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On April 03 2013 21:15 d07.RiV wrote:Show nested quote +An alternative, or perhaps addition to, drops is the use of Nydus Canal to more efficaciously navigate the map for increased reinforcement speed and more effective multi-pronged aggression. I'd also emphasize this, especially on Akilon Wastes, where you can break the collapsible rocks in the enemy fourth and safely pop a nydus there, with zero chance of it being denied unless P opened with stargate.
Super late game I definitely can see Nydus play being really great, though I'm trying to develop this strategy very slowly allowing it to "evolve naturally" so that I don't ever allow it to become gimmicky. Early Nydus play unfortunately is very gas expensive so it feels like it turns the build into an all-in, since we're only at 2 base when the pressure begins.
Long term though, I do want to start adding nydus play both ZvP and ZvT, particularly once I've maxxed
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On April 03 2013 22:04 InfCereal wrote: I used to play with a similar strategy in the beta (mid master), except investing in a nydus for immediate siege.
I really like how you're abusing the swarm host range. I always put my swarm hosts far too close to the protoss, and end up being too close to run away.
The three prong siege is sexy as well. I'm going to have to play with this some more on ladder. I also don't play with solid build orders a lot of the time (But this is because I find that boring), so I think it'll fit me well.
Ya I find it boring/rigid as well, and sometimes flat out worse for my play because I react poorly to certain things that I didn't expect if I'm stuck on a rigid build order "oh my god I have to defend this without another spine because that'll ruin my build order!"
That swarmhost split is by far my favorite thing in SC2 these days. It feels SO cool when you pull it off, though it's very much a high risk/high reward play, because if they push out when you're moving into position you can easily lose 1/3 - 1/2 of your SH for free.
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On April 03 2013 20:37 Rekatan wrote: I find for burrowing/unburrowing they tend to manage themselves a bit. They're automatically going to spread out so just keep them on the same control group and you should be able to keep them synched up relatively well. The one thing that can be a bit annoying is one or two swarmhosts will fail to burrow because you must immediately set the locust rally point, so while the straggler is finding its burrow location, the locust rally overrides the burrow command causing him to suicide into the protoss army. Unfortunately this just has to be watched closely and the straggler manually pulled back to be burrowed during the next spawn. Is this because you are just using rightclick to set the rally instead of the rally command? I know the rally option is not visible when they SH is not burrowed, but what about R (to burrow) then Y (when it becomes available to rally) Shift-Leftclick? I will play around with this when I get home tonight but I would assume that this would work.
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How do this work against double robo colossus ?
Everytime i try to go swarmhost against a protoss, he starts double robo colossus and i get wrecked...
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On April 04 2013 15:24 Insoleet wrote: How do this work against double robo colossus ?
Everytime i try to go swarmhost against a protoss, he starts double robo colossus and i get wrecked...
Top 8 masters here, same thing. I boil it down to not having my swarmhosts in proper position and not scouting it in time, but I also seem to be quite economically behind when this hits. I think I'm just really new to this time of zerg macro, I find managing my macro with swarmhosts are super weird.. i float various amounts of minerals/gas and those 3supply bastards supplyblock me like crazy, specially with churning out queens at the same time.
Down to practise I guess, we'll see if experience can anwser the 2robo collosi.
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Russian Federation50 Posts
Shouldn't you be able to get tons of collosi kills with vipers for free? Sure, you might have to pull back a couple times, but they gotta have a ton of collosi to survive 3 waves of locusts + abducts.
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this looks really cool and I would love to see more, do you stream by some schedule?
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On April 04 2013 17:20 d07.RiV wrote: Shouldn't you be able to get tons of collosi kills with vipers for free? Sure, you might have to pull back a couple times, but they gotta have a ton of collosi to survive 3 waves of locusts + abducts.
My hive is never fast enough.. you reckon i should go hive as soon as my third is up?
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This is a really cool guide I watched the three vods in the guide and one question I have is why you never use corruptors, even against the carriers on neo planet S.
