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I've recently been curious about zerg hate for the ultralisk and the extreme efficacy of broodlords in any non mirror ZvX. Specifically the ability of zerg to pop 10+ broodlords, while maintaining a large support army (usually by suiciding the early game units and creating spine walls).
Here is the cost of a broodlord from Liquipedia: 300 minerals, 250 gas, 4 supply (Let us ignore the hive tech and greater spire part of it). This cost is paid in two parts, first when spawning a corruptor, and then when you finally morph it into a broodlord. The length of time between these two payments can vary, but typically is of the order of about 8 minutes or so (I'm not v sure about this). Would it make sense to revise the brood lord's cost based on this delayed payment? The present value of the future morphing cost is likely to be much less than this simple additive sum.
A comparison with the ultralisk (300 min 200 gas 6 supply) may help at this point. Ignoring the roles they play, the cost structure may explain why ultras are reviled by most zergs. Broodlords are morphed from corruptors, which accompany large standing armies. Ultras are usually made as a remax option (due to the high supply cost) or alongside cheaper, less supply intensive units (lings, banelings). Ultras massively eat into zerg banks, which means that once they die, the next zerg remax is drastically weaker (assuming the game is on even footing).
This may well be the reason for 'ultras are something I make when I'm already ahead', since being ahead implies a larger bank, which ultras dont affect as much. This is made worse by the ultras role as a huge tank and damage dealer, so they will inevitably be the first things to die, and tanks are pointless without something to tank for. 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 (?).
How much do you think broodlords actually cost i.e. how much do you discount the morphing cost and is it balanced out by the cost of hive tech and the greater spire?
Since I play protoss, what, in your opinion, is the most cost efficient way of combating brood lords? Is it the silver bullet-esque archon toilet, the more expensive, hard counter way of a void ray/phoenix switch or more indirect methods like dropping and harassing and chipping away at the zerg bank?
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Build Robo > Build Warp Prism
User was warned for this post
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I'm a Protoss player so from a Protoss perspective it is simply because BLs are a much more effective unit overall than Ultras. Carriers/BCs aren't seen much (actually you do see BCs in TvT) because of the long build times which necessitates multiple production buildings to make, whereas BLs do not have that issue due to zerg's production mechanics.
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The time cost of spawning a broodlord is also staggered across the corruptor and the brood lord itself, so it too, imo is less than the sum of the two.
Skyro: Yes, I was interested in opinions as to why they are more effective, my take is that it lies in the cost of the unit
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mothership and 4-5 archons are the most cost efficient way of combating everything zerg has.. I don't think voids are good at all seeming as they are more of an all in because once they die you won't be able to get more fast..
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BL are very, very, very expensive, more expensive than a colossus. and a lil more than an ultra. the difference for me, is utility.
the problem with ultras IMO is they cant hit air and you are left with a hole. with BL you can morph to BL, leave some as corrupter, and put all your excess larva into lings to stop those pesky stalkers from blinking right into you (which is a pretty bad idea unless you have a huge amount anyway)
another important to note is most (almost all) of zergs strategy ZVP is capitalize on how good mutas can be in the midgame, keeping the protoss penned in while the zerg takes a 3rd/4th and starts pumping out late game units while the toss is stuck on 2base. The natural transition to corrupter/bl is right there. whereas double evo chambers and ultra cavern may never be thrown down.
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I thought blink stalkers were the most organic way to combat a flock of Brood Lords. You don't really have to go out of your way to get them, and there will probably already be quite a few in the death ball of your choosing. Are the introduction of brood lords to your matches so devastating that they necessitate a hard counter?
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On December 30 2011 06:14 BreakfastBurrito wrote:
BL are very, very, very expensive, more expensive than a colossus. and a lil more than an ultra. the difference for me, is utility.
the problem with ultras IMO is they cant hit air and you are left with a hole. with BL you can morph to BL, leave some as corrupter, and put all your excess larva into lings to stop those pesky stalkers from blinking right into you (which is a pretty bad idea unless you have a huge amount anyway)
another important to note is most (almost all) of zergs strategy ZVP is capitalize on how good mutas can be in the midgame, keeping the protoss penned in while the zerg takes a 3rd/4th and starts pumping out late game units while the toss is stuck on 2base. The natural transition to corrupter/bl is right there. whereas double evo chambers and ultra cavern may never be thrown down.
I would disagree on this point, imo broods are much cheaper than their additive cost. My post ignores their utility, since the choice of broodlords in PvZ and ultras in TvZ have more to do with the cost effectiveness of each race's responses to these units (and their early game compositions). In this sense, both broods and ultras have tremendous utility, but the choice of one over the other is made by how easy it is for the opponent to macro up a counter.
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if you can get out like 3 stargate void ray fast enough then you can handle bls directly for the most part, but thats not going to happen too often. imo best way is to go blink stalker/collosus/void ray and just run around the BL with your essentially flying army or just warp prism around them with zealots and dts while you tech to mothership/archon.
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On December 30 2011 06:19 Hurricane Sponge wrote:
I thought blink stalkers were the most organic way to combat a flock of Brood Lords. You don't really have to go out of your way to get them, and there will probably already be quite a few in the death ball of your choosing. Are the introduction of brood lords to your matches so devastating that they necessitate a hard counter?
Broodlords in situations you normally find them, which is with a large supporting roach army sprinkled with infestors. Compare to situations in which you normally find ultralisks.
Personally, yes, I find the introduction of large numbers of brood lords a huge pain to deal with, since imo the macro situation i find myself in leaves me v slim avenues I can take to combat them. For example, with the current meta of muta ling into roach broodlord, I may find myself with too many stalkers and templar, archons, and no ready way to free up supply. I'm not interested in unit or situational counters per se to such an army composition, its more the macro decisions that make up your late game plan that I'm interested in. But this deviates from the specific topic, since it relies on better macro, scouting etc which I can obviously stand to improve. Better players take on this would be v valuable.
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I like the archon + mothership reaction. Archons in general are good and it's not like if you decide to go Voidray. The Z catches all the Voidrays in a fungal and they all die.
Archons in general are very strong so I like that way of dealing with it (I play Z)
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Another large factor is that you'll already (usually) have a mass of corruptors flying out and about in ZvP and ZvT that you can then make the spot decision to convert them on a need basis as well as the ability to -cancel-. If you start to make several ultralisks and then you scout 6 voids ready to slam at you, you're entirely dead.
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On December 30 2011 06:20 chestnutcc wrote:
I would disagree on this point, imo broods are much cheaper than their additive cost.
Hmm, could you explain further how they can be less expensive than their additive cost? Or did you argue that they are somehow "cheaper" than another unit with the same mineral/gas cost but that has less utility? I.e. that they have higher "value" per gas/mineral cost. Or do you mean something else? I tried reading the OP again but I could not quite follow.
I also wonder what you mean when you say that the time to morph a brood lord should be considered as less than the sum of making a corruptor and the morph to blord.
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Broodlords cost a lot, especially considering that you're taking a serious risk to attempt to tech to them.
I think hive tech upgrade and time should absolutely count, because it's very rare that you'll upgrade to hive for a reason other than broodlords. Starting with lair tech already, it costs 200/150 (100 sec) for Hive, 100/150 (100 sec) for G.Spire (and add on another 200/200 if you didn't already have a spire, sometimes the case vs protoss). Then 150/100 (40) for a corruptor and 150/150 (34) to morph to BL.
Grand total investment, from the time you decided "I think I'll try getting some broodlords": 600 minerals, 550 gas, and 4 minutes 34 seconds.
That is a looooooooong tech time considering you are already starting at tier 2! Also, you're not going to tech up to make just 1 broodlord... so with that and the potential cost of a spire if you didn't have one, you could be investing 1200/1200... maybe 1500/1500 or even more, and it doesn't pay off at all until the entire process is complete.
