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How would you guys deal with mass roach doom drops? Assuming that I don't fall behind to run-bys or sacced roaches for no reason, I don't see how this can hold off 40+ 2-2 roaches dropped before ultras are out.
Overlord spread. Drops and nydus are actually quite deadly, since you are relying 90% on spines, so your infestors should never be massed in a ball like you do with typical play, but instead they should be spread out, at least half at main and half at third (I'd even recommend putting your lair and tech in the most 'central', least droppable place, ie on shakuras or daybreak, your natural).
I also put 2 lings on patrol on each side of my main to deal with nydus as well, as soon as my opponent's lair done basically.
You could also just be good, spread overlords, scout well, and be aware, but fuck that.
Once drops start happening, I'd recommend you re-root your mass spines to behind your mineral lines as well. That makes you pretty drop-proof. Usually if the opponent went drops, he won't be doing any sort of mass roach push so you won't need them in the front (and if he does, you'll see him move out and can re-root, or your ultras should pop if he wasted tech time on drops).
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I don't think the strategy is the problem this game. You got outmacrod pretty hard. Take the third much earlier and if your opponent is playing that defensively, you can afford to drone up and later make spines to defend any roach aggression. You also build too many lings which is why you have no minerals for Ultras. The drops he did were cute, but in those situations you can typically just attack them with your ultra/infestor as they wasted a lot of their infestor energy. Don't attack into 16 spines with roaches and infestor/BL supporting. You can easily take out other bases instead and if it turns into a base race you have mass ling which are very strong there.
It can be hard to approach games like that rationally after you just played them, but you need to be able to look at a game like that and recognize how poorly you played.
Do you think I was too far behind from the start or something?
So I should take a quick third the same time the opponent takes a third, and then mass spines in my natural and counterattack? He seemed to have a lot of spines at home, and was defensive, but at the same time was pushing with a small group of roaches. I didn't feel like I had enough lings to take out his third, and he had enough roaches that I couldn't take my third. Or was my infestors too late?
He had put spines at his other bases, and his 4th was at a really forward location so I had trouble getting around to his other bases if I wanted to do that.
He didn't deny your 3rd with roaches - he hadn't made a single roach until his 3rd base was completely saturated. If you tried taking your 3rd, there would have been ling baneling fights for it, but I think that's what you have to do. If he takes a 3rd base and you don't, you have to at least fight over his with the units you have, to prevent him from saturating it so quickly.
I think you need to take the 3rd much much faster - if it's not possible, than maybe you are right, but I'm pretty sure it is very possible to hold the 3rd, or at the very least, trade 3rds.
If you really are forced to infestor turtle on 2 base, you can't be that late on your 2/2 upgrades or your infestors.
so... take the third the same time the opponent does, and then mass spines? What I try to do is mass spines, and then take the third, since I had trouble against people who would go fast third and mass roaches.
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If you see your opponent take a third you should take a third. If he decides to not drone his third and goes for a roach timing go kill his third and he won't be able to bust your natural.
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On July 16 2012 08:45 Crilmon wrote:
How would you guys deal with mass roach doom drops? Assuming that I don't fall behind to run-bys or sacced roaches for no reason, I don't see how this can hold off 40+ 2-2 roaches dropped before ultras are out.
Here's a replay of how I did it. Basically just see it coming and camp it with all your lings, fungal as they are dropped. With spines or units positioned elsewhere you can also deal with multiprong drops (this game I expected nydus, so I had spines in my main.
http://drop.sc/222619
It's one of the first times I did the build, actually, and I accidentally took the 4th base when I intended to take my third, but it really doesn't give me any advantage or affect the game, as I just used it for a macro hatch when I realized my mistake.
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What do you think of getting a roach warren, and building like 10-20 roaches to help defend your third if required? Like, not intending to get roaches, but if you see him massing roaches, just getting some to support your ling/spine army?
Obviously it cuts into your gas and you don't benefit from upgrades, but I think it could fill the hole before your infestors pop against e.g. speedbane-roach. If you're going to get banes anyway to defend such an attack, you could be getting roaches.
Just a thought..
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You could but that is going to dealy your upgrades/hive a lot and probably isn't worth it because he won't be all in. So you may defend but now he is going to have better upgrades (in terms of his roaches will have range attack as well) your hive will be a lot later as he'll probably attack again with roaches so then when hive finishes you won't be getting 3/3 and ultra cavern.
don't think it's really worth it but it might be, I know I won't be doing that though.
