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honestly the best way to deal with broodlords is to NOT engage directly. ppl need to remember how insanely slow and imobile broodlords are. abuse that. get prisms, warp in DTs or some zealots, snipe greater spire or other buildings, profit.
i see way to many protosses just massing up a death ball and trying to A move into a broodlord infestor army. that is the wrong way to go about dealing with broodlord infestor.
broodlords are very cost effecient units compared to ultras because broods can siege, but in some situations, as long as there are no immortals insite, ultras are better. when your going up against mostly stalker colo army ultras ling will tear into it insanely hard. ultras are also mobile so they can atk other bases or can be used in drop play.
the only thing that really makes ultras bad are immortals, but the second you see toss massing to many immortals you tech switch into broodlords. i really hate infestors after the huge nerf they got so i honestly dont waste gas on them most of the time anymore.
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It's funny how broods are 4 and ultras are 6, considering their respective usefulness. I do think that something needs to be revised in the way of unit 'cost,' though.
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On December 30 2011 08:41 Ballistixz wrote:
honestly the best way to deal with broodlords is to NOT engage directly. ppl need to remember how insanely slow and imobile broodlords are. abuse that. get prisms, warp in DTs or some zealots, snipe greater spire or other buildings, profit.
i see way to many protosses just massing up a death ball and trying to A move into a broodlord infestor army. that is the wrong way to go about dealing with broodlord infestor.
well said! Ideally this is the way to approach dealing with the zerg; tech structures are less and less protected the more immobile the zerg army is. However, if the zerg forces the issue (as they often do when they have a huge bank of resources to remax on with a potential army switch) its mainly just about figuring out how to either separate the zerg ground army from the brood lords or go for a favorable angle of engagement/convace
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On December 30 2011 08:45 KimJongChill wrote:
It's funny how broods are 4 and ultras are 6, considering their respective usefulness. I do think that something needs to be revised in the way of unit 'cost,' though.
ultras are a unit that get exponentially better the more of them you have. if ultras costed 4 supply it might break the game honestly. ESPECIALLY on wide open maps where ultras can easily surround and not get there AI fucked up.
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I heard Broodlord was a pretty good game
User was temp banned for this post.
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I think the cost-staggering of the broodlord (in comparison to the ultra) is secondary to the superior way the broodlord changes the pace of the game. a zerg army, if the game is even, zerg is almost always going to max first as the mid/late game rolls around. Terran and protoss almost always want to turtle at this point, so that they can cut the advantage that the zerg may have by moving up in supply while zerg is stuck at 200/200. the same concept can be adopted to tech, especially in zvp. Zerg will get its most potent tech (and the econ to support it) up faster than a protoss will, but protoss will eventually catch up, and then surpass the zerg's. The point is, there comes a time in the game when zerg is forced to attack. And broodlords allow you to attack someone who wants to turtle more effectively
Broodlords necessitate movement out of the enemy, whether it be retreat to buy time or to advance to engage in an attempt to defend. Both of these present zerg opportunities to engage favorably with flanks, catching retreating units use AoE on advancing units, etc. ultras promote the opposite response. against azerg maxed on ultras, terran and protoss are inclined to maintain defensive positions so that the ultras cannot get enough surface area to trade effectively. Ultras encourage your enemy to turtle when you want to be stacking him most. In theory the ultra's cleave would cause you to want to spread out (which would help zerg trade, and would be good for breaking siege lines) in actuality, the danger presented by the cleave is more than offset by the damage prevented by the forcing ultras into small spaces, where only a few can attack at a time.
Burrow charge, in HotS, in combination with the viper's dark swarm type ability is going to definitely change this. These two things will enable zergs to have strong options against fortified pistons, so enemies will want to get more mobile as a response which its what zerg wants any way
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Lobotomist: Thats a v good point about how the utility of the unit affects the way it helps zergs spend their money i.e. brood lords forcing engagements to help spend banked money, and moving turtling players out of position, whereas ultras have to attack into defensive positions and will almost always get wiped out due to their front line role. But depending on the zerg's initial choice of t3, do you think theres much difference in the way trading either army makes to the way zergs manage their banks?