I know I've lost my share of games by making this investment and then dying in the next 4:30 because my opponent spent those resources on army and attacked me, and I fell just short because my money was wrapped up in BL tech.
So for this kind of investment... they damn well better be strong units without a mindless hard counter to them.
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On December 30 2011 06:33 straycat wrote:Show nested quote +On December 30 2011 06:20 chestnutcc wrote:
I would disagree on this point, imo broods are much cheaper than their additive cost.
Hmm, could you explain further how they can be less expensive than their additive cost? Or did you argue that they are somehow "cheaper" than another unit with the same mineral/gas cost but that has less utility? I.e. that they have higher "value" per gas/mineral cost. Or do you mean something else? I tried reading the OP again but I could not quite follow. I also wonder what you mean when you say that the time to morph a brood lord should be considered as less than the sum of making a corruptor and the morph to blord.
The idea is simply that of 'Do you prefer a dollar now, or a dollar tomorrow?'. If you have multiple payments at different points in time, their total value cannot always be simply the grand sum of all the payments. This is known as time discounting of payments and is the fundamental principle behind returns on bank deposit or investments of any sort.
On December 30 2011 06:34 Chocobo wrote:
Broodlords cost a lot, especially considering that you're taking a serious risk to attempt to tech to them.
I think hive tech upgrade and time should absolutely count, because it's very rare that you'll upgrade to hive for a reason other than broodlords. Starting with lair tech already, it costs 200/150 (100 sec) for Hive, 100/150 (100 sec) for G.Spire (and add on another 200/200 if you didn't already have a spire, sometimes the case vs protoss). Then 150/100 (40) for a corruptor and 150/150 (34) to morph to BL.
Grand total investment, from the time you decided "I think I'll try getting some broodlords": 600 minerals, 550 gas, and 4 minutes 34 seconds.
That is a looooooooong tech time considering you are already starting at tier 2! Also, you're not going to tech up to make just 1 broodlord... so with that and the potential cost of a spire if you didn't have one, you could be investing 1200/1200... maybe 1500/1500 or even more, and it doesn't pay off at all until the entire process is complete.
I know I've lost my share of games by making this investment and then dying in the next 4:30 because my opponent spent those resources on army and attacked me, and I fell just short because my money was wrapped up in BL tech.
So for this kind of investment... they damn well better be strong units without a mindless hard counter to them.
This is assuming you are rushing for brood lords, in which case, yes you will probably die. If you were rushing for broodlords, the time between payments is minimized and the total cost is effectively additive, so its a huge investment. My post was more about a normal game, where these payments would be staggered significantly.
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On December 30 2011 06:33 straycat wrote:Show nested quote +On December 30 2011 06:20 chestnutcc wrote:
I would disagree on this point, imo broods are much cheaper than their additive cost.
Hmm, could you explain further how they can be less expensive than their additive cost? Or did you argue that they are somehow "cheaper" than another unit with the same mineral/gas cost but that has less utility? I.e. that they have higher "value" per gas/mineral cost. Or do you mean something else? I tried reading the OP again but I could not quite follow. I also wonder what you mean when you say that the time to morph a brood lord should be considered as less than the sum of making a corruptor and the morph to blord.
Well you gain increased flexibility. With a completely upfront cost you pay for X now and are weak until X is finished. With the 2 stage morphing you get to pay some now, then re-evaluate the situation and opt to pay again for X. A good examples of how this can play out is if you:
1. Make a bunch of corruptors.
2. Spend all your money on other units.
3. As corruptors fly across the map bank money.
4. Morph to broodlords right before engaging the enemy.
Compare that to having to do
1. Wait for money (since you pay all upfront)
2. Make a bunch of broodlords.
3. Spend new income on other units
4. Fly them across the map.
In the first scenario you get to start the production earlier and you get some additional units earlier. In the second scenario you don't get those extra units until later with no benefit to yourself. So in the 2nd scenario you are weak from 1 to 4 when the 'other units' finish making. In the 1st scenario you are only weak from 1 until the other units finish making (around 3).
So in a way by being able to make a 2 tier investment you reduce the risk to yourself and the true cost of a unit should include the risk of its production.
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The cost of risk will certainly feature in the overall price, but I tend to ignore it here since its quite a volatile figure. Imagine asset pricing a brood lord.
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I would argue the overall cost is actually more than the sum of the corrupter+morphing.
Why?
Because in order to get brood lords, you have to go through corrupters. Your argument is that I pay essentially half up front for a corrupter, half at delivery of my broodlord, therefore the cost feels less.
I could see how that would be true, if corrupters had a purpose. Unfortunately, just about anything a corrupter can do, an equal cost of mutas can do better and faster. Nevermind that your ultimate goal is brood lords, which is obviously an anti-ground unit, which the corrupter is not.
What I'm trying to say is that, while you're trying to get this anti-ground unit, you have to spend a significant amount of time with a purely anti-air unit which is useless to you.
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Felnarion: For that to be true, there must be an active cost of having corruptors instead of other units. What you're saying is that the opportunity cost of the corruptors must be fed into the total price. I'm not sure what to say to this, since it is v situational, and should there be colossi or void rays, or should the P/T attempt to counter with voids/vikings, corruptors obviously have great utility here. One does not usually see mutas perform this function.
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broodies are nice in mirror as well. The hate comes from one unit needing micro, the other simply being a click. Though broodies allow micro, but still you see 10 broodlords die to a vortex, which should basically be something to never happen in a game.
But the true cost is what they cost, the morphing cost nothing else. You could have used corruptors to prevent drops or get air dominance, so in some situation they payed for themself already, where you can't incorporate the corrupter cost for the broodlord.
Calculating the teching cost to something isn't helpful. You should have a plan on how to get your high tech out, not just tech up and pray it works.
For example, teching up to mutas and use them for harassment, and try to save as much minerals as possible till you reach t3, meanwhile you get the ground attack/armor upgrades. Then you add adrenal glands on t3 and use your overmins and lings to tech up to broodlords.
The only interesting part should be how much extractors do you need to effectively use the tech. Because every fight messes up any timing calculation.
For example ultra compositions are low gas, using 6 extractors for them is almost over the limit you should use. Unless you still need upgrades or want to do a high gas unit switch.
PS: always fun to see zerg players die because they think they can win with only t3 units. And then you see 16 broodlords flying around or 12 ultras walking in a line and complain about their bank running dry so fast.
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On December 30 2011 06:50 Felnarion wrote:
I would argue the overall cost is actually more than the sum of the corrupter+morphing.
Why?
Because in order to get brood lords, you have to go through corrupters. Your argument is that I pay essentially half up front for a corrupter, half at delivery of my broodlord, therefore the cost feels less.
I could see how that would be true, if corrupters had a purpose. Unfortunately, just about anything a corrupter can do, an equal cost of mutas can do better and faster. Nevermind that your ultimate goal is brood lords, which is obviously an anti-ground unit, which the corrupter is not.
What I'm trying to say is that, while you're trying to get this anti-ground unit, you have to spend a significant amount of time with a purely anti-air unit which is useless to you.
The amount of time is as low as 0 if you time out your resources correctly. Even if Corruptors are near useless they're still less useless than no unit at all. Especially since if you have BL's you can expect your opponent to likely have vikings, medivacs, colossi, or their own corruptors/bls.
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As a very high masters zerg, i think broodlords are a terrible designed unit. Its sad that in the late game, versus protoss or terran your only option is broodlord / infestors.
Yet... once you do get out a good numbers of broodlords, you give up any map control you had. On a big map like taldarim, broodlords means protoss can have a huge amount of stalkers, blink around, kill 2-3 bases before he even engage your army, In the meanwhile, if his econ wasnt too bad, he can also expand, and rebuild all his gates to another base if your broodlords are killing his main.
You also cant really split your army with broodlords, if you leave them undefended, without roaches/infestors, or infestors queens corruptors, they will get killed by a bunch of stalkers or marines ghosts vikings. So it leaves you with yes, one decent deathball, but super slow, and very hard to control. A few misclick or seconds of inatention, they get too far ahead of your army and get picked off, etc.
