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Video Guide:
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Greetings, some of you might remember me from Guides such as 3 Roach Opener vs Terran and the Swarmhost Infestor Style vs Protoss.
Who am I / Credentials
+ Show Spoiler +I am a Swiss Grandmaster Zerg residing around 6.1k MMR on EU and in the top 50 on NA. I came up with this build around a year ago and wrote a guide on it in August last Year. However, the meta shifted heavily from Tankivac to 16 Marine drop.
The Idea:
+ Show Spoiler + Terrans almost always open with a Reaper. By sending two Lings around the reaper we are able to do economic damage and get good scouting Information. It is very early on that the Terran decides what kind of opener he is going for.
We follow it up with 3 Roaches to one shot Marines / SCVs. As a lot of Terrans are scared of Ravager pushes, they might even misread the build if they didn't scout properly and think it's an allin. We follow it up with 2 Hatch Roach Corruptor to shut down drops and safely get a 3rd.
The 3 Roaches can be misread in many ways. There is Dark's 19 Drone Allin where you go 3 Roaches + 5 Roaches into mass ling allin. There is the 3 Roach into 2 Roach into Ravager push and many others. It's hard for a Terran to read what exactly he is up against so Terrans will often overcommit / undercommit to defense.
Eventually the goal is to max out @ 8:30 with Roach Ravager Corruptor + 1 on 4 Base economy.
The Build Order
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EARLY GAME
13 Overlord
17 Pool
18 Hatch
17 Gas
16 2 more drones rally them to the gas
@Pool build Roachwarren with 2nd gas Drone
@50 Minerals 2 Lings try to evade the Reaper with them and send them to the Terran Natural
@150 Minerals Queen use it to defend vs the Reaper and inject
20/22 2 more drones send them to the gas
22/22 1 Overlord
@Queen start another Queen in the Main
@Roachwarren build 2 roaches in the Main and 1 Roach in the Natural rally them across the Map
@Natural start a Queen at the Natural (total of 3 Queens)
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MID GAME
Now build only Drones and Overlords
@100 Gas (3:00-3:05) start your Lair
@3:45 start two Extractors at your Natural
@Lair (4:05) build a Spire in your Main + 4th Gas
@100 Gas Roach Speed
@50 Gas Scouting Overseer
@4:20 you should now have 44 Drones (full 2 base Saturation)
Build nothing but Roaches for now to deal with the Terran 2 Base aggression
@4:30 if you are scared build two more queens to deal with drops. Otherwise take a 3rd Base
@ Spire build 2-3 Corruptors to deal with his Drops / Libs / Banshees
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LATE GAME
Once you held his push start 2 Evo chambers and get +1/+1 then fully drone up your 3rd and take a 4th.
Build as many Roaches / Ravagers as you can and aim for a 8:30-9:00 max out push or transition as you feel after you take your 3rd to either Infestors, Hydras or even Ling Bane.
Adjustments:
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Vs 16 Marine Drop (2 Barracks)
None needed the Build is designed to perfectly counter a 16 Marine Drop
Vs Single Factory
Usually Hellions so just make sure that you have an overlord spotting for hellion drops in your main / natural and keep some queens / 2-3 Roaches ready to defend hellions Runbys
vs Double Factory
Usually Hellbat Cyclone what you need is 3 defensive Queens or 1 Queen + 1 Spine and a couple Roaches behind it. Build Mutalisks instead of Corruptors here if you feel like the Terran would struggle. Usually a Roach Mutalisk push will kill him before you even take your 3rd. Delaying your 3rd is no issue vs this build.
vs Banshees (Techlab Starport)
Usually coupled with Hellbats / Hellions. Use a defensive overseer and you might want to add a spore per base and definitly go up to 5 Queens total. Definitly get Overlordspeed so you can catch the Bancheese.
The Strategy
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The build uses 3 Core Units:
Roaches to tank damage and deal deal with the Terran in the early game.
Ravagers to make the Terran move and dodge the Corrosive Biles. Corrosives should be used to kill tanks / liberators primarily.
Corruptors to snipe the Medivacs and provide high ground vision.
Corruptors vs Mutalisk
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I generally prefer Corruptors vs Terran. However, there are Situations where going for Mutalisks is better. Mutalisk Roach is pretty weak versus the 16 Marine Opener as the Mutas just get sniped by the stimmed marines and the medivac is about as fast as a Mutalisk while boosted.
