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There are a lot of techiques currently used that can make the early game a lot safer, such as a spine at your expansion covering your ramp when FEing, extra queens for general defence, AA and creep spread, and making sure you have detection available by the time banshees and DTs become a serious threat.
Everything that needs to be said. On maps like Tal'darim, you are pretty damn safe against anything short of stuff like proxy 2gate with things like 15hatch, and you can definitely have the econ to blindly make 2 spines and 3 queens and get detection before these builds will get across the map to you. Also extermely helpful: run down their scouting probe and have lings outside their base to know when he moves out. 4gate is much easier to stop on huge maps like tal'darim
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So how do you guys feel about a change to "Pneumatic Carapace" or Overseers. I'm talking about skipping the Lair prerequisite. I wonder if any Terran or Tosser would argue that it makes Zerg overpowered since you gotta sacrifice a fast t1 if you want the upgrade so it gives T&T even more time for timing pushes and nasty allins... on the other hand it would finally teach Terrans to proxy their starports (because obviously it'll get scouted inbase) AND would give Zergs more opportunity to screw up their Overlordspread in the early game.
In exchange we get better scouting information... any thoughts?
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Ol speed at T1 might fix the scouting problem, but it would also be incredibly boring.
then, zergs would have knowledge of exactly what their opponents are doing, throughout the game.
if you can know what the opponent is doing during the whole game, not only would it probably be OP, but it would be boring. Then you are just reacting to what you see, there is no gamesense, strategies become pretty meaningless, and its all just about mechanics.
whats interesting is when both players have different opening strategies that they can do based on the metagame, cluse of the opponent's build, faking, gamesense, timings, and so on, with incomplete information, and whoever executed it better, had the best strategy and timings, and found out what the other was doing, has the advantage.
whats annoying, is when its a guessing game, with clues and where you can be faked, but if you dont have it perfectly right, you immediatly lose.
SC with maphacks would seriously be no fun, and OL speed at hatch tech would make it incredibly easy to know exactly what the opponent is doing at all times, at least until he takes his third.
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You need to make reads. It was the same deal in Brood War. You probably weren't seeing into his base past the drone scout, and that means you have to make an educated guess. Listen to Day9's BW Podcast called "Building Triggers and the Imaginary Player". The notion of the imaginary player is that you need to account for every possible opponent possible. You can make a very informed decision on who that player is by what you do and do not see. For example...
You scout a protoss going 1 gas, 1 gate, 1 core. He makes a stalker as the second unit out of his gateway and off's your drone. At this point, you know he's either...
A) Not doing a 3 gate sentry expand, or
B) Not doing the most efficient 3 gate sentry expand.
At this point, you can say to yourself that a 4 gate is a good possibility. Why would an early expander make anything other than a sentry with his gateways? It's a waste of minerals he could be using to get a nexus up. Now, that's not to say he can't be doing a 3 gate sentry expand, but if he is, it's not the most efficient he could do it, so it's ok to match his possible aggression with some lings. If he is trying to fake you out, sure, you missed some drones, but he is delaying his expo, so it evens itself out. At this point you're bobbing up and down his ramp to check his additional gate units and chronoboost usage. If you see a chronoboost on warpgate, you know he's either going for aggression in the form of a 4 gate, or he's trying to fake you out, either way, you need to respond with your own units. Everything you do and do not see is a hint. If he's super dedicated to faking a 4 gate, and ends up doing a void ray rush, he's doing it inifficently, so you'll have an ovie in position in time to sac it and find out (he opened up with one gas and is using his chrono's not on additional voids, but on his "fake" 4 gate, so you're 2 queens will be enough to hold off that void and give you ample time to builld a third to respond to additional. You know by past analysis that by the amount of pylons/probes with your initial worker, that there's either a proxy pylon or not at the time of your drone scout, and if there's a probe out on the map. Eventually, through enough analysis, you'll figure these things out without having a scout in his base. It's harder for zerg right now because we don't have scan/obs, but as the game gets figured out more and more, zergs will figure out these clues and be able to be safer through analysis of their games and relations to their own builds.
