Recently I've been facing a lot of ultra play in ZvZ, and we are seeing it recently in the GSL - Freaky did it a lot, but Nestea tried to do it once, and usually we just see the ling/infestor stage (i dont think we've ever seen it get to ultras, but when people are going ling/infestor/spines, they are planning to go ultras if they don't end the game with mass counter-attacks and burrowed infestors).
I just can't really beat this play at all. I have no clue what to do - everyone says "oh just attack they will be weak when getting infestors" but eventually they will have enough spines and infestors, and if they are good, they will have it in time and kill your entire army.
But they get those ultras so damn quickly, because they don't spend any gas on roaches. I don't even think broodlords is an option, because you'll just be torn apart on certain maps by counter-attacks. I imagine broodlords are great on, say, shakuras, but terrible on a map like cloud kingdom or ohana. Maybe the idea is to use nydus/drops, but that is gimmicky.
Anyways here's a replay of me losing to it. The guy actually went 2 base muta and threw down his infestation pit when his spire popped, and went straight into mass spines and into hive, I guess skipping infestors in favor of mutas to force me not to move out.
The game got really, really laggy when he started attacking, that sucked. I don't know if I would have won if it didn't lag, he had a broodlord switch coming right afterwards.
Here's another replay where someone does it to me, except they did it more standard, just ling/infestor on 2 base into third,mass spine/infestor. I totally thought i was 'ready', and put sooo many banes at home for his counterattacks. And he ran right into all 10 banes. And still had enough lings left over to snipe my third. I did a lot of damage to him, but I knew the game was over when I realized I had not killed his third during my attack.
But I had no clue what to do here. I macro/tech up or turtle essentially, and I die to the ultras. I attack, and well, you see what happened when I attacked.
the thing about ling/infestor is you have to turtle on 3 base behind spine while teching to ultras. there's really no way you can get a fourth, unlike the more "standard" roach/infestor/hydra player, which can get a fourth and get ahead on economy. when you're on 4 base like that the best answer to ultras is just standard roach/hydra/infestor with good upgrades. infestors should be fungalling and messing with the ultra AI with infested terrans, while hydras should be dps'ing down the ultras ( they drop incredibly fast vs 2/2 or 3/3 hydra/roach). just take advantage of the fact that ling/infestor has to turtle behind spines until they get ultras (which again means you can take a fourth).
Pretty much what kane said, but also if someone is going straight infestor/ling they will be super vulnerable to Roach/Bane all-ins since you need Roaches to defend unless some terrible micro happens. It's kind of hard to do this reactively tho unless you see super fast 2 gas at the natural, so it's kind of a gamble. I mean, yeah it is possible to defend with ling/bane + MASS spines but that'll cost them a ton of minerals/drones and allow you to take a 3rd and go into the mid game with an advantage.
What Kane said is definitely right, but one thing you should also consider is trying to nydus into the main. While it is a coinflip, its not that huge of an investment when you are on 3+ bases. If you get into the other zergs main (if there is a viable spot) before he has a ton of ultras out, just spread out your +2 roaches and it should basically be an auto-win.
Main thing also when fighting ultras is microing the engagement. As long as you don't clump horrible to get destroyed by fungals, your IT spam plus roach hydra micro should be able to chew thru the stupid ultras quite cost effectively
Once Ultras are out, if you keep up to par with upgrades with roach/infestor you can counter ultra/ling. Place a IT wall with roaches behind that while fungal on the lings if necessary. While doing this you should be able to secure broodlords out and be able to engage if you want to have a front end engagement.
If you want a different scenario, if you are keeping up with the scouting you will see him doing this. You can camp mutas and just base race.
Another scenario is base race with roach/infestor.
So the first game you had 4000 minerals when he attacked. You attacked out in the open where the Ultralisks were able to get good surface area and you didn't spread your roaches out one bit, instead relying on the pitiful number of infested terran eggs you were able to spawn. Yes, the mutalisk player was behind for perhaps a smidge in the midgame because he couldn't just outright take out your third and win in a war of attricion, but keeping scouting out and not having you move out was more than worth it. On top of the fact that you got in the perfect situation for Ultralisks to do damage, it was not much of a great game to show that Ultralisks were good neccesarily.
