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The LotV Zerg Help Me Thread

Forum Index > StarCraft 2 Strategy
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Moosegills
Profile Joined March 2011
United States558 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-12-07 21:32:27
December 04 2015 03:33 GMT
#1
[image loading]
ZvT: Early Game • Mid Game • Late Game        ZvZ: Early Game • Mid Game • Late Game        ZvP: Early Game • Mid Game • Late Game


[image loading]
  • Anyone is allowed to answer. Try to backup your statements with pro game examples whenever possible. However, if you assert something wildly wrong, especially without enough support, you will be warned/banned. If you are unsure of the validity of an idea, just ask a question instead.
  • In general this thread is here to help bridge the gap between proven pro level strategies/ideas and the average player, not for you to give your opinion (unless it has very sufficient grounding from pro game evidence).
  • Don't ask the same questions that are in the OP.



[image loading] Top


  • A full list of Zerg changes can be found here




[image loading] Top


    Guides
    + Show Spoiler +
    Blades ZvT Guide (created: 11/24/15)
    3 ravager opener (created: 11/30/15)

    Q: What time does the first reaper arrive?
    + Show Spoiler +
    Assuming a standard timing build, the first reaper finishes at ~2:00, and arrives at your base at ~2:30. If more than one reaper is made, the next one will finish at ~2:30.


    Q: Why should I avoid going for lots of mutas?
    + Show Spoiler +
    Liberators scale exceptionally well, and can melt mutalisks if there are 6 or more together. It's risky to get a high number of mutalisks and have them disapear to a pack of liberators.






[image loading] Top


    Guides
    + Show Spoiler +
    Blade's ZvZ Overview (created: 12/6/15)

    Q: What army composition should I be going for?
    + Show Spoiler +
    Roach/ravager has been dominating the mid game compositions. Ravagers have essentially replaced hydralisks, and going for mutas is too risky due to how hard a timing can hit with roach/ravager.




[image loading] Top
    Guides
    + Show Spoiler +
    PiG's ZvP (created: 12/6/15)

    Q: How do I punish a nexus first?
    + Show Spoiler +
    Going for a pool before hatch and making early lings can significantly delay their tech progression, and even bust down the wall. Behind this you can start up your own economy and you can pull ahead in the worker count.


#1 HuK fan, zerg player playing for http://www.complexitygaming.com - @coL_Moosegills
jeeeeohn
Profile Blog Joined May 2011
United States1343 Posts
December 04 2015 03:43 GMT
#2
Yay! I've been waiting for this!

How would people recommend engaging a Terran who's pushing out with mines, thors, liberators, tanks, and MMM?

I generally go for lurkers, corruptors, banelings, and speedlings (maybe mix in some left over hydras) while I wait for hive tech and hope I don't die. Terran is an incredibly difficult matchup for me; I usually just die to the initial push or the followup. I can't seem to find the right mix of units to get a good engagement.
If you can't jam with the best, then you have to slam with the rest.
DontDropPlz
Profile Joined December 2015
15 Posts
December 04 2015 04:30 GMT
#3
Great thread.

I am complete bronze noob.

http://ggtracker.com/matches/6292635 - Please run at 8x and skip a lot.

1) I just could not enter his base. Why couldn't they attack the structures on the outside of his base?

And he kept destroying me with phoenix spam/a few BCs+mothership (which I had detected)

My units were fully upgraded. AND I HAD 2.5-3X HIS RESOURCES.

2) My hydras/corruptors were useless. Should I have used focus fire on individual targets?

3) Should I have used vipers/infestors ?


Cascade
Profile Blog Joined March 2006
Australia5405 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-12-04 09:05:13
December 04 2015 09:04 GMT
#4
I would like to talk a bit about queen inject mechanics.

I used to do camera hotkey inject:
queens on a hotkey, location hotkeys for each base. Select queen, press inject, hold down shift and quickly go through the location hotkeys and leftclick on the hatcheries.

That worked fine in hots with minimal queen wandering. Reason was that if the hatch is free to be injected, then the inject queen will have 25 energy, and the close by queen will do the inject. If the nearby queen doesn't have 25 energy, then the hatchery is still injected, and the inject command will not go through, even if other queens have more energy.

