infestor/Roach into hydra. Again more infestors to lock down the ravens and damage marine balls such that roaches can 1-shot them. Roaches tank the damage of auto-turrets and marines. Teching to hydras greatly increases the damage output of the zerg army (and upgraded hydras outrange marines so there's micro potential there). Transfuse helps keep roach tanks alive. Roach/hydra/queen all benefit from +rangedamage upgrades, so there's good upgrade synergy there.
I know PDDs can negate queen damage. But from a zerg perspective that may be a good thing. Forcing a PDD to drop means less turrets and HSMs which means a safer environment for the queens/infestors to do their thing. And at the risk of sounding like a broken record, FG's damage bypasses PDD.
Edit: someone posted above that it is difficult to support roach/hydra/infestor production off 2 bases. My anecdotal ZvZ experience tells me that it is indeed very possible to do so. 2 bases can give easily u an army of 5 infestors, and tons of roach/hydra by around the... 15(?) minute mark. Now if you need more infestors, hydras have to be cut. And queens can be used to fill in the anti-air gap.
On October 26 2010 11:09 drdovetalk wrote: Love the discussion - As a zerg it's great to see the competition evolving.
One of the key principles behind this strategy is to force the zerg to use gas heavy units (e.g. infestors/mass banelings/hydras) to counter big marine balls and to catch/snipe raven packs. During army clashes, zerg loses gas units while the terran loses mineral units, assuming the ravens are kept alive. (which is why infestors are needed to root the ravens since FG cannot be stopped by PDD)
Hence I pose a query to the OP and other readers: Have you considered the effect of mass queens as a defense? Queens are very good anti-air units that soak only minerals (150 minerals) and take 50 secs to build. (Compared to ravens that take 100 min, 200 gas, and 60sec to build). Queens have enough health to survive more than 1 HSM. With sufficient queens, you can spread creep aggresively (improving your ability to bring the queens to the frontline), and transfuse can be used to mitigate HSM. Their range 7 makes it a little easier to snipe ravens. And they do not use larvae to produce. 2 Hatch constant queen production should be able to compete with 2-base ravens.
I dunno. It is certainly possible and would be fairly entertaining to play. I just don't know how good mass queens are against upgraded marines with stim. You can transfuse quite well but marines just do ridiculous damage. Likewise, ravens don't usually stick around. It would be interesting to fight though.
Gas previously used for hydras/mutas/corrupters can be channeled towards two supporting builds:
1) Infestor/bling into Ultra. More infestors (which in turn gives more FG to root armies and bypass PDDs). Banelings clear the path of auto turrets and marines, giving the infestor/queen space to work. Teching to ultras and +armor eventually allows zerg to ignore auto turrets, because auto turrets do not benefit from +damage upgrades and are armored (i.e. die fast to ultras). Ultas function well against marines due to armor. Mass queens continue to support ultras through transfuse.
2) Infestor/Roach into hydra. Again more infestors to lock down the ravens and damage marine balls such that roaches can 1-shot them. Roaches tank the damage of auto-turrets and marines. Teching to hydras greatly increases the damage output of the zerg army (and upgraded hydras outrange marines so there's micro potential there). Transfuse helps keep roach tanks alive. Roach/hydra/queen all benefit from +rangedamage upgrades, so there's good upgrade synergy there.
I know PDDs can negate queen damage. But from a zerg perspective that may be a good thing. Forcing a PDD to drop means less turrets and HSMs which means a safer environment for the queens/infestors to do their thing. And at the risk of sounding like a broken record, FG's damage bypasses PDD.
Edit: someone posted above that it is difficult to support roach/hydra/infestor production off 2 bases. My anecdotal ZvZ experience tells me that it is indeed very possible to do so. 2 bases can give easily u an army of 5 infestors, and tons of roach/hydra by around the... 15(?) minute mark. Now if you need more infestors, hydras have to be cut. And queens can be used to fill in the anti-air gap.
As with all these, suggestions, I would be curious how to can deal with the constant trading and the increasingly large raven fleet. Most of my games(which I will post later) and the posted reps peaked around 15-20 minutes with the zerg burning out. I would love to see more queens personally. I think they would really be interesting to play against. Constantly transfused roaches would really be a pain to deal with.
But then again, I can get tanks or ravens or banshees and less ravens as well.