one thing thats great but abit risky is to instead of getting the spire for mutas get fast infestation pit and get infestors figure out if they play bio or mech. play roach ling infestor vs mech heavy and infestor ling baneling vs bio heavy
the down side about skipping mutas is that medivac drops can be quite deadly so what u want to do is have sick creep spread and speedoverlords all over the map so u can catch medivac play with infestors
this style is really good but is overall more unstable than going mutalisk
I do think at high-diamond-ish levels opening roach/ling/bling into infestor is less micro-intensive in early to mid game, but later on it's easy to accidentally lose the infestors if you aren't careful. Mass roach is great if it works, but easily shut down by marauders.
You can use speed ovies and drops to harrass instead of mutas, but it's not as mobile and you really don't want to lose an overlord full of units either (although it's probably a bit easier to avoid than with mutas).
Some people have suggested infestor+hydra vs bio, since hydras with range upgrade outrange marines; I haven't tried it yet, but it sounds like something that is at least as unstable -- hydras die like flies in direct combat against marines, hellions, or just about anything; and if you're one infestor short you can't pull back safely.
In short, I'd love to have something more meaty and not as micro-dependent as muta-ling-bling and the variants described earlier, but I don't know of anything that works in this matchup. (Terran has mech, in ZvP roach+hydra into corruptors is solid, ZvZ has mass roach.)
These days I've been trying ot play without banelings/mutas against terran. What I do is 15 Hatch 14 pool 20 gaz. I Get 4 roaches to prevent any early aggression, and procede to mass drone. Once i have enough gaz i get zerlings speed.
Frrom this point i rely only on zerglings/hydras/infestors. Hydras pevent you from dying from cheesy 2 starport banshee, infestors can fungal bio and banshees to uncloack them. I try go to hive ASAP and get 3/3 zerlings ASAP. Once you have enough economy to support it you can add ultras in the mix. This army composition deals quite well against bio/medivac, imo it the most effective against tank/marine since the hydras can outrange marines as stated above. BUT do no try this against a mech player since thors/tanks will rape your idras.
The nice thing with this build is that you can deal with early aggression, as I think mutas are kinda week early on. It also force the terran to switch is army composition so that you can respond by going delayed mutas which can catch him offguard.
The only major alternative to ling/bling/muta is ling/bling/muta/roach. Those 2 very similar compositions are used for obvious reasons. It's very flexible and allows you to out-play your opponent for a win. That being said, losing to even 1 push from the Terran player is an immediate game-ender. But I doubt this changes at all for other compositions.
There are some people playing with mass queens, which lends itself to queen/roach/hydra play since you will have such strong creep spread, but this hasn't been proven viable in any way, though it can be pretty fun to play with.
Just about everything else has been tried and has failed miserably. Marines and Tanks counter pretty much everything Zerg has, so you kind of need those banelings so that when they die at least they take the marines with them, then this lets your mutalisks clean up the tanks.
I generally go ling, infestor, hydra, ultra, baneling, in that order. Instead of using mutas for contain, I use infestors spread across the map with lings as spot man.
Progression is generally ling, infestor first, which is good against any timing push or harass T may throw at you (you won't get infestors out if T goes for 3 rax stim MM into expo, but you should be able to just stop it with lings since the ball will be fairly small). Work into hydras (get only a handful, add more depending on enemy composition).
When you grab a third, start working into hive and grab ultras.
Zling, bling, infestor, ultra is my goto anti terran start. Admittedly I am only gold in 1v1. However as long as I am paying enough attention it shutdowns drops + banshee/hellion harass esp if I have some bonus queens. I usually just hold off until I get three bases, build 4+ ultras and win. Ultras lead the charge followed by banes and infestors, while zerglings go for the flank. I usually don't need the infestors until after the initial charge, they either mop up the remainder or wait underground for reinforcements. Mutas just seem so squishy, and all they need is marines and missile turrets (min only units + structures) to shut them down pretty hard. Plus dropping ten IT on a mineral line is sooooo ridiculously effective.
Zergling/Infestor/Hydra/Ultra late game sounds really funky, but it actually SMASHES most Terran compositions. Adjust the proportions to their build, and you're set!
don't know where exactly you pull those 10% win rate statistics from (even though i have a hunch).
ling bling muta is the way to go midgame when T has marines tanks medivacs. Yes, it is micro intensive and strategically demanding, but trust me, it's equally challenging to control your army as terran.