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I don't believe you know what you're talking about at all, mate.
Not only is 2 overlords way too much to sacrifice, the 7-minute mark is long past when marine/scv, 4gate, etc. hits, and longer past how early you need to scout to prepare against everything else.
And in what world does Zerg win 100% of games if they scout?
EDIT: Found another thing wrong with your post, what maps are you playing on that have 2 different locations to hide an overlord?
Huh? It's a lot but it's worth it.
Sorry, I mean after the early ling pokes and such, talking more about ZvP here where if he doesn't push yet you check again at 7 minutes.
They don't, but if they know from the 1 minute mark what they're doing you should win 100% of the time. That's an extreme but that's the point I was trying to make. If you can scout as early as when they only have 1 marine (according to Idra you can't get 1 overlord past 1 marine), and know what they're doing, or even only the dangerous possibilities, you should win. Similarly, even if you scout at the 3 or 4 minute mark, before early pushes come in, you should still win 95% of the time. If you don't then you should improve decision making skills. Now if you scout at 7 minutes and the push comes at 7:30, you will probably lose right there if it was an all-in or some very aggressive push.
Any map? You don't hide the overlords, you send them in from opposite sides.
Idk what you're doing wrong, all you need to do is sacrifice some overlords.
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On April 06 2011 04:17 GinDo wrote:Marine SCV all in is not an issue, thats old news especially with the new bunker time. YOu can have a spine and should have a blind spine placed asap. And don't give the crap that it puts you behind as a zerg player. People in BW put sunkens all the time really early on. And any how zergs usually float 2k minerals anyhow.
A) Marine/SCV all in doesn't involve bunkers, that's a bunker rush.
B) Marine/SCV all in runs over a spine, you need a fairly early bane nest vs most of them.
C) Creep colonies cost half as much, zerglings were stronger, marines were weaker in BW.
D) ....It's literally impossible to float 2k minerals at this point in the game.
But thanks for coming into the thread and tell zergs how to play, always great to get another terran perspective.
In ZvP I've switched to going for a gas steal 100% of the time, the second my drone gets to their base it makes a run right for a geyser, as long as I can steal a gas there is nothing they can do that will hit critical mass and kill me before I can react that I can't scout by poking lings up the front another key benifit of gas steal is that you can see their nexus which lets you see when exactly they start using up stored energy (which normally gives away the direction they are going in) and if it's on the nexus or not.
In ZvT I'm having a much much harder time so I'd appreciate any scouting guides people have for terran.
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On April 04 2011 16:10 Zerokaiser wrote: I think this is a problem that I'm not alone with, but I don't think it's really been discussed specifically on larger maps. A notorious Zerg complaint has been lack of viable scouting options and being reduced to guessing what the opponent is doing. More so than Protoss and Terran, Zerg has very limited options and specific responses to many Protoss and Terran builds which will kill the Zerg player outright if the Zerg doesn't have ample preparation time. The problem with that is that those builds which will kill the Zerg player all hit before Zerg has access to better scouting methods. While it's true that Protoss also suffers from poor scouting before hallucination or robotics tech, Protoss walks less of a razor's edge leading into the mid-game and has more "catch all" builds that leave the Protoss player capable of responding to most threats. As far as Zerg goes, the biggest "I need to scout" threats are 4gate, void rays, banshees, and marine/scv all-ins. Less common rushes such as Dark Templar are also possible. In addition, many "normal" Terran builds can kill the Zerg player that isn't properly prepared, even the somewhat silly mass-hellion. Failing to scout one of the above builds with plenty of time to prepare is GG for the Zerg player. Zerg has 2 methods for scouting in the early game: Overlords and checking the front. In the past, this has been effective on most maps and in most circumstances. However, it has still been possible for a