Basicly if feels like,* well lets hope hes stupid and goes straight for my army*, but in most cases its not true, terrans will take map with pfs and turrets, turtle with tanks and ghosts.
Overall, i feel like broodlord is just a finishing move unit when your already very far ahead but cant finish a turtling terran or toss. You never get the same feeling as having a protoss max deathball where your like * Alright, im in pretty good shape, i can do whatever i want now*
I really cant wait to try the new Hots units to see if it changes the dynamic, i would love to have ultralisks a little bit more powerful, or rather, ghosts, archons, stalkers, immortals and mauraders a little bit weaker versus ultralisk. Ultralisk is a really great fun unit, very mobile and fast, good for map control, if only theyre were ground bases army with ultralisk that are as powerful as a Protoss deathball or a terran army with lots of ghosts and siege tank.s
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Not entirely sure what questions your asking? Are broodlords worth it? In some situations yes. If you have established air control, broodlords in large numbers are very effective. Not so much as other transitions or other builds. Every unit in the game has a purpose, and is effective when used correctly at the correct timings. The broodlord is no different then the ultralisk in that respect.
It is my opinion, that many zergs use ultalisks incorrectly. Their dps is not very high for their cost. They are not usually very cost efficient in and of themselves. They are amazing damage absorbers though, and if your strategy already involves a lot of lings and bannelings to begin with, then ultralisks make a lot of sense because they benefit from the same upgrades. Ultralisks in ZvP, PvZ should be used to break forcefields and direct collossus fire away from lings. In ZvT they should buffer seige tank shots. In my opinion, ultralisks should not be the main component of your army, but a subset used for a specific purpose. It makes me sad when zergs, even good zergs, make 10 ultralisks and the game goes south as a result. Make 3, 4, maybe 5. And then make other stuff. Just my two cents.
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On December 30 2011 06:53 chestnutcc wrote:
Felnarion: For that to be true, there must be an active cost of having corruptors instead of other units. What you're saying is that the opportunity cost of the corruptors must be fed into the total price. I'm not sure what to say to this, since it is v situational, and should there be colossi or void rays, or should the P/T attempt to counter with voids/vikings, corruptors obviously have great utility here. One does not usually see mutas perform this function.
Mutas are often used to kill voidrays and colossi, in fact, I would argue Mutas are better against VRs than corrupters.
And any zerg will tell you, corrupters biggest cost, is their opportunity cost. We would much rather have other units in our mix. Because once the colossi are dead, the corruptors have almost no value until they're morphed into brood lords.
Of course, your analysis of this cost assumes the Protoss is going Colossi at all.
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If you're losing to broodlords it's more often than not a result of bad scouting. If you have an obs in his main and you see the greater spire starting. JUST PUSH. He'll have like 20 corruptors that will be wasted until broodlords come. If you feel like you don't have an army strong enough to push, just take like 3 bases, add on fleet bacon and make mothership. Also, get a warp prism or two just to keep him busy until mothership has enough energy and you have enough archons.
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On December 30 2011 06:37 chestnutcc wrote:Show nested quote +On December 30 2011 06:33 straycat wrote:On December 30 2011 06:20 chestnutcc wrote:
I would disagree on this point, imo broods are much cheaper than their additive cost.
Hmm, could you explain further how they can be less expensive than their additive cost? Or did you argue that they are somehow "cheaper" than another unit with the same mineral/gas cost but that has less utility? I.e. that they have higher "value" per gas/mineral cost. Or do you mean something else? I tried reading the OP again but I could not quite follow. I also wonder what you mean when you say that the time to morph a brood lord should be considered as less than the sum of making a corruptor and the morph to blord. The idea is simply that of 'Do you prefer a dollar now, or a dollar tomorrow?'. If you have multiple payments at different points in time, their total value cannot always be simply the grand sum of all the payments. This is known as time discounting of payments and is the fundamental principle behind returns on bank deposit or investments of any sort.
The total value will be more than the sum of the payments, not less.
This is assuming you are rushing for brood lords, in which case, yes you will probably die. If you were rushing for broodlords, the time between payments is minimized and the total cost is effectively additive, so its a huge investment. My post was more about a normal game, where these payments would be staggered significantly.
Sure, you can try to get away with taking hits of 200/200 here and there, spread across a long time period, in order to increase your survivability. But this increases the cost of your broodlord investment - you're putting in the same money, but now it takes several minutes more for it to pay off in the end.
And all of this money invested equals units that you are not making in the present, as an alternative to teching up. If you don't go for BLs, you could add another handful of roaches and infestors to your army and do more damage in the short term. Or you could hatch a bunch of mutas and go pick off workers and do harrassment damage.
You have to give up those short-term advantages (which could potentially make a huge difference in the game) in order to tech up to BLs. IMO the time cost is too high, and the morph time for G.Spire and BLs should be cut down.
It takes longer for a saturated 2-base 100+ supply zerg on hatch tech to get a broodlord out, than it does for terran to get a banshee with cloak when starting a new game with 6 workers.
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mothergoose729: I was pondering the cost structure and macro factors that lead to the choice of brood lords over ultralisks. and what macro decisions other races can or should take to combat them, not just on the battlefield, but also in their economy.
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I agree with those who have said they can't really count the cost of the tech in the price of the unit. Your entire gameplan should have transitions to get to later stages of the game. Getting up expansions, siezing map control, getting up expensive and time consuming tech or upgrades, and doing so safely. Whether by turtling, harassing, pushing, or poking the front, it revolves around the time you have bought to buy that advantage.
I get what you mean about this being a split cost making it more efficient than having to pay all up front, but I believe that to be an intentional design choice for the Zerg by the developers. They have stated numerous times that they want the three races to be asymetrical, each with unique advantages and disadvantages, and the ability to morph banelings and brood lords from other units is one such aspect.
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+ Show Spoiler +On December 30 2011 07:05 Chocobo wrote:Show nested quote +On December 30 2011 06:37 chestnutcc wrote:On December 30 2011 06:33 straycat wrote:On December 30 2011 06:20 chestnutcc wrote:
I would disagree on this point, imo broods are much cheaper than their additive cost.
Hmm, could you explain further how they can be less expensive than their additive cost? Or did you argue that they are somehow "cheaper" than another unit with the same mineral/gas cost but that has less utility? I.e. that they have higher "value" per gas/mineral cost. Or do you mean something else? I tried reading the OP again but I could not quite follow. I also wonder what you mean when you say that the time to morph a brood lord should be considered as less than the sum of making a corruptor and the morph to blord. The idea is simply that of 'Do you prefer a dollar now, or a dollar tomorrow?'. If you have multiple payments at different points in time, their total value cannot always be simply the grand sum of all the payments. This is known as time discounting of payments and is the fundamental principle behind returns on bank deposit or investments of any sort. The total value will be more than the sum of the payments, not less. Show nested quote +On December 30 2011 06:34 Chocobo wrote:
Broodlords cost a lot, especially considering that you're taking a serious risk to attempt to tech to them.
I think hive tech upgrade and time should absolutely count, because it's very rare that you'll upgrade to hive for a reason other than broodlords. Starting with lair tech already, it costs 200/150 (100 sec) for Hive, 100/150 (100 sec) for G.Spire (and add on another 200/200 if you didn't already have a spire, sometimes the case vs protoss). Then 150/100 (40) for a corruptor and 150/150 (34) to morph to BL.
Grand total investment, from the time you decided "I think I'll try getting some broodlords": 600 minerals, 550 gas, and 4 minutes 34 seconds.
That is a looooooooong tech time considering you are already starting at tier 2! Also, you're not going to tech up to make just 1 broodlord... so with that and the potential cost of a spire if you didn't have one, you could be investing 1200/1200... maybe 1500/1500 or even more, and it doesn't pay off at all until the entire process is complete.
