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This is a bit problematic.
Not because you cannot have thors in time, but because going for thors first leaves you vulnerable to mass roach play.
I usually go for 1rax FE to 2reactor factories with +1 first and then transition to 2techlab factories making thors which does ok even against early mass roach. Around the time I take 3rd, if he hasn't shown mutas, I usually need to start making tanks. It's maybe less coinflippy if you open with banshees, BUT then you are even weaker if they go mutas (having 2 thors just pop-out vs having 2-4 thors with +1). The way I play you can get a big lead by countering the mutas hard, or need to play slightly more passive and stay on 3 bases for longer against roach(/infestor). If you go for a late game mass air transition, you'll obviously be happier playing against the roach player who you'll have air upgrade advantage on.
Making many turrets early on, especially making them blindly, should always be the last possible option when you try to work your build.
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Big mutas balls are clearly out of date. I'm not saying against that. Buy you see top World Terrans loosing against Litlle mutas counts builds every weeks in every tournaments around the world.
Infestor are not the go-to unit. They are juste a more easier play (i play Terran and Zerg) and a more boring one who gets freely into Hive tech.
Going muta don't makes you fall far behind in upgrades, unless you're staying on it until 20 minutes in the game. And it's more easier to attack and be reactive than with Infestor. Current metagame is late late tanks. 2-2 Ling/BlingMuta hits before the 2nd and third factory start to pop up additionnal tanks. It's more EZ to secure additionnal bases with this compo too. SO you don't fall behind on gas unless you're making more than 12/14 mutas. Saying muta play bad and stupid is against the facts. Well controlled mutas are even far more efficient imo than waiting with infestors until hive. It gest you the ability to force your opponnent composition and movements at the 11 minutes mark, it allows you too to shut down drops easily, reduce the medivac counts, killing eventually some SCVs, and gets mobile anti-air if you're going hive tech.
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On October 04 2012 23:48 lastshadow wrote:
You don't make mutalisks, because making mutalisks is relying on your opponent to mess up, rather than anything you're doing actually being proactive or beneficial. This isn't a good way to approach the game and it certainly is not an ideal or correct way to think.
There is so many loopholes that basically show you're going mutas, that the Terran will just laugh and be prepared. You don't see ebays being made, because the T sees mutas are not possible.
When you watch pro-games you have to understand that the pro-gamers eyes sees much much much more than what you see. It's not as simple as you make it seem.
I agree with this. You should be able to get enough scouting information with banshee/hellion scouting to know when to get thors up. And if you don't, and they catch you without enough defense, then that was you taking a risk.
Also if they get mutas at a bad timing (aka terran is prepared) they can just lose to a thor hellion banshee push (not always easy, but can be done basically all the time on ladder)
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For Mech Mutas can be tricky when the early got messy for both sides but if both players open passively meaning some kind of 3 CC into hellion banshee against 3 hatches you should be able to see mutas coming from a mile away and just throw down an ebay and get like 4 turrets at key points and then you cant be magic boxed. If they go for 2 base muta then it is even easier to spot and you should end up way ahead. If you have 4 thors out they can't really do much with their mutas and then you just start tank production.
Count how many roaches or banelings they made in the early game. Get an engineering bay if you suspect them go for a Spire and then try to confirm at the 10 minute (against 2 base) or 12 minute mark (against 3 base) and react accordingly.
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On October 05 2012 00:03 wTeffecT wrote:Show nested quote +On October 04 2012 23:48 ReMiiX wrote:
This is in the wrong section, but I've encountered it a lot. Yeah, I kinda realised after I posted. If a mod wants to move this, no problem. But I'm not asking for help. Where I play (Diamond), it is completely fine to spam static defence because you don't need to maximise the efficency of every mineral, simply because people's macro just isn't that good (and Mech floats minerals  ) I'm kinda more interested in the Theorycrafting, and I understand what you're saying LastShadow, but I'm still seeing a lot of Pro games where this sort of thing happens. Either the Mutas straight up win the game, of give the zerg a huuuge advantage. Edit: GSL Ro8 Example/results: + Show Spoiler +The MKP vs. Life example probably wasn't the best because Life was taxing MKPs multitasking with constant ling runbys etc. which would have made it harder for him to work out what was coming and respond to it.