Is this just something that happens in those specific games? Or do you just prefer hydras and then rushing vipers versus collosi/air? It just seems like theres a timing where a big collosi push could be really hard to deal with with the unit comp you have before vipers.
If there is a point where you throw down a spire when is it? When you start Hive? after taking a fourth?
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Russian Federation50 Posts
My hive is never fast enough.. you reckon i should go hive as soon as my third is up? If you suspect he's massing collosi or any kind of air, then yes, that would be a good time to do that. Two bases give you barely enough gas for swarmhost production, so a third is very handy. There is no way he should be able to get a lot of collosi before that, because you start applying pressure so early.
This is a really cool guide I watched the three vods in the guide and one question I have is why you never use corruptors, even against the carriers on neo planet S.
Is this just something that happens in those specific games? Or do you just prefer hydras and then rushing vipers versus collosi/air? It just seems like theres a timing where a big collosi push could be really hard to deal with with the unit comp you have before vipers.
If there is a point where you throw down a spire when is it? When you start Hive? after taking a fourth? Hive is cheaper than spire and takes the same time to complete, so why bother? Vipers have great synergy with swarmhosts against any unit comp, and corruptors are only good against collosi (against air they will draw fire instead of locusts, which is definitely not what you want).
@Rekatan - what do you do if you anticipate a push before SHs are out? Simply put up a lot of spines and continue with the plan? What about immortal push, wouldn't that hit just before SHs?
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On April 04 2013 20:41 d07.RiV wrote:Show nested quote +My hive is never fast enough.. you reckon i should go hive as soon as my third is up? If you suspect he's massing collosi or any kind of air, then yes, that would be a good time to do that. Two bases give you barely enough gas for swarmhost production, so a third is very handy. There is no way he should be able to get a lot of collosi before that, because you start applying pressure so early. Show nested quote +This is a really cool guide I watched the three vods in the guide and one question I have is why you never use corruptors, even against the carriers on neo planet S.
Is this just something that happens in those specific games? Or do you just prefer hydras and then rushing vipers versus collosi/air? It just seems like theres a timing where a big collosi push could be really hard to deal with with the unit comp you have before vipers.
If there is a point where you throw down a spire when is it? When you start Hive? after taking a fourth? Hive is cheaper than spire and takes the same time to complete, so why bother? Vipers have great synergy with swarmhosts against any unit comp, and corruptors are only good against collosi (against air they will draw fire instead of locusts, which is definitely not what you want). @Rekatan - what do you do if you anticipate a push before SHs are out? Simply put up a lot of spines and continue with the plan? What about immortal push, wouldn't that hit just before SHs?
From watching other zergs do different styles of swarm host play, a standard three hatch, double gas @ 6min, will get hosts out in time for Immortal allins.
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i played with this (different bo), but basically reaching same sh time, so far i had fairly solid results, thanks for the videos!
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is nydus ever a good addition? Im thinking being all over the place with SH would be a good thing but I dony play zerg. Lets say on maps where the third is a bit off
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On April 04 2013 13:23 DeCoup wrote:Show nested quote +On April 03 2013 20:37 Rekatan wrote: I find for burrowing/unburrowing they tend to manage themselves a bit. They're automatically going to spread out so just keep them on the same control group and you should be able to keep them synched up relatively well. The one thing that can be a bit annoying is one or two swarmhosts will fail to burrow because you must immediately set the locust rally point, so while the straggler is finding its burrow location, the locust rally overrides the burrow command causing him to suicide into the protoss army. Unfortunately this just has to be watched closely and the straggler manually pulled back to be burrowed during the next spawn. Is this because you are just using rightclick to set the rally instead of the rally command? I know the rally option is not visible when they SH is not burrowed, but what about R (to burrow) then Y (when it becomes available to rally) Shift-Leftclick? I will play around with this when I get home tonight but I would assume that this would work.