I don't have time to review the second replay, but I can give a few simple tips against Ultralisks. In ZvT, how the Terran defeats Ultralisks is using marine spreads to minimalise splash damage and chokes. In ZvZ, those chokes can be created by building evochambers ( only 75 minerals + drone ) in combination with Spinecrawlers that are spread out. If you want to tank Ultralisk damage, Hydralisks and Queens are your best bet. Hydralisks are the bane of Ultralisks in ZvZ because of their rapid fire and light categorisation, while Queens just tank a hell of a lot of damage and can transfuse eachother. You need to spread out your units so they don't all get fungalled and get dealt maximum splash damage by the Ultralisk. Single pockets of 3 or so units tend to work best. If you see a roach/Ultralisk composition, make sure to fungal the roaches so that the Ultralisks just can't move in if they were wrongly placed in the army.
I'd love to give a replay, but the last ultralisks I faced were a desperation move back in february or so, and most of my zerg opponents just tend to die around the 3 base economy kicking in.
Pretty much what kane said, but also if someone is going straight infestor/ling they will be super vulnerable to Roach/Bane all-ins since you need Roaches to defend unless some terrible micro happens. It's kind of hard to do this reactively tho unless you see super fast 2 gas at the natural, so it's kind of a gamble. I mean, yeah it is possible to defend with ling/bane + MASS spines but that'll cost them a ton of minerals/drones and allow you to take a 3rd and go into the mid game with an advantage.
There's no way to reactively roach/bane all-in. You can't tell they are going mutas over infestors until wayyyy late. And even doing that, they just defend with spine+ling anyways... I don't think doing a roach/ling all-in (or bane...) is a good idea,it's like saying 6 pool to counter someone going mutas.
Thanks Kane, i'll remember to take a fourth super quick instead of attack when facing ling/infestor. What do you think of the 1st replay though, where he went mutas first and I defended and got my fourth just fine? He had a ton of spines, so I couldn't really attack. I ended up actually attacking him right when his ultras came (he made zero units, he literally went mutas into infestoation pit when spire finished, hive, and massed spines to be safe until ultras popped).
Main thing also when fighting ultras is microing the engagement. As long as you don't clump horrible to get destroyed by fungals, your IT spam plus roach hydra micro should be able to chew thru the stupid ultras quite cost effectively
By the time I have roach/hydra/infestor, he will have ultras out, because they aren't making any roaches or hydras, and relying on mass spines so all that gas is pure tech.
Have you played against this style?
So the first game you had 4000 minerals when he attacked. You attacked out in the open where the Ultralisks were able to get good surface area and you didn't spread your roaches out one bit, instead relying on the pitiful number of infested terran eggs you were able to spawn. Yes, the mutalisk player was behind for perhaps a smidge in the midgame because he couldn't just outright take out your third and win in a war of attricion, but keeping scouting out and not having you move out was more than worth it. On top of the fact that you got in the perfect situation for Ultralisks to do damage, it was not much of a great game to show that Ultralisks were good neccesarily.
I took my gases late because of fighting the mutas, I wanted to drone up more. I guess I'll work more on gas timings vs muta play, I always feel I either am gas starved for taking gases late, or mineral starved because I take gas too quick and not enough drones due to that.
The game really started to bug out when I pushed out, every time we fought I was hitting huge lag spikes where I couldn't do any micro at all (you'll notice my camera is clearly focused over my army, so it's not like I wasn't aware that I should be micro'ing, and it's not like I can't micro, there isn't much micro involved in kiting ultras, but it was just soooo laggy).
I thought about maybe not posting that rep because maybe you could say "well why post a replay if you clearly only lost because of lag" but I think even if I had kited him, all that would have done is made it so I won that first engagement more, but his second engagement was more than enough. I mean at best, the game would have been even, but him getting his broodlords out while I'm still on lair.
I thought attacking in the open would have been better, as it was off creep. There is no chokes on Ohana except by the bases, where there is lots of creep.
Maybe instead of making infestors so much, I should have heavily went into more roaches? I'm not sure how I'm supposed to know what's going on though with the mutas denying scouting. Maybe pressure is good for scouting, I don't know :X
Maybe thats a side effect of my late gas.
Is no one else playing this style? I seem to run into it a lot. The first guy, who went mutas into ultras, was actually really unique, I have never seen that before, but I'm sort of talking more about the new ling/infestor into ultra play (as shown in the 2nd replay).
"Main thing also when fighting ultras is microing the engagement. As long as you don't clump horrible to get destroyed by fungals, your IT spam plus roach hydra micro should be able to chew thru the stupid ultras quite cost effectively[/quote]
By the time I have roach/hydra/infestor, he will have ultras out, because they aren't making any roaches or hydras, and relying on mass spines so all that gas is pure tech.
Have you played against this style?"
