[D]ZvP Return of the Swarm-an infestor-less style

Hello everyone! I’m a masters Z player who has played the game since launch. When I stopped playing for a 6-month period back in March, the Zerg was a swarming, fast race that required a lot of attacking, counterattacking, and macro/micro.

When I returned to the game a couple of months ago, my beloved Zerg had changed. I was shocked to see that the metagame was about massive spine crawlers, equal bases with the opponent, and a deathball comparable or even better than that from protoss: BL/infestor. Obviously this is a strong composition, but beyond everything else, people from all races and all levels seem to have the general consensus that this is boring. I do not have the patience for it, it’s just not as fun for me, and it’s not very “swarm”-y.

As such, I wanted to work on a strategy that could handle today’s current metagame while bringing the idea of the “swarm” back to the Zerg race. I hope you enjoy, and constructive criticism and improvements are appreciated =)

The opening for this build is the current standard. I’ll include the rough build order for completeness sake:

14p/15h/21h
Double gas at 5:45~6
OL sac at 6:15~6:30ish – if you see chrono on cyber/no double gas at natural, or gateways going down, throw down a roach warren immediately and prepare for gateway pressure/allin. If you see a robo and no chrono on the cyber, no double gas, it’s fine to delay roach warren and evo until 7 minutes. There’s a lot of other things to consider in the opening, but I won’t go too in-depth on this as it is covered in other guides. This guide is more oriented towards once protoss takes a 3rd.

Lair at first 100 gas, add 3rd and 4th gas, ling speed with 2nd 100 gas, +1 carapace with next 150 gas. Throw down macrohatch while lair is morphing, add 2nd evo and +1 melee when you’re comfortable (sometimes I don’t get this if he’s going for immo/sentry allin and opt for more units instead).

Everything above is pretty standard. Here is where things start to deviate:
At lair completion, instead of spending 100/100 on roach speed, throw down a hydra den.

Now if you didn’t stop reading because of the previous sentence, please let me explain: first of all, we will build the hydra den but not actually get any hydras, unless they’re needed. It is more for “safety.” Since we aren’t using infestors with this strategy, we need some kind of anti-air/high dps unit for various protoss 2-base allins. I will discuss the immo/sentry allin in depth below, and how to use hydras to beat it straight-up, but the hydra den is also useful for blink allins as well as stargate allins for obvious reasons. It’s a very small investment for a potentially significant boost to your army, and also will come into play much later in the game. Lastly, if he scouts your hydra den, he’s (even more) inclined to go colossi, which is what you want. If he has a robo bay already building when you scout him or he’s taking a fast 3rd, you can skip the hydra den since you won’t be using it for a long time.

Now if he hasn’t taken a 3rd, keep building units (probably primarily lings with a few roaches, unless he’s going for a stargate allin, then you can start getting hydras and getting the range upgrade). Saturate your 3base fully when you can, but stay on 4 gas. At this point if he allin’s you the game is pretty much over one way or another; otherwise, if he’s leaning towards a 3rd, you can transition to the midgame.

Main idea: Tech to drops, and use roach/ling drops to buy time for T3.

So the toss player has maybe done some light aggression (4gate +1) or just gone safe with some immortals and sentries and taken a 3rd base. At this point, we want to transition into the late game and buy as much time as possible for our “ultimate” composition, which is going to be ultra/ling/bane.

Once you feel safe (either seeing 3rd nexus go down or just the potential for a delayed push), start researching drop and take your 5th and 6th gas. Also, research roach speed. When he takes his 3rd, take a 4th. Make an overseer over your army to snipe any observers; then, when drop finishes, you’re going to unleash a 3-pronged attack, at around the 12:30 mark.

Load 6 overlords with roach/ling. Send 3 to his main and 3 to his 3rd. Make sure you’ve sniped the observer over your army. At the same time, move out with your main army towards his nat. As best as you can, drop both his main and his 3rd at the same time and hit his front.

This is a very powerful attack that requires him to be completely on top of his multitask and army splitting to handle. It hits at a time where he’s just getting a couple of colossus up and is not ready to move out with a 3-base timing, so even if he has a superior army, he will have a very difficult time dealing with the multipronged threats due to the immobility of his army, and you’re dropping enough stuff that just 1 warpin is not able to handle it (especially in two locations).

Note that this is NOT an allin. The main goal here is to buy you a little time. Be judicious with your main army; if you can’t do any damage to his natural, just rely on your drops, which are pretty expendable. Don’t just throw your main army away.

