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FFW_Rude
France10201 Posts
Your post on ATZ was really cool so you should post it here too. I don't see any people disagreeing with that  When i put my infestation pit i wanted to go hive but forgot  So i'll do stuff and move on if i die (i told you i was doing that but a few days ago i started not liking again to lose and tried to ajust or react). So i'll try to focus on : "training" and not "winning". Since i play like 8 game per day and it's almost 7 ZvZ i should get better at that  Thanks again (and again). | ||
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Zheryn
Sweden3653 Posts
I originally wrote this post as a response to a thread on reddit.com/r/allthingszerg asking this question. FFW_Rude seemed to find it atleast a bit interesting so I edited it a bit and added some things and now post it here as well, hope no one minds. I don't really know how to format stuff so this might look ugly. From my personal experiences I think understanding builds and macro and how these things work together is the most crucial part of the game and the first thing one should focus on learning. Builds don't have to involve many steps, and you don't have to remember a bunch of supply timings unless you're really trying to optimize a build to the max. As zerg, builds come quite naturally once you've learned to macro properly for the first minutes of a game. When you practise using builds it will be easier to understand and learn new builds and easier to understand the race, especially because of how zerg macro works. When I played this game a few years ago, I was trying to make builds based on timings. I would for example say "I want to hit a speed roach timing at 9 minutes" and then work backwards from there and figure out the build, example: - Roach speed takes 110 seconds, lair needs to be done 7:10 - Lair takes 80 seconds, need to have 100 gas at 5:50 - It takes 25 seconds to mine 100 gas from double geyser, and 30 second build time so I need to start 2x geysers at 4:55 - etc etc What I didn't realise when I was doing this was that I might hurt my economy/macro by not using the macro as a part of the build, and this was because I didn't really understand how zerg works. I was just making as many drones as I could afford and build the buildings at the times I had worked out, and ultimately my timings wasn't as strong as they could have been. Zerg has one resource that protoss and terran does not: Larva. This is the resource I didn't take into consideration when I made my builds. Just as any resource you want to spend it asap, but since larva is your production, it's extra important. If you don't spend your larva on drones asap, you will lose out on some income you would have got from those drones, which means you don't have enough money to spend upcoming larva on drones which means you are losing even more income. This means that you want to balance your larva income, as well as your mineral and gas income. For example, when you're going hatch first you're going to get double queen at roughly the same time, and will therefor get a double inject off quite early for 8 larva. You want to make sure you can spend those larva as quickly as possible so you want to start floating some minerals once you approach that first inject, and will have to plan out what you can afford to build before those larva pop and still have enough minerals to spend the larva. With a gasless builds it will time out nicely to make 2 additional queens and still be able to spend those 8 larva. However, if you get a gas together with a hatch first, you'll have less income, which means you won't be able to spend those larva if you also make 4 queens. This is why gas builds only have 2 or 3 queens in the early game, to be able to spend larva and not cut in to drone production. Trade-offs like these are what a zerg has to make while creating builds. This is also something you'll have to think about during a game. Let's say you open up a gasless hatch first and get 10-pooled. You manage to save the hatchery by using drones but you take some drone losses. Now you'll have less income to work with, which means that if you still try to go for 4 queens and inject both hatcheries, you won't be able to spend your larva. So now you have to balance your larva income. You could either skip 1 or 2 queens and probably still be able to spend your larva on drones and get ahead. This is a good choice if you don't think you will be attacked as you'll be able to raise your drone count quickly. If you think you still need 4 early queens for defense, you might want to consider using some queen energy for something other than injects as you know you won't be able to spend the larva anyway. Saving it up for transfuse or getting a creep tumor might be best. Back to build orders. What I changed in the way I make builds is to make sure I can continually spend my larva while morphing the buildings I want, unless I have a specific reason to cut some drone production to get a building out quicker. An example of a build I do now is HyuNs 1/1 roach timing on 3 base, which is really simple and makes so much sense if you connect it to larva/injects. Please note that the exact supply counts might vary but that doesn't really matter as long as the timings are about the same and that you don't cut drone production. How I do it: - 15 hatch - 16 pool - 6 lings and double queen - Inject both hatcheries and start 2 more queens - When first inject pops, make 2 gases. Notice that you'll be at 36 supply if you do it right before spending larva or 44 supply right after spending larva. - After second inject you start buildings because now you have made enough drones for 2 base saturation. Third base, lair, roach warren followed by double gas in main and then