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Ok, I'm going to open by saying i started this season in masters, and am currently 15:6 for wins:losses. So please don't dismiss me as a newb.
Lately, in ZvT, I've been doing a build that focuses on mass speedlings until hive tech with a heavy emphasis on upgrades. The great thing about mass speedling is you have tons of gas for upgrades and tech. The entire build revolves around geting 3:3 cracklings with ultralisk support, and upgraded speedlings are amazing against everything but mass hellions.
Start off with a heavily structured build to time your metabolic and carapace I upgrades. I like to mass drones to 22, build my natural, and then mass speedlings until the hatch completes for defense/expansion denial. Watch for mass hellion and build roaches/spines in response to any hellions. If you suspect banshees drop spore crawlers in each mineral line.
As long as don't neglect your upgrades/tech and maintain a good zergling/drone balance you should be able to hold until the unstoppable crackling/ultras pop up. Lead with the ultras to deflect seige tank & marine fire and then sweep what's left with cracklings to win. Discuss.
Replay:
http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/164454-1v1-terran-zerg-taldarim-altar-le
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How are you able to hold off marine/siege tank before getting hive tech without banelings and/or mutas/infestors? If you are depending on upgraded lings, what happens if his marines keep up with your upgrades?
Since you aren't spending gas on units do you get upgrades and hive tech much faster than normal?
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since when is ultracrackling unbeatable?
edit: ok most terrans won't let you get away with these kinds of shenanigans. Trying to get into hive tech off pure speedling is pretty risky and doesn't allow you to safely take a third. If they go blue flame hellions you are pretty much screwed, or any sort of aggressive play for that matter. Upgraded marines with medivacs in good position will screw you over.
That being said, transitioning into upgraded ultralisk tech definitely has potential. Using zergling + infestor in a passive manner while getting a quick hive is definitely a viable strategy, however skipping a spire is very risky and leaves you vulnerable to drops.
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I've been doing double evo crackling with infestor. I expand a lot and then just do the standard BL/Ultra switch lategame. It is pretty good but this build has been around for a long time. The only change I do now is the double evo and get infestors faster because they do so much DPS with the patch.
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It's a fun build, but it has a lot of weaknesses. I do enjoy it a lot, especially since the infestor upgrade.
How do you deal with drop play? Of course it's stoppable, but on big maps and with upgraded infantry units it can be very hard to deal with. It takes a LOT of zergling to stop 2 medivac full or marines, and if two of those are going on and you've been droning like a normal zerg it can do a lot of damage.
As mentionned before, if they keep up with your upgrades get medivacs and a lot of marines you won't win with zerglings alone. Not remotely cost effectively, anyways. I've solved this problem with infestors.
How do you deal with mech? Blue flame openings are very popular, but stoppable on creep. Yet when they reach critical mass of blueflame with thor/tank support, zerglings alone won't win and ultras aren't out in time.
I feel this is really strong vs passive players or early game *ground unit* agression but theres a huge timing in the late game when a push could kill you. Zerglings alone won't cut it for a 2-base tank marine push.
If they are going mech with upgrades and are one behind you, your ultras will have a hard time reaching the thors, too. I'd like to see more replays of how you deal with the wide variety of openings and mid-game pushes terrans make. Also if they go banshees, you can defend your base but they have map control...basically until you push. How do you adjust this build according to the different unit compositions that involve air units?
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Seems quite fearsome, but you must realize BF Hellions are pretty common vs Zerg in TvZ these days. And I don't mean Hellions for harass, but for map control vs lings. So better scout for this.
Also, if someone prone to rushing (like myself) scouts a Zerg trying to push 22 drones before getting anything else, he's pretty much dead.
On April 16 2011 00:17 ThE_OsToJiY wrote:
since when is ultracrackling unbeatable?
Sigh... Who said anything about anything being unbeatable?
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I'm watching the replay and taking notes. The first thing i notice is that this Terran player is not very good. He doesn't put any pressure on you early, which is understandable since he scouted a bunch of lings, but his hellion pressure was awful. had he brought his marines with the hellions like you're supposed to in that push, you would have been in a lot of trouble.
secondly, he just threw away the hellions he had, and that was that.
His intel is also pretty bad, he didn't know you where transitioning to ultras, and he also wasn't nearly aggressive enough considering the unit comp he was going for.
It looks to me like there is a pretty large timing where a terran with better macro could push and win, between the time when your first few roaches pop and when you start producing ultras. had this guy built 2 more barracks' he would have had a much larger army when he pushed, or pushed sooner.
I feel like you don't have anyway to deal with drops in this strategy either,
When he pushed, he didn't siege his tanks, which should have obliterated that army had he been active about focusing the ultras.
I also don't see why you don't incorporate infestors, I think that they would make this comp 100% better with fungals and dropping infested terrans into the siege line. It's a pretty common comp on the Korean server, and it was used by dimaga in his game against mvp in the gom tournament they had recently.
