EPT[Q] Fungal Growth helping ZvP vs. Deathball? - Page 6
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Cheerio
Ukraine3178 Posts
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Solstafir
England32 Posts
On April 03 2011 11:57 LaLuSh wrote: 2-3 infestors are always good. More than that commonly proves to be a waste. I agree with LaLuSh | ||
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Juice303
United States42 Posts
One replay from yesterday - roach/hydra/corruptor but with 7 infestors! http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/160569-1v1-protoss-zerg-shakuras-plateau In the end I think his blink micro is what did him in, but you can decide if the fungal growths helped the end battle. | ||
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BlasiuS
United States2405 Posts
On April 07 2011 22:12 sylverfyre wrote: The real strength of fungal vs Protoss death-ball comes when you start chain-casting it. 1 fungal tickles the shields, 6 fungals locks down a pile of stalkers and void rays and there's no hope of escape. I actually think we're going to start seeing much more than "2-3" infestors in a group - more like 5-6 - enough that you have the energy required to lock down a part of the ball and just laugh as you chain-cast fungal til it all dies. You still need corruptors so they dont just lead with colossi to prevent infestors from getting in range. (If they do? Then you get to pick them off. Victory anyway!) Really, when you have corruptors out, is the protoss gonna stick his colossi in the front of his army so that they "counter infestors" ? No... If they do you just get free colossi kills which is what you want in the first place and you don't even need much fungal. you don't need colossus out in front to be able to hit infestors. Just keep them above the stalkers. You can't chain fungals against an army that has lance colossus in it. Another thing, by the time the first few colossus are out, you can have infestors or corruptors, but not both. | ||
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Sajuuk7
134 Posts
Honestly, the spell wasn't changed that drastically. 36 vs 47 damage is not a big deal. 4 seconds vs 8 seconds is not a big deal. Let's say you hit 5 Stalkers with the fungal... It used to be 180 damage, but now it is 235 damage. Infesters aren't suddenly the counter to Stalker+Sentry+Colossus+Voidray. The problem isn't that they don't do enough damage. It's that they only can do some damage. An Ultralisk on the other hand can tank a ton of damage for the rest of your army, while an Infester basically gets two-shot. Something has to tank Stalker+Colossus+Voidray damage. If you don't choose Ultralisk, you have to choose Roach. | ||
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Johnny_Vegas
United States239 Posts
On April 07 2011 23:46 Juice303 wrote: The Infestor seems like a unit that works well with the roach in ZvP. It is also Zergs longest range ground unit, so FF doesn't play a huge roll in stopping fungal or trapping infestors. IMO the infestor is a great tech choice if you want to get very little or no hydras in the mid game and stick to a roach centric army. Opening up a quicker hive tech against a turtle toss is never a bad thing either. One replay from yesterday - roach/hydra/corruptor but with 7 infestors! http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/160569-1v1-protoss-zerg-shakuras-plateau In the end I think his blink micro is what did him in, but you can decide if the fungal growths helped the end battle. And now a mini battle report of this replay, courtesy of BattleReports.com's founder Johnny_Vegas! Battle Report: Sleek vs CCGJuice + Show Spoiler + It was a build up game with both sides getting 200 supply before the Zerg finally attacks. The map was Shakuras, and the unit compositions were something like... Protoss: 3 Colossus, 30ish Stalker, 6 Sentry, 1 Void Ray, 3-4 zealots (Protoss suicided 15 zealots before the battle to make more supply for Void Ray it looks). +3 attack upgrades +0 armor. Zerg: 27 Hydra, 30 Roach, 13 Corruptor, 7 Infestor, and a single Broodlord. +2 range/+2 carapace. The zerg did a great job of spreading creep, took a fairly early 3rd, and had as a result had 50% gas income than the Protoss for a good 5 minute window. Zerg had corruptors and infestors on separate hotkeys from his army, and appeared to have superior micro. Protoss didn't use guardian shield, nor force fields. I think the Zerg would have won without the 7 infestors, but the multiple fungals that he landed made the final battle a cake walk. Protoss's unit composition appeared to have been too stalker heavy, as he easily could have afford more Colossus/Voids, he just didn't have the supply left. One notable thing about this game was the utter lack of conflict before the 22 min mark. There was a single