So what’re we buying time for? When you’re about halfway done with drop, throw down a baneling nest and an infestation pit. Once drop finishes, start building your hive and researching baneling speed. Also make sure you’re keeping up on your melee upgrades; start 2/2 ASAP. This is a lot of gas, but since your main army is so gas-light, it should not be a problem.

So at this point, you either have done significant damage with your drops and you’re well on your way to T3, or your opponent is a total boss and has defended your 3-pronged attack perfectly, but you still have a decent standing army (or you remade one). If the former, then the game is more or less over; if the latter, he may be wanting to get some payback for being a pain in his neck and roll out with his 3-base army, and your T3 isn’t ready yet. So how do you defend?

This is the most vulnerable part of the strategy, but you have drops, and you have banelings. Morph all those lings into banes, and get a solid roach army. If your micro is good enough, then defend his attack with bainrain; if not, then try to flank from 2 sides with your roach/bane army and hold him off. You don’t have to engage him; just try to push him back and buy time for your ultras.

Main idea: Get your endgame army comp of ultra/ling/bane.

At this point, you’ve delayed him enough to get the T3 unit of choice for this strategy: ultras. Once ultras are out, you are pretty safe against any sort of stalker/colossus ball as long as you engage properly (like, not in a small choke). Transition into a pure ultra/ling/bane army and get 3/3, adrenal, and ultra armor. You should have started building ultras around 15:30ish. Try not to get more than 6 ultras or so; the ultras are mainly there to break forcefields and tank for your banelings. You want a TON of banelings with your army at this point (like 40+). They will serve as your primary DPS in any engagements. Ultra/bane completely WRECKS stalker/colo, which is likely what he’ll have at this point in the game.

Also once ultras are out, you want to split up your remaining roach army from your ultra/ling/bane army. It is very easy for ultras to get stuck on roaches, so either attack one of his bases with your roach army and one with your ultra/ling/bane army, or drop them somewhere. For the immediate future you will not be building roaches.

At this point, your army may not be as powerful as the BL/infestor combo, but here is what you do have:

1. A highly mobile, pretty powerful army able to stand toe-to-toe with most protoss compositions
2. An army that can reinforce quickly
3. Drop tech, which allows for multipronged harassment/attacks
4. Baneling drops (as they’re +2 or +3 at this point, they will 1-shot probes)
5. Just a more fun army =)

Basically at this point your goal is to attack him and engage appropriately and pull advantages when you can. Also, either after you finish 3/3 or from a 3rd evo when your hive is morphing, you want to start upgrading +1ranged ASAP for a possible transition (see next section on “Protoss counters”).

EDIT: These are covered beautifully in-depth in this TL guide on PvZ just released today:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=383628#3.2.3
This guide far (far) outclasses anything I could do here, but I hope this is still somewhat of a contribution given that it's from the Zerg point of view =)

Archon/immo: The main counter for this build is archon/immo/temp, maybe with some zeals for mineral dump. This fares very well against ling/bling/ultra.

Zerg counter: First of all, he will likely not be going for this unit comp after seeing your roach/ling/hydra tech, since archon/immo is not very good against this. However, it is likely that after the first engagement, he will start to switch into his composition.

Remember that hydra den you threw down? Now is the time to start building some. The best switch after losing that kind of army vs archon/immo is just pure roach/hydra (with hydra range). Unfortunately your ranged attacks will be slightly lagging, but you can also reinforce with some flanking lings on the immos for DPS on them. Kite the archons/zeals with your army, build about 12-15 hydras MAX, and the rest roach. Reinforce with roaches as long as your hydras are alive. This army comp is very strong against anything without colossi and as long as you’re able to not get stormed too hard, you should be in good shape.

If toss goes straight for archon/immo/temp from the outset, you need to catch wind of this fast and stay on roach/hydra (you already have the tech buildings in place, right?)

Void rays/stargate: Well, none of your army can shoot up, so this is another path he can go.

Zerg counter: Once again, hydras fare very well against voids, especially with ultras and lings to tank for them. Also, voids are not that great vs lings (though quite good vs ultras).

If he goes carrier, however, you will need corruptors. You should be able to spot this in plenty of time though with proper scouting.

On the mothership: Vortex is a VERY dangerous spell to use against this strat. You’re going against mass banelings, which will obliterate any army that goes in the vortex. It’s nice to have if used well (recall is still good), but vortex won’t do too much against this army comp.

Warp prism harass: AA is pretty light with this strat, so drops can rule the day.

Zerg counter: The usual: fast reaction times and static defenses, with properly placed spores. You can get some hydras at each base as well, but it is probably not worth it. Your army is very fast, so if you react properly and have good OL spread, you should be able to deal with the drops.

Basically both sides need to try to stay on top of the opponents’ tech switching and react accordingly.