player to deny both methods of scouting by means of hiding tech and revealing units from the front and keeping marines or stalkers patrolling around the base to shoot down overlords. This problem is exaggerated on large maps. On many large maps such as Typhon Peaks it is impossible to guarantee yourself a chance at scouting with an overlord. With 3 possible bases to scout there is no way to know where you will need an overlord to be, since the distance is too far to have an overlord at all three (or even 2). Cross spots in particular are a problem, since even your first overlord can't cross the entire map before a marine could be out to shoot it down. ![[image loading]](http://www.observer-sc2.cz/wp-content/uploads/Typhon_peaks.jpg) Good luck getting an overlord in my base! Zerg is left with scouting the front of the base. Unfortunately, the game is such that it is not difficult to hide information from the Zerg player, and it is just as easy to outright deceive them. Cross position on Typhon Peaks, ZvP. Your zergling has scouted a zealot and stalker at the front, and warpgate tech is being chronoboosted at the cybernetics core. It looks like a 4gate or otherwise early pressure, and you switch into heavy ling/roach production. A few minutes later, after realizing it's too late for the 4gate, the void rays fly into your base and it's GG. With builds that kill outright, there is the luxury that "smoothness" and refinement of the build can be sacrificed in the name of deception. Although the Protoss player has used his chronoboost and 50 gas on tech that he has no intention of using, it is a meaningless sacrifice given the decisiveness of void rays that have not been prepared against. In the above example, the Zerg player will die to the 4gate if he chooses to drone much higher than 21 or 22 drones. It is a guessing game. If he loses to the 4gate, he is a fool for having not prepared. If he loses to the void rays, he is justified, but no better off in the end. Terran, with faster anti-air, can be even harder to scout given the ease of hiding their buildings. Should a Terran player wall off, keep a couple marines patrolling his base, and hide an additional 2 barracks and marines in the furthest corner of their base, there is no way to be sure you can scout it. Even if you have an overlord at their base, there is a strong likelyhood that it will be shot down before it sees what it needs to see. ________________ Basically, I feel like without viable scouting in the early game, Zerg is doomed to a complete guessing game on 4 player maps with large rush distances a significant percentage of the time. What could fix it? Perhaps having overlord speed moved to Spawning Pool tech. In the immortal words of Idra, "No amount of creativity will get a zergling past a wall or an overlord past a marine." Do other Zergs feel blind on large maps?
When I get Zerg, I don't feel blind. On bigger maps, I throw down 1 spore crawler and 1 spine per base, so that I don't get killed by banshees. As soon as I get lair, I start overlord speed upgrade and morph a few overseers. Then I also scout the ground with speedlings, which you can have done before a 4 gate. Besides, as Zerg, you are supposed to sac an overlord. If you make it to late game as a Zerg player on a large map, you practically won the game assuming you don't goof up big time.
When I scout an opponent with an overlord/seer, I move it around to the far side of their base and bring it back towards me.
Example: my opponent spawned in the 2 o'clock position on Shakuras. I cram my overlord in the corner at the beginning of the game and during midgame and then bring it at a diagonal through their base. Sure, he dies, but he reveals more than a head on Ovy run in scouting.
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xBANKx, all sorts of wrongs in your post so I'll just micro-quote:
On April 06 2011 02:29 xbankx wrote:
Yes, toss don't die immediately to a front push due to ff but it doesn't mean just keep ffing on ramp doesn't really win you the game either.
The difference between lack of scouting ability causing immediate and frustrating death as is the case with Zerg and a Protoss playing safe and "not really winning the game" with his safe build is, you know, kind of huge.
Just because I can keep roaches out of my main base doesn't mean Ill win 1-base toss versus 2 base fully saturated zerg. The idea is no different then zerg building units early game instead of drones. If all toss is doing is staying 1 base and defend with ff. Toss will fall behind macro-wise.