In lotv, using the same method causes a lot of queen wandering. If I come and do another round of injects while (some) hatcheries are still injected, the nearby queen is below 25 energy, but other queens are above 25, then an inject cycle will tell queens to go and inject the wrong hatcheries, which is a mess.

Ideally you'd go through and inject only the hatcheries with a queen with 25 energy next to them, but it is impossible to see the difference between 20 and 30 energy without selecting that single queen, and it'd take a lot more time anyway if you need to look at each queen before you decide if injecting or not.

So that method simply doesn't cut it in lotv I think. What other options are there?

1) Go through and only inject hatcheries that are not injected.
This is a worse method than original hots, as you don't take advantage of the queueing, and you'll do slower cycles as you need to look at each hatch before deciding if injecting or not. This is really a worst case approach.

2) Do normal cycle, and add a stop command at the end.
Well, the queens won't wander too much if you are fast with your cycle, but you also risk missing injects. Example:
Queen A by hatch A has 20 energy. Queen B and queen C by hatch B and C respectively each have 30 energy. When you start your cycle at hatch A, the inject command will go to queen B, that will start walking towards hatch A. You then issue a command to inject hatch B, which will go to queen C, as queen B is already busy walking towards A. The last inject command at hatch C will be queued to queen C to do after queen C has injected hatch B. After that you press stop, and you have done no injects, only moved two of the queens a bit, despite both queen B and C having mana.
Not ideal, and worse than hots, where hatch B and C would have been injected if available (hatch A is injected already as queen A is below 25).

3) location hotkeys + drag-select.
Some pros did this on streams in hots I think, because they apparently had spare apm in hots... (or they didn't train properly). This transitions perfectly into lotv, as you can still do the exact same thing without wandering, and you'll be able to make use of the queueing. It is still hard to see if a queen has 25 energy or not when you location hotkey there, so you risk wasting a lot of actions on trying to inject with queens with 20 energy. For me, being used to a significantly faster inject method (in the sense that it requires less button presses and mouse movement), this still really feels like a step back from hots though. :/

4) Single queen inject with rapid fire.
I noticed that if you bind inject to rapid fire, and select a single queen with lots of mana, you can hold shift, hover a hatch and hold down rapid fire a short while to tell the queen to empty the mana into the hatch. This can be useful for noobs (like me) in late game where we collect queens with 100+ mana. Going through to do that at all hatches takes some time, but it only has to be done once every 4-8 inject cycles or so (with 100-200 spare mana) for constant injects. Not really useful early-mid game though, when queen energy is pretty low.

So well, I think all of those are worse than hots in terms of keeping queen mana down in early-mid game. Unless there are other methods, I feel like the inject queueing is making it harder to inject in practice.

So well, how do you guys inject? Is there a trick that makes it easy again?
A_Scarecrow
Profile Joined March 2013
Australia721 Posts
December 04 2015 12:02 GMT
#5
thanks for making this thread!
I have been struggling to play zvt. ive tried to play roach ravager but just cant move out with out dieing to drops. muta ling bane works on big maps but smaller maps drops do a lot of damage before mutas are out. should i be going for roach ravager ling then transition into lbm lurker ultra? or should i hit timings and leave some units to defend/static defence?

Masters zerg.
Dangermousecatdog
Profile Joined December 2010
United Kingdom7084 Posts
December 04 2015 12:07 GMT
#6
Just use the location hotkey, select queen, inject method. I lolled at your idea that the pros in hots which used location hotkey method used it because they didn't train properly! Especially considering that you propose emptying 100+ mana into the same hatch. Did it occur to you that the pros purposefully trained their location hotkey method so they don't have 100+ energy?
Magus.421
Profile Joined November 2011
France159 Posts
December 04 2015 12:19 GMT
#7
So well, how do you guys inject? Is there a trick that makes it easy again?


I have the same injection method since WOL and it has always worked without any problem (queen in the middle of the map, queen don't want to inject because "hey it's not my job, ask the other queen", ...).