double evos comes at this point. This is a point where you intentionally cut your drone production in favor of buildings, since you have already saturated 2 bases and don't have much use of more drones right now. - Spend a few more larva on drones for a slight oversaturation and then start +1/+1, some roaches and roach speed - Transfer some/make some drones for third base then mass roaches As you can see, it's a very easy build order, (basically: first inject = double gas, second inject = buildings), which is why I said you don't have to memorize a lot or do things at exact times, just building stuff when you can afford it based on larva. Since this build is timed out well, you can spend you larva on drones without having idle larva, all the way up to 2 base saturation. (Of course in some MUs/vs some builds you'll have to do builds that cut in to your drone production in order to be safe, but as long as you do it because you have a reason to do it it's okay). This is why I almost always tell people to put their focus to practising inject cycles before they do anything else, because they are hurting themselves so much by not actually spending their larva, and also building stuff when they really can't afford it because they have larva they need to spend. | ||
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Zheryn
Sweden3653 Posts
On September 24 2014 22:21 FFW_Rude wrote: I do the build five time every night before going to ladder. Maybe that's not enough ? Your post on ATZ was really cool so you should post it here too. I don't see any people disagreeing with that When i put my infestation pit i wanted to go hive but forgot So i'll do stuff and move on if i die (i told you i was doing that but a few days ago i started not liking again to lose and tried to ajust or react). So i'll try to focus on : "training" and not "winning". Since i play like 8 game per day and it's almost 7 ZvZ i should get better at that Thanks again (and again). That's great, keep practising :D Well, you shouldn't just lose because you play way too greedy and just be happy with it and move on. You should look at what you can improve mechanic wise and then see if you need to adjust your build to not die. That's something I keep doing when I'm learning stuff I haven't done that much. For example, right now I'm trying out more hatch first vs zerg and some 3 hatch before pool vs protoss, and I die quite often to early attacks, but I always feel like there's something I can change in how I deal with them so I always have something to practise. And even if I come up with a perfect response in theory vs different stuff, I'll have to execute those many times to be able to do it really good as well. If you don't feel like you're learning anything from your losses or don't like how the games play out, try a different opener or ask for tips about a specific situation. There's a lot to learn and practise in this game and it never stops ;D | ||
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FFW_Rude
France10201 Posts
And if you don't find it, you scratch the build you are doing against what your opponent have done ? Did i get that right ? Exemple : - He linged allin and I supply blocked two times so i need to improve on that. - He linged allin too but oh, when he attacked i had perfect ovie, perfect drone, perfect tech and no supply so what could i do to stop him. *try to change stuff. Don't find something that can be done while not doing mistakes* => Ok so if i scout ling allin, don't do the build and do another one. I done kind of that with your ZvP build, as i can get away with hatch first instead of pool first. But in ZvZ i'm really ... not able to do that for now. | ||
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Zheryn
Sweden3653 Posts
On September 24 2014 23:52 FFW_Rude wrote: So basicly, see if you have done something wrong. If you have, move on. If you didn't and it was good, look at what youo can change to stop this kind of attack with this build. And if you don't find it, you scratch the build you are doing against what your opponent have done ? Did i get that right ? I done kind of that with your ZvP build, as i can get away with hatch first instead of pool first. But in ZvZ i'm really ... not able to do that for now. You can play this game in different ways and focus on different things, so everyone should do whatever they enjoy the most My approach is what I enjoy the most and what I also believe is the best way to learn, but that not might be the case for everyone. I just don't think you should make strategic changes if you make pretty big mechanic/macro mistakes as there might not be anything wrong with the strategy, just the execution. If you're not comfortable with or think you can execute a build, then just scrap it yeah. Or also ofc if you play it really well and you can't think of a way to react to some things, but then it probably means you're using a really weird or extremely greedy build. Just try to be really decisive. Try to have already prepared responses to the most common builds and just try to execute them as well as possible and then just change it up if you notice it doesn't work. It's better to be decisive and go "I'm going to build exactly one spine and 6 lings and then just drones until I see him rallying lings if I play vs 14/14" rather than trying different stuff each game and kind of winging it. The more prepared and decisive you are, the easier it will be to stay focused/not panic, even if your prepared response happens to not be the best response. | ||
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FFW_Rude
France10201 Posts
Not in builds per say but in mentality. Hey silver to top 8plat in 15days (facing some diamond right now) after not playing for a year. Yeah i think your advices work :p | ||