On February 10 2011 19:48 azoriusherald wrote: Zergling/Infestor/Hydra/Ultra late game sounds really funky, but it actually SMASHES most Terran compositions. Adjust the proportions to their build, and you're set!
I totaly agree, plus I recommand to get neural parasite to deal with the tanks and the thors.
I dont play zerg but my team has some really excellent masters zergs and they've blessed us with the following games:
Mass crackling infestor to a big broodlord push, this rocks marine tank and defensive terrans, you either need ghosts to emp infestors or you need to be aggressive otherwise the broods will roll you and your vikings will all die to infestors.
Mass 3/3 crackling + roach or w/e you want. This is one that one of the guys in my team does, he's a very high diamond, almost masters with sick macro and again it rocks marine tank so hard, you get way better upgrades, you can use nydus / drops with the lings to harass and keep pressure off you.
Both these builds arent really that awesome vs mech but everyone knows the standard for mech is roach infestor so use your imagination!
You can also do things like ultra queen for that zerg deathball (add broodlords as well if you are already seriously pwning).
1) Get good upgrade, you NEED upgrades. Your army should be even if not higher in upgrades, anything less is asking to get rolled. Get hive ASAP w/o dying or sacrificing economy for the 3/3 and the cracklings. Upgrade mutaweapon.
2) Get roaches, you NEED roaches if there are any mech in that army. U'll use roach to tank some tank shells and most imporantly, they are very good at cleaning up and have ton of lasting power. Think of it this way: If you only have ling/bling/muta, that army is so fragile and can only deal 4 seconds, max, damage before they die. Most of your lings will probably run around stupid if not flanked properly, and they can at most get 3 swipes in before being blew up.
On Roaches: The goodness of roaches cannot be overstated, I used to do pure ling/bling/muta and what happen is a lot of times when the battle is over, he has a few marines/marauders and I have a few zerglings/mutas left over, and marine/marauder wins and proceed to do damage. With roaches they are extremely good in small numbers, and are more STABLE so get them. Of course, if you go pure roaches ur going to die, so you need a good mix.
On Banelings: do NOT overmake banelings, they are terrrible at offense and can only blew up marines. If he doesn't have a lot of marine, just don't make too many. I rarely make more than 12 of them nowadays unless I forgot to macro and need to save my ass so I just hold down e lol. If you keep up the upgrades, the job of the baneling is to negate marine's DPS by making them run around instead of shooting. While the marines run around, your army will instapwn his high-tech units, tanks, thors, whatnot, and even if you lose all the banelings, the marines are going to be spread out and with a lot of surface area where your roach/ling can just overpower easily.
On Mutas: Ideally you want to dump all your gas in here, but marines kill you if you do that. So you want as many gas dumped in here as possible for control and counter power, but spare gas for banes when nessesary.
On Zerglings: Fuckton of them until you think they won't be able to flank anymore since u got too many. As with all melee units, if you make too many they lose effectiveness, so you want to shift toward roaches. They are your main damage dealer though, so make sure you flank well.
Overall: Gas Sink: Muta/Bane Mineral Sink: Roach/Ling Balance those 4 units well depend on his composition. Marauder Heavy implies more ling to dump mineral, more muta to dump gas Marine Heavy implies more roach to dump mineral, more bane to dump gas Tank Heavy implies more muta to dump gas, evenly dump roach/ling for min Thor Heavy implies hurpderp roaches with enough bane to pwn marines from bmm's link to Seige's guide, this awesome picture: http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/7844/unitcomposition.jpg
Something like that... flank well, most important, chase marines with banes, blah blah.
How about by passing the tank army completely? I use ovies and hydra drop all over the place. I have infestors Bcuz the marines love to stim and run in. Well I fungal them then kill them from a safe distance with range 6 hydras. Then drop roaches and hydras next to the tanks to kill them efficiently. GG
==>Yes sir, you can do roaches and infestors. When you see tank, you should have lair by now, so put down that infestor pit. Make about 3-4 infestors. The rest go for roaches. When siege tank/ stim marine push is near you, just fungal all the marines. Dead marines now it time for wave or roaches to own tanks.