|
The title is pretty descriptive of my problem: I can't win TvZ at all. For some reason, despite the fact that my games don't even get to hive generally, post 1.4.3 my winrate in TvZ has plummeted. In a hilarious irony, it's also the matchup I get most frequently by a large margin in low masters.
Stats:
In my last 25 ladder games:
TvZ: 5-10
TvT: 2-4
TvP: 2-2
The wins have generally been either extremely sloppy by me with huge mistakes from my opponents, or earlier on when terran is stronger. Here are five replays with analysis:
+ Show Spoiler [Game 1] +http://drop.sc/119495Antiga Shipyard Macro slipped a bit after first push, and I was down 30 supply. I was aware that I was behind in army, so I decided to wait until I had a good enough army to attempt more aggression. Used a double drop as cover for my push, went really well and traded extremely well with his army in the middle of the map. After this I am up in army supply. Killed his fourth. Macroing poorly while the push happened, probably would have crushed if I had macroed correctly. Threw away units on a drop that probably wasn't going to work. Engage went as well as it was going to go at that point, was hugely behind after it got crushed.
+ Show Spoiler [Game 2] +http://drop.sc/119494Metal This game was actually a win, more to prove the point of how badly I play even when I win. Went for a marauder/hellion aggression off of a reactor hellion expand this game; I do this build on this map because it is effective due to how wide the natural is. However, my push is killed before it even starts when zerg takes his lings and kills the marauders I'm keeping behind. Macro poorly behind push (again lol) Zerg is on 23 drones at the 10 minute mark Scan third, find out he's probably allining, play defensively. Zerg attempts to allin through my third, but his engagement was terrible and I was able to hold it off easily and counterattack and kill his third. He never retakes third, therefore doesn't have money to tech, therefore pretty easy win from here. I played like shit though, macroed poorly behind the push, didn't clear south watchtower which let him kill my marauder/hellion push, etc.
+ Show Spoiler [Game 3] +http://drop.sc/119493Entombed Build executed shitly, he does a roach/ling/baneling allin that I don't pull SCVs for early enough, plus the fact that I didn't have as much as I was supposed to have with as many upgrades, makes this a loss I should have avoided.
+ Show Spoiler [Game 4] +http://drop.sc/119492Shattered This game was really frustrating. My marauder/hellion aggression did a lot of indirect damage by forcing a ton of lings and killing most of them, and I followed up with a pretty strong push, but he attacked my wall which was ineffective for a while but finally broke through and forced me to retreat. Was really lost at that point.
+ Show Spoiler [Game 5] +http://drop.sc/119491Cloud Kingdom Ahead after the first marine pressure, then suddenly I fall behind 20 workers and ~10-15 supply. During push I macroed terribly, and didn't know what to do with my army once I set up at his ramp. He used this time created by my indecision to be able to make more units which killed the push. Fortunately I had a good enough defensive position that his counter didn't do anything. He catches me out of position on a later push when I see him leave and that's gg.
I don't feel like anything I do in the matchup is correct, and I don't know what to try and improve. Please help if possible!
|
Watched the first game.
I think your first push wasnt executed very well. You went to the zerg saw 2 spines sat there until he just crushed you cuz he had all the time in the world to mass up on banes/lings/mutas. Basically he made a pretty huge mistake by not scouting your push / not making banes before it arrived at his base.
Also as you might have noticed marine splitting could have been better, you also sent ~10 marines so far to the north that they didnt even fight. But i guess you generally just gave him too much time.
Question yourself what you wanna do with that push.You wanna do dmg, right ? So walk to his base, maybe push with a few tanks and not only marines( you knew he had spines).
Imo you just do it cuz you saw it in replays/streams. Imo the point is to pressure him and to prevent him from making drones. BUT you need to be more aggresive, i think. Imo you could have done alot more dmg if you tried to kill the spines, cuz he only had mutas/lings and as we all know m/m is pretty strong against that.