Main idea: Use that hydra den to hold him off with hydra/ling. Build hydras only when he moves out and don’t get range (you’d rather spend that money on units). This is mostly a compilation from my posts on this topic from the ZvP immo/sentry allin thread.

OK, so you scout him with your overlord, you see a robo and no twilight, his probe count is relatively low, and immos are coming out. He’s probably going for the infamous immo/sentry allin. At this point, you should be stopping drones at 55ish and making pure lings if you suspect the push, and just start pumping lings. I also like to get about 4 roaches since they add significant beef to your army.

If he has a good build and is moving out at the 9:00 mark, you should be in a position where your lair just finished and your hydra den is building. As soon as it finishes and when you see him moving out, start pumping hydra/ling. If you have the APM, take the lings that you have and try to delay him (DO NOT commit with them, just fake-surround), but this is not entirely necessary. Only build hydras if he pushes out. Skip the range upgrade; you want those resources for units. Spend all your gas on hydras (4 gas) and the rest of the money on lings. Your hydras take 33s to build, so they will finish in time for his push if your build is clean. If he is heavy on zeals, reinforce with some roaches as well, preferably from the hatch at your 3rd if you can manage it since they don’t have speed. If he doesn't push, drone up and continue as above.
Here are some replays of this vs masters toss. Note that in all these games, I build hydras AFTER he pushes out:

http://drop.sc/270235 - This is vs high masters with a 9:00 moveout on Ohana. I don't even flank.

http://drop.sc/276966 - On Cloud Kingdom, pretty normal game.

http://drop.sc/276967 - On Cloud Kingdom again. I have to pull drones, but I mop up pretty easily with reinforcements.

http://drop.sc/276964 - On Daybreak. An example of a game where I have about equal drones with his probes (I had to drone pull) after the fight, but because I'm able to resupply drones quickly and tech switch I win pretty easily.

http://drop.sc/276968 - A loss on Ohana. My hydras don't have enough of a meat shield this game because I overcommitted and didn't pull drones appropriately.

With hydras, your build still has to be very clean, and if all your ling/roach die, you HAVE to pull drones to tank for your hydras, or pull back to wait for reinforcements. Never let your hydras fight alone.

Also the typical things you should do against this build still apply: fake ling surrounds, great creep spread, flanking, etc. Still, if you engage smartly you don't have to do any of those things and you can still win.

A typical criticism of going hydra is that he can just retreat and go colossi. However, colossi take SO long to get that you can easily transition to corruptor and max out in time, while droning and getting to 6 gas (if he goes to 2base). Here is an example:
http://drop.sc/277488 - He sees my hydra/ling army and retreats. I immediately drone and scout him. When I see the robo bay, I drop a spire and max out on roach. He pushes with 3 colossi and I crush it pretty easily. He ends up basically basetrading with me because I handle his warp prism harass really poorly, but I'm so flushed with cash that I max out and have to build a ton of spines to free up supply for corruptors. I engage horribly, especially when attacking into him, and nearly ignore his harass, don't get infestors or tech to hive, but I win because I'm miles ahead.

If he goes to 3base, it's like the game resets where you have 55 to 45 workers and slightly more tech with equal armies. Drone up, get your drop tech, and continue the game as you would above.

While I came up with this playstyle with the idea of not using infestors, they are, well, a good addition to pretty much ANY army comp. Infestors with your ultra/bane can lock down his retreating army and allow you to plow through it, along with providing AA, etc.

The one downside with using infestors is that it takes away gas that could be used on ultras and banelings, and they can slow down your tech. Still, they’re a fine addition to your army, though I would argue not necessary, given all your other attack options.

All replays are against masters protoss opponents.

UPDATE: new replays 12/01/12
http://drop.sc/280467 - On Daybreak. Really fun, pretty close game. For people asking about the archon/immo/temp counter, I think this is a decent showcase. My opponent was a little used to my style by now so he played against it fairly well I think, but I manage to pull it out in the end. Drops get handled pretty well, though they set him off-kilter a little, and they allow me to take 5 bases. I transition to ultra/bane and attack into strong positions at his 3rd, trading decently while taking a lot of bases. Seeing a lot of archon/immo, I remax on roach/hydra. In retrospect, I should have put in 1 more ultra along with some more banes to soften up his army, with slightly less roach. Some of my engagements aren't great; I don't really flank (really would be useful) and I sit under some storms, but eventually I'm able to overwhelm with ultra/ling/bane/hydra and some roach.