Against other Openers going for Mutalisks can be good though. Hellion / Cyclone openers struggle dealing with Mutalisks and make the Terran overcommit to Widowmines / Turrets / Thors. The biggest disadvantage of going for Corruptors is that the Terran does not need to add Turrets to his mineral lines.
Transition
+ Show Spoiler + It's possible to Transition to e.g. Ling Bane Mutalisk after the Lair if you get Ling Speed instead of Roach Speed and a Baneling Nest. However, I think going Roach Ravager is smarter. Additionally, Hydralisks can work very well if added to the composition especially since they have been buffed recently.
For a Hydra Transition just throw down a Hydra Den when your start your Upgrades.
For an Infestor Transition throw down an Infestation Pit when you start your Upgrades.
Videos
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If you want to see the Build in Action you can always watch me on Twitch @ http://www.twitch.tv/railgan
Thank you all for reading
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Very detailed and interesting guide, as usual coming from you. Thanks !
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On March 13 2017 07:17 [PkF] Wire wrote:
Very detailed and interesting guide, as usual coming from you. Thanks !
Thanks. There is still the 2 Base 3 Gas Roach Push follow up that I would like to cover but I have been having too much fun with other builds 
Here is a video on it though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2Q6q_pjwlk
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How do you transition from this vs mech? Roach swarmhost isn't as good as ling bane swarmhost. Vipers just get wrecked by thors
Also, is it a good idea to go make mutas instead of roaches when you see the terran just going mass marauders? Some cheeky terrans actually do this, with them only making a handful of marines.
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The 3 Roach is an opener. You can do a lot of things behind it.
For example, I'm playing greedy behind it (getting a third, droning like a mad man, etc).
The 3 Roach is a simple pressure which throws the Terran of his build and makes his mind blow up (especially if he is dependent on a build order like most terrans.
I'm trying to use one of the lings to hold position under the rax when they try swaping the rax and the factory, as the 1-1-1 is very popular now and many terrans rely on the rax building a tech lab for the starport.
I won with it even when my opponent simply made a single cyclone to make the roaches go away and didn't commit to anything else (he was Masters 2). But it was still enough to make him play passively in the first 5 minutes of the game, which was enough to get me the eco I need for my future plans (be it mech or bio).
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On July 10 2017 22:13 bulya wrote:
The 3 Roach is an opener. You can do a lot of things behind it.
For example, I'm playing greedy behind it (getting a third, droning like a mad man, etc).
The 3 Roach is a simple pressure which throws the Terran of his build and makes his mind blow up (especially if he is dependent on a build order like most terrans.
I'm trying to use one of the lings to hold position under the rax when they try swaping the rax and the factory, as the 1-1-1 is very popular now and many terrans rely on the rax building a tech lab for the starport.
I won with it even when my opponent simply made a single cyclone to make the roaches go away and didn't commit to anything else (he was Masters 2). But it was still enough to make him play passively in the first 5 minutes of the game, which was enough to get me the eco I need for my future plans (be it mech or bio).
It seems a waste having all those roaches for the defense.
Guess I should just remember to always overlord scout once lair is available. See if he's going mech or not.
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The 3 Roach is a pressure you do while the terran building add-ons and preparing his initial poke (2-1-1, hellion banshee, whatever).
ZvT usually starts with the Terran pressuring somehow the Zerg so that the Zerg doesn't explode in eco, but if you push the Terran a bit it slows them by quite a lot, as they usually don't used to react.
While the roaches there he can't mule the natural and produce SCVs there. Swapping add-ons is also hard, and many defensive reactions will make the terran poke either delayed or way weaker then it was supposed to be.
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When do you put down your spores in case of libs in maps having those abusive lib spots? After lair?
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Everything Bulya said is completly correct. The Build just uses 3 Roaches instead of 4 Lings and Ling Speed in the early game. The Roaches allow you to pressure a bit, scout, do economic damage and make your opponent wonder what you are actually going for.
Versus Mech you can go back to Lings, Roach Hydra Viper, Roach Ravager, Mass Muta (if you can make it work...) or even just go Ling Bane Hydra (Swarmhost / Viper). It is just an opener and no big commitment.