I have 4 groups. One for each queen (i never have more than 4 queens for injection. If i want more larva, i spawn more hatcheries). In each group i have the queen + the hatchery. When i have to inject, i double select my group. The camera is centered on the hatchery but in the commands panel i have the queen spells (i don't know why. Maybe it's a bug from the very start of Starcraft 2). So, for an injection cycle i do this :

* Put the mouse cursor at the center of the screen
* Double select first group
* Injection hotkey
* Clic
* Double select second group
* Injection hotkey
* Clic
* And so on ...
No whine, just play.
Haku
Profile Joined August 2013
Germany550 Posts
December 04 2015 12:33 GMT
#8
Hey there. High Diamond Zerg here.
Played a lot of Mutas (arround 10) into Roaches in HotS. Worked out well, even against master League opponents.
How does this go in LotV? Spores are a bit nerfed in my opinion and the whole Playstyle should work out the same, doesn´t it?

Other question is, any confirmed gas timings in the different matchups yet? I am still kinda confused with the new gametime, economy at the start. I got my own gas timings so far, but they are still not where they used to be and some advice in the regard could help me out a ton.

Greetings.
Jaedong | Life | MKP | PartinG | LosirA | ByuN | TaeJa | TY | TLO | Bomber | HerO | Rotti | Dark | Stephano | Maru | Ragnarok | MC | IdrA | Serral | Creator | Bunny | INnoVation | Liquid | Prime | JinAir
blade55555
Profile Blog Joined March 2009
United States17423 Posts
December 04 2015 15:26 GMT
#9
On December 04 2015 21:33 EXRNaRa wrote:
Hey there. High Diamond Zerg here.
Played a lot of Mutas (arround 10) into Roaches in HotS. Worked out well, even against master League opponents.
How does this go in LotV? Spores are a bit nerfed in my opinion and the whole Playstyle should work out the same, doesn´t it?

Other question is, any confirmed gas timings in the different matchups yet? I am still kinda confused with the new gametime, economy at the start. I got my own gas timings so far, but they are still not where they used to be and some advice in the regard could help me out a ton.

Greetings.


That should work fine zvz/zvp, zvt might not just because Liberators are very powerful versus mutalisks.

For gas timings, in general it seems to start double mining gas at around 3:30 seems good.
When I think of something else, something will go here
Cascade
Profile Blog Joined March 2006
Australia5405 Posts
December 04 2015 17:50 GMT
#10
On December 04 2015 21:07 Dangermousecatdog wrote:
Just use the location hotkey, select queen, inject method. I lolled at your idea that the pros in hots which used location hotkey method used it because they didn't train properly! Especially considering that you propose emptying 100+ mana into the same hatch. Did it occur to you that the pros purposefully trained their location hotkey method so they don't have 100+ energy?

Yes, that's my alternative 3 above, which is significantly slower than what I and many others did in hots (also in my above post), for no advantage. So that is the best method then? :/

Then yes, I am convinced that most pros, at least foreigners, train in incredibly silly ways, but that discussion isn't for here. Feel free to pm if you are interested, but im also fine with just dropping it.


On December 04 2015 21:19 Magus.421 wrote:
Show nested quote +
So well, how do you guys inject? Is there a trick that makes it easy again?


I have the same injection method since WOL and it has always worked without any problem (queen in the middle of the map, queen don't want to inject because "hey it's not my job, ask the other queen", ...).

I have 4 groups. One for each queen (i never have more than 4 queens for injection. If i want more larva, i spawn more hatcheries). In each group i have the queen + the hatchery. When i have to inject, i double select my group. The camera is centered on the hatchery but in the commands panel i have the queen spells (i don't know why. Maybe it's a bug from the very start of Starcraft 2). So, for an injection cycle i do this :

* Put the mouse cursor at the center of the screen
* Double select first group
* Injection hotkey
* Clic
* Double select second group
* Injection hotkey
* Clic
* And so on ...