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On July 16 2012 09:38 blade55555 wrote:
If you see your opponent take a third you should take a third. If he decides to not drone his third and goes for a roach timing go kill his third and he won't be able to bust your natural.
How would you transition from this and get your own 3rd eventually? he still has a bunch of roaches outside your base threatening your 3rd, and once he has enough roaches back in his base he can just retake his 3rd and keep some of them there to defend it. Are you forced into 2-base ultras in this situation or would you be relying on a lucky fungal once you have infestors or what?
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The zerg player holding his roaches at your third while you have your lings denying his will only give you more of an advantage. Once your infestors pop mass ling with infestors will crush his roaches and then you can retake the third. Honestly it wouldn't be very smart of the other zerg player to keep his whole army of roaches there as then neither player gets a third which favors you.
I think I was in that situation once and just did that and I won pretty easily. As long as he can't secure his own third (and by the time he can secure his you can secure yours) the ling/infestor player is in a great position.
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DRG used this style last night, except he played very strangely and made some weird queen attack vs leenock's mutas on Atlantis Spaceship (longest map...)
http://www.gomtv.net/2012gstls2/vod/67621/?set=9&lang=
He actually takes his 3rd a lot later than I would against 2 base lair players, but I think it's just because his scouting wasn't good early game and you can't see the natural's gas on this map. All that said, he gets to late game and just makes big mistakes, so he actually could have won despite any early mistakes.
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Keep in mind ling infestor isn't a build, its a strategy. There are many different styles you can do with infestor ling.
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On July 21 2012 09:37 oOOoOphidian wrote:DRG used this style last night, except he played very strangely and made some weird queen attack vs leenock's mutas on Atlantis Spaceship (longest map...) http://www.gomtv.net/2012gstls2/vod/67621/?set=9&lang=He actually takes his 3rd a lot later than I would against 2 base lair players, but I think it's just because his scouting wasn't good early game and you can't see the natural's gas on this map. All that said, he gets to late game and just makes big mistakes, so he actually could have won despite any early mistakes.
I know!
He made WAY too many infestors, he made 20 of them! As a result, his hive is just ridiculously late. He also didn't make near enough spines. I don't know wtf was up with that, even when he saw the mass roaches came he didn't add any more spines and he had more than 500 minerals. Then he tried to take his fourth before ultras, which is cool, you just cancel it if he comes at you, but the problem was that the opponent was clearly pushing and he didn't cancel it... just a lot of problems.
It was rather obnoxious the casters clearly had no idea what was going on though. They kept saying the dumbest things, like 'oh hes got banelings there's no way he will be able to damage' when non-upgraded banes don't do shit against upgraded lings, et cetera. God, ling/infestor has been out for a while, why do casters always seem so confused on builds that came out a long time ago. DRG is far from the first pro to use this strat.
But very cool validation of this strategy to see DRG using it on the last set of a GSTL game, despite losing. He just made wayyyyy too many infestors, if he simply stopped at 8-12 and gotten hive quicker, he definitely would have had ultras out in time and easily won the game. He didn't make near enough spines either. I'm guessing he went with infestors instead of spines for defense, relying on units instead of static defense, which is an interesting idea, but I think it shows a lack of understanding (that sounds terrible to say about DRG), because the whole point of the build is to turtle out ultras, so spines is fine because you don't plan to move out, mass infestors aren't going to do any aggression anyways. In the end he just flopped because although his choice to go 20 infestors instead of spines meant he survived the roach aggression, it just meant his ultras were too late to prevent leenock from having his fourth or getting his own hive tech (although broodlords in that game would have been useless, i think leenock was a bit confused himself).
Keep in mind ling infestor isn't a build, its a strategy. There are many different styles you can do with infestor ling.
Sort of... you do a build to get there though, 2 base lair, and unlike going mutas, you make 2 evo chambers and get 1/1 first, and your lair is significantly later than with 2 base muta because of that. You can scout at ~40+ and deduce if someone is going ling/infestor or not. You can't go ling/infestor after doing a fast third before lair strategy, because you need tech (roaches/infestors/mutas) to secure your third and when going fast third, you won't have your tech out in time.