I know I've lost my share of games by making this investment and then dying in the next 4:30 because my opponent spent those resources on army and attacked me, and I fell just short because my money was wrapped up in BL tech.
So for this kind of investment... they damn well better be strong units without a mindless hard counter to them. This is assuming you are rushing for brood lords, in which case, yes you will probably die. If you were rushing for broodlords, the time between payments is minimized and the total cost is effectively additive, so its a huge investment. My post was more about a normal game, where these payments would be staggered significantly. Sure, you can try to get away with taking hits of 200/200 here and there, spread across a long time period, in order to increase your survivability. But this increases the cost of your broodlord investment - you're putting in the same money, but now it takes several minutes more for it to pay off in the end. And all of this money invested equals units that you are not making in the present, as an alternative to teching up. If you don't go for BLs, you could add another handful of roaches and infestors to your army and do more damage in the short term. Or you could hatch a bunch of mutas and go pick off workers and do harrassment damage. You have to give up those short-term advantages (which could potentially make a huge difference in the game) in order to tech up to BLs. IMO the time cost is too high, and the morph time for G.Spire and BLs should be cut down. It takes longer for a saturated 2-base 100+ supply zerg on hatch tech to get a broodlord out, than it does for terran to get a banshee with cloak when starting a new game with 6 workers.
This is the opportunity cost point of view, in which the opportunity cost of the investment must feature in its cost. I will say off the bat that I am not considering rushing to brood lords, or 2 base zergs or anything like that because those are extremely situational and obviously incur huge opportunity costs due to the fragile nature of the build.
My argument is that broodlords typically appear when the zerg needs them i.e. when they need to break seige lines or run over a turtling toss. Rushing for them is not what I consider here. In this sense there is no opportunity cost to morphing the brood lord. The opportunity cost of getting corruptors out I'm not so sure, in PvZ with colossi out, corruptors don't incur a significant opportunity cost, but in TvZ corruptors may indeed have such a cost since the entire corruptor and morph cost is usually done within a short time span.
dasbif: The baneling is another interesting example, thanks for bringing it up.
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BLs are costly but the fact that they don't cost 6 supply is very valuable for zerg. You can get more unit to support them than with an Ultra based army.
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From my non-numerical feelings on my own games, brood lords just FEEL like a lot cheaper of an option than ultras. Let me explain.
Occasionally I reach a point in the game where I say to myself "no matter how big my economy gets, I can't win on lair tech. I need to go to hive." I'm faced with the decision, brood lords or ultras. I'm not going for both because unless I'm on 5, 6 bases with an absurd number of drones (say, 100 mining after I make/cancel spines for extra supply) that's not gonna be economically viable.
In almost 100% of my games, you'll see my answer be "brood lords." Why? Because of the following excerpt from the OP:
On December 30 2011 05:55 chestnutcc wrote:
the disappearance of several broodlords does not affect the next remax, if the game is on even footing
This means I can keep being my zergy self and remax and remax again and again until the game is over. If I build Ultras, for one reason or another, and I couldn't tell you why, this doesn't happen. I get ONE army of ultras and if they don't win I'm gonna be hard pressed not to die right after they fail.
EDIT: Upon further thought, it strikes me that this may be why Blizzard buffed the build time of ultralisks; when they had ridiculously long build times you absolutely could not remake them after losing them because by the time they were ready to spawn, their eggs were liable to be the only things left for the Zerg player on the map. The reason the dramatic build time cut didn't increase their popularity too much was probably due to the fact that, again, brood lords are simply better and don't feel like a one hit wonder after which all hope is lost if enormous damage isn't dealt.
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It's actually way easier than this broodlords perform better in most combats. broodlords are the only unit that zerg can build to force combats. broodlords can be morphed from corruptors, so you can get them and their protection really easily/naturally. broodlords are supplyefficient while ultralisks are not (so you are not forced to fight with them right away). Broodlords have very few and rather specialized counters while ultralisks get countered by nearly everything on their own and still get countered by good positioning with infestorsupport.
Conclusion? Broodlord>Ultralisk in most scenarios.
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dunno about zvp but ultralisks are amazing in midgame zvt...
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On December 30 2011 07:45 KawaiiRice wrote:
dunno about zvp but ultralisks are amazing in midgame zvt...
well but i think that OP was specifically asking about times when you have the opportunity to decide between ultra or broodlord and as far as I know there is no strategy that allows you to go for midgame broods.
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@chocobo: Usually, future payments are discounted downwards, not upwards, so the sum is cheaper, not more.
@bigj: I ignore the direct utility of broodlords in my post. I'm interested in why they perform better than ultras in the macro scenario.
@felnarion: True, but your scenario assumes that the toss does nothing about the harass so you're inflating the opportunity cost. This is sort of why I ignore it since its too volatile a facet. If you want to go mass muta, you don't make corruptors, and your game plan is to win via attrition. Brood lords are a more head on approach, so the two are mutually distinct imo so I'm not sure what to say about that.
@kawaiirice: Yes, its an interesting contrast to the usual corner of shame ultras find themselves in. Imo this has to do with the unit compositions used against terran and how ultras and broods are suddenly on even footing, since corruptors are created in this matchup more or less for the sole purpose of morphing broodlords, so the separate costs are no longer staggered. Also reactored vikings are much most cost efficient counters, but that deviates from the zerg macro part.
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reactor vikings are extremely cost inefficient vs zergs in high counts of brood lord and when you overproduce vikings zerg can overrun you with an ultra switch due to lack of army supply or just kill them all off with infinite fungal / transfuse
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from what I've seen from how protosses cope with my brood lord army is from least to most effective: attempted phoenix/voidray switch < archon toilet < blink stalker archon. Seeing as these are the most likely base compositions you'll see as a zerg when you go for the classic 'ultra switch' their utility isn't as much as staying with brood lords; it can simply throw off the opponent
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On December 30 2011 08:02 KawaiiRice wrote:
reactor vikings are extremely cost inefficient vs zergs in high counts of brood lord and when you overproduce vikings zerg can overrun you with an ultra switch due to lack of army supply or just kill them all off with infinite fungal / transfuse
These overlapping considerations are sort of why I choose to ignore all but the zerg's point of view. You would be able to comment on this better, but imo the overall game plan is made roughly in isolation, with deviations appearing as required (reactionary play); my concern is more with the plan in isolation, ignoring possible deviations.
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On December 30 2011 07:55 chestnutcc wrote:
@chocobo: Usually, future payments are discounted downwards, not upwards, so the sum is cheaper, not more.
@bigj: I ignore the direct utility of broodlords in my post. I'm interested in why they perform better than ultras in the macro scenario.
@felnarion: True, but your scenario assumes that the toss does nothing about the harass so you're inflating the opportunity cost. This is sort of why I ignore it since its too volatile a facet. If you want to go mass muta, you don't make corruptors, and your game plan is to win via attrition. Brood lords are a more head on approach, so the two are mutually distinct imo so I'm not sure what to say about that.
@kawaiirice: Yes, its an interesting contrast to the usual corner of shame ultras find themselves in. Imo this has to do with the unit compositions used against terran and how ultras and broods are suddenly on even footing, since corruptors are created in this matchup more or less for the sole purpose of morphing broodlords, so the separate costs are no longer staggered. Also reactored vikings are much most cost efficient counters, but that deviates from the zerg macro part.
Hm, so you mean wether i go for ultras are broods if i have no direct use or some sort of "counter"-argument?
Well then I guess my answer would be neither of them, due to broods not being mobile enough to be versatile and ultras being not supplyefficient so i dont want to sit on a bunch of them and wait for my opponent to max on supplyefficient units and then lose in one big engagement.
Though if i have enough support units (very likely) to hold most harras scenarios i would definatly try to get a huge corruptor/broodlord army with infestor support as i think that if you control (unrealisticly high
amounts of) them well they should not lose to anything but a superspecific hardcounter composition anymore in a direct engagement.
