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A Baneling costs 50 minerals and 25 gas (25/25 + zergling). It deals 20+15light damage upon exploding, and has a respectable splash radius.
Players have found banelings to be very useful in multiple situations, like against the Terran bioball and even blink Stalkers (typically with Fungal Growth). However, what is your opinion on using Banelings to destroy structures?
A baneling deals 80 damage against structures, with upgrades giving up to 95 damage. Most structures however have LOTS of health. The supply depot and pylon are the lowest at 400HP, and most military structures float around ~1000HP. It takes 5 banelings to break a supply depot, costing 250min/125 gas. A typical 1000HP structure requires 11/13 banelings to destroy, costing from 550M/225G to 650M/325G. A bunker takes 5 banelings (6 if he's repairing and you don't have upgrades), costing a taxing 250M/125G to break. This isn't counting the defenders struggling to stop your Baneling bust.
Is this ever worth it? Do you find the Baneling is useful for destroying structures? What's the most damage you have done to a base with Banelings?
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Ever seen banelings roll down a PF? Yep, it's useful for the same reason you need banelings against repaired thors too.... and then there's baneling bust for chokes. But that's all for terran. There's much less need to go banelings against protoss much less doing it for building kills.
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I only even think about using Banelings against Terran or Zerg. Protoss has the shields, and therefore it will take twice as long to destroy one unit, or twice as many units suiciding. That's too much of a loss for me to think about doing, when Roaches are pretty decent T1 units.
For protoss, I either mass Speedlings, go Roach Muta, or Roach Hydra, depending on what I feel like when I decide to do it.
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Ever seen banelings roll down a PF? Yep, it's useful for the same reason you need banelings against repaired thors too.... To kill the SCVs, you mean? 20 damage isn't much against a Thor.
Crashing through a PF takes at least 16-19 banelings, which is NOT cheap. It seems to be a very expensive way of getting the job done.
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It's not just a question of whether it's worth the cost, it's also whether losing all those banelings will leave you open to a push. You could decimate their entire economy and any shot they have at ever mining again, you still could lose if your army is gone and their army is big enough to steamroll you.
Another thing to remember when trying to work out cost efficiency in Zerg vs X, is that Zerg is expected to have more bases and a better eco, or they're going to lose. 1:1 cost efficiency is EXTREMELY good for Zerg (in fact it is way too much to ask for in most games).
Generally Banelings aren't "cost efficient" at all, and it's a little bit more intricate than just whether they're efficient. They are the only way to effectively deal with large amounts of Marines, and yet they cost 25 gas while Marines cost none. Still, that doesn't mean it's not worth it. It's just you have to take the entire game scenario into consideration when you're deciding if an attack is worth it or not.
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in a recent game that husky casted, might have been a haypro game, don't remember who the opponent was, but banelings were used in the late part of the game to run into an undefended expansion and take out the fortress
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Banelings are only good for destroying in-base structures if they are clustered (due to splash damage). If your opponent built 4 pylons in a square however... you can instantly supply block him because 5 banelings will destroy all 4 pylons. They are also good at destroying clustered cannons for this reason.
Honestly though, if you have banelings in your opponent's base, you're almost always better off using them to blow up workers.
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Banelings are good for destroying clustered structures, and sometimes great for destroying walls.
Destroying static defences is never cost-effective, and if you're destroying a wall, a wall is basically a static defence. I don't think anyone is going to use banelings to destroy a barracks or gateway when there are other, more cost-effective units to kill.
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One thing to note is that Banelings are the most cost-effective way to take out a Planetary (especially if you get all the SCVs also) short of Ultralisks (Ultralisks are best since none will die, but if the Planetary has additional defenses or if they try to repair then Banelings might still be the best way to handle it since they also deal lots of AOE damage and deny repairing)
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Baneling cost efficiency is in splash damage, not specific damage types. Hit two or more buildings at a time and they're being cost effective.
Terrans that do a double rax factory wall off are giving you more area to hit. IF you focus your banelings on the factory, through the choke of the two Baracks, all three buildings will fall.
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On December 01 2010 05:32 telfire wrote:
One thing to note is that Banelings are the most cost-effective way to take out a Planetary (especially if you get all the SCVs also) short of Ultralisks (Ultralisks are best since none will die, but if the Planetary has additional defenses or if they try to repair then Banelings might still be the best way to handle it since they also deal lots of AOE damage and deny repairing)
This is just soooooo wrong. Banelings are not cost effective against one building, ever. Especially not the highest health building you can possibly go after. Remember, banelings are one time use. A couple fungals for the scv's and one mutalisk would be the most cost effective counter to a PF. Or hell, just mutas. They'll splash the scv's, and can't take damage from the PF.