I don't get your point, all i said if microed properly upgraded roach hydra infestor should beat ultra.
Here's another replay where someone does it to me, except they did it more standard, just ling/infestor on 2 base into third,mass spine/infestor. I totally thought i was 'ready', and put sooo many banes at home for his counterattacks. And he ran right into all 10 banes. And still had enough lings left over to snipe my third. I did a lot of damage to him, but I knew the game was over when I realized I had not killed his third during my attack.
No simcity? When he has +1 carapace, banelings won't kill his lings (unless you get +1melee attack), just hurt lots of them, but he can still kill a hatchery with 1 hp zerglings, even if he ran headlong into a baneling. So you need a few units to fight against the 1 hp lings, and more importantly, you need simcity so he can't get a full surround on the hatchery easily. Pretend you are protoss. Spines and evo chambers along the hatch side will take away a bunch of surface area, 2 roaches (or a queen) on hold position between the geyser and a building, etc. Lings are imbalancedly good if you don't try to limit surface area, and that flips to almost useless if they have no surface area.
Looking at the Ohana game, I think it's very important to get a macro hatch when you saturate your 3rd base. This lets you crank out roaches a lot faster, or immediately saturate a 4th base, or build 20 spinecrawlers and replace the drones.
Also, I stand by my suggestion to bring uprooted spines/spores in your army. Make your own chokes. Don't knock it until you've tried it If you're defending, obviously they can stay rooted.
On June 08 2012 08:25 Oboeman wrote: Also, I stand by my suggestion to bring uprooted spines/spores in your army. Make your own chokes. Don't knock it until you've tried it If you're defending, obviously they can stay rooted.
Not as easy as it sounds (and it doesn't sound easy) but absolutely ideal.
I was always under the impression that roaches dealt with ultras cost-effectively if upgrades are even? You have to focus fire quite a bit though and spread your roaches some. My experience is that if my opponent is going ultras I can deny their fourth for a very long time, and by the time they have ultras out my fifth tends to be done and I can simply throw roach/infestor at them until they die.
I'm mid-masters zerg on EU so take my observations with a grain of salt. I watched the cloud kingdom game: Really crisp third timing =] After handling the ling pressure at your third and getting out a bunch of roaches I feel like these should be put to use, other than a handful of infestors your opponent didn't have that much in defense, he was being pretty damn greedy. I feel like an attack inbetween 10-12 minutes by you would have been devastating. Since you didn't attack however, and you scouted his upgrades you should have (and probably did) concluded ling/ultra coming, and since ultra means hive and generally 3-3 you have quite a big window, at the very least take a 4th during this!
I don't feel it was the ultras per se as it was that your opponent was way greedier than you. This is hard to see during a game especially when he's running around with 30 lings on the map, but try to recognize it and give a poke!
On June 08 2012 08:01 Belial88 wrote: There's no way to reactively roach/bane all-in. You can't tell they are going mutas over infestors until wayyyy late. And even doing that, they just defend with spine+ling anyways... I don't think doing a roach/ling all-in (or bane...) is a good idea,it's like saying 6 pool to counter someone going mutas.
I specifically said you can't do it reactively and that it is a gamble, I was just pointing out one of the weaknesses of the straight infestor/ling style. Also, if someone is defending Roach/Bane with pure Ling/Spine then you are doing something wrong, Roach/Ling yeah, but definitely not a 38 Drone 2 gas Roach/Bane. Only way someon can hold Roach/Bane with pure Ling/Bane is if you throw so many Spines down that now you are super behind from wasted resources on static defense and loss of drones.
lose my infestors carelessly and still manage to kill him with a maxed timing
Care to watch my replays then? Specifically, the first 1? Do you think I could have won if I wasn't hit with a huge lag spike during the battles?
I don't feel it was the ultras per se as it was that your opponent was way greedier than you. This is hard to see during a game especially when he's running around with 30 lings on the map, but try to recognize it and give a poke!
You are telling me 2 things and your post makes me want to tear my hair out tt.
Take a fourth or do pressure? And him being so greedy allows him to mass spines. Ugh. I think I need to deny his fourth, take my fourth, not pressure, just deny his fourth... and get ultras of my own. I don't know. get 3/3 quickly maybe.
I'm thinking whatever the answer is, I should not get infestors.
What did i do wrong?
I keep playing these people who I KNOW I'm better than - like I get my third up very quickly, I do it safely even against them massing lings against me, I deny run-bys, I drone up hard and stay alive against ling/bane pressure, I'm on 3 bases way before them. And it's like they are going "okay, well, fuck it, I'll just turtle this herpderp deathball, eventually take my third with a million lings/infestors/spines, and then make ultras!" and there's no way to beat it. Reminds me of something completely broken a year ago that had to be patched and totally overhauled every match-up with a new unit...