On July 11 2017 21:18 SilverHawk1 wrote:
When do you put down your spores in case of libs in maps having those abusive lib spots? After lair?
I usually use my 3-5 Queens to defend vs Liberators or morph up to 3 ravagers if he also attacks me with tanks. You dont really need spores because you can also morph an overseer in time to deal with the banshees (once your lair is done).
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I usually use my 3-5 Queens to defend vs Liberators
You okay with them dying to the lib sieging in abusive spots where the queens' range isn't enough to hit it from outside its circle?
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On July 14 2017 14:10 SilverHawk1 wrote:You okay with them dying to the lib sieging in abusive spots where the queens' range isn't enough to hit it from outside its circle?
A lib is 150-150, a queen is 150. So losing a queen for a lib is fine, losing 2 is quite ok, and if you do it well you can transfuse the injured queens so that you keep them all alive.
While the queens are in the circle the lib targets the queens (unless it was ordered otherwise), so you don't have to pull drones this way (less lost mining time).
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On July 14 2017 15:30 bulya wrote:Show nested quote +On July 14 2017 14:10 SilverHawk1 wrote:I usually use my 3-5 Queens to defend vs Liberators You okay with them dying to the lib sieging in abusive spots where the queens' range isn't enough to hit it from outside its circle? A lib is 150-150, a queen is 150. So losing a queen for a lib is fine, losing 2 is quite ok, and if you do it well you can transfuse the injured queens so that you keep them all alive. While the queens are in the circle the lib targets the queens (unless it was ordered otherwise), so you don't have to pull drones this way (less lost mining time).
I don't usually miss my injects so I don't have energy for tranfuse.
And I just realized this build is pretty weak to a two base marine tank all in. I don't think you can drone your third fully vs that if the terran has competent macro. They will have like four tanks and a bunch of marines. And if your third goes down, that's GG since he can keep flooding in units while your eco goes down the shitter.
Happened to me where I cleaned up his first force thanks to him unsieging on creep, only to die later on with his force literally rallied across the map to my base because my two remaining bases are running out of resources.
Edit:
Also, are you supposed to prioritize ravagers in roach ravager comp? Because I maxed out on Blood Boil with mostly roaches thanks to that inner one gas base and they can't kill shit, especially against marauders.
And then you just die once the terran gets to three three and you're still on Lair tech.
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I use it from time to time but I make 1-3 ravagers from the roaches otherwise there is no potential to do anything
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United Kingdom10443 Posts
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On July 15 2017 01:10 SilverHawk1 wrote:Show nested quote +On July 14 2017 15:30 bulya wrote:On July 14 2017 14:10 SilverHawk1 wrote:I usually use my 3-5 Queens to defend vs Liberators You okay with them dying to the lib sieging in abusive spots where the queens' range isn't enough to hit it from outside its circle? A lib is 150-150, a queen is 150. So losing a queen for a lib is fine, losing 2 is quite ok, and if you do it well you can transfuse the injured queens so that you keep them all alive. While the queens are in the circle the lib targets the queens (unless it was ordered otherwise), so you don't have to pull drones this way (less lost mining time). I don't usually miss my injects so I don't have energy for tranfuse. And I just realized this build is pretty weak to a two base marine tank all in. I don't think you can drone your third fully vs that if the terran has competent macro. They will have like four tanks and a bunch of marines. And if your third goes down, that's GG since he can keep flooding in units while your eco goes down the shitter. Happened to me where I cleaned up his first force thanks to him unsieging on creep, only to die later on with his force literally rallied across the map to my base because my two remaining bases are running out of resources. Edit: Also, are you supposed to prioritize ravagers in roach ravager comp? Because I maxed out on Blood Boil with mostly roaches thanks to that inner one gas base and they can't kill shit, especially against marauders. And then you just die once the terran gets to three three and you're still on Lair tech.
What do you mean? The 3 roach opener, or the muta/corruptor into roach ravager follow-up?
I'm not doing the muta/corruptor into roach ravager follow-up. But I use the opener a lot, and tank pushes do nothing if you spread your queens, let them eat the first shoots and jump with ling bane (or eve ling roach) on this army. You can also scout if its a tank production so that you know what to anticipate.
I even like them doing early tank pushes, as I have the time to transition into speedlings and if I catch it moving unsieged I can handle it this way..