My roach rush is scoutable. There's no way I can hide those roaches or roach warren from you because if you send in a probe and see my massing roach army you'll immediately get a feel for what's going on. If I hide my roaches you can just walk up the ramp and see the warren. We can't do this since we have no access to your ramp.
Zerg already have anti hellion/banshee in the form of a unit called the queen which most zerg at least get 2-of sometimes 3 for creep spreading.
This is perhaps a fair point, but do note the following - to have that many queens we need to fast expand or we won't have the minerals (or the hatcheries) to produce 3 queens in time. If you fast expand 2 of your queens should normally have no energy left so transfuse is not viable. Still, I guess queens are a partial solution to the no-scouting problem since they're a sort of jack-of-all trades when it comes to counters.
You complaint of zerg has to choose between unit or drone. I don't know how you can even complain about that. That attribute is what separate zerg from other two races. Zergs can overproduce units or drones since they all come from 1 production units. If you want to drone, you will out make toss or terran. If you want to make units, you will out "number-wise" terran/protoss. Zerg can always make fighting units and drone at same time. Granted that won't optimize your play. But the notion that having a separate unit producing structure is an advantage just shows how you don't understand the game.
Wrong again and the elitist spin at the end doesn't help you get your point across. Please don't forget the following - the production capabilities of the zerg are a huge boon mid and late game, but early on they are a setback. Remeber that:
- we sacrifice a drone for each building
- we're larvae starved in the beginning - if we have 5 larvae and make 5 drones instead of 5 roaches it's gg (this however should be avoidable through ramp scouting and xel naga control)
- our MULE/chrono ability which speeds up production is entirely dependent on our queen's positioning - if our queens need to run around blocking a hellion or chasing a banshee we are set back in production/resource gathering
Since I don't want to make any snotty remarks, please watch any PvZ replay where the zerg fast expands and look at the drone/probe count and realize that even a fast expanding zerg is actually catching up to the protoss in worker count up until the 6-7th minute or so, by which time we usually die from your cheese/allin. So you see, what you deem as an advantage is actually a curse - we make drones to catch up, we die to the cheese. We make units or tech to defend the cheese, we lose our racial advantage in late game.
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im by no means a good zerg but getting a fast lair (after ling speed) for changelings has worked ok so far.
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Yeah this is totally true. All I can do as a zerg is send a ling up the ramp or get lucky with my overlord placement on a large map.
I usually die before lair tech to voids or 4gate which is why I haven't been playing 1v1's that much.
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You need to make reads. It was the same deal in Brood War. You probably weren't seeing into his base past the drone scout, and that means you have to make an educated guess. Listen to Day9's BW Podcast called "Building Triggers and the Imaginary Player". The notion of the imaginary player is that you need to account for every possible opponent possible. You can make a very informed decision on who that player is by what you do and do not see. For example...
You scout a protoss going 1 gas, 1 gate, 1 core. He makes a stalker as the second unit out of his gateway and off's your drone. At this point, you know he's either...
A) Not doing a 3 gate sentry expand, or
B) Not doing the most efficient 3 gate sentry expand.
[...]
aye, educated guesses are an awesome and important part of the game.
thats another reason why overseers or OL speed on hatch tech wouldnt be good for the game.
The main problem isnt the fact that you have to make educated guesses, the main problem is that if your educated guess is wrong, you flat out lose 90% of the time.
For example, if you see someone get 2 gas, a lot of sentries, a pylon at the bottom of his ramp, and start a nexus. You can now make an educated guess.
either he is doing a 3gate expand
or he is doing another build, but not the most efficient version of it.
But it turns out, that even not the most efficient version of a 4game can kill you, if you made the wrong educated guess (ie, you guessed he was going 3gate expand after seeing a lot of sentries and a nexus.)
educated guesses are good, in fact, they are great for the game. But when you outright lose each time your educated guess is wrong, thats the issue.
for example, if you see someone open with 1 gas, and a stalker, you can make an educated guess that he is probably not going stargate, and its more likely that he is doing a 4gate. if he is going stargate, then it wont be the most efficient stargate build.