Since it's theorycrafting, I'll add my two cents since this is something I've recently thought about. I managed to get that question through to Taeja in the GSL and was a bit surprised by the answer, that he avoided mech against Leenock because of the mutas. I also watched Vortix vs Taeja in RSL and it made me think. Now, I'm not a very good player, I just watch a lot of Starcraft and would like to hear what better players think about this.
I think that to talk about it, we first have to identify the goal as zerg when facing mech. One goal could be to end it quickly before the mech force becomes substantial, or at least do irreparable damage. I'm not that interested in this option for the purposes of this theorycrafting, although there are a lot of options to be explored. But unless you can end it quickly, I believe that everyone agrees that you need hive tech to fight a decent mech force. Stable hive tech production needs gas, gas requires expansions. The strength of your late game army is directly proportional to the number of geysers you have.
The main problem for zerg when encountering MVP mech in the early and mid-game seems to be drone losses, lack of creep and with that no map control. This is due to the banshee hellion and potentially raven combo. Runbys are devastating for drone lines, and the only thing that can control banshees killing creep is having queens out on the map, limiting runby defense, and this too becomes useless if the banshees are cloaked and/or the hellion/banshee numbers grow enough to take out queens.
In my opinion, mutas as a damage dealer is unrealistic against mech, due to turret rings and/or thors. Sure, there is a small window of vulnerability before a terran defense is adequate but like many have pointed out, it's not something you should rely on. But just like terrans don't have to suicide in hellions, I don't think that zergs have to shove with mutas.
Active mutas on the map control space, keeps banshees and hellions from killing creep, and the creep identifies incoming runbys in time to prepare. The creep and map control allows you to take more bases safely. Mutas cost a lot of gas, and that gas could be used for infestor tech and a quicker transition to hive. On the other hand, active mutas should allow you to take a lot more geysers. So it's a gas investment now for more gas income later.
Can something counter the usefulness of the mutas? The only danger to mutas I see with mech is thors and static defenses. Thors and missile turrets are not that quick ^^ I'd say that unless you suicide them in hoping for some lucky damage, you won't lose the mutas until you're ready to trade them.
My question for better players is, is this realistic? If you choose to go mutas, what is a good number? Does it delay hive too much, do the added geysers from more expansion kick in too late? In the late game, how can you effectively get rid of the mutas while keeping them cost efficient?
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I dont see making about ten mutalisks to be such a huge investment. If he doesnt have thors up, you basically kill him and can continue more production from there. If hes got a couple you can literally sack the mutas while targetting the repairing scvs, and you can take out quite a bunch. The gas sink in the mutas doesnt seem all that bad since, generally, mech aint pushing for quite a while and roach/spine will counter helion harass. Not gas heavy-- so your free to drone and drone in that time. If you think that isnt cost effective they are at the very least helpful in pushing away helions.
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You can usually see it coming. Your initial hellion/banshee harass will give you info. If you don't see roaches, be suspicious. If you don't see a third on top of that, its probably quick mutas.
Just throw down an ebay no matter what, then if you scout it you can start spamming turrets.
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I've got a question for zerg players. Against mech, if you don't go mutalisks, how do you control the early to mid game where banshees and helions just are so effective in containing you on 3 bases? They grab their third easily and then freely mass mech while you can't start a fourth unless you pull queens and invest in preemptive spores to discourage banshee attacks. Fungal is overrated, it's way too costly impossible to just continually fungal every banshee and helion to death especially when they just split them all over the place. Do you just attack head on with roach infestor to deny the third and let banshees pick units off slowly?
If you play defensive and build your eco up, how do you deal with that medium sized tank/thor timing attack that hits before you can get your broodfestor army up? They just attack and sit there tank banging you while you can't really effectively engage with just roach infestor. Your fourth is already lost if you don't engage (and if you do and lose your army, well gg). They max out and reinforce with vikings.
I've tried several times going mutaless and lategame is just horrible for me if I don't stop that tank thor attack with my roach infestor. My fourth timing is just too late to get that gas for broodfestor deathball. Getting that 6-8 mutas and possibly more depending on if he gets e-bay or not helps secure the fourth as well as forces more thors than tanks and makes the terran play more defensive, ultimately making any potential timing attack nonexistent or that much easier to defend, allowing me to get my late game deathball.
What are your guys' tricks to going mutaless?
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On October 05 2012 21:41 Insoleet wrote:
I like to snipe firsts thors with roaches and destroy everything with mutas. Its a good way to stay safe against terrans early game pressure. And you can counter if the terran overcommits to his push.