Right, I think idra did that back when he played, but hotkeyd only the queens. It's slower than location hotkeys but faster than drag select. It may be the best method in lotv. It does eat up four hotkeys that you need to access all the time though. So either you use uncomfortable keys for queens (I think idra used 5-8), which may be acceptable (but not ideal) for pros but noobs like me struggle, or you sacrifice valuable keyboard real estate for the queens. :/

Thanks for suggestions both!
Magus.421
Profile Joined November 2011
France159 Posts
December 04 2015 18:21 GMT
#11
My groups for queen/hatch are 6, Y, H and N. And my injection hotkey is on the previous button of my mouse.
No whine, just play.
Tachion
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
Canada8573 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-12-05 23:40:23
December 04 2015 21:49 GMT
#12
nvm!
i was driving down the road this november eve and spotted a hitchhiker walking down the street. i pulled over and saw that it was only a tree. i uprooted it and put it in my trunk. do trees like marshmallow peeps? cause that's all i have and will have.
alyxia
Profile Joined December 2015
United States2 Posts
December 05 2015 04:02 GMT
#13
How do I harass a terran that is building a lot of Liberators? Should i just forgo harassment and mass units and force and engage?
[UoN]Sentinel
Profile Blog Joined November 2009
United States11320 Posts
December 05 2015 06:39 GMT
#14
Just switched from toss to zerg. Getting used to some early game comps but having trouble with mid/late game. Baby steps.

In ZvT, what's a good number of ravagers to push out with when the opponent is starting to get his tanks? Seems like I don't have enough to punish him whenever I try to attack.
Нас зовет дух отцов, память старых бойцов, дух Москвы и твердыня Полтавы
Maxie
Profile Joined August 2010
Sweden2653 Posts
December 05 2015 12:21 GMT
#15
What is the best way of dealing with bio + liberators? Taking out liberators with corrosive bile seems close to impossible since the range advantage (if there is any) is so small and they're guarded by the bio anyway. Hydras? Though they probably melt quickly.
Sickel1
Profile Joined August 2015
26 Posts
December 05 2015 16:14 GMT
#16
How do we deal with the immortal adept warp prism all in? I've considered pretending it's BW and going for a 2 base spire to 4 base lurker-ling but I feel like it's too difficult to get things done with mutas if they don't all-in because of pylon overcharge.
Cascade
Profile Blog Joined March 2006
Australia5405 Posts
December 05 2015 17:10 GMT
#17
On December 06 2015 01:14 Sickel1 wrote:
How do we deal with the immortal adept warp prism all in? I've considered pretending it's BW and going for a 2 base spire to 4 base lurker-ling but I feel like it's too difficult to get things done with mutas if they don't all-in because of pylon overcharge.

Purely theory crafting, shouldn't ravagers and queens be good, as neither immortals nor adapts deal their bonus damage vs them? Then fill up with lings or roaches depending on how the adapt/immoral balance is.
Sickel1
Profile Joined August 2015
26 Posts
December 05 2015 17:31 GMT
#18
On December 06 2015 02:10 Cascade wrote:
Show nested quote +
On December 06 2015 01:14 Sickel1 wrote:
How do we deal with the immortal adept warp prism all in? I've considered pretending it's BW and going for a 2 base spire to 4 base lurker-ling but I feel like it's too difficult to get things done with mutas if they don't all-in because of pylon overcharge.

Purely theory crafting, shouldn't ravagers and queens be good, as neither immortals nor adapts deal their bonus damage vs them? Then fill up with lings or roaches depending on how the adapt/immoral balance is.

That's a good point! I keep forgetting that ravagers aren't armored.
blade55555
Profile Blog Joined March 2009
United States17423 Posts
December 07 2015 00:37 GMT
#19
On December 06 2015 01:14 Sickel1 wrote:
How do we deal with the immortal adept warp prism all in? I've considered pretending it's BW and going for a 2 base spire to 4 base lurker-ling but I feel like it's too difficult to get things done with mutas if they don't all-in because of pylon overcharge.


Roach/ravager/ling will crush this. Moment you scout this use as much gas as you can on ravagers and lings with roaches and you will hold just fine. Ravagers are very key in this.
When I think of something else, something will go here
TheDougler
Profile Joined April 2010
Canada8306 Posts
December 07 2015 04:01 GMT
#20
I just haven't been able to beat Disruptors lately. Any tips?
I root for Euro Zergs, NA Protoss* and Korean Terrans. (Any North American who has beat a Korean Pro as Protoss counts as NA Toss)
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