Hi all, I have been using mass Swarmhosts in all matchups since early beta, and have had relatively good success. The following guides are designed to help others develop their Swarmhost play, as well as to stimulate further discussion so that we can maximize the potential of this amazing unit.
In ZvP specifically I am confident enough in my play (81% currently vs High Master/GM) to post a build order and short guide.
The vod detailing the build order and executing it live as I explain it can be viewed here:
For those who would rather skip the vod and give the build order a try without further explanation, it is listed below.
Let me know if you have any questions/comments/critique in how I can improve this!
10 - Extractor Trick 11 - Overlord 11 - Spawning Pool 16 - Queen 18 - Extractor Trick 18 - Zergling 19 - Overlord 19 - Hatchery 20 - Queen 22 - Overlord 28 - Queen 28 - Extractor 44 - Lair 44 - Extractor 60 - Spine Crawler 60 - Extractors 3 and 4 60 - Infestation Pit 59 - Overseer 59 - 3 Spores (Depending on what they have shown) 64 - Begin Swarmhost/Queen production, and take 3rd if they are not 2 base all in
From here you are going to go for Queen/Swarmhost aggression eventually mixing Roach/Hydra to support the Queens. Finally for end game 3-6 Vipers can be included to lock the game down.
A few tips to keep in mind:
1. Always keep your Swarmhosts moving! SH have by far the highest skill ceiling of any unit Zerg has, so don't be surprised if it takes you a bit to become comfortable with the way SH change your Zerg play both in macro and micro. As a rule of thumb if your SH have spawned twice or more from the same location, it's probably time to move them (optimally you want to relocate between each spawn).
2. Zerg macro is entirely different when Swarmhosts are involved. Your measure of success is unit efficiency now, rather than superior economy. It is OK to be at 60 drones the entire game if you are keeping a 1:3 resource loss ratio. Vice versa, you will never want to be much higher than 70 drones (definitely not 80) as you will no longer have adequate supply to maintain critical mass (16+) for your Swarmhosts, and still have a supporting army. That said, you can also comfortably stay on equal bases with your opponent (no more +1 rule woohoo!).
3. Likewise, where you put your multitasking needs to change drastically. Optimizing your Swarmhosts is now priority #1 (this includes keeping them alive ^_^). Also, injecting should be entirely discontinued after the initial push begins since your queens will be needed up front, and your larva use is very low. If you suspect that a remax will be needed to end the game feel free to grab 2 or 3 macro hatcheries to make up for the lack of injections, you will have plenty of resources to spare after all!
4. Your second highest priority is creep spread. Drop creep on expansions, aggressively push your creep tumors, and when the time comes make sure to bring plenty of overlords to creep highway to their 3rd. Without this your Queens will most likely be caught out of position, and your Locusts will have significantly reduced efficiency.
5. Drops synergize extremely well with Swarmhost play. Consider loading 8 Hydras into overlords and dropping enemy mineral lines while your main aggression hits their 3rd. This is particularly strong versus double stargate and warp prism opens.
6. Just because they have air, does not mean your Swarmhosts are useless! They are absolutely crucial for cleaning up the ground buffer to allow your Hydra/Viper to take care of their air (see the below VOD for an example).
7. Lastly, as long as you still have a reasonable Swarmhost count, you are still in the game, so don't count yourself out too soon! I have had many games both ZvP and ZvT where my main and all tech were lost, but the game was won due to a slow Spore/Spine/SH crawl across the map to clean up his remaining buildings.
Other casts with further analysis:
ZvP vs Barcode -
ZvP vs Nyb -
ZvP vs LucyPrime -
ZvP vs EGHukRC -
My most recent replay pack (all matchups, but all ZvP should include SH play unless the game ended before midgame): http://snk.to/f-chm0ol8p
For now this section will be used to add some introductory youtube casts so that you guys can see the progress that I am making with ZvT. Eventually this section will feature its own complete guide.
ZvT vs Razuik - Some new elements are added to the early game to allow the SH midgame to occur a bit more organically.
ZvT vs Jacks - One of my earlier ZvT Swarmhost casts that starts to develop some of our initial ground rules for ZvT with Swarmhosts.
Tili - I'd say that SH are far better used offensively than defensively, they tend to be dodged by the opponent when used in a defensive capacity. I've actually had a player walk right past 8 swarmhosts and eat my mineral line with his stalkers before. The moment I take those kinds of games offensive though, the losses I took on the defensive side are paid back 10 fold >:D
On April 03 2013 13:58 Rekatan wrote: Thanks guys, I'm glad it's helped!
Tili - I'd say that SH are far better used offensively than defensively, they tend to be dodged by the opponent when used in a defensive capacity. I've actually had a player walk right past 8 swarmhosts and eat my mineral line with his stalkers before. The moment I take those kinds of games offensive though, the losses I took on the defensive side are paid back 10 fold >:D
Yea, what I've seen on some streams, and am working on myself, is knowing how to leave 1-3 SH home for defense against small or even medium counters/harassment. Knowing how many to break off, an getting the SH in the right position at the right time.... these are very difficult for me.
On April 03 2013 13:58 Rekatan wrote: Thanks guys, I'm glad it's helped!
Tili - I'd say that SH are far better used offensively than defensively, they tend to be dodged by the opponent when used in a defensive capacity. I've actually had a player walk right past 8 swarmhosts and eat my mineral line with his stalkers before. The moment I take those kinds of games offensive though, the losses I took on the defensive side are paid back 10 fold >:D
Yea, what I've seen on some streams, and am working on myself, is knowing how to leave 1-3 SH home for defense against small or even medium counters/harassment. Knowing how many to break off, an getting the SH in the right position at the right time.... these are very difficult for me.