You could have taken down the rocks and try to harass the third. Maybe even just showing up infront to force army instead of drones and backing up would have been a idea.
Later on i think you just fell too much behind in economy. he haad like 70-80 drones you got like 50 scvs.
Last point i must stress is that you didnt scout his tech. Iam not a terran but if you dont scout the tech from the zerg and you have like 2 medivacs - need way more against fungal - and nothing at all, to kill ultras.
"I don't feel like anything I do in the matchup is correct, and I don't know what to try and improve. Please help if possible!"
I think you do pretty well tbh. You pretty much gave yourself the answers already. Macro slipped - True, round 30 workers less so not even mules make up for that. His macro sucked pretty hard too tbh. Also flying a drop over creep and losing 2 medivacs full of marines doesnt help much.
I think your focus - atleast on that map - should be to deny his fourth. Harass the third and just macro up, if you cant kill him with an early push. Keep him at three bases and take a third yourself.
|
On February 26 2012 09:45 aGn wrote:
Watched the first game.
I think your first push wasnt executed very well. You went to the zerg saw 2 spines sat there until he just crushed you cuz he had all the time in the world to mass up on banes/lings/mutas. Basically he made a pretty huge mistake by not scouting your push / not making banes before it arrived at his base.
Also as you might have noticed marine splitting could have been better, you also sent ~10 marines so far to the north that they didnt even fight. But i guess you generally just gave him too much time.
Question yourself what you wanna do with that push.You wanna do dmg, right ? So walk to his base, maybe push with a few tanks and not only marines( you knew he had spines).
Imo you just do it cuz you saw it in replays/streams. Imo the point is to pressure him and to prevent him from making drones. BUT you need to be more aggresive, i think. Imo you could have done alot more dmg if you tried to kill the spines, cuz he only had mutas/lings and as we all know m/m is pretty strong against that.
You could have taken down the rocks and try to harass the third. Maybe even just showing up infront to force army instead of drones and backing up would have been a idea.
Later on i think you just fell too much behind in economy. he haad like 70-80 drones you got like 50 scvs.
Last point i must stress is that you didnt scout his tech. Iam not a terran but if you dont scout the tech from the zerg and you have like 2 medivacs - need way more against fungal - and nothing at all, to kill ultras.
"I don't feel like anything I do in the matchup is correct, and I don't know what to try and improve. Please help if possible!"
I think you do pretty well tbh. You pretty much gave yourself the answers already. Macro slipped - True, round 30 workers less so not even mules make up for that. His macro sucked pretty hard too tbh. Also flying a drop over creep and losing 2 medivacs full of marines doesnt help much.
I think your focus - atleast on that map - should be to deny his fourth. Harass the third and just macro up, if you cant kill him with an early push. Keep him at three bases and take a third yourself.
Thanks for the advice!
I agree that my pushes should be... quicker(is that the term)? Let him make too mayn things.
I've been harassing that third since I read this with the marines, but it doesn't seem to matter when I never win any engagements... and I can't really tell why TT
I don't think I'm doing pretty well tbh, I'm crushing protosses and terrans at my level but I've lost like 7 TvZs in a row and am about 1 for my last ten.
|
hmm well if you keep him at 3 bases and you are on 3 yourself then you should win engagements.
I think the most common mistake terran do against me is relentless pushing and loosing their army again and again.
Also tanks are the most important unit, if you got like 9 tanks its pretty hard for a zerg to engange. Keeping your tank count high is pretty essential. If the zerg attacks focus banes/infestors with your tanks splitt marines and watch his army evaporate.
Most terrans just basecamp for too long or do stupid pushes with like 2 tanks and 15 rines + 2 medivacs at 13-14 mins and thats pretty easy to crush if you scout properly.
Maybe seek some new builds with strong timings just rdm attacking doesnt work vs zerg most of the time. Always considering they know what they do, but generally he will just sit back and mass up ling/bling. Tank Focus fire + splitting properly are essetial vs banes.