ling run by and a zealot sacrifice, both of which did minimal damage. Thanks to ease of defending 3 bases on that map (the 3rd not quite as easy to defend) both sides just massed up, with the only viable options for Zerg aggression (besides a frontal assault) being Ventral Sacs, Nydus or Muta, none of which he had. The zerg seemed to be a level above the Protoss skill wise. I was very impressed with that Zerg though, I think he could have beaten a much better Protoss with that unit composition. Zealot Suicide Squad (full size image) ![[image loading]](http://www.battlereports.com/vegas/infestors1/zealots1.jpg) Zerg's Army (full size image) ![[image loading]](http://www.battlereports.com/vegas/infestors1/zerg_army.jpg) Protoss's Army (full size image) ![[image loading]](http://www.battlereports.com/vegas/infestors1/protoss_army.jpg) Final Battle (full size image) ![[image loading]](http://www.battlereports.com/vegas/infestors1/battle.jpg) | ||
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Sajuuk7
134 Posts
They didn't change the outcome of the battle since the Zerg would have won anyway. 3 Colossus and 1 Voidray got stomped by 13 Corrupters. 30 Stalkers, 6 Sentry, and 5 Zealot got stomped by 30 Roach and 27 Hydralisk. How is that supposed to be a fair fight? | ||
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Kreos.Z
United States37 Posts
On April 08 2011 01:08 Sajuuk7 wrote: I facepalm every time I see someone saying "the new fungal growth is wayyy better"! Honestly, the spell wasn't changed that drastically. 36 vs 47 damage is not a big deal. 4 seconds vs 8 seconds is not a big deal. Let's say you hit 5 Stalkers with the fungal... It used to be 180 damage, but now it is 235 damage. Infesters aren't suddenly the counter to Stalker+Sentry+Colossus+Voidray. The problem isn't that they don't do enough damage. It's that they only can do some damage. An Ultralisk on the other hand can tank a ton of damage for the rest of your army, while an Infester basically gets two-shot. Something has to tank Stalker+Colossus+Voidray damage. If you don't choose Ultralisk, you have to choose Roach. This alone is the big change. All you're comparing is one infestor using a single fungal growth and running away or offing himself. Against all units the DPS has been doubled. Against armored it has been more than doubled. So using your comparison, in that same 8 seconds against the 5 stalkers you hit, it used to be 180 damage, but now it is 470 damage. That's over 2.5x more damage dealt in the same time period. Kind of a big deal. Obviously this means you'd need two fungals, that's the tradeoff. | ||
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Sajuuk7
134 Posts
So using your comparison, in that same 8 seconds against the 5 stalkers you hit, it used to be 180 damage, but now it is 470 damage. That's over 2.5x more damage dealt in the same time period. Kind of a big deal. This makes me facepalm more. This is not how it works in a real situation at all. Yes the DPS has been doubled. That doesn't mean you have more or less Fungals to use. If you have 3 Infesters that can each cast Fungal twice. You have 6 fungals. 6 fungals each hitting 5 Stalkers without overlap = ~1400 damage. You can't just multiple it by 2.5x more damage in the same time period... If they are approaching your base, you will simply fungal them for less amount of time, or more amount of time before the battle ensues. Either way, you will have done the damage of 6 fungals in whatever amount of time. Obviously this means you'd need two fungals, that's the tradeoff. This is inaccurate as well. There is no tradeoff. You still deal the same amount of damage total no matter what the duration is. (other than that small bonus to armored they threw in) | ||
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Kreos.Z
United States37 Posts
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Sajuuk7
134 Posts
How often is that possible? As often as you like whenever you feel like microing. Unless they put all of their thermal lance colossus in the very front of their army while advancing, you can get free shots off with the instant cast 9 range fungal growth. Why engage before weakening the opponent? ...essentially being harass before the engagement. It still deals the same amount of total damage... other than the small bonus to armored. | ||
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Sajuuk7
134 Posts
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Kreos.Z
United States37 Posts
Again, you're in theorycraft land where you can land all your infestors worth of energy before the engagement begins. This rarely if ever happens. The fungal change has allowed infestors to be used as a dps spellcaster during the engagement rather than a deathball softener prior to the engagement. The spell's roll has drastically shifted, I'd say. Whether or not it's going to turn out to be a staple of ZvP who knows. But I find it funny that it can be dismissed like that without ever really given a shot. | ||