Out of curiosity, how does those roaches get across the map when there are hellions and banshees right at your doorstep?
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On October 06 2012 15:25 scph wrote:
I've got a question for zerg players. Against mech, if you don't go mutalisks, how do you control the early to mid game where banshees and helions just are so effective in containing you on 3 bases? They grab their third easily and then freely mass mech while you can't start a fourth unless you pull queens and invest in preemptive spores to discourage banshee attacks. Fungal is overrated, it's way too costly impossible to just continually fungal every banshee and helion to death especially when they just split them all over the place. Do you just attack head on with roach infestor to deny the third and let banshees pick units off slowly?
If you play defensive and build your eco up, how do you deal with that medium sized tank/thor timing attack that hits before you can get your broodfestor army up? They just attack and sit there tank banging you while you can't really effectively engage with just roach infestor. Your fourth is already lost if you don't engage (and if you do and lose your army, well gg). They max out and reinforce with vikings.
I've tried several times going mutaless and lategame is just horrible for me if I don't stop that tank thor attack with my roach infestor. My fourth timing is just too late to get that gas for broodfestor deathball. Getting that 6-8 mutas and possibly more depending on if he gets e-bay or not helps secure the fourth as well as forces more thors than tanks and makes the terran play more defensive, ultimately making any potential timing attack nonexistent or that much easier to defend, allowing me to get my late game deathball.
What are your guys' tricks to going mutaless? When I dont go muta I go for a 3 base infestor/broordlord timing and double expand as my deathball exerts pressure. I've always managed to get my broordlords out in time as I rush it rather quickly [basically only getting burrow+roach speed before hive]. If hes going for some really concentrated two base timing I just stall with spines; when the broordlords pop hes finished anyway. Just my experience.
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On October 06 2012 16:12 whatevername wrote:Show nested quote +On October 06 2012 15:25 scph wrote:
I've got a question for zerg players. Against mech, if you don't go mutalisks, how do you control the early to mid game where banshees and helions just are so effective in containing you on 3 bases? They grab their third easily and then freely mass mech while you can't start a fourth unless you pull queens and invest in preemptive spores to discourage banshee attacks. Fungal is overrated, it's way too costly impossible to just continually fungal every banshee and helion to death especially when they just split them all over the place. Do you just attack head on with roach infestor to deny the third and let banshees pick units off slowly?
If you play defensive and build your eco up, how do you deal with that medium sized tank/thor timing attack that hits before you can get your broodfestor army up? They just attack and sit there tank banging you while you can't really effectively engage with just roach infestor. Your fourth is already lost if you don't engage (and if you do and lose your army, well gg). They max out and reinforce with vikings.
I've tried several times going mutaless and lategame is just horrible for me if I don't stop that tank thor attack with my roach infestor. My fourth timing is just too late to get that gas for broodfestor deathball. Getting that 6-8 mutas and possibly more depending on if he gets e-bay or not helps secure the fourth as well as forces more thors than tanks and makes the terran play more defensive, ultimately making any potential timing attack nonexistent or that much easier to defend, allowing me to get my late game deathball.
What are your guys' tricks to going mutaless? When I dont go muta I go for a 3 base infestor/broordlord timing and double expand as my deathball exerts pressure. I've always managed to get my broordlords out in time as I rush it rather quickly [basically only getting burrow+roach speed before hive]. If hes going for some really concentrated two base timing I just stall with spines; when the broordlords pop hes finished anyway. Just my experience.
How do you get enough gas to fund that kind of army so fast? Do you skip infestor production and just rush broodlords off 6 gas relying on queens overseers spines/spores and roaches? Man, that seems so difficult to pull off, I guess I need better unit control. Usually the terran players I face just keep building banshees non stop and add more starports if I don't get any mutas or enough infestors. They'll skip ground army completely.
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On October 06 2012 15:25 scph wrote:
I've got a question for zerg players. Against mech, if you don't go mutalisks, how do you control the early to mid game where banshees and helions just are so effective in containing you on 3 bases? They grab their third easily and then freely mass mech while you can't start a fourth unless you pull queens and invest in preemptive spores to discourage banshee attacks. Fungal is overrated, it's way too costly impossible to just continually fungal every banshee and helion to death especially when they just split them all over the place. Do you just attack head on with roach infestor to deny the third and let banshees pick units off slowly?