I think the tricky thing there is that now you're tieing up 3, 6, 9, etc supply for static defense, when 90% of those locust spawns will expire without dealing a bit of damage. Swarmhosts are only paying for themselves when the locusts are attacking. Effectively this means that we're tieing up a very expensive unit, and the supply to maintain them, to fill the role that the same amount of resources invested in spines/spores could have done just as well if not better, with no supply commitment.
I've been trying to experiment with aggressive 2-base swarm host openers, but hadn't had too much success with them. Your BO is far superior to what I was using though. Definitely going to give this a shot! Thanks for the guide, looks really good.
My questions are: 1) How does the build match up against 2-base colossus openers? How do you play that out? 2) How does it match up against stargate openers?
Against 2-base tech play, are you looking to take a faster 3rd and play more passively? It seems like if they have VRs out, you can't actually get aggressive until you have creep spread to their half of the map, since queens are your only AA for some time.
On April 03 2013 14:56 JDub wrote: I've been trying to experiment with aggressive 2-base swarm host openers, but hadn't had too much success with them. Your BO is far superior to what I was using though. Definitely going to give this a shot! Thanks for the guide, looks really good.
My questions are: 1) How does the build match up against 2-base colossus openers? How do you play that out? 2) How does it match up against stargate openers?
Against 2-base tech play, are you looking to take a faster 3rd and play more passively? It seems like if they have VRs out, you can't actually get aggressive until you have creep spread to their half of the map, since queens are your only AA for some time.
1.By the time I move out they're typically on 1-2 colossus, so as long as I don't take too much damage from warp prism harass I'm able to pin them down while my 3rd gets comfortably saturated (not too many more drones are needed to accomplish this since my target drone count is so low).
The end result is typically a 2 base all in from Protoss, which Zerg holds very well since your SH are knocking down their wall when they decide to push out - allowing you an easy 4-6 locust spawns as you kite back. Optimally you will want a couple vipers by the time he arrives at your 3rd but even without, by this time his army has been worn down too much by the constant locust attacks.
*EDIT*
2. It tends to hard counter all single stargate openers as long as you can get the creep highway established long enough for queens to get in position. Double stargate openers I like to just pin down with a spore/SH/queen contain and let attrition win the game for me by way of hydra drops and repeated queen/hydra push behind the locust wall (interceptors are baited out by the locusts allowing hydras to clean them up, so this is particularly easy vs carriers). All in all, I'd say actually blink/collo is the toughest to deal with. Skytoss is generally pretty easy though.
very good guide, I could never make swarm host works unless I am smurfing in the lower leagues. It's probably the mind set and the different play style that I just don't quite get yet. Your videos were very detailed and opened my eyes up on some crucial points I never noticed.
a few questions: should I be spawning locust from far distance? when should I press forward?
another is how to burrow and unburrow them effectively? I am having big trouble trying to doing that repeatly for a large swarm host count. some need time to find a location to burrow and so the spawn locust time differs and each wave becomes smaller than what it could have been.
I had a ridiculous win percentage in the beta using a similar Queen/Swarm Host strategy. 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.
Oh god, I think you just ruined my life, making this build even more popular!
In all fairness, I really have no clue how to counter this build as a P player. Continously fighting against free units is so hard, especially because the hosts are burrowed and get the support of many queens and overseers.
On April 03 2013 17:22 ETisME wrote: very good guide, I could never make swarm host works unless I am smurfing in the lower leagues. It's probably the mind set and the different play style that I just don't quite get yet. Your videos were very detailed and opened my eyes up on some crucial points I never noticed.
a few questions: should I be spawning locust from far distance? when should I press forward?
another is how to burrow and unburrow them effectively? I am having big trouble trying to doing that repeatly for a large swarm host count. some need time to find a location to burrow and so the spawn locust time differs and each wave becomes smaller than what it could have been.
Awesome I'm glad they're helping! To answer your questions - You should generally be spawning locusts from a distance. The goal is to consistently take advantage of the high range the SH has. If you are pushing your swarmhosts close enough that the opponent can easily reach them after a locust spawn has been cleaned up, you are giving him an opportunity to kill all your swarmhosts (and by association, autowin the game).
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.
On April 03 2013 20:18 WonnaPlay wrote: Oh god, I think you just ruined my life, making this build even more popular!
In all fairness, I really have no clue how to counter this build as a P player. Continously fighting against free units is so hard, especially because the hosts are burrowed and get the support of many queens and overseers.
Haha sorry! I've had a lot of Protoss players ragequit vs this, I can only imagine how frustrating it is.
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.
Biggest scumbag strategy i've encountered on ladder Fortunally he underestimated double stargate and didnt invest into enough antiair to counter my voidrays ~~.
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.
On April 03 2013 20:55 gronnelg wrote: You say one should always be relocating the SH. 1. What triggers you to move? 2. Where do you move to? 3. What triggers you to NOT move?
1. I personally try to relocate between each spawn if possible, unless I've established a spore/spine contain, in which case it's safe to keep them still for a bit.
2. I move either A. Forward (they are retreating from the locusts) B. Backward (they are pushing through the locusts, indicating they want to snipe my Swarmhosts) or C. to another angle, but neither forward or backward (they are neither retreating or pushing, but holding with forcefield/blink micro/collosus). C will often times force them to reposition and deal some guaranteed damage to buildings for the brief moment that they are out of position. The other two are meant to take out army.
3. Typically only if I have spores/spines set up to support my SH, or I'm making my final push and am too occupied with queen/viper micro.
EPT![[image loading]](http://starcraftlictor.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/zerg-vs-protoss-counters.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://starcraftlictor.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/zerg-vs-terran-counters.jpg)