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Allred mentioned a few posts up about having Banelings show up in the late game to take out an undefended expo (from a Husky-cast he said), and I've had a few games like that myself. Blings are really effective for the result they achieve instead of the cost they have. Think of them like using a scan...you gain detection and vision in an area, probably scouting a base for tech, but you miss out on the opportunity to gain 270 minerals faster for something else.
Blings work in much the same fashion, you destroy an expo for great cost, or break through a supply depot, which can be game-winning to get your troops into their base or deny the expansion to starve your enemies of resources. You "lose" the large mineral/gas cost to accomplish this, but you do get something out of it. This resource loss is offset by Zerg traditionally operating at least 1 base more than whoever it is they are playing against. The concept of playing Zerg, the swarm, is "More" of everything.
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On December 01 2010 05:40 Uncultured wrote:Show nested quote +On December 01 2010 05:32 telfire wrote:
One thing to note is that Banelings are the most cost-effective way to take out a Planetary (especially if you get all the SCVs also) short of Ultralisks (Ultralisks are best since none will die, but if the Planetary has additional defenses or if they try to repair then Banelings might still be the best way to handle it since they also deal lots of AOE damage and deny repairing) This is just soooooo wrong. Banelings are not cost effective against one building, ever. Especially not the highest health building you can possibly go after. Remember, banelings are one time use. A couple fungals for the scv's and one mutalisk would be the most cost effective counter to a PF. Or hell, just mutas. They'll splash the scv's, and can't take damage from the PF.
In most realistic situations versus a terran using mutas, they will turret up the planetary.
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Banelings vs buildings is only useful for breaking walls. ZvT if I scout a weak wall (single layer supply depots), I'll pump speedlings, use 6-7 banelings to kill a depot, then wreak havoc in his base.
Otherwise, only waste a baneling on a building if there's nothing else to use it on. Like...if all their units are dead and they haven't gg'd yet. Zerg buildings heal, Terran buildings can be repaired. and Protoss buildings have shields. Useful only in special situations.
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Only to break terran wall ins or one shot pf's. It can be almost impossible to snipe a pf with scv repair and the way unit targetting priority works. Good luck killing 20 scvs with zerglings when you have to individual target each one. Easier just to throw a bunch of banelings at it. While it's a no brainer that you will lose a lot of resources blowing up a pf, you will however prevent the terran from mining making the cost effiecient quite good (especially gold expos with mule drops).
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Banelings can very well be cost effective at killing a gaggle of SCV's repairing a Planetary Fortress so that you can kill it in a more cost effective way. They aren't going to be cost effective for actually killing the Planetary Fortress unless you're getting something else in the splash, although you could in theory gain some kind of time-related advantage by doing it very quickly with a bunch of Banelings.
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On December 01 2010 04:54 bobucles wrote:
Crashing through a PF takes at least 16-19 banelings, which is NOT cheap. It seems to be a very expensive way of getting the job done.
The reason PF's are considered OP by some is exactly this. Killing it with banelings is more efficient than killing it with roaches, lings, or hydras. Banelings let you smash it before it can be repaired. They are a completely valid option.
A lategame tactic I use quite frequently nydus baneling attacks. Like on metal, if you have a 50/50 map split, you just pop a nydus in one of the other mains, and rally to their nex/cc. Since the nydus spaces units as they come out like it does, PF's are actually quite vulnerable to a stream of banelings. It doesn't even require you to move your army away from your main.
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Have you ever seen 150 banelings crash into a PF, while also killing their marine tank thor army and the surrounding SCV's/production buildings?
It's usually followed by "gg"
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i like to see zerg players use nydus alot. especially late game i think it is under used. especially if you have several go up at the same time. very difficult to stop because if terran moves his army to 1 to defend you just harass the other. totally underused imo
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On December 01 2010 04:54 teh_longinator wrote:
I only even think about using Banelings against Terran or Zerg. Protoss has the shields, and therefore it will take twice as long to destroy one unit, or twice as many units suiciding. That's too much of a loss for me to think about doing, when Roaches are pretty decent T1 units.
For protoss, I either mass Speedlings, go Roach Muta, or Roach Hydra, depending on what I feel like when I decide to do it.
Um.... Banelings in fact, do not take twice as long to destroy one unit because of shields.. The reason that protoss isnt THAT vulnurable to banelings is because they have many non "light" units in their army, such as stalkers, which banelings suck against.
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EPT