Hmm I've never tried that, I just burrow and then right click. I know when I first started using them I tried to burrow + shift right click in order to queue up the locust rally to occur the moment the burrow was completed, and it resulted in the first locust spawn sitting idle. I'll play around with it some more though to see if that's changed.
On April 04 2013 15:24 Insoleet wrote: How do this work against double robo colossus ?
Everytime i try to go swarmhost against a protoss, he starts double robo colossus and i get wrecked...
Very well, if he attempts double robo collo on 2 base just close the gap ASAP and get that army pinned in his natural. While he's building up the deathball tech to viper and save 9 supply for them. He'll be taking losses the entire time, and will have lost his upgrading forge, possibly even his cyber core. When he finally does all-in you'll have 3 vipers ready for him, and he won't have blink or ht to respond, so 6 abduct later, he GGs :D
If he attempts to go up to double robo on 3 base, then he most likely loses his 3rd just straight up, and GGs out shortly after.
The biggest threat is probably blink stalkers into double robo, as the blinksters can really put the hurt on your SH if you aren't watching your flanks, and buy him time to get the mass established on his collos. I find that top notch SH management still deals with this though, as it is still on you to screw up and allow him a window to snipe your SH, so if you are paying close attention to them and managing them perfectly, he never is given an opening and you still win :D
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On April 04 2013 17:35 Roblin wrote: this looks really cool and I would love to see more, do you stream by some schedule?
I stream every Saturday and Sunday (except for D&D or Monster Hunter night once a month or so). Weekdays are pretty much whenever I can find the time, but are always evenings since I work 9-5. I also update my twitter and facebook when I know I'll be streaming. You can follow me @rekstarcraft and facebook.com/rekatansc2
On April 04 2013 18:55 Cry4Me wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2013 17:20 d07.RiV wrote: Shouldn't you be able to get tons of collosi kills with vipers for free? Sure, you might have to pull back a couple times, but they gotta have a ton of collosi to survive 3 waves of locusts + abducts. My hive is never fast enough.. you reckon i should go hive as soon as my third is up?
If your hive is never fast enough it is likely because you aren't starting the pressure soon enough. Hive immediately after 3rd is up is a solid timing (sooner if you are delaying 1/1) so I'd say that's good to stick with. Make sure from 10 minutes on though, he's eating locusts. That's really the key. If you sit back and try to play defensively with your swarmhosts he'll be at your door 4-8 minutes earlier than if you are shoving 40 locusts down his throat repeatedly *gross*.
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On April 04 2013 19:49 ultrakiss wrote:This is a really cool guide  I watched the three vods in the guide and one question I have is why you never use corruptors, even against the carriers on neo planet S. Is this just something that happens in those specific games? Or do you just prefer hydras and then rushing vipers versus collosi/air? It just seems like theres a timing where a big collosi push could be really hard to deal with with the unit comp you have before vipers. If there is a point where you throw down a spire when is it? When you start Hive? after taking a fourth?
Thanks! I'm glad you like it.
I haven't made a corruptor in probably 2-300 ZvP. Even before SH was released I only made them because I needed broodlords. Post HoTS though they are just flat out a terrible unit which needed attention from blizzard long ago. If they're into collo, I'd rather vipers. If they're into air, he can just select his stargates and press the V button a few times to nullify infinity corruptors.
That said, whenever you think "Corruptor" versus Protoss, think "Hydra+Viper" from now on, and you'll be a much happier Zergy :D
On April 04 2013 20:41 d07.RiV wrote:Show nested quote +My hive is never fast enough.. you reckon i should go hive as soon as my third is up? If you suspect he's massing collosi or any kind of air, then yes, that would be a good time to do that. Two bases give you barely enough gas for swarmhost production, so a third is very handy. There is no way he should be able to get a lot of collosi before that, because you start applying pressure so early. Show nested quote +This is a really cool guide I watched the three vods in the guide and one question I have is why you never use corruptors, even against the carriers on neo planet S.