He says at the end of the game that he didn't have enough templar, which I agree with. This could have turned the tide in what was a close game. However, flanking would mitigate the effect of storm somewhat. Still it does merit some further testing.

http://drop.sc/280468 - On Cloud Kingdom. This is a fairly one-sided game (he forgot warp gate =( ), but I wanted to show the last two engagements, which should have been very favorable for him. He has 5 archons, 7 immortals, and 2 colossi vs ultra/bane in a pretty narrow choke. He manages to chew through a lot of my army, but once again at the end it's just not enough and I clean up against what is basically the hard-counter to my army comp. Mass banes = good.

http://drop.sc/280469 - On Cloud Kingdom again. This was not a particularly well-played game on either side, but I include this one because he has a mothership with vortex, as well as some archons in his army. I engage a 4-colossi 3-archon/stalker/sentry deathball army with 9 ultras (I got a little ultra-happy this game) and 66 banes. Result: 8 ultras left. Archons are nice, but in an open field vs that many banes it's not nearly enough. He also vortexes me later on, but I just send in all my banes and my ultras in. I lose some banes carelessly when the vortex ends, but he wisely keeps most of his forces out of the vortex (since he knew he'd lose them).

http://drop.sc/278773 - On Metropolis. The multiple drops ends the game early as I kill all but 9 probes.

http://drop.sc/278769 - On Daybreak. Once again, I do enough damage with the multiple drops to end the game quickly.

http://drop.sc/278771 - On Daybreak. Drops do little damage, he moves out to kill me before ultras pop. I hold him off with banelings (ideally should have loaded them up and banerain’d), and he retreats while I get ultras. Ultra/bane wins fairly easily after killing his 4th.

http://drop.sc/278770 - On Cloud Kingdom. Probably the worst map for this strat since the bases are so close together. A really fun game that has a lot of back and forth, with multiple mistakes made on both sides. Lesson learned: don’t flank with pure baneling =P Still after a long game, I manage to win with 1.5 bases mining and lings killing his probes.

http://drop.sc/278772 - On Cloud Kingdom again. Because it is hard to do multipronged aggression on this map, I keep the drops small just to buy time for fast ultras. Once I have ultras I engage and roll his stalker/colo ball. He transitions to archon/immo, and I mop this up with roach/hydra.

UPDATE: GSL similar strategy game analysis 12/01/12
Symbol vs Parting on Entombed - Symbol goes for drops, but decides to try a doom drop and for some inexplicable reason decides to fly right by where he knows Parting's warp prism is, enabling Parting to be in position to fend off the drop. The game then goes into a well-timed 3-base push by Parting. Symbol tries to hold it off with roach/bane drops, but Parting is patient and waits. Symbol delays ultras too long (18 minutes and no ultras), and as a result gets rolled. One reason for this is because he gets a couple of infestors, delaying his ultra tech. I think a multipronged drop and earlier ultras (without infestors, they did little in this game) would have been able to turn the tide in his favor.

Squirtle vs Hyun on Metropolis - Once again, Hyun goes for a couple of doom drops and multipronged attacks. I'm not a big fan of doom drops, but maybe people react fast enough at that level that it's better that way, not sure. Hyun does OK with his drops, but he has no transition and overbuilds hydras, so Squirtle wins fairly easily with a colossus push.

Symbol vs Seed on Ohana - Symbol opens roach/ling and goes into ultra/bane. In the first engagement he doesn't keep his ultras in front, which leads to a pretty bad engagement. In the second, however, Seed tries to run but Symbol has his ultras in front, and no running can really help against the ultra/bane army.

Symbol has a similar style. Belial discusses it in-depth here:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=346535
The midgame varies though, and unfortunately I can't watch the games. Also, Symbol does get infestors. Also, this is really sick:


EDIT: Upon further looking into this thread, there's a lot of great high-level discussion on ultra/bane. However, as Insoleet says below, there's not a lot of discussion about roach/hydra as a counter to this. Currently I think the best counter with this style to archon/immo/HT is ultra/bane/roach/hydra, preferably with a flank (and maybe without roaches). Ultra/hydra is compliment each other fairly well because every toss unit will target the super-tanky melee ultras first, letting the hydras sit in the back and do DPS. Banes are just good overall DPS, and I think should always be included with the army.

Also you have drop, which allows you to force engagements in somewhat favorable positions/spread out his army.

SeinGalton’s “Neo-Sauron ZvP” has many similar ideas to what I’ve posted here:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=335035

However the guide is slightly outdated and there are some large differences in our styles in the midgame. I did not build on these guides but I ran across them recently and wanted to give credit where credit is due =)

Also, this guide (released today) on PvZ addresses almost all of what I discuss here from the protoss side:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=383628#3.2.3

If you know of other guides that are similar to this one, please let me know and I will link them.