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On December 30 2011 05:55 chestnutcc wrote:
This is made worse by the ultras role as a huge tank and damage dealer, so they will inevitably be the first things to die, and tanks are pointless without something to tank for.
One could argue that broodlords also add tanking, in the form of broodlings. Those pesky little buggers seem to be bullet magnets, absorbing a lot of damage. And they're free.
Related question: Will the ultras' burrow charge make them more viable, due to increased life expectancy?
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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
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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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broods 8 supply
roaches 3 supply plox
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I've always thought blinking beneath with groups stalkers and focus firing was the best way to kill broodlords.Storms and Archons also do amazing damage vs clumps of anything. Colossus and Zealots deals with everything else on the ground. As a Terran player, i feel most of the dps broodlords does, comes from the broodings so getting good armour would help against this.
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On December 30 2011 06:34 Chocobo wrote:
Broodlords cost a lot, especially considering that you're taking a serious risk to attempt to tech to them.
I think hive tech upgrade and time should absolutely count, because it's very rare that you'll upgrade to hive for a reason other than broodlords. Starting with lair tech already, it costs 200/150 (100 sec) for Hive, 100/150 (100 sec) for G.Spire (and add on another 200/200 if you didn't already have a spire, sometimes the case vs protoss). Then 150/100 (40) for a corruptor and 150/150 (34) to morph to BL.
Grand total investment, from the time you decided "I think I'll try getting some broodlords": 600 minerals, 550 gas, and 4 minutes 34 seconds.
I don't agree with this at all. Brood lord build time and tech cost is pretty cheap compared to other races T3 air. Take the battlecruiser for instance. It is more expensive (400/300) and takes longer (90s). Add to that the Fusion core (150/150) and weapon refit (150/150). Not to mention that you need at least 2 starports (300/200) to produce them at a decent clip with the long build time.
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Russian Federation164 Posts
Uhhhh, I think most of you completely missed ideas OP came up with.
Future/Present Value are economical terms, etc. Whatever.
If I get it right:
BL DON'T cost 350/200, since you kinda invest 150/100 into Corruptor, and then morph BL whenever you think it's necessary. Later on in the game you have a much higher income, so casrificing 150/100 @15 minute mark is MUCH more expensive than doing so @25. Which means BL probably cost 150/100 + I2/I1* (150/150), where I1 = income rate @ when you morphed corr, I2 = income rate, when you morphed BL. Don't want to theorycraft, but I2 might be 1.5x or even 2x+ bigger then I1, which means the discounted cost of BL is probably closer to 225/175!
Now compare that to toss: you get Collosus tech, and start producing them paying 300/200 for each, which means you have to delay other tech/upgrades/army for awhile. If I had an option to produce 'Lossus', which cost 150/100, instead getting more bases/army/uprgrades RIGHT NOW, and only then upgrade them into Collosus whenever I deside, I'd totally use that opportunity. Don't get me wrong, that's not whining)))
It's just that due to the Zerg mechanics you can't estimate cost of buildings/units in FIXED terms. 'Real' cost doesn't matter that much for zerg, it's about opportunity cost (i.e. what should I sacrifice to do ABC right now). What's the cost of 7 roaches? Well it's cost of 7 not-freaking-mining drones, not the 7*75/25 lol. BL/Corruptors don't pop up when you starve for drones, so it's harded to explain, but hope I expressed my thoughts clearly.
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i think the much bigger advantage of zerg is that they can tech switch so fast...
they get mass roaches into mass mutas and keep the protoss busy (im protoss... so only talking about pvz) while teching to broodlords. if the protoss gets surprised by them the game ends right here. ^^
if he reacts correctly (whatever way) zerg has so many possibilities. most of the time they float in resources and bases. so then they might tech switch into ultra/zergling/infestor..... into roach/hydra and then mutas again :<
i won so many games against zerg because he was on mutas all game long and tried to enforce it. you just mass blinkstalker/HTs and mass cannons... if he just had switched to ultra/zergling/infestors i would have lost my whole army.
ok, that was kinda off topic. but my point is: i dont think its the cost why zerg go broodlords. its rather that if they get into play too surprisingly they are incredibly hard to counter (as they are as it is if they are supported from ground units). ultras on the other hand: the counter for them is already in the field (for protoss) and the infrastructure is well established: robo, ground upgrades, mass gates. DT/zealot to tank and immortals do an ridiculous amount of dmg on them.
killing a decent broodlord army (10+) without air is almost impossible if the zerg is no moron :<
ok, im not sure if this was an answer to the posed questions ^^ at least its my opinion on broodlords.
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elefes: Yes, topics have been a little divergent, lol. Roaches actually would cost more drones, taking into account their supply cost (assuming sufficient larvae production). But we must look at the marginal utility of an additional drone in this case, so 7 roaches at the 5 min mark hurt a lot more than 7 roaches at the 25 min mark. This is another reason I don't consider opportunity costs of broodlords, at least in the drone sense, since they come at a point in the game when this marginal utility is low. Perhaps this is why drops work so well against a brood lord heavy army, by hurting their macro and cutting the drone count, you raise the marginal utility of the next drone, which raises the cost of any non drone unit they choose to morph at that point. In this sense, drops help to combat the cost effectiveness of broodlords.
Feos: I wasn't specifically talking about the tech switching aspect, this is dependent on your scouting abilities. Though it would be interesting whether such constant tech switches would be cost effective for a zerg. For example in the famous Huk vs Aria game, aria tech switches several times, but burns out eventually.
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Against Protoss, Ultralisks have a hard counter (Immortals) and an extremely easily-accessible soft-counter. (Zealots) On the other hand, Broodlords have no hard-counter and the soft-counter is extremely difficult to access. (Mothership)
Void rays do not work at all against a Zerg that also has Infestors on the field. Even if you have like 12 VRs it only takes 2-3 fungals to root all of them in place while spammed Terrans kill them all.
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On December 30 2011 16:19 Elefes wrote:
Uhhhh, I think most of you completely missed ideas OP came up with.
Future/Present Value are economical terms, etc. Whatever.
If I get it right:
BL DON'T cost 350/200, since you kinda invest 150/100 into Corruptor, and then morph BL whenever you think it's necessary. Later on in the game you have a much higher income, so casrificing 150/100 @15 minute mark is MUCH more expensive than doing so @25. Which means BL probably cost 150/100 + I2/I1* (150/150), where I1 = income rate @ when you morphed corr, I2 = income rate, when you morphed BL. Don't want to theorycraft, but I2 might be 1.5x or even 2x+ bigger then I1, which means the discounted cost of BL is probably closer to 225/175!
Now compare that to toss: you get Collosus tech, and start producing them paying 300/200 for each, which means you have to delay other tech/upgrades/army for awhile. If I had an option to produce 'Lossus', which cost 150/100, instead getting more bases/army/uprgrades RIGHT NOW, and only then upgrade them into Collosus whenever I deside, I'd totally use that opportunity. Don't get me wrong, that's not whining)))
It's just that due to the Zerg mechanics you can't estimate cost of buildings/units in FIXED terms. 'Real' cost doesn't matter that much for zerg, it's about opportunity cost (i.e. what should I sacrifice to do ABC right now). What's the cost of 7 roaches? Well it's cost of 7 not-freaking-mining drones, not the 7*75/25 lol. BL/Corruptors don't pop up when you starve for drones, so it's harded to explain, but hope I expressed my thoughts clearly.
What if your "Lossus" was a HT without storm? What if two HT (Without storm) could be morphed into a colossus? Would you consider that to be a good opportunity? To have access to a virtually useless unit while the Robotics bay finishes building? Yeah, it could be nice to pick sentries or banshees, and it has some purposes, but for the most part, if you build it and they come for you with an army, you're going to get rolled. Realistically, you would just make the "Lossus" (HT) and right when it finishes, immediately begin building the brood lord, this delays the cost only very slightly.