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Asgorath
United States15 Posts
http://ggtracker.com/matches/5455748 I probably overbuilt Lings because I wasn't sure what to do, and poor micro meant I lost a bunch of my Queens. He eventually built up to 13 Reapers and had me pretty well contained on one base until I got enough Roaches out, then transitioned into mass Banshee and won the game. | ||
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EndOfLineTv
United States741 Posts
On September 24 2014 22:22 Zheryn wrote: How important are build orders as zerg? (Post about builds, larva and macro) I originally wrote this post as a response to a thread on reddit.com/r/allthingszerg asking this question. FFW_Rude seemed to find it atleast a bit interesting so I edited it a bit and added some things and now post it here as well, hope no one minds. I don't really know how to format stuff so this might look ugly. From my personal experiences I think understanding builds and macro and how these things work together is the most crucial part of the game and the first thing one should focus on learning. Builds don't have to involve many steps, and you don't have to remember a bunch of supply timings unless you're really trying to optimize a build to the max. As zerg, builds come quite naturally once you've learned to macro properly for the first minutes of a game. When you practise using builds it will be easier to understand and learn new builds and easier to understand the race, especially because of how zerg macro works. When I played this game a few years ago, I was trying to make builds based on timings. I would for example say "I want to hit a speed roach timing at 9 minutes" and then work backwards from there and figure out the build, example: - Roach speed takes 110 seconds, lair needs to be done 7:10 - Lair takes 80 seconds, need to have 100 gas at 5:50 - It takes 25 seconds to mine 100 gas from double geyser, and 30 second build time so I need to start 2x geysers at 4:55 - etc etc What I didn't realise when I was doing this was that I might hurt my economy/macro by not using the macro as a part of the build, and this was because I didn't really understand how zerg works. I was just making as many drones as I could afford and build the buildings at the times I had worked out, and ultimately my timings wasn't as strong as they could have been. Zerg has one resource that protoss and terran does not: Larva. This is the resource I didn't take into consideration when I made my builds. Just as any resource you want to spend it asap, but since larva is your production, it's extra important. If you don't spend your larva on drones asap, you will lose out on some income you would have got from those drones, which means you don't have enough money to spend upcoming larva on drones which means you are losing even more income. This means that you want to balance your larva income, as well as your mineral and gas income. For example, when you're going hatch first you're going to get double queen at roughly the same time, and will therefor get a double inject off quite early for 8 larva. You want to make sure you can spend those larva as quickly as possible so you want to start floating some minerals once you approach that first inject, and will have to plan out what you can afford to build before those larva pop and still have enough minerals to spend the larva. With a gasless builds it will time out nicely to make 2 additional queens and still be able to spend those 8 larva. However, if you get a gas together with a hatch first, you'll have less income, which means you won't be able to spend those larva if you also make 4 queens. This is why gas builds only have 2 or 3 queens in the early game, to be able to spend larva and not cut in to drone production. Trade-offs like these are what a zerg has to make while creating builds. This is also something you'll have to think about during a game. Let's say you open up a gasless hatch first and get 10-pooled. You manage to save the hatchery by using drones but you take some drone losses. Now you'll have less income to work with, which means that if you still try to go for 4 queens and inject both hatcheries, you won't be able to spend your larva. So now you have to balance your larva income. You could either skip 1 or 2 queens and probably still be able to spend your larva on drones and get ahead. This is a good choice if you don't think you will be attacked as you'll be able to raise your drone count quickly. If you think you still need 4 early queens for defense, you might want to consider using some queen energy for something other than injects as you know you won't be able to spend the larva anyway. Saving it up for transfuse or getting a creep tumor might be best. Back to build orders. What I changed in the way I make builds is to make sure I can continually spend my larva while morphing the buildings I want, unless I have a specific reason to cut some drone production to get a building out quicker. An example of a build I do now is HyuNs 1/1 roach timing on 3 base, which is really simple and makes so much sense if you connect it to larva/injects. Please note that the exact supply counts might vary but that doesn't really matter as long as the timings are about the same and that you don't cut drone production. How I do it: - 15 hatch - 16 pool - 6 lings and double queen - Inject both hatcheries and start 2 more queens - When first inject pops, make 2 gases. Notice that you'll be at 36 supply if you do it right before spending larva or 44 supply right after spending larva. - After second inject you start buildings because now you have made enough drones for 2 base saturation. Third base, lair, roach warren followed by double gas in main and then double evos comes at this point. This is a point where