PS: That doesn't sound v clear, so let me put it this way. If I choose ultras and max out on them, and I force an engagment, trade armies, am I worse off than if I had chosen broods first and then traded roughly equally? Assume a rather late game situation where the opponent reacts appropriately and the rest of the army composition is the same (numbers will vary of course). My guess is no for a standard TvZ and yes for a standard PvZ.
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I would say the true cost of broodlords is actually more than the sum of the parts.
I you got broodlords immediately from your hateries, there would be 1-2 broodlords coming from all over the map. The chances that some do not get picked off would be slim, and to get them all together and attack, would take a long time. Assuming you get broodlords on 4+ bases, the time it takes to them to all get together and attack would be long. Corruptors allow you to morph all your broodlords together and you don't ahve to worry about them being picked off while rallying in from hatcheries.
Assuming the time of the broodlord building is corruptor time + broodlord morph, I'd say I would much rather get them all together ready to attack, then floating in very slowly from my expos.
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Um, if you want to discount the cost then what do you suggest the discount rate be? Moreover one won't necessarily convert Cs into BLs immediately after it morphs so the timeframe becomes ambiguous and arbitrary. And Liquipedia functions fine with just simple, non-discounted value costs, because if you do you can start comparing the NPVs of a Broodlord and that of your 1st/10th/50th Drone/Ling/Bane and it becomes rather useless as a scientific pursuit by then.
But it is a good consideration, that Broodlords have 2 stages to their production (plus buildings, but whatever), and so you can adjust budgeting on Corruptors accordingly and make more Corruptors than you'd be able to make Broods provided you have mining bases.
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On December 30 2011 05:55 chestnutcc wrote:
This is imo pretty much the reason carriers/ battle cruisers are non viable in any match up. Broodlords however, have good survivability, and the disappearance of several broodlords does not affect the next remax, if the game is on even footing (?).
I'll just weigh on on this piece: Zerg gas weak anti air so unless you want to make hydralisks, you make corruptors. Battlecruisers/Carriers/Banshees/Void Rays/etc are the reason you DON'T make ultralisks, because it sucks to put so much money into a tech that doesn't get you any new tactical advantage that zerglings didnt already offer.
In other matchups, its a different story, but at least in ZvP corruptors are basically required in the midgame so broodlords are the natural consequence.
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Keep trying to abuse mobility if the brood lord numbers are low and manageable. You can rely on Blink stalkers here. Obviously, on certain maps, an engagement can be inevitable, but maps like Tal'Darim, and some of the newer maps allow you to circumvent huge broodlord armies. If you can't run around them, then use a Warp Prism to snipe crucial tech buildings. This will force the Zerg to split his army, or at least attempt to do so. The slow movement speed of the Broodlords makes dealing with Multi-pronged harass extremely difficult. There is a decent chance that the Zerg will make a critical mistkae during this phase that will allow you a few easy snipes. Void Rays are great as well, but are slow producing. You need to have full visibility on the Zerg's tech to know when to make them.
Late late late game, is when you can turn to the Archon Toilet. That thing is still disgustingly overpowered (in my mind), and really hurts the matchup.
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Brood lords aren't good cost-wise, but they are good supply wise. They are the most resource dense unit zerg has that isn't hard countered by AE spells like baneling/hydra. 300/250 is 75/63 per supply, making a 200 ball with brood lords much stronger than if you had it in lings/roaches (which are good units cost-wise, but not supply-wise). If you want to trade armies somewhat cost-effectively with a terran/protoss 200 army, you need brood lord/infestor.
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Mobius_1: But this sort of thing is prevalent in sc2. We use opportunity costs to give values to scans and 9 pylon scouts vs 12 gate scouts, or to estimate how much forcing a few spores or spines is to a zerg. I am not worried about the numerical value of the discount rate per se, I only assume there is one and that it is less than 1. In my OP, I ask your opinion for how high or low you think this rate is. I mention the variability of the time frame, which is why I think additive sums are fine in TvZ, but not in standard PvZs. The exact length of time, like the discount rate is unimportant, all that matters is that it scales the cost downwards. Extending this to every unit is of course, pointless, but a T3 game ending unit is not just any unit, so this argument is not completely valid. My contention is that zerg's expenditure on their T3 varies a lot more than the additive costs suggest due to this discounting. This definitely makes a difference to the late game cost effectiveness of a zerg army. My other point was that keeping this in mind, how should other races trade cost effectively?