Zergs almost never split the cost of brood lords, the exception is occasionally when against Protoss. Some zergs get corrupters to deal with colossus, in which point I can see this argument having a -degree- or relevance.
On the other hand, versus Terran or another Zerg, corrupters have no usefulness before brood lords come out, essentially ever. The game in both those instances moves along with ground vs ground, or mutalisks, and then a time comes when broodlords could be really beneficial, at which point you make a corrupter and immediately morph it into a brood lord, where the split cost is almost non-existent.
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Brood lord is generally better than ultra because brood lords can break down the front door of the opponent. Ultras are awful unless it's in the open.
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This is a really silly argument. The cost is almost entirely irrelevant here - broodlords could cost 50% more than ultralisks and they would still see more play in ZvP. A really simple question to ask any zerg is - would you prefer 6 broodlords or 12 ultras (both with infestors) against a decent deathball?
The answer should always be broodlords, simply because ultralisks can be ridiculously hard countered. Ultralisks have their uses (esp. thanks to the ease of tech - spire > greater spire is a huge investment) but broodlords are a far more stable unit when paired with infestors.
You'll never wish you didn't have broodlords, no matter the composition. Ultralisk/roach/infestor against 5 (+3) immortals and some buffer units? Those fat bastards would have been better off as zerglings.
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Well if lobber's build continues to work as well as it has, I may never have to see a BL again 
But in all seriousness, I don't think you can consider the present value of the money you invest into the corrupters simply because the corrupters have utility before they are morphed. You can use them for scouting, corruption spell, and attacking air units + colossus. The only time I would consider them to have no utility until they are morphed is if the zerg made a bunch of corrupters after spire, and then let them sit in the corner of the map until greater spire..
I think it is important to not over-make them.
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To answer your really winded question on how to stop broodlords, most effective thing is archon toilet... When that isn't a time option, second best thing to do is go for some sort of base race, hide a probe and make like 5 stargates and just mass voidrays... Try and keep your supply alive, if must be suicide stalkers to make it possible. Mass voidray actually works quite well against corruptor broodlord.
Well the first thing is the broodlord actual cost..
We have a corruptor, 150 100. Which is 2 food of wasted gas and minerals. (assuming no air)
Then we have a greater spire. We won't add this into the cost.
We morph the broodlord which is another 150/150. Basically that means that zerg has to run around with a 1/3rd smaller army just to get broodlords out. Most zergs lost the game right before broods hit because of this.
so overall the cost for broodlords are very cheap, but the time it takes to make them destroy most zergs.
Ultralisk are just terrible units, they don't do anything special that is helpful lategame zvx, and they aren't maneuverable. Every situation a ultralisk is used, broodlords are better.
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On December 30 2011 20:12 Xequecal wrote:
Void rays do not work at all against a Zerg that also has Infestors on the field. Even if you have like 12 VRs it only takes 2-3 fungals to root all of them in place while spammed Terrans kill them all.
This would require a spread of the VRs, the same way you can spread broodlords vs the vortex. But that is pretty difficult whenever you change your position, because both units are very slow. At the engagement you still have to micro your voids to focusfire the broods and a group of spammed ITs and maybe some corrupters will get some kills. I guess you are lucky if you trade a void for a broodlord.
edit: That's my (personal) answer to the OPs question, to trade one void for one broodlord. If this is possible depends on the pace of the game.
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Broodlords are so effective because of their supply / cost ratio imo. Zerg lategame is often troubled by supply because they have such high population into economy already. Zerg usually needs to be up in drones compared to the opponent AND they need roughly 4-5 queens in the lategame, which usually means they have 15-20 supply less for army.
Broodlords being the most supply effective unit in the game really helps them to even this out.
As for countering it with protoss it really depends. Blink with some micro works really well if zerg doesn't have a good supporting army (not enough units and especially no infestors), this typically happens if zerg tried to rush to broodlords.
If zerg does have an supporting army you want to attack the broodlords by air, voidrays are quite ok but won't cut it anymore if zerg gets to really high corruptor / infestor counts, at that point you want a mothership preferrably with archons ofcourse.
Some people suggest a few carriers are good too because of their long range, this way you can attack broodlords and force the corruptors in a bad position.
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On December 30 2011 06:56 FeyFey wrote:
broodies are nice in mirror as well. The hate comes from one unit needing micro, the other simply being a click. Though broodies allow micro, but still you see 10 broodlords die to a vortex, which should basically be something to never happen in a game.
But the true cost is what they cost, the morphing cost nothing else. You could have used corruptors to prevent drops or get air dominance, so in some situation they payed for themself already, where you can't incorporate the corrupter cost for the broodlord.
Calculating the teching cost to something isn't helpful. You should have a plan on how to get your high tech out, not just tech up and pray it works.
For example, teching up to mutas and use them for harassment, and try to save as much minerals as possible till you reach t3, meanwhile you get the ground attack/armor upgrades. Then you add adrenal glands on t3 and use your overmins and lings to tech up to broodlords.
The only interesting part should be how much extractors do you need to effectively use the tech. Because every fight messes up any timing calculation.
For example ultra compositions are low gas, using 6 extractors for them is almost over the limit you should use. Unless you still need upgrades or want to do a high gas unit switch.
PS: always fun to see zerg players die because they think they can win with only t3 units. And then you see 16 broodlords flying around or 12 ultras walking in a line and complain about their bank running dry so fast.
You need 6gas to afford broodlord/infestors and air upgrades 
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Jehct: You implicitly factor its cost effectiveness in your statement when you say its a far more stable unit. How do you define stable? In my view, its stable because you can lose ten of them and not be affected in the remax, whereas losing ten ultralisks sets you back quite a bit. This despite the broodlord being costlier than the ultra on paper. My contention is that this cost effectiveness of the brood lord lies in the manner in which you acquire it. Brood lords are ridiculously hard countered by void rays and many units, it just doesn't work out cost effectively for the opponent. Your assertion is that brood lords are just better, my question is why and my answer is that it lies in the cost structure. I've mentioned several times that I'm ignoring the direct utility of the unit.
[AG]AggressionGaming: I wasn't asking how one stops broodlords, its a [D] thread not a [H]. A simple search reveals many text book answers. I was interested in opinions as to which one would offset the cost effectiveness of brood lords the most i.e. how do I counter brood lords while keeping an even footing on the macro front. Making 5 stargates to mass void rays against a race which can tech switch in the blink of an eye seems unwise. Your assertion that corruptors are useless isn't quite correct, they certainly see a lot of use in PvZ, but you may be correct in TvZ (this has been mentioned several times before). Ultras see a lot of use in TvZ too.
Revelatus: You make a good point, but wouldn't that make the eventual brood lord cheaper since the corruptor has paid a bit off a bit of it's cost? Overmaking them would nullify this, and you would rather have something else.
Felnarion: Exactly, this is imo the reason for the different unit choices in TvZ as opposed to PvZ, since broodlords are actually more expensive than ultras in this case.
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I don't think anyone would deny that there are cases where corruptors are useful, and therefore having them before they are able to be morphed into brood lords is useful, therefore the overall cost (above and beyond resource cost) is less. But there's still a cost to having them, even in those cases.
But the fact that you're ignoring the effecitveness of the unit in-game, the "direct utility" shows that this is a pointless exercise. The reasons zerg don't make ultras has nothing to do with up-front of deferred cost except partially in ZvP. The reason zerg don't make ultras is because they do not scale at all. I don't mean to say they don't scale well, i mean, they don't scale at all. 20 brood lords create a never-ending stream of broodlings that traps and pushes back the army as it kills them. 20 ultras act confused and block not only each other, but other units as well, while they fail to attack, or tank, or do anything effectively.