you intentionally cut your drone production in favor of buildings, since you have already saturated 2 bases and don't have much use of more drones right now. - Spend a few more larva on drones for a slight oversaturation and then start +1/+1, some roaches and roach speed - Transfer some/make some drones for third base then mass roaches As you can see, it's a very easy build order, (basically: first inject = double gas, second inject = buildings), which is why I said you don't have to memorize a lot or do things at exact times, just building stuff when you can afford it based on larva. Since this build is timed out well, you can spend you larva on drones without having idle larva, all the way up to 2 base saturation. (Of course in some MUs/vs some builds you'll have to do builds that cut in to your drone production in order to be safe, but as long as you do it because you have a reason to do it it's okay). This is why I almost always tell people to put their focus to practising inject cycles before they do anything else, because they are hurting themselves so much by not actually spending their larva, and also building stuff when they really can't afford it because they have larva they need to spend. Good post. I am a GM zerg and I am all about build orders: I have them memorised all the way to 100 - 150 supply. I really think you can get 50 more supply at 13 min with a good build order vs a bad one | ||
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FFW_Rude
France10201 Posts
On September 25 2014 01:20 Asgorath wrote: How do I defend against mass Reaper in the early game? http://ggtracker.com/matches/5455748 I probably overbuilt Lings because I wasn't sure what to do, and poor micro meant I lost a bunch of my Queens. He eventually built up to 13 Reapers and had me pretty well contained on one base until I got enough Roaches out, then transitioned into mass Banshee and won the game. I'm not sure i'm the one to help and can't look at your rep right now but i faced a guy last week or so that did the same thing : http://ggtracker.com/matches/5436975 | ||
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keule82
Germany2 Posts
I am struggling hardcore in ZvT right now. I just can't figure out how to play this matchup. This is particularly annyoing because I feel I can get into or at least a big step closer to masters league when I figure out what I have to do. So what is my problem? I feel I am not alone with this. Terran can be agressive an many ways right now: Reaper / Helion / Banshee play in the early / midgame or a combination of this. Hellbat / Marine pushes in midgame, then switch to a biocentric playstyle. If I take to much damage in the early game, the bio push will kill me. Sometimes I lose to Hellbat psuhes right away. If I fend of the early agression because I am prepared for it, I am behind on upgrades, lair and most importantly my third. What is my approach to this? I go for a 15 hatch / 16 pool / 15 pool / 3 queen / ling speed / overloard speed opener. After saturating my 2 bases I take 2 more gases and go for a roach warren and an evo chamber (+1 carapace). Then I start my lair and try to get a third. This depends on what **** the terran throws at me. Overlord speed is crucial because I have to know if he has a tech lab on his starport or if he is hiding an armory. Also I build 4 roaches preamptively to be safe. But all of this costs a lot of money, so the terran will just overwhelm me later on. Am I angry? You betcha! I think at my skill level the matchup is just broken atm. Zerg is forced to be extremely passive and I dont want to do an all in build every game to be able to circumvent this. I could need your help! 1. If you are a high diamond / masters Zerg: Do you have a replay of how you play this matchup right now? Looking at DRG, sOo or others doens't really help because I don't have 400 apm at my disposal to pull off what they are doing. 2. Do you have a stable macro build that you would recommend. There aren't any good up to date builds available in the forum. If this is wrong I aplogize for not checking thoroughly. Also, I don't seem to be bright enough to figure out a build myself, plus I have this waste of time to do which is called a job. Whoever's idea it was to invent this ****!? Maybe you can help me with my problem. I also hope that the level of whining and imbaing is still tolerable in my post! Peace out! | ||
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Enigmasc
United Kingdom147 Posts
lategame i have no idea how to fight them, even if i get to 3/3 ling bane feels uselless because of the ammount of widowmines they mix in, and you cant even pick off stray mines with your muta cloud because you just eat a thor volley to the face whenever you try -_-, i dont know what im aiming for endgame, utlras are just bad unless you have a huge economy + infestors and i feel like a mm/widowmine/thor just straight up wins unless your on creep. so frustrating , ill conceed that tvz was pretty broken in our favour for a while but iv literally dropped from 60% to like 25-30% winrate vs terran | ||
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Big J
Austria16289 Posts
Good post. I am a GM zerg and I am all about build orders: I have them memorised all the way to 100 - 150 supply. I really think you can get 50 more supply at 13 min with a good build order vs a bad one I doesn't even have to be a bad BO, but rather just one that tries to be too catch-all or safe where you could replace resource investments (like safety techs, keeping options open, static D, units...) with actions (like scouting, using the units you have more efficiently...) The first time I really realized what a huge difference that makes, i.e. that it is not just "well, let's build that one spore crawler just in case he is DTing; get that hydra den even though I never play them, just in case he plays multiple Stargates", was back in WoL when Stephano's roach max out became popular as well as Sentry/Immortal attacks. Try to hit a 11-12min max out without making perfect use of your Overlords or holding a pre 10min Sentry/Immortal when you didn't drone straight to 55... Then you realize how huge of an advantage you can get if you just make the proper reads instead of scattering tech/units/defense all over the place. | ||