Achilles306: I'm not sure I understand you, but no zerg morphs broodlords separately at each hatch and then rallies them to his army. What you're suggesting is that risk be factored into their cost, I've stated before why I ignore this.
darkscream: I think zealots and immortals are more the reason you dont see ultras in PvZ that much, but you're right about the almost certain necessity of corruptors in this match up.
VoirDire: imo per supply cost effectiveness is actually better in PvZ, while its what you state in TvZ.
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On December 30 2011 10:26 QTIP. wrote:
Keep trying to abuse mobility if the brood lord numbers are low and manageable. You can rely on Blink stalkers here. Obviously, on certain maps, an engagement can be inevitable, but maps like Tal'Darim, and some of the newer maps allow you to circumvent huge broodlord armies. If you can't run around them, then use a Warp Prism to snipe crucial tech buildings. This will force the Zerg to split his army, or at least attempt to do so. The slow movement speed of the Broodlords makes dealing with Multi-pronged harass extremely difficult. There is a decent chance that the Zerg will make a critical mistkae during this phase that will allow you a few easy snipes. Void Rays are great as well, but are slow producing. You need to have full visibility on the Zerg's tech to know when to make them.
Late late late game, is when you can turn to the Archon Toilet. That thing is still disgustingly overpowered (in my mind), and really hurts the matchup.
If the zerg remax is minimally affected by the loss of several broodlords, the toilet is not that overpowered. It takes some skill to pull off and the chances of losing the mothership are high. Extreme late game is a bit rare, it may be overpowered when the map is mined out, so there is no chance for a remax. Compare this to mass snipes from ghosts, who have cloaking and can match the broodlord's range.
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On December 30 2011 10:42 chestnutcc wrote:Show nested quote +On December 30 2011 10:26 QTIP. wrote:
Keep trying to abuse mobility if the brood lord numbers are low and manageable. You can rely on Blink stalkers here. Obviously, on certain maps, an engagement can be inevitable, but maps like Tal'Darim, and some of the newer maps allow you to circumvent huge broodlord armies. If you can't run around them, then use a Warp Prism to snipe crucial tech buildings. This will force the Zerg to split his army, or at least attempt to do so. The slow movement speed of the Broodlords makes dealing with Multi-pronged harass extremely difficult. There is a decent chance that the Zerg will make a critical mistkae during this phase that will allow you a few easy snipes. Void Rays are great as well, but are slow producing. You need to have full visibility on the Zerg's tech to know when to make them.
Late late late game, is when you can turn to the Archon Toilet. That thing is still disgustingly overpowered (in my mind), and really hurts the matchup. If the zerg remax is minimally affected by the loss of several broodlords, the toilet is not that overpowered. It takes some skill to pull off and the chances of losing the mothership are high. Extreme late game is a bit rare, it may be overpowered when the map is mined out, so there is no chance for a remax. Compare this to mass snipes from ghosts, who have cloaking and can match the broodlord's range.
I disagree, watch Brown vs Losira to see exactly how silly it looks. I use it frequently at Mid to High masters and I find it very easy to pull off. Sure, there is the remax that you have to worry about, but the strength of the Archon toilet is that when executed correctly, you barely lose ANY units. The Zerg can Remax on whatever they want, but that doesn't change the fact that they do not have a standing army. As your Army supply stays at 150+, the Zerg is streaming out Roaches / Hydras / Lings in bite size chunks, which get annihilated immediately. The lack of a standing army after losing a BL Infestor army is what makes the Zerg extremely easy to run over afterwards.
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What the.... There's 3 train of thoughts in ZvP.
1-Early bust Protoss
2-Contain Protoss on two base with muta haras. Either A move with max army or just mass muta until you win
3-Take early 3rd, mass roach = profit!