Too often does a zerg watch his ultras flail about on a ramp as a Terran holds it, easily, losing almost nothing. In the same instance, even 5 brood lords would slowly eat the marines, marauders, away, and draw their fire, as your roaches and lings tear down the production structures that make up their wall.
In fact, in that case, the zerg makes brood lords IN SPITE of the additional cost. Brood lords take longer to make, are more gas heavy, require an additional step in the build process, a step which is totally useless in that situation, and brood lords are a slower unit, leaving the base significantly more vulnerable. Further, if a drop or push kills the greater spire, no air units of ANY kind can be built for 100 in-game seconds and 200 gas, and then another 100 in-game seconds and 150 more gas before brood lords become available again. Attention is a resource in SC2, and the brood lord/corrupter must be "touched" twice in order to get your unit. It's entirely possible and common to forget to morph your brood lords, only to have them not ready as the protoss or terran pushes to your base. While this is the case for any unit, it's easy to forget to build something, there are two instances for brood lords, one for other units.
In contrast, an ultra pops faster, does not require an additional step of a useless unit in a matchup and therefore additional attention after production, costs less in minerals/gas, and the tech structure builds in 1/3 the time at significantly less cost. In fact, you can get Chitinous plating AND the ultra cavern with fewer resources and less time than a greater spire.
But zerg players consistently choose brood lord, why? Because it's significantly better in most cases and this HAS to be taken into account in any serious discussion about the units.
That said, I believe I've revealed how you handle brood lords in an even game. Snipe the spire. If you do, Zergs will almost universally transition into ultras, because their first ultras will pop out, literally, about the same time the regular spire will finish. Chitinous plating, if they choose to get it, will finish approximately half a minute before the greater spire will be done, at which point you have multiple ultras, on the field, doing their work, in a significantly shorter time.
If there's any benefit to the cost effectiveness of the brood lord in its ability to have the cost spread out, it is completely countered by the vulnurability of the tech.
EDIT: I'd like to add, if I could, that the Brood Lord tech tree also appears to be the longest one of any unit in the game, requiring:
Hatch > Spawning Pool > Lair > Spire/Infestation Pit > Hive > Greater Spire
As opposed to Carriers or Battlecruisers
Nexus > Gateway > Cybernetics Core > Stargate > Fleet Beacon
CC > Barracks > Factory > Starport/Tech Lab (Switchable) > Fusion Core
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There's some confusion here. Paying part of the cost at 15 minutes and then the rest at 20 minutes is WORSE than paying the full cost at 20 minutes. If broodlords are "cheaper" than their cost indicates, it's not because of anything about delayed payment but because you subtract from its cost (which again, if anything, is greater than its nominal total cost) the value of having a corruptor for the intermediate time.
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I think the cost would scale differently if you factor in Ultra drops in the main or Nydus Ultras so they don't stack. I think Ultras haven't seen full use yet really. If you've ever watch LiquidTLO used Ultras they can be very efficient, especially with Nydus play and Infestor fungals to prevent retreat.
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^ And mech against protoss hasn't seen full use either, right?
Ultralisks probably reached their peak a few months ago, back when Idra said "I always go ultralisks against protoss, they are way better than broodlords". Although this was back when infestors were useless, so Zerg didn't really have any good t3 yet ;/
Protoss can too easily dump into zealots which tear through ultralisks, and are great against banelings when gas becomes an extremely precious resource and being mineral inefficient isn't an issue, especially for protoss. Not to mention immortals and voids can be cranked out quite quickly. Ultras are too hard to be offensive with against wall-ins too (a single immortal on a ramp wrecks ultras) and turtles and cannons.
I think overlord drop is way better than nydus. I think nydus has been a huge failure, although non-zergs insist on how great they are, they cost way too much and overlord drop is much better. They have a spot for some neat all-ins, but I don't think they are that viable in general play (read: not cute or all-in play, or being a pro player vs ladder).
Ultra/Infestor/baneling is definitely the 'strongest' army composition for Zerg, but it's too cost inefficient, can't siege as well as broodlords, and gets countered too easily. Not to mention problems getting into the actual engagement.
As for the OP - I think the best thing for Protoss to do is try to stay on somewhat even bases with Zerg, mass cannons at expos 5+, and beat BL based compositions with tons of void rays and mass gateway stalkers. BL/Infestor sucks ass when it's 8 base zerg vs 6 or 7 base protoss, but when toss is only on 4 bases vs 8 base zerg, yea, you are going to lose... just like you should.
I don't really think archon toilet is a viable counter - yes, broodlords are too slow to dodge vortex which is ridiculously large (if you say dodge, I'll say lol dodge EMP pre-nerf by moving you HT bro), but Zerg should be extremely cautious against motherships and be able to FG/NP to keep it away from the broodlords and then rush a bunch of corruptors to snipe it (or spam IT's around the vortex).
Keep getting bases, stay in the macro game. 99% of the time, it's not BLs you are losing to, it's the fact you are only on 4 bases against a zerg who has 6 bases.
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On December 30 2011 22:34 IMPrime wrote:
Brood lord is generally better than ultra because brood lords can break down the front door of the opponent. Ultras are awful unless it's in the open.
Utralisks are pretty good in ZvT. Ultralisk/Bane/3 infestors is pretty much unstoppable, unless he goes banshee.
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On December 31 2011 04:41 Belial88 wrote:
^ And mech against protoss hasn't seen full use either, right?
Ultralisks probably reached their peak a few months ago, back when Idra said "I always go ultralisks against protoss, they are way better than broodlords". Although this was back when infestors were useless, so Zerg didn't really have any good t3 yet ;/
Protoss can too easily dump into zealots which tear through ultralisks, and are great against banelings when gas becomes an extremely precious resource and being mineral inefficient isn't an issue, especially for protoss. Not to mention immortals and voids can be cranked out quite quickly. Ultras are too hard to be offensive with against wall-ins too (a single immortal on a ramp wrecks ultras) and turtles and cannons.
I think overlord drop is way better than nydus. I think nydus has been a huge failure, although non-zergs insist on how great they are, they cost way too much and overlord drop is much better. They have a spot for some neat all-ins, but I don't think they are that viable in general play (read: not cute or all-in play, or being a pro player vs ladder).
Ultra/Infestor/baneling is definitely the 'strongest' army composition for Zerg, but it's too cost inefficient, can't siege as well as broodlords, and gets countered too easily. Not to mention problems getting into the actual engagement.
As for the OP - I think the best thing for Protoss to do is try to stay on somewhat even bases with Zerg, mass cannons at expos 5+, and beat BL based compositions with tons of void rays and mass gateway stalkers. BL/Infestor sucks ass when it's 8 base zerg vs 6 or 7 base protoss, but when toss is only on 4 bases vs 8 base zerg, yea, you are going to lose... just like you should.
I don't really think archon toilet is a viable counter - yes, broodlords are too slow to dodge vortex which is ridiculously large (if you say dodge, I'll say lol dodge EMP pre-nerf by moving you HT bro), but Zerg should be extremely cautious against motherships and be able to FG/NP to keep it away from the broodlords and then rush a bunch of corruptors to snipe it (or spam IT's around the vortex).
Keep getting bases, stay in the macro game. 99% of the time, it's not BLs you are losing to, it's the fact you are only on 4 bases against a zerg who has 6 bases.
That assumes Protoss should be able to keep up with Zerg's bases, when that's clearly not the case. There are some split map situations where that happens but realistically if the game's even, Zerg should have the whole map when Protoss is on 4 bases.
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On December 30 2011 20:12 Xequecal wrote:
Against Protoss, Ultralisks have a hard counter (Immortals) and an extremely easily-accessible soft-counter. (Zealots) On the other hand, Broodlords have no hard-counter and the soft-counter is extremely difficult to access. (Mothership)
Void rays do not work at all against a Zerg that also has Infestors on the field. Even if you have like 12 VRs it only takes 2-3 fungals to root all of them in place while spammed Terrans kill them all.