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velvex
Germany226 Posts
On September 25 2014 01:20 Asgorath wrote: How do I defend against mass Reaper in the early game? http://ggtracker.com/matches/5455748 I probably overbuilt Lings because I wasn't sure what to do, and poor micro meant I lost a bunch of my Queens. He eventually built up to 13 Reapers and had me pretty well contained on one base until I got enough Roaches out, then transitioned into mass Banshee and won the game. I haven't played against this much, but I think defending this is mostly a mechanics check, meaning it's mostly about not taking too much damage, so you can eventually win by gaining an economic advantage. You should realise pretty quickly that something's up when the reaper pressure comes earlier and with more reapers than what usual. At that point, you should get a gas not only because you want speedlings to deal with the reapers, but also because you'll most likely not be able to mine from your natural for quite some time, and one base with 16 drones and some gas mining is much better than just 16 drones without gas. Roaches are an option, too, but I personally prefer speedlings because they can actually catch reapers and punish a reckless opponent that way. Once metabolic boost is done, drive out the reapers and build a two-base economy while looking out for possible blue-flame/hellbat or banshee follow-ups (Terran is on two gases and the gas has to go somewhere). React with roaches or queens/spores, respectively. | ||
EsportsJohn
United States4883 Posts
On September 25 2014 00:11 Zheryn wrote: You can play this game in different ways and focus on different things, so everyone should do whatever they enjoy the most My approach is what I enjoy the most and what I also believe is the best way to learn, but that not might be the case for everyone. I just don't think you should make strategic changes if you make pretty big mechanic/macro mistakes as there might not be anything wrong with the strategy, just the execution. If you're not comfortable with or think you can execute a build, then just scrap it yeah. Or also ofc if you play it really well and you can't think of a way to react to some things, but then it probably means you're using a really weird or extremely greedy build. Just try to be really decisive. Try to have already prepared responses to the most common builds and just try to execute them as well as possible and then just change it up if you notice it doesn't work. It's better to be decisive and go "I'm going to build exactly one spine and 6 lings and then just drones until I see him rallying lings if I play vs 14/14" rather than trying different stuff each game and kind of winging it. The more prepared and decisive you are, the easier it will be to stay focused/not panic, even if your prepared response happens to not be the best response. My usual approach to learning is to play with extremes and then adjust because it's a lot easier to figure out which direction to skew towards. For instance, opening with pressure builds like 4-gates and 14/14 and things like that force you to really understand the basics of what you're doing and help you identify in which situations that works and which situations that really really doesn't; in this way, you can adjust your build to be more macro oriented while still retaining this timing and knowing when it will work. On the opposite extreme, going super greedy like triple hatch before pool or gasless openings in ZvZ helps you figure out how greedy you can be. If you die to something, you add it to a list of timings and possible pressure and create a response and slowly skew back towards "safer". Doing the two of these in tandem creates an environment where you're constantly learning about how greedy you can be while also learning what attacks work under certain circumstances. Like you said, as well, being decisive in these situations is incredible useful. You want to make adjustments OUTSIDE of the game. Inside of the game, just do what you planned to do and do not deviate no matter what. At least, for practice purposes. Vaderseven has a really great post in SC2 Notes: How to Plan a Strategy that talks about this kind of practice. On September 25 2014 01:20 Asgorath wrote: How do I defend against mass Reaper in the early game? http://ggtracker.com/matches/5455748 I probably overbuilt Lings because I wasn't sure what to do, and poor micro meant I lost a bunch of my Queens. He eventually built up to 13 Reapers and had me pretty well contained on one base until I got enough Roaches out, then transitioned into mass Banshee and won the game. Quite simply: queens, spines, and drones. If you're going gasless, just use the lings to buy time for 4 queens to get out and to protect the queens. If he continues making mass reapers, just add on a spine in each base, take your gases, and just keep making mostly drones and queens. Against this, either go into zergling speed first and take a 3rd or just go straight into 2-base muta. As long as you're not mass producing useless lings, you'll be fine; don't panic and float 1K minerals. (Your gases are incredibly late and related to you panicking and making a ton of sacrificial slowlings). On September 25 2014 03:54 Big J wrote: I doesn't even have to be a bad BO, but rather