If you go with no.2 then you've already got spire tech. If you go with no.3 you already have Lair for Roach upgrades anyway.
On top of that most Zerg throw down a spire eventually preemptively for Colossus tech anyways, And it's not like you're going Hive only for the tier 3 units anyways. You're going to want to get your level 3 upgrades and the glands for your lings eventually.....
So honestly Brood Lords are something you just kind of stumble onto eventually anyways.
And it's totally retarded that a air superiority unit turns into a DPS siege unit. Clear the air, then kill everything? What the.... That's like being able to pay 100/100 to turn your vikings into siege tanks that fly.
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QTIP: You would know more about this than me, but to be fair, the casters are divided about Losira's decision to throw all the broods into the vortex. Also there was no roach supporting army. If I understand you, the idea is to throw your own army in the vortex to save it while probably sacking the mothership so you retain most of your units? How would this work if there was a beefy roach army?
PS: Losira had 16 or so broodlords with a lot of air support in that game. I'm not certain anything else would have done the job. What else could Brown have done?
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I wonder what would happen if you could morph 2-3 pheonix into a carrier ( lessening the build time factor drastically ) or morph a battlecruiser out of 3-4 vikings. Having the transitional anti air unit in the form of the corruptor is really quite a nice boost from zergs if you think of it that way.
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On December 30 2011 11:10 chestnutcc wrote:
QTIP: You would know more about this than me, but to be fair, the casters are divided about Losira's decision to throw all the broods into the vortex. Also there was no roach supporting army. If I understand you, the idea is to throw your own army in the vortex to save it while probably sacking the mothership so you retain most of your units? How would this work if there was a beefy roach army?
PS: Losira had 16 or so broodlords with a lot of air support in that game. I'm not certain anything else would have done the job. What else could Brown have done?
I'm not saying that Protoss has a viable counter to Mass (15+ Broodlords) that isn't the mothership. It has not been explored enough. However in my experience, Psi Storm / Voids / Blink stalkers can get the job done. Yes, it is extremely hard to engage head on, but that's exactly what you should be avoiding. Again, I'm not saying that my experience is the end all of discussion, but I have had success using other methods including Warp Prism harass and abuse of mobility.
What I am saying is that the Archon Toilet is far too powerful of a counter. True, Zerg's can split (lol) their sloth-like Brood lords to avoid a Vortex, but you essentially risk giving away the rest of your army for free, assuming the Protoss is a competent Vortex user, (point and click). If the Archon Toilet is the only possible counter, then it is simply too good of a counter. The skill requirement of executing an Archon toilet is too low for it to be such a Game ending tactic. Moreover, I don't think an ability that takes place over the course of less than 5 secs that can instantly end the game should be in SC2. There are already enough problems revolving around single engagements that end the game. The Archon Toilet is an extreme example of that, where Protoss can essentially win the game with a single well-placed Vortex. Isn't this somewhat anticlimactic considering 200/200 high-tech maxed out armies?
If it's the only viable counter, then PvZ is stupid because the way it is now, its way too good of a counter.
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On December 30 2011 08:48 Ballistixz wrote:Show nested quote +On December 30 2011 08:45 KimJongChill wrote:
It's funny how broods are 4 and ultras are 6, considering their respective usefulness. I do think that something needs to be revised in the way of unit 'cost,' though. ultras are a unit that get exponentially better the more of them you have. if ultras costed 4 supply it might break the game honestly. ESPECIALLY on wide open maps where ultras can easily surround and not get there AI fucked up.
if u talk about a unit that gets "exponentially better" the more u have of them, ultras actually is the opposite. because they are melee units, huge and clumps around. the more you have in an army the easier it is to lose 1 here and there when trying to get into position, attack ur opponents arny or even retreat
broodlord is a perfect unit that gets "exponentially better" because they dont lose mobility, or damage, and they grow in survivability the more you have of them
i think the reason why broodlords cost less food than ultralisk is just because the raw strength and size of an ultralisk looks and is much more fearsome when facing it alone. broodlord is a unit that you generally need quite alot of them to actually make them useful where as you only need 2-3 ultras added to ur army to make it much stronger
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EPT