Regarding the spire follow-up you'll have to wait for Railgan.
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On July 15 2017 15:20 bulya wrote:Show nested quote +On July 15 2017 01:10 SilverHawk1 wrote:On July 14 2017 15:30 bulya wrote:On July 14 2017 14:10 SilverHawk1 wrote:I usually use my 3-5 Queens to defend vs Liberators You okay with them dying to the lib sieging in abusive spots where the queens' range isn't enough to hit it from outside its circle? A lib is 150-150, a queen is 150. So losing a queen for a lib is fine, losing 2 is quite ok, and if you do it well you can transfuse the injured queens so that you keep them all alive. While the queens are in the circle the lib targets the queens (unless it was ordered otherwise), so you don't have to pull drones this way (less lost mining time). I don't usually miss my injects so I don't have energy for tranfuse. And I just realized this build is pretty weak to a two base marine tank all in. I don't think you can drone your third fully vs that if the terran has competent macro. They will have like four tanks and a bunch of marines. And if your third goes down, that's GG since he can keep flooding in units while your eco goes down the shitter. Happened to me where I cleaned up his first force thanks to him unsieging on creep, only to die later on with his force literally rallied across the map to my base because my two remaining bases are running out of resources. Edit: Also, are you supposed to prioritize ravagers in roach ravager comp? Because I maxed out on Blood Boil with mostly roaches thanks to that inner one gas base and they can't kill shit, especially against marauders. And then you just die once the terran gets to three three and you're still on Lair tech. What do you mean? The 3 roach opener, or the muta/corruptor into roach ravager follow-up? I'm not doing the muta/corruptor into roach ravager follow-up. But I use the opener a lot, and tank pushes do nothing if you spread your queens, let them eat the first shoots and jump with ling bane (or eve ling roach) on this army. You can also scout if its a tank production so that you know what to anticipate. I even like them doing early tank pushes, as I have the time to transition into speedlings and if I catch it moving unsieged I can handle it this way.. Regarding the spire follow-up you'll have to wait for Railgan.
I go roach ravager with this build. It just feels awkward transitioning into lings. Gotta research ling speed, drop that bane nest, and research bane speed.
What I both love and hate about this build is how the reaction from the Terran varies a lot. He can drop his sphagetti and forget his macro, giving an easy win or he's going to stay calm and I got a harder game. In Diamond 2, you still get that wide variance of response, making me get cocky a lot of times and attack into a larger force than I was expecting.
And with an SCV scout, he can see your pool first so he doesn't build a reaper (while you take the longer route with your lings assuming a reaper, making them arrive even later), and instead make marines on the low ground followed by a bunker. CC finishes and when your roaches get there, they gotta die if they want to kill the natural scvs/marines. Not sure if it's worth it letting them die like that.
Vs an incompetent terran however, he'll just let my three roaches stay on his nat for a long time and I can just run away once he pushes out.
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If they SCV scout and don't scout with the reaper you can do many things, just don't go for something middle of the road.
Either be super greedy (and if they are passive with bunkers in your league vs that, then great), take a very quick third (no reaper you can take it way earlier) and drone like a mad man, or go for something very committed (the muta switch Railgan proposed is one of them). If the Terran doesn't know what you are doing you can surprise him.
I found way of avoiding bunkers if they are put in bad locations (getting the roaches bruised but denying a lot of mining time and killing SCVs) , but I guess it doesn't happen in the more higher level.
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On July 15 2017 20:28 bulya wrote:
If they SCV scout and don't scout with the reaper you can do many things, just don't go for something middle of the road.
Either be super greedy (and if they are passive with bunkers in your league vs that, then great), take a very quick third (no reaper you can take it way earlier) and drone like a mad man, or go for something very committed (the muta switch Railgan proposed is one of them). If the Terran doesn't know what you are doing you can surprise him.
I found way of avoiding bunkers if they are put in bad locations (getting the roaches bruised but denying a lot of mining time and killing SCVs) , but I guess it doesn't happen in the more higher level.
Yep even if they scout you can still deal damage to them with roaches. I mean just because you know 3 rax reaper is coming doesn't mean that you will automatically win right?
And you can do many different timings off a 3 roach opener (whether you build the roaches or not) you can even go for a roach speed timing or a ling roach bane bust or whatever you feel like 
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EPT