Thats not really a good argument because i can counter your zealot/immortal easily with lings then you can counter them easily with colossi and in the end we reach a point at which we will see that every unit is easy to counter without support and hard to counter with support...
And just to be clear. void rays are good against broodlords but as always infestor+combat unit is a very versatile combo and therefore works against most things to a certain degree.
On topic: if you're just looking for ways to measure broodliords then you are fighting a lost war. a marine costs 50mins and 2zerglings cost 50mins. but with all the implied costs (raxes,techlab,reactor, shield,stim) and all the other factors that effect unit costs (build time, larva mechanic, unit behavior in certain amounts...) it is impossible to really compare them.
Broodlords without mutas first cost more than broodlords as follow up to a muta strat because you have to calculate the whole spire into their costs. the same for the hivetech and the infestation pit.
You can argue that they cost less supply because they cost more gas then they should...
You can argue that they are more expensive than if they wete produced by terran, due to larva mechanic... cost is always a comparison and it makes little sense to compare BLs to other things if we dont even know how to exactly measure these other things/they have to be measured differently in different situations.
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On December 31 2011 05:02 K3Nyy wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 04:41 Belial88 wrote:
^ And mech against protoss hasn't seen full use either, right?
Ultralisks probably reached their peak a few months ago, back when Idra said "I always go ultralisks against protoss, they are way better than broodlords". Although this was back when infestors were useless, so Zerg didn't really have any good t3 yet ;/
Protoss can too easily dump into zealots which tear through ultralisks, and are great against banelings when gas becomes an extremely precious resource and being mineral inefficient isn't an issue, especially for protoss. Not to mention immortals and voids can be cranked out quite quickly. Ultras are too hard to be offensive with against wall-ins too (a single immortal on a ramp wrecks ultras) and turtles and cannons.
I think overlord drop is way better than nydus. I think nydus has been a huge failure, although non-zergs insist on how great they are, they cost way too much and overlord drop is much better. They have a spot for some neat all-ins, but I don't think they are that viable in general play (read: not cute or all-in play, or being a pro player vs ladder).
Ultra/Infestor/baneling is definitely the 'strongest' army composition for Zerg, but it's too cost inefficient, can't siege as well as broodlords, and gets countered too easily. Not to mention problems getting into the actual engagement.
As for the OP - I think the best thing for Protoss to do is try to stay on somewhat even bases with Zerg, mass cannons at expos 5+, and beat BL based compositions with tons of void rays and mass gateway stalkers. BL/Infestor sucks ass when it's 8 base zerg vs 6 or 7 base protoss, but when toss is only on 4 bases vs 8 base zerg, yea, you are going to lose... just like you should.
I don't really think archon toilet is a viable counter - yes, broodlords are too slow to dodge vortex which is ridiculously large (if you say dodge, I'll say lol dodge EMP pre-nerf by moving you HT bro), but Zerg should be extremely cautious against motherships and be able to FG/NP to keep it away from the broodlords and then rush a bunch of corruptors to snipe it (or spam IT's around the vortex).
Keep getting bases, stay in the macro game. 99% of the time, it's not BLs you are losing to, it's the fact you are only on 4 bases against a zerg who has 6 bases. That assumes Protoss should be able to keep up with Zerg's bases, when that's clearly not the case. There are some split map situations where that happens but realistically if the game's even, Zerg should have the whole map when Protoss is on 4 bases.
Over half of the maps in any mappool dont allow zerg to take more than one half of the map. also it depends vastly on playstyles/compositions. Apart from terminus, calm and TDA i cant think of any maps that zerg really has the potential to take a lot of extra bases (after getting an advantage). Partly crevasse and even there splitmap is quite possible.
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Utralisks are pretty good in ZvT. Ultralisk/Bane/3 infestors is pretty much unstoppable, unless he goes banshee.
Siege tanks. And when Terran doesn't have siege tanks, he's lost the game. So Ultra/Bane/Infestor doesn't really help in lategame high level ZvT, because they are completely countered by something that defines the state of the game. It's like telling zerg to mass hydras in ZvP - it doesn't work because of colossi, and once all the colossi are gone, it works sure, but by then the game is already won.
They are terribly cost inefficient, and aren't good siege units at all.
Ultra/bane/infestor is indeed extremely fucking good as a comp, but it's not cost efficient, and doesn't do anything to break turtling terrans, usually ones who split a portion of the map, meaning you can't do shit to deny their further bases, which means the comp doesn't achieve anything for you.
They can be good if your mutas or BL clean up the siege tanks, but by then, you've won, and just pure crackling or baneling would do the job better.
That assumes Protoss should be able to keep up with Zerg's bases, when that's clearly not the case. There are some split map situations where that happens but realistically if the game's even, Zerg should have the whole map when Protoss is on 4 bases.
Unless Zerg goes mutas (which, granted, is most of the time) or plays a mobile style like mutas or mass lings, Protoss should be only behind zerg by a base or two. If Zerg is comfortably on hive tech with an infestor group, no way a protoss with a 3+ base deficit will win.
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On December 31 2011 05:23 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On December 31 2011 05:02 K3Nyy wrote:On December 31 2011 04:41 Belial88 wrote:
^ And mech against protoss hasn't seen full use either, right?
Ultralisks probably reached their peak a few months ago, back when Idra said "I always go ultralisks against protoss, they are way better than broodlords". Although this was back when infestors were useless, so Zerg didn't really have any good t3 yet ;/
Protoss can too easily dump into zealots which tear through ultralisks, and are great against banelings when gas becomes an extremely precious resource and being mineral inefficient isn't an issue, especially for protoss. Not to mention immortals and voids can be cranked out quite quickly. Ultras are too hard to be offensive with against wall-ins too (a single immortal on a ramp wrecks ultras) and turtles and cannons.
I think overlord drop is way better than nydus. I think nydus has been a huge failure, although non-zergs insist on how great they are, they cost way too much and overlord drop is much better. They have a spot for some neat all-ins, but I don't think they are that viable in general play (read: not cute or all-in play, or being a pro player vs ladder).
Ultra/Infestor/baneling is definitely the 'strongest' army composition for Zerg, but it's too cost inefficient, can't siege as well as broodlords, and gets countered too easily. Not to mention problems getting into the actual engagement.
As for the OP - I think the best thing for Protoss to do is try to stay on somewhat even bases with Zerg, mass cannons at expos 5+, and beat BL based compositions with tons of void rays and mass gateway stalkers. BL/Infestor sucks ass when it's 8 base zerg vs 6 or 7 base protoss, but when toss is only on 4 bases vs 8 base zerg, yea, you are going to lose... just like you should.
I don't really think archon toilet is a viable counter - yes, broodlords are too slow to dodge vortex which is ridiculously large (if you say dodge, I'll say lol dodge EMP pre-nerf by moving you HT bro), but Zerg should be extremely cautious against motherships and be able to FG/NP to keep it away from the broodlords and then rush a bunch of corruptors to snipe it (or spam IT's around the vortex).
Keep getting bases, stay in the macro game. 99% of the time, it's not BLs you are losing to, it's the fact you are only on 4 bases against a zerg who has 6 bases. That assumes Protoss should be able to keep up with Zerg's bases, when that's clearly not the case. There are some split map situations where that happens but realistically if the game's even, Zerg should have the whole map when Protoss is on 4 bases. Over half of the maps in any mappool dont allow zerg to take more than one half of the map. also it depends vastly on playstyles/compositions. Apart from terminus, calm and TDA i cant think of any maps that zerg really has the potential to take a lot of extra bases (after getting an advantage). Partly crevasse and even there splitmap is quite possible.
I didn't mean Zerg takes Protoss' side of the map, bad choice of words sorry. But it's common to see Zerg lategame taking all their bases on their side and constantly having 3 base+ mineral income and 5 base gas income. That's not exactly "outmacroing" it's actually normal.
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EPT