If you play defensive and build your eco up, how do you deal with that medium sized tank/thor timing attack that hits before you can get your broodfestor army up? They just attack and sit there tank banging you while you can't really effectively engage with just roach infestor. Your fourth is already lost if you don't engage (and if you do and lose your army, well gg). They max out and reinforce with vikings.
I've tried several times going mutaless and lategame is just horrible for me if I don't stop that tank thor attack with my roach infestor. My fourth timing is just too late to get that gas for broodfestor deathball. Getting that 6-8 mutas and possibly more depending on if he gets e-bay or not helps secure the fourth as well as forces more thors than tanks and makes the terran play more defensive, ultimately making any potential timing attack nonexistent or that much easier to defend, allowing me to get my late game deathball.
What are your guys' tricks to going mutaless?
If I don't go muta I have to scout vigilantly and constantly spreed creep. I never really had an issue with banshees. Have good spore placement and queens fungals and IT usually works just fine while I set up roaches defensively to deny any hellion harass. I feel like the trick is to keep trying to take towers and try to set up a really good engagement by catching his army unsieged if possible. The second he moves out I try ling runbys at third. I use 4-5 corruptors to take out banshees and tank thor fire and neural thors and take out tanks fast. If he is seiged up then I try to split roaches up so I can flank from multiple directions and drop IT from burrowd festors to tank siege fire. The only other strat I know is doing a huge roach drop on all the tanks, but I haven't always had much success with it so I like to try and force really favorable engagements.
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Another great thing with spire tech is the ability to makes some corruptors early. Corruption is a great addition to your DPS units. even makes mass ling winning against mass clumped Thors, whitout corruption they looses badly, but with it, it's a real fest.
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On October 06 2012 17:53 lodeet wrote:Show nested quote +On October 06 2012 15:25 scph wrote:
I've got a question for zerg players. Against mech, if you don't go mutalisks, how do you control the early to mid game where banshees and helions just are so effective in containing you on 3 bases? They grab their third easily and then freely mass mech while you can't start a fourth unless you pull queens and invest in preemptive spores to discourage banshee attacks. Fungal is overrated, it's way too costly impossible to just continually fungal every banshee and helion to death especially when they just split them all over the place. Do you just attack head on with roach infestor to deny the third and let banshees pick units off slowly?
If you play defensive and build your eco up, how do you deal with that medium sized tank/thor timing attack that hits before you can get your broodfestor army up? They just attack and sit there tank banging you while you can't really effectively engage with just roach infestor. Your fourth is already lost if you don't engage (and if you do and lose your army, well gg). They max out and reinforce with vikings.
I've tried several times going mutaless and lategame is just horrible for me if I don't stop that tank thor attack with my roach infestor. My fourth timing is just too late to get that gas for broodfestor deathball. Getting that 6-8 mutas and possibly more depending on if he gets e-bay or not helps secure the fourth as well as forces more thors than tanks and makes the terran play more defensive, ultimately making any potential timing attack nonexistent or that much easier to defend, allowing me to get my late game deathball.
What are your guys' tricks to going mutaless? If I don't go muta I have to scout vigilantly and constantly spreed creep. I never really had an issue with banshees. Have good spore placement and queens fungals and IT usually works just fine while I set up roaches defensively to deny any hellion harass. I feel like the trick is to keep trying to take towers and try to set up a really good engagement by catching his army unsieged if possible. The second he moves out I try ling runbys at third. I use 4-5 corruptors to take out banshees and tank thor fire and neural thors and take out tanks fast. If he is seiged up then I try to split roaches up so I can flank from multiple directions and drop IT from burrowd festors to tank siege fire. The only other strat I know is doing a huge roach drop on all the tanks, but I haven't always had much success with it so I like to try and force really favorable engagements.
Yeah I guess my problem isn't so much the banshees completely destroying me, but that its containment along with hellions restrict my map control. I'm not able to match the terran with an extra base to get that vital gas, partly due to banshee threat and not having creep to zone out hellions and banshees. Hellions keep destroying my creep so I can't connect to the fourth. Just seems like I don't have enough infestors to keep fungalling so my fourth is usually delayed.
If I can catch their timing attack with thor/tank/banshee army in a good position then my late game usually comes out alright, but it's that critical attack that feels like a coinflip to me. If he wins that battle then I've already lost because my fourth is guaranteed dead. If I win, it's often rare for me to be able to have enough units to overpower him and win right then and there, so I just wait for a lategame battle in which I still can lose since by then he's already grabbed his fourth base as well and anything goes from then on.