Anyways thanks for the compliment of my nice third timing. I crush people who try to do 2 base lair speedroach all-ins even. But I'm going to stick with 2 base play for a while now until I see a way to beat this new ultra style, and go either 2 base ling/infestor/spine into fast ultras myself, or muta into quick infestor, hive like that guy did to me in the first game. I was extremely good in ZvZ when 2 base muta was king and my win rate stopped when people figured out how to beat it, but I haven't seen anyone figure out a way to beat this so... can't beat them, join them. Maybe it's the future of zvz.
You beat him with a roach bust. it didn't get to the ultra part of the game. And he didn't make spines well and he teched too hard and didn't have enough ling/infestor.
Interesting game though. I'll take away from it that maybe I can just bust with roaches, and if I see infestors (without roaches), I'll just max out on roaches and attack. And I guess leave lots of roaches at home to deal with runbys.
On June 08 2012 05:58 Kryptonite wrote: Pretty much what kane said, but also if someone is going straight infestor/ling they will be super vulnerable to Roach/Bane all-ins since you need Roaches to defend unless some terrible micro happens. It's kind of hard to do this reactively tho unless you see super fast 2 gas at the natural, so it's kind of a gamble. I mean, yeah it is possible to defend with ling/bane + MASS spines but that'll cost them a ton of minerals/drones and allow you to take a 3rd and go into the mid game with an advantage.
roach bane allin will not work against mutas, which the OP said his opponent opened muta. The mutas will shoot all the banes as you walk to the base. A pure ling spine infestor mix does sound like it would struggle with roach bane ..
I don't feel it was the ultras per se as it was that your opponent was way greedier than you. This is hard to see during a game especially when he's running around with 30 lings on the map, but try to recognize it and give a poke!
You are telling me 2 things and your post makes me want to tear my hair out tt.
Take a fourth or do pressure? And him being so greedy allows him to mass spines. Ugh. I think I need to deny his fourth, take my fourth, not pressure, just deny his fourth... and get ultras of my own. I don't know. get 3/3 quickly maybe.
I'm thinking whatever the answer is, I should not get infestors.
What did i do wrong?
I keep playing these people who I KNOW I'm better than - like I get my third up very quickly, I do it safely even against them massing lings against me, I deny run-bys, I drone up hard and stay alive against ling/bane pressure, I'm on 3 bases way before them. And it's like they are going "okay, well, fuck it, I'll just turtle this herpderp deathball, eventually take my third with a million lings/infestors/spines, and then make ultras!" and there's no way to beat it. Reminds me of something completely broken a year ago that had to be patched and totally overhauled every match-up with a new unit...
Anyways thanks for the compliment of my nice third timing. I crush people who try to do 2 base lair speedroach all-ins even. But I'm going to stick with 2 base play for a while now until I see a way to beat this new ultra style, and go either 2 base ling/infestor/spine into fast ultras myself, or muta into quick infestor, hive like that guy did to me in the first game. I was extremely good in ZvZ when 2 base muta was king and my win rate stopped when people figured out how to beat it, but I haven't seen anyone figure out a way to beat this so... can't beat them, join them. Maybe it's the future of zvz.
Honestly in that game you should have been able to kill him before the point he go ultras. He had like 5 spines at 3rd plus 24 lings and 7 mutas.
There is no way you should let that base live, and you also allowed him to take a 4th before you.
As for winning the engagements there wasn't a ton you could do because i feel like you let him get to 4 base ultra basically for free
while it isn't what you are looking for in the Ultra category just another showing of how good a +2 roach plus infestor maxed timing is against this style.
Maps where something like this probably wouldn't work would be shakuras or entombed
I don't feel it was the ultras per se as it was that your opponent was way greedier than you. This is hard to see during a game especially when he's running around with 30 lings on the map, but try to recognize it and give a poke!
You are telling me 2 things and your post makes me want to tear my hair out tt.
Take a fourth or do pressure? And him being so greedy allows him to mass spines. Ugh. I think I need to deny his fourth, take my fourth, not pressure, just deny his fourth... and get ultras of my own. I don't know. get 3/3 quickly maybe.
I'm thinking whatever the answer is, I should not get infestors.
What did i do wrong?