just one that tries to be too catch-all or safe where you could replace resource investments (like safety techs, keeping options open, static D, units...) with actions (like scouting, using the units you have more efficiently...) The first time I really realized what a huge difference that makes, i.e. that it is not just "well, let's build that one spore crawler just in case he is DTing; get that hydra den even though I never play them, just in case he plays multiple Stargates", was back in WoL when Stephano's roach max out became popular as well as Sentry/Immortal attacks. Try to hit a 11-12min max out without making perfect use of your Overlords or holding a pre 10min Sentry/Immortal when you didn't drone straight to 55... Then you realize how huge of an advantage you can get if you just make the proper reads instead of scattering tech/units/defense all over the place. Another reason why I tend towards the extremes. Playing "too safe" with long term macro builds is actually really bad for practicing. You want to figure out the best way to get into the mid game in the best position possible before you even consider the mid game as a whole, much less the late game and everything after ~12:00. Forcing yourself to play extremely greedy and having to identify timings and attacks, etc., allows you to learn exactly what corners to cut without forcing you into the box of blindly "being safe". | ||
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velvex
Germany226 Posts
On September 25 2014 03:02 keule82 wrote: What is my approach to this? I go for a 15 hatch / 16 pool / 15 pool / 3 queen / ling speed / overloard speed opener. After saturating my 2 bases I take 2 more gases and go for a roach warren and an evo chamber (+1 carapace). Then I start my lair and try to get a third. This depends on what **** the terran throws at me. Overlord speed is crucial because I have to know if he has a tech lab on his starport or if he is hiding an armory. Also I build 4 roaches preamptively to be safe. But all of this costs a lot of money, so the terran will just overwhelm me later on. This sounds really like you're over-investing early on. All the tech you mention except ling speed other Zergs get after starting the third, not before. With early ling speed, it shouldn't be much of a problem to plant the third at some point between 6:00 and 6:30, before hellion harass starts. The thing that irks me most about your opener is the unconditional early overlord speed. It might avoid some nasty surprises, but there are just so many cases where you can get the necessary scouting information without it. Usually, it's easier to make a roach warren or bane nest along the evos if you can't rule out a two base attack. Regarding build orders, look at this post by John or Blade's guide, which is still not outdated in that regard. If you want to open 1/1 roaches, look at Zheryn's post a few above yours. I'd also post a replay of mine, for what it's worth, but I don't have one on 2.1.4, and the old ones don't work currently. (I hope a hotfix is already under way cos it'd really suck if you couldn't go back to any tournament games from before, well, this week.) | ||
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Jowj
United States248 Posts
On September 25 2014 03:02 keule82 wrote: Hello fellow Zergs, I am struggling hardcore in ZvT right now. I just can't figure out how to play this matchup. This is particularly annyoing because I feel I can get into or at least a big step closer to masters league when I figure out what I have to do. So what is my problem? I feel I am not alone with this. Terran can be agressive an many ways right now: Reaper / Helion / Banshee play in the early / midgame or a combination of this. Hellbat / Marine pushes in midgame, then switch to a biocentric playstyle. If I take to much damage in the early game, the bio push will kill me. Sometimes I lose to Hellbat psuhes right away. If I fend of the early agression because I am prepared for it, I am behind on upgrades, lair and most importantly my third. What is my approach to this? I go for a 15 hatch / 16 pool / 15 pool / 3 queen / ling speed / overloard speed opener. After saturating my 2 bases I take 2 more gases and go for a roach warren and an evo chamber (+1 carapace). Then I start my lair and try to get a third. This depends on what **** the terran throws at me. Overlord speed is crucial because I have to know if he has a tech lab on his starport or if he is hiding an armory. Also I build 4 roaches preamptively to be safe. But all of this costs a lot of money, so the terran will just overwhelm me later on. Am I angry? You betcha! I think at my skill level the matchup is just broken atm. Zerg is forced to be extremely passive and I dont want to do an all in build every game to be able to circumvent this. I could need your help! 1. If you are a high diamond / masters Zerg: Do you have a replay of how you play this matchup right now? Looking at DRG, sOo or others doens't really help because I don't have 400 apm at my disposal to pull off what they are doing. 