Most mportant thing is to scout his late game tech though you must be prepared. He can make like 6 ultras at once and then its too late to switch to marauders. Same goes for broods/vikings.
|
I watched game1:
I don't like your build. first it seemed like a nice 16 marine drop, but it wasn't, instead you did no aggressions at all until you moved out at around ~12:00 with marines + medivacs only, and it's not a good idea to do so if you're not handling your marines like MKP.
In my opinion, to do a similiar build/opening that can work well, you should either do a fast ~16 marine drop, which comes just much earlier if you go factory->reactor->starport instead of factory->reactor>barracks>reactor>starport
or a good tank push around the muta timing, where you have lots of marines with stim or combat shield, 3-4 tanks and no medivacs ( you might wanna try combat shield 1st, if you feel your splitting is horrible, cuz stimmed marines = 35hp die by 1 baneling, and 45/55hp do not, but it's definitely better/stronger if you can split well and hence use stim )
with your build, you should have at least dropped or poked to be efficient, instead you just waited.
but what happens vs zerg when you just wait and don't push/poke at all? he will stop drone production, go into full battle production mode, wait until he has enough stuff to totally crush your army and until upgrades are finished (in this case zerg waited for bane-speed, +1attack +1 armor). and then just a-move you.
this is when you lost the game. and according to day9, this is where you have to fix you mistakes. good luck!
pushing vs zerg, especially when there's such a long rush distance like cross antiga, is a ticking time-bomb,
the only thing you can do when you are taking too long to push/attack is to go back to your base after some time. this can also set you ahead, because Z won't drone up for a long time and will be likely to attack you afterwards, and then you should have a good fight in your base, with tanks in position and wall-off.
|
try this
10 depo
12 rax
13 refinery
15 orbital
16 tech lab
17 refinery and stim
after stim start the next 100 gas for factory
while you build the factory build another barracks
when factory finish build a starcport and reactor on factory
get 2 medivac and drop asap
the whole time you make marines marauder medivac hellion
and when you drop try to snipe buildings
tares zerg and terran
hope this helps
|
I watched game 1.
First thing: I don't agree with that build. I like the hellion opening but I think a faster transition to dropships or tanks would be better. Also, after you saw the push could do no damage you should fall back because the zerg will be pumping out expensive units and all of a sudden have nothing to do with them which gives you and automatic lead especially if you take your third behind it. That's why in progames you see terrans move out with their full armies to the watchtower and the just fall back. It's a simple tactic, extremely effective.
Another thing was the hellions didn't do much damage. If you think about it, the hellions are there to either sac themselves to kill a few drones, deny creep, or delay the third. Obviously if the zerg has flawless mechanics it will be hard to do such a thing, but I feel like the zerg has no business taking a 9 minute third when u have 4 hellions right there.
You should download some recent pro replays of players you like and refine that build. Also, I would recommend getting familiar with 2raxing as it's extremely useful of shakuras and in tournaments. In my opinion, you didn't have a fair shot at winning after the push failed because he was in a completely commanding position. It's important (especially in TvZ) that the first push do some damage because often the outcome of the game relies on that push to an extent.
Good luck! Add me if you need help remaerc.109 I have good zerg friends that you can practice with
|
Alot of points were already touched upon so in an attempt not to be redundant, just a few possible tips:
Early aggression is super tempting such as maurader hellion openings / 3 tank pushes cause sometimes they just work on a super greedy zerg but in general don't work on a safe playing zerg (usually if u see macro hatch that, they can usually just outproduce ling bling off 2 base to stop 3 tank pushes and marauder hellion if pretty stoppable if u see a larger than normal number of queens and a few spines.
|
Thanks to all of you for the tips!
I'm probably going to switch to either a 1 rax fe build I've done in the near past or a reactor hellion double expand. I don't like early aggression in TvZ for the reasons Makura stated, and having three base before zerg is a huge advantage in the matchup in my opinion.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