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On April 16 2011 00:26 Gaspa wrote:Show nested quote +On April 16 2011 00:17 ThE_OsToJiY wrote:
since when is ultracrackling unbeatable? Sigh... Who said anything about anything being unbeatable?
The OP actually 
On April 16 2011 00:05 Duban wrote:
As long as don't neglect your upgrades/tech and maintain a good zergling/drone balance you should be able to hold until the unstoppable crackling/ultras pop up. Lead with the ultras to deflect seige tank & marine fire and then sweep what's left with cracklings to win. Discuss.
It is definitely a strategy that could be mixed up with your other game plans, many would simply be surprised by it, but there are pretty hard counters.
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I watched the replay and honestly you could have beat him with anything. Roach hydra, pure roach, roach bling, the only thing that maybe wouldn't have beat him was mutas since he built turrents and you didn't have a spire, and even then I think you still could have pulled it off since his marine count was so low.
He spent the entire game building hellions to try and kill drones. His first attack was moderatly succesful but only succeded in (almost) evening hte worker count, after which he failed to apply follow up pressure which would have prevented you from redroning so quickly. he spent hte rest of hte game trying to kill you with hellions, until finally at the end he built a couple of tanks and you killed him with ultras.
If he had made tanks instead of his 2nd wave of hellions and just pushed, you would have been screwed. Show us a replay of you holding off a tank push that isn't in the late game where you already have ultras out.
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infestors solve the marine problem that plague ultralisks and even zerglings. infestor/ling mid-game holds early tank pushes, ultralisks with this mix (and neural parasite) suddenly makes any siege tank count below 8 a minimal problem.
with infestors this becomes super super similar to brood war ZvT, except infestors instead of defilers. in the end, they serve the same purpose. dark swarm eliminated marine and siege tank splash fire, while plague did nasty damage. Fungal growth does nasty damage and eliminates marines while neural parasite eliminates siege tank splash damage. It's such a great build.
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Dealing with drops by neural parasiting medivacs and using them for your lings good?
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spanishiwa 40 supply gas opener into lair speed+2 evo. start meele+carapce insta then put down infestation pit when lair is done. when infest pit is done, tech to hive while getting energy upgrade + infestors with a lot of lings. then just cracklings push on a bit to secure a 4th and start pumping ultras. also queens for early defense/ramp block. that's my general idea going into all MU's except for ZvZ where i replace lings with roaches.
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How do you put any pressure on the Terran without Mutalisks?
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I do this build myself, going evo at 66 gas after speed ( i leave one drone in gas), for the midgame i like to mix in banes and infestors. The infestors give this build the spice it needs, vs marines with fungal and vs tanks with burrow and infested terrans. U do multi pronged attacks ( drops, infested terrans in mineral line, banes in co or just fungal on scvs) to put pressure on.
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I like the concept but maybe infestors for midgame defense/harass as well as making numerous overseers for contaminate harass, and then the nydus worms for distracts, easy movement between bases with infestors and later ultras.
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i really do not like this build at all. Its inferior in every way to speedling/infestors into broodlord/ultra. Like others have said you will die to any push before ultras come out (which is why you need infestors which can stop cloaked banshees,marine/tank pushes, blueflame hellions and can harass mineral lines). You can also afford upgrades while going for infestors as well and still have ultras/broodlords quite early if you used your infestors to take your 3rd and its gasses relatively quickly.
I feel this build is taking a really good build in speedling/infestor into whatever T3 you desire or banes and just backtracking in usefulness for the sake of being different
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I'm sorry but you really need banelings. A large ball of marines can literally hold off an unlimited number zerglings with decent micro especially with tanks. I dont care how many upgrades you have. Marines pretty much counter both those units. If you dont get banelings your gonna need atleast infestors.
This build actually works better against toss if they do anything except open with collosus.
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Im no super high master league zerg but i am in masters, and i have been using this idea vs terran for a while with a lot of succes. Only difference i have is a delayed lair and faster +1 +1 (i saw psystarcraft do it in one of his recent vods) It really thows off terrans and the lings are so good vs marines/tanks.
Only problem i see is heavy heavy BF hellions, early banshee and a lot of drops. But the nice thing is that u can delay hive and 3/3 for a bit for anything to counter any air. Ofcourse scouting is still important.
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Without mutas on the map, you can easily drop numerous locations pretty much constantly. I think that's the weakness of your build. On biggers maps you don't even need to drop, just running around with BFH is enough. This is what I've been using against builds similar to yours with decent success. Maybe if you added like 8-10 mutas to your build and delayed hive a bit, it could be safer. It would also allow you to harass nicely.
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I used to use this strategy all the time until most Master league terrans started opening with blue flame hellions.
Mass lings deal with pretty much everything well except for blue flame hellions and it really forces you out of this strategy unless they have atrocious unit control.
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EPT