2. Do you have a stable macro build that you would recommend. There aren't any good up to date builds available in the forum. If this is wrong I aplogize for not checking thoroughly. Also, I don't seem to be bright enough to figure out a build myself, plus I have this waste of time to do which is called a job. Whoever's idea it was to invent this ****!? Maybe you can help me with my problem. I also hope that the level of whining and imbaing is still tolerable in my post! Peace out! Heya! I have replays that could help you out. I'm a 18-1900ish (bonus poolT_T) masters zerg and I don't really have a problem in the match up. If you wanna add me on bnet (jowj.559) we can go over them together either tonight or tomorrow sometime. I do have some recommendations for your build though. The standard macro build that I do is copied from JD/DRG/other top zergs: 15h 16p 17g 2xqueen asap 3rdqueen at natural @100gas pull 2drones off gas. @5:30-6 Ol scout main (looking for 3rd CC/extra production facilities) @6:30 3rd base, put 2 back in gas After 3rd base placement start 4th queen @7 2xEvo, 2x gas @8 min ol scout (bio/mech/delayed 3rd) After 3rd base finishes 2x queen ASAP 1/1 with first 250 gas, baneling nest, then lair. This is a very safe build that works because of the crazy queen count. It gets you very fast upgrades and creep spread, as well as timely defense with an easily earlier baneling nest or roach warren if you are scouting at 5:30 to see their follow up tech. Jaedong also has a very successful roach warren based build that works on a lot of levels. It looks identical to the above until the 3rd base is placed, something like this: 16p 17g 2xqueen asap 3rdqueen at natural @100gas pull 2drones off gas. @5:30-6 Ol scout main (looking for 3rd CC/extra production facilities) @6:30 3rd base, put 2 back in gas then, instead of the 4th queen it gets a RW and at least 1 evo chamber (this varies) while taking slightly earlier gasses (6:45ish), and starts lair at 7 minutes. This is the basic framework for JD. With just this (which seems best to do as an adaption to confirming helion banshee or some other 2base play involving factory units or vs 3reaper into anything) JD can do 1 of 3 basic things: 1 - Go allin with +1 missiles and roach/ling/bane a Terran - he doesn't have to straight up kill him, just do damage, deny the natural/3rd for a while, that kind of thing. I really like getting burrow when I start the attack so I can leave lings behind to further economic dmg. 2 - Do a sharp timing with + 1 carapace or 1/1 lings (if he got 2evos) while droning behind the attack. This basically is just for killing SCV's, forcing units, and delaying expansions just like the first timing, you just commit less to the attack and have a swifter transition set up. 3 - Use the roaches purely for defense while getting 1/1 melee and teching to lair and spire. You can take a much faster 4th base vs any 2base play like this as you will be more than fine against anything the Terran throws at you on 2base with just ling bane roach on creep. I hope this stuff helps you! Feel free to ask me any questions and I'll try and clarify stuff. | ||
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Asgorath
United States15 Posts
On September 25 2014 05:16 SC2John wrote: Quite simply: queens, spines, and drones. If you're going gasless, just use the lings to buy time for 4 queens to get out and to protect the queens. If he continues making mass reapers, just add on a spine in each base, take your gases, and just keep making mostly drones and queens. Against this, either go into zergling speed first and take a 3rd or just go straight into 2-base muta. As long as you're not mass producing useless lings, you'll be fine; don't panic and float 1K minerals. (Your gases are incredibly late and related to you panicking and making a ton of sacrificial slowlings). Yep, I just completely panicked because I had no idea how to defend. Thanks for the info! | ||
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velvex
Germany226 Posts
On September 25 2014 05:16 SC2John wrote: Another reason why I tend towards the extremes. Playing "too safe" with long term macro builds is actually really bad for practicing. You want to figure out the best way to get into the mid game in the best position possible before you even consider the mid game as a whole, much less the late game and everything after ~12:00. Forcing yourself to play extremely greedy and having to identify timings and attacks, etc., allows you to learn exactly what corners to cut without forcing you into the box of blindly "being safe". You're surely talking with at least Diamond+ players in mind, right? Since players in platinum or lower (or even diamond or lower) should focus on getting better mechanics, along with developing game knowledge, and that becomes much harder if you're notoriously and needlessly greedy. Btw, does anyone else feel this thread has become a bit overblown and hard to read? There are a lot of questions with replays and self-analysis that would actually qualify for separate threads, and there are hardly any [H] tags on the thread list. There used to be way more [H] threads. | ||
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EsportsJohn
United States4883 Posts
On September 25 2014 03:02 keule82 wrote: Hello fellow Zergs, I am struggling hardcore in ZvT right now. I just can't figure out how to play this matchup. This is particularly annyoing because I feel I can get into or at least a big step closer to masters league when I figure out what I have to do. So what is my problem? I feel I am not alone with this. Terran can be agressive an many ways right now: Reaper / Helion / Banshee play in the early / midgame or a combination of this. Hellbat / Marine pushes in midgame, then switch to a biocentric playstyle. If I take to much damage in the early game, the bio push will kill me. Sometimes I lose to Hellbat psuhes right away. If I fend of the early agression because I am prepared for it, I am behind on upgrades, lair and most importantly my third. What is my approach to this? I go for a 15 hatch / 16 pool / 15 pool / 3 queen / ling speed / overloard speed opener. After saturating my 2 bases I take 2 more gases and go for a roach warren and an evo chamber (+1 carapace). Then I start my lair and try to get a third. This depends on what **** the terran throws at me. Overlord speed is crucial because I have to know if he has a tech lab on his starport or if he is hiding an armory. Also I build 4 roaches preamptively to be safe. But all of this costs a lot of money, so the terran will just overwhelm me later on. Am I angry? You betcha! I think at my skill level the matchup is just broken atm. Zerg is forced to be extremely passive and I dont want to do an all in build every game to be able to circumvent this. I could need your help! 1. If you are a high diamond / masters Zerg: Do you have a replay of how you play this matchup right now? Looking at DRG, sOo or others doens't really help because I don't have 400 apm at my disposal to pull off what they are doing. 