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On July 17 2012 03:41 blade55555 wrote:
The zerg player holding his roaches at your third while you have your lings denying his will only give you more of an advantage. Once your infestors pop mass ling with infestors will crush his roaches and then you can retake the third. Honestly it wouldn't be very smart of the other zerg player to keep his whole army of roaches there as then neither player gets a third which favors you.
I think I was in that situation once and just did that and I won pretty easily. As long as he can't secure his own third (and by the time he can secure his you can secure yours) the ling/infestor player is in a great position.
But I'm talking about when he's splitting up his roaches. Suppose he has 2/3 of his roaches behind the mineral line at your 3rd and 1/3 of his roaches walling off his own 3rd with his reinforcement roaches going there too. You wouldn't be able to get a 3rd because you can't get surface area with your lings and he has +1, whereas he can take his own.
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^ I think when taking your third, if the opponent moves out you want to go for a trade, and take his third out in the process (and make sure he can't straight up kill you with spine/infestor at the natural), but once your third is up, you want to focus on keeping it. If the opponent has most of his roaches at your third, you should easily kill them with your ling/infestor/spine army (most losses are just not enough spines... like when drg lost), and then you'll have a commanding lead since he split up his army, and you can then just waltz to his third and kill the rest of his roaches (or just keep playing, whatever, your ultras should be out soon and then you can definitely kill him).
Also, if he has 1/3rd of his roaches at home, you should easily be able to focus fire it down with 2/2 lings, and 2/3rd of his roaches should not be able to bust your wall (even 100% of them shouldn't).
You'd be surprised how strong ling/infestor is straight up vs pure roach. Once your infestors pop, your army should win straight up vs his. Spines, queens, and creep helps, but it's really not necessary. Basically, if the opponent takes a third, he can't afford enough roaches to straight win vs ling/infestor, and then you should start spining up your third (having overlords spewing creep, which you positioned for that reason early in the game), as any 3 base mass roach attack, even 200/200, cannot take 8+ spines, lings, and infestors. Or even just 8 spines and infestors, really. If he's on 2 base, that's fine, you will have a huge tech advantage, and simply make enough infestor ling to eventually secure your third.
Maybe provide a rep? It's pretty simple - if the opponent takes his third, you take yours. You can't do that as much with mutas because it's pivotal you get those mutas asap because you are being aggressive, but taking a momentary hit in infestor production to take your third is fine, since you know he won't be doing a mass roach attack yet. If he does, it will come after your third is up, which you started spining up immediately when you see him going roaches.
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I'm facing this style more and more on ladder and it's really incredible strong and there doesn't seem to be a real counter. o
I wonder how the game goes when both players go for this style which should happen quite often?
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On July 21 2012 21:11 roym899 wrote:
I'm facing this style more and more on ladder and it's really incredible strong and there doesn't seem to be a real counter. o
I wonder how the game goes when both players go for this style which should happen quite often?
I've played this mirror before. It's.... volatile.
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I think in mirror it'll come down to nydus and drops if it gets to late game. Infestor drops etc.
Hasn't really happened to me recently, though, but I'll post any mirror replays here.
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I think nydus is a big deal in roach vs roach games, but I think when both of you are going fast hive ling/infestor, both sides won't do any harass at all (except maybe some ling runbys), and try to get hive as fast as possible (and maybe some games where one guy tech switches to roaches or just masses ling/infestor for the kill). I've won and lost so many mirror games because of things as small as making the gases at the third before your third popped so you have a 200 gas advantage and thus the ultras come quicker, and a 5 vs 6 ultra fight snowballs really quickly into 1 vs 4 and you lose. Really unforgiving.
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I mostly meant after hive. It seems hard to really engage otherwise.
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Every mirror game I've played, the winner was simply who got ultras first (which usually results in who has more ultras, as you both are on 3 bases, maybe setting up your fourth). Just stupid games where infestors are completely skipped or something.
I'm curious what's more important, 1 more ultra or upgrades. That may be an interesting way to cut corners in mirror. I mean doesn't really seem like it matters anyways, you have ultras when the other person doesn't, doesn't matter if you are 0/0.
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I hate this strategy actually. Everyone I meet is just doing this style. Gives really silly late game scenario's...
Nothing beats ultra's, except more ultra's... That's an obvious game design mistake.
Or am I oblivious to some unit which can actually win fights versus ultra/infestor?
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EPT