I keep playing these people who I KNOW I'm better than - like I get my third up very quickly, I do it safely even against them massing lings against me, I deny run-bys, I drone up hard and stay alive against ling/bane pressure, I'm on 3 bases way before them. And it's like they are going "okay, well, fuck it, I'll just turtle this herpderp deathball, eventually take my third with a million lings/infestors/spines, and then make ultras!" and there's no way to beat it. Reminds me of something completely broken a year ago that had to be patched and totally overhauled every match-up with a new unit...
Anyways thanks for the compliment of my nice third timing. I crush people who try to do 2 base lair speedroach all-ins even. But I'm going to stick with 2 base play for a while now until I see a way to beat this new ultra style, and go either 2 base ling/infestor/spine into fast ultras myself, or muta into quick infestor, hive like that guy did to me in the first game. I was extremely good in ZvZ when 2 base muta was king and my win rate stopped when people figured out how to beat it, but I haven't seen anyone figure out a way to beat this so... can't beat them, join them. Maybe it's the future of zvz.
Sorry if my post was a bit of a mess it was quite late at the time. ^^ Like I said I feel with your current third timing you have a nice clean window to kill this style seeing as he cannot both have double upgrades and a ton of stuff to defend and a third between the 10-12 min mark.
What I tried to say is you took the middleground on everything where your opponent was like: pure lings to pressure, pure drones and third, double upgrade and lair, pure drones and spines, 3-3 and ultras. A more extreme response by you would have punished this, in which case you have two real options: -Some really strong pressure (or call it an all-in if you must, I disagree off-of 3 base saturation) -Some greedy 4th timing.
Hope that clears it a bit up. Again, take it with a grain of salt though.
edit: Something to try is when you do a push at ~12 minutes against this style is to get burrow so that if he's trying to hold with infestor spine, if he ever lets up on the fungals you pull back a bit and burrow to regenerate that health, then come back full health with reinforcements against low energy infestors, have fun!
I don't have time to watch both replays but I watched the second.
You did a great job holding your fast third against his heavy ling/bane pressure, but he did manage to get a runby in that did a good amount of economic damage and screwed up your attack timing by making you produce 2 rounds of drones instead of 2 rounds of roaches. I think if that had been denied you could have done a push to deny his 3rd for quite a long time.
I don't know about the hydra choice; when I play against this style I tend to go up to infestors ASAP so I can fungal his lings. I don't feel like much is gained by using hydras against this style.
Still, if you had killed his 3rd and pulled back with that significant clump of units you would have been fighting Ling/Ultra without infestor support, which roach/hydra on equal upgrades should win in a defensive position.
This guy also had the sickest overlord spread, so he knew the second anything was going to happen and knew where he could send his units to counter safely and what the optimal time to run-by was.
Against this style I usually win if I go fast third into +2 roach/infestor timing, it hits well before ultras and usually around the time they are getting their 3rd up and running. Ling counters are super annoying to deal with and I still haven't found the best method, but banelings and a few roaches in key positions tend to do quite well. I will see if I can find a replay.
CK is a bitch to attack the third on in ZvZ, especially against infestors, so I understand your pain.
Edit: It's worth checking out the game Freaky played vs Life in the GSTL. Freaky was about as mobile as you can be with infestors due to good nydus play, but Life used his superior map presence and a quick tech to infestors to force Freaky out of ling production and onto the defensive. While he definitely made some stupid moves and lost a battle he was up by 80 supply in, he ended up starving Freaky out, which I think is key. Freaky also never had the chance to tech up to ultras since he was constantly being traded with. This style can definitely be called a "deathball" since you can be so behind in eco and supply for so long but still win pretty easily with it, but I think it adds flavor to ZvZ beyond that of Roach/Infestor/Hydra macro wars.
On June 08 2012 12:02 Belial88 wrote: I'll take away from it that maybe I can just bust with roaches, and if I see infestors (without roaches), I'll just max out on roaches and attack. And I guess leave lots of roaches at home to deal with runbys.
On June 08 2012 12:02 Belial88 wrote: Moosegills I watched your replay.
That's not really fair ;/
You beat him with a roach bust. it didn't get to the ultra part of the game. And he didn't make spines well and he teched too hard and didn't have enough ling/infestor.
Interesting game though. I'll take away from it that maybe I can just bust with roaches, and if I see infestors (without roaches), I'll just max out on roaches and attack. And I guess leave lots of roaches at home to deal with runbys.
if he takes an undefended fourth thats fine, but its a badddd idea to attack with roach/infestor into infestor/spine unless you get a good position.
EPT
If you're defending, obviously they can stay rooted.