2. Do you have a stable macro build that you would recommend. There aren't any good up to date builds available in the forum. If this is wrong I aplogize for not checking thoroughly. Also, I don't seem to be bright enough to figure out a build myself, plus I have this waste of time to do which is called a job. Whoever's idea it was to invent this ****!? Maybe you can help me with my problem. I also hope that the level of whining and imbaing is still tolerable in my post! Peace out! There are so many things to address here. First of all, you need to get out of the mindset that Terran has too many options and you're scared of everything. If you read any of the other posts on this page, we talked a lot about learning strong builds that aren't "overly safe" because you need to be able to get into the BEST possible situation in the mid game by only cutting the most necessary corners. Your build order falls under the category of "overly safe", which you even identify: "But all of this costs a lot of money, so the Terran will just overwhelm me later on." The second thing you need to rethink is whether or not you can pull of a professional build. There are certainly some builds that are more difficult than others and certain players which I would absolutely never ever ever suggest you copy. However, saying that you can't do a professional build because you just mechanically aren't good enough is bullshit -- it's your mind's way of saying that you're okay with where you're at and that you can't improve. Anyone who has a basic understanding of macro can pull off almost any professional build; if you're looking for a build order, don't sit around and wait for someone to post it, just go rip it off of a VoD or a replay and just practice it against the AI until you get all the macro benchmarks perfectly. It's really that simple. Here are my two go-to builds: HyuN's Roach King ZvT:+ Show Spoiler + 9 Overlord 15 Hatch 16 Pool 17 Overlord @100% Pool, start two queens and zerglings x2 (3 if you're not confident against reapers) 26 Overlord @100% Queens, start two more queens for a total of four 34 Overlord @5:15 Gas x2 40 Overlord 3rd Hatch @6:00 (use queens to push away reaper) @6:45 (100 gas) Lair -> roach warren, evo chamber x2 @7:20 Gas x2 @100% Evo chambers, start +1 ranged/+1 carapace @100% Lair, start roach speed and overlord speed @60 drones -> nonstop roach production (overlord swell first) Benchmark: At 10:30, 150/200 supply, ~35 roaches Standard Muta/ling:+ Show Spoiler + 9 Overlord 15 Hatch 16 Pool 15 Gas 17 Overlord @100% Pool , start two queens and zerglings x2 (3 if you're not confident against reapers) @100 gas -> start zergling speed and pull 2 drones off of gas 26 Overlord @100% Queens, start one more queen 34 overlord @5:50 optional ling swell (no more than 12 lings) 40 overlord 3rd Hatch @6:00 (with 3 queens) @6:30 Start two additional queens and put drones back into gas @6:45 Start 2nd gas and double evo + either roach warren OR baneling nest (recommended) @100% evos, start +1 melee/+1 carapace @Next 100 gas, start lair Get burrow and overlord speed when lair is about halfway done (~8:20) @10:00 4th hatch (either in-base or at the fourth depending on whether you killed the hellions or not) Main scouting timings are:
If you have any questions, let me know. Like I said, though, THE BEST source of information and trying to figure out how to win is to simply just take a pro game and learn the build order to perfection. As long as you can hit the benchmarks, just focus on doing that before you worry too much about how to micro queens against hellions or when you need to make a swell of lings, etc., etc. On September 25 2014 03:22 Enigmasc wrote: how do you even win in zvt anymore?the matchup just feels so terran sided right now its ridiculous lategame i have no idea how to fight them, even if i get to 3/3 ling bane feels uselless because of the ammount of widowmines they mix in, and you cant even pick off stray mines with your muta cloud because you just eat a thor volley to the face whenever you try -_-, i dont know what im aiming for endgame, utlras are just bad unless you have a huge economy + infestors and i feel like a mm/widowmine/thor just straight up wins unless your on creep. so frustrating , ill conceed that tvz was pretty broken in our favour for a while but iv literally dropped from 60% to like 25-30% winrate vs terran Look up soO vs Flash and just practice that. All you need to do is get up to four bases as quickly and safely as possible and then max out on muta/ling/bling. soO only makes like 3-4 mutas per inject cycle and spends all the rest on banes. However, by 13:30, he's maxed out with a shitton of banes and he just runs over the 2/2 Terran timing and rides it all the way back to the Terran's base FTW. If you play like this, you're going to find transitioning into hive and figuring out where to go in the late game a lot easier. | ||
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Enigmasc
United Kingdom147 Posts
so basically go much much lighter on the mutas rather than the old style of going up to 25+ muta? which tournament was so0 vs flash btw? just wondering where ill get the replay from  or is it behind a paywall? | ||
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