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Dellward
Australia138 Posts
That's the main issue. | ||
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kcdc
United States2311 Posts
On April 03 2011 11:57 LaLuSh wrote: I have always been of the opinion that fungal growth should (partially) ignore shields and do direct damage to armor (like a light version of plague from broodwar). With fungal being a projectile as it was in the PTR build, I think fungal doing half of its damage to armor and half of its damage to shields would have been a good compromise. Especially as protoss have got counters to infestors in colossi range and templar feedback. Patch didn't do too much to change the infestor's situation in ZvP. I still think it's too much of an investment, too hard to micro; a strategy too prone to backfiring. Whatever people say, you can't keep chaining fungals against a thermal lance army. Maybe in theory you can -- but doesn't work as well in practice. And it just gets harder and harder the longer the game progresses and the bigger the Protoss army gets. 2-3 infestors are always good. More than that commonly proves to be a waste. Disagree completely. I don't think I've won a PvZ where Z has gotten a decent number of infestors out. I had a game where I was up a base the entire game (even bases is often considered to be advantage: P), ahead in food (Z should be ahead in an even game), and got completely rolled by ~6 infestors. Colossi with range aren't a counter. Templar feedback is 100% necessary, but it's not a proper counter since you wind up spending as much gas on tech and templar as Z spent on infestors. Storm sucks against roaches so you don't get much value out of the templar beyond defending the infestors, and since Z typically has access to more gas, it's a losing trade for P. I'm not going to call infestors imbalanced because it's too early and I need to work out responses, but against standard P play styles, infestors are really freaking good. | ||
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Juice303
United States42 Posts
One big thing I have noticed while controlling infestors is that you should just have them hang out behind a army and use fungal to force a infestor forward to cast the spell. Generally what I end up doing is move commanding my infestors forward, casting a couple fungals and the ones that did not cast just keep charging to the spot I move commanded, and in turn get fried up. Infestors have a snare ability and if controlled right should be able to retreat out of most situations. Burrow can also be a major savior for your festors. | ||
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jimmyjingle
United States472 Posts
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Sajuuk7
134 Posts
@Dellward - It takes three Colossus attacks to kill an Infester. @Kreos - If you had 3 Infesters: You could run up once when they are halfway across map and fungal twice. Fungal twice again when they get closer to your base. And fungal twice again during the battle. That would be the 6 fungals. This is not impossible. | ||
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Kreos.Z
United States37 Posts
On April 08 2011 02:27 Sajuuk7 wrote: @Kreos - If you had 3 Infesters: You could run up once when they are halfway across map and fungal twice. Fungal twice again when they get closer to your base. And fungal twice again during the battle. That would be the 6 fungals. This is not impossible. And again, you're dismissing that infestors only have the harassment role and they're finished. What a lot of people are suggesting that you seem to dismiss is that with MORE than 2-3 infestors, they can have a potential spellcasting DPS role. | ||
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skypig
United States237 Posts
Late game is harder because the P army grows in size and it's harder to FG everything at once (if not impossible), but FG can still help immobilize P while the Z gets into position; plus, if you're lucky enough to land 5-6 consecutive FG's, you destroy the P deathball automatically...and that's pretty powerful, regardless of how easy it is for infestors to die/be sniped. I agree that at this point, I myself wouldn't make more than 2 or 3 infestors, just because they are so fragile and I can't trust myself to reliably watch them all the time; however, with good micro and minimap watching, then 8-9 infestors would become a viable means of stopping the P death ball. I just don't have the skill to pull that off as a Z at this point....I prefer teching to ultras or BL's to trash the P deathball. | ||
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