With mutas, I don't need to rely on creep and spores so I can grab my fourth relatively quick and discourage any pushing as well by harassing his base. Then again, mutas are just...so useless after that window where thor count is low that it's just so cost ineffective to produce them. I want to find a way to play without building them, but I guess I'm not good enough yet.
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On October 04 2012 23:48 lastshadow wrote:
You don't make mutalisks, because making mutalisks is relying on your opponent to mess up, rather than anything you're doing actually being proactive or beneficial. This isn't a good way to approach the game and it certainly is not an ideal or correct way to think.
Sorry but what utter rubbish, mutalisks are a viable strategy. They give you map control and extra bases if played correctly, the opponent making a mistake is just a bonus if it happens. Keeping mutas alive the whole game (and don't build more then the initial 8-12)and you most likely get your money worth picking off medivacs, stray tanks, stray buildings etc My experience anyway.
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I see mutas alot when I play mech, but I learned the solution from watching Lucifron. Even with the banshees you can still miss it if they position it well with their spores, but you have the minerals to start ebay and 7 or 8 turrets (usually 7) around your main nat and third. Its no big deal to build the turrets since you arent producing from barracks and you already have your third. Thors should be popping shortly after any muta harass starts, but if you have no turrets and are relying on just thors then that window turns into jackpot bonanza free damage super fun time, and with thors being slower than mutas its not hard to get pulled apart.
I just started building them regardless of what I saw, since I had the minerals stacked anyways, and even if he wasnt planning on mutas he will find out you didnt build them when his overlord scouts and can make a quick enough shift to punish you.
I think the mutas are viable even if you get the turrets (only the first 8-12 as was said above) because they hard counter hellions and banshees and allow you to take control of the map.
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On October 04 2012 23:37 wTeffecT wrote:Edit: GSL Ro8 Example/results: + Show Spoiler +This was also one of the reasons (not the only reason) MKP lost in Game 4 to Life in the GSL RO8, the Mutalisk transition caught him with only 1 Thor out, and with magic boxing, the mutas were able to kill a huge amount of SCVs.
A counter example would be Symbol vs MVP on abyssal city, where the turrets finished in time, and the mutalisks accomplished nothing, and couldn't even take out the banshees without dying. I kind of like nerchio's corruptor approach better, for getting rid of the banshees.
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As a masters zerg who plays mutas pretty much every zvt, I feel that mutas are much more effective when terran goes hellion banshee into bio rather than into mech. Most terrans I play still build an engi bay and thors are usually popping in sufficient numbers to hold it off, maybe with damage taken but nothing crazy. If you are desperate you can pull workers to repair your thor accepting that you will lose a few. However against the bio transition I have had mutas straight up win or effectively win many times. simply because you will frequently just not have the marine count.
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On October 07 2012 15:58 Insomni7 wrote:
As a masters zerg who plays mutas pretty much every zvt, I feel that mutas are much more effective when terran goes hellion banshee into bio rather than into mech. Most terrans I play still build an engi bay and thors are usually popping in sufficient numbers to hold it off, maybe with damage taken but nothing crazy. If you are desperate you can pull workers to repair your thor accepting that you will lose a few. However against the bio transition I have had mutas straight up win or effectively win many times. simply because you will frequently just not have the marine count.
yeah at first I tried to hold the muta timing by producing marines from the barracks to help cover until thors popped but it never worked because I didnt have enough and they had no stim with gas being tight. Even with thors and turrets a ball os 10 mutas should be able to do something though, the first 7 turrets secure the mineral lines and depending on where his factories are and how the turrets are spread there will be openings somewhere.
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I am mid masters terran who frequently hears zergs complaining about the mech deathball which I always go with. I have tried to incorporate Banshee helion builds, but I like the proxy port, and that is too easily scouted by a drifting lord. Sometimes I see a hydralisk response if I stick with it. One time I saw something different.
Corruptor/roach pretty much owns it because it is a direct hard counter to everything I have. That is why I have stopped incorporating Banshee rushes/harass. Just puts me behind everywhere else. Do terrans see this response at all?
Also, why do zergs never use the building contaminate with the Overseers? That thing is an absolute killer. Seems HotS seems to be getting rid of that. I never build any turrents in TvZ and Overseers have free roam, yet they are always dropping an obvious fake marine, or whatever those things are called... even though they have all the scouting info they need.
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EPT