Is this just something that happens in those specific games? Or do you just prefer hydras and then rushing vipers versus collosi/air? It just seems like theres a timing where a big collosi push could be really hard to deal with with the unit comp you have before vipers.
If there is a point where you throw down a spire when is it? When you start Hive? after taking a fourth? Hive is cheaper than spire and takes the same time to complete, so why bother? Vipers have great synergy with swarmhosts against any unit comp, and corruptors are only good against collosi (against air they will draw fire instead of locusts, which is definitely not what you want). @Rekatan - what do you do if you anticipate a push before SHs are out? Simply put up a lot of spines and continue with the plan? What about immortal push, wouldn't that hit just before SHs?
The only push that will hit before SH are out is going to be certain cut-probes gateway timings. These require the protoss player to go gateway first, so that is my first tell. By 8 minutes I like to have at least 2, probably 3 spines up. I find 3 can reliably hold long enough for a few SH to pop, without losing any drones.
Once in a while forge first will surprise me, but I've gotten into the habit of checking the nexus for chrono boost/probe count at least once before my OV leaves, and that has solved that issue.
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On April 04 2013 21:15 anatase wrote: i played with this (different bo), but basically reaching same sh time, so far i had fairly solid results, thanks for the videos!
Sure thing! Thanks for watching!
On April 04 2013 21:57 Snusmumriken wrote: is nydus ever a good addition? Im thinking being all over the place with SH would be a good thing but I dony play zerg. Lets say on maps where the third is a bit off
Late game Nydus is an amazing addition that I hope to eventually implement (once I feel the other aspects of my play such as drops and multiprong are as clean as can be).
Nydus immediately after lair will cut your swarmhost count by 3 though, which makes the push itself weaker AND puts you all-in. I think the addition of a nydus to the initial push makes the difference between stable pressure-based macro, and gimmicky all in. That said, there's a time and a place for nydus/sh/queen all in, but it's not a very reliable standard.
Ok guys I tried to get all questions responded to. If I missed something feel free to call me names and demand I respond immediately or be flogged!
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You're going to make me lose my god damn ladder points.
Hahaha in all seriousness this is pretty well thought out. I think a little bit more of addressing different situations you might run in to as a SH user would be good, but other than that good job!
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On April 05 2013 01:40 Rekatan wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2013 17:35 Roblin wrote: this looks really cool and I would love to see more, do you stream by some schedule? I stream every Saturday and Sunday (except for D&D or Monster Hunter night once a month or so). Weekdays are pretty much whenever I can find the time, but are always evenings since I work 9-5. I also update my twitter and facebook when I know I'll be streaming. You can follow me @rekstarcraft and facebook.com/rekatansc2
thanks! I'll tune in when possible, also: you earned yourself a 490th subscriber
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On April 05 2013 02:36 Nuclease wrote: You're going to make me lose my god damn ladder points. Hahaha in all seriousness this is pretty well thought out. I think a little bit more of addressing different situations you might run in to as a SH user would be good, but other than that good job!
Hahaha sorry!!! I'll get around to that dieing thing when I have a chance ^_^
I appreciate the feedback. I'm going to do a version 2 of this in a month or so once I have a mic that doesn't butcher my SSSSS sounds, and I've had a chance to develop the "what to do when you see X" a bit more.
On April 05 2013 03:28 Roblin wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2013 01:40 Rekatan wrote:On April 04 2013 17:35 Roblin wrote: this looks really cool and I would love to see more, do you stream by some schedule? I stream every Saturday and Sunday (except for D&D or Monster Hunter night once a month or so). Weekdays are pretty much whenever I can find the time, but are always evenings since I work 9-5. I also update my twitter and facebook when I know I'll be streaming. You can follow me @rekstarcraft and facebook.com/rekatansc2 thanks! I'll tune in when possible, also: you earned yourself a 490th subscriber 
Awesome thanks for subscribing!! :D
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