But even a non efficient stargate build can quite easily outright kill you if you prepared for a 4gate.
And on the other hand, if you see someone going double gas very early on, and making a stalker first, and not moving out with a probe by the 6:30 mark to make a pylon, you can make an educated guess that hes probably doing something with tech.
But unfortunately, if your educated guess is wrong, and he was doing a slightly less efficient 4gate, and built up a couple of rounds of units before moving out, and you made extra drones, an evo, 2 spores, and 2 extra queens, you just flat out die again.
The problem isnt the way the scouting system works, with faking, clues, hints, and educated guesses. That system is quite awesome.
the problem is the fact that even inefficient builds can outright kill zergs quite easily, should the zerg have prepared for something else instead.
and the other problem, is that due to lack of agression that isnt all-in from zerg, its impossible for a zerg to effectively limit the opponent's options.
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As Z I've felt really safe recently, probably because I committed to the race full-time and have really learned the timings for pre-lair all-ins. I still work in the fast evo and extra queen so I'm safe against banshees or voids, but against 4gates or marine all-ins it's possible to be bulletproof with just a good sense of the timings and a couple of lings outside your enemies base/a sacked overlord.
All you REALLY need to see is 1) They aren't expanding & 2) Did they take both gasses. If 1 is no, then you KNOW an attack is coming, and if you see no gas, 1 gas, or 2 gasses, you can make some guesses as to what kind of attack it'll be.
And what's this nonsense that you can't prepare for a 4gate and voids at the same time? Queens are awesome for holding both those things
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On April 06 2011 12:46 morimacil wrote:
Ol speed at T1 might fix the scouting problem, but it would also be incredibly boring.
then, zergs would have knowledge of exactly what their opponents are doing, throughout the game.
if you can know what the opponent is doing during the whole game, not only would it probably be OP, but it would be boring. Then you are just reacting to what you see, there is no gamesense, strategies become pretty meaningless, and its all just about mechanics.
whats interesting is when both players have different opening strategies that they can do based on the metagame, cluse of the opponent's build, faking, gamesense, timings, and so on, with incomplete information, and whoever executed it better, had the best strategy and timings, and found out what the other was doing, has the advantage.
whats annoying, is when its a guessing game, with clues and where you can be faked, but if you dont have it perfectly right, you immediatly lose.
SC with maphacks would seriously be no fun, and OL speed at hatch tech would make it incredibly easy to know exactly what the opponent is doing at all times, at least until he takes his third.
Well although I'm not agreeing with you I see your point. Thing is even though Terran HAS maphacks they still get suprised by dark templar or mutas some times. Because you have to execute the scouting at the right time! We can't argue that scan can be denied for sure but speed overlords running in a terrans/tossers base can be killed. I don't see the change as imbalance but an opportunity for Zerg to make right decisions early and get as much intel as the other two races can get their way.
My problem is not to react to what I see but to actually see something on the big maps and I feel either overseers or ovi speed on T1 could fix that. Again, it comes with the cost of delayed Lair and gives more opportunity for timing atacks.
Don't get me wrong I love the guessing game but especially on the big maps it turns into "I better spine up/build units and get my queens or I lose to something NOW" --> then dying later because of unnecessary precaution.
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On April 04 2011 16:10 Zerokaiser wrote:
A notorious Zerg complaint has been lack of viable scouting options and being reduced to guessing what the opponent is doing. More so than Protoss and Terran, Zerg has very limited options and specific responses to many Protoss and Terran builds which will kill the Zerg player outright if the Zerg doesn't have ample preparation time.
The problem with that is that those builds which will kill the Zerg player all hit before Zerg has access to better scouting methods. While it's true that Protoss also suffers from poor scouting before hallucination or robotics tech, Protoss walks less of a razor's edge leading into the mid-game and has more "catch all" builds that leave the Protoss player capable of responding to most threats.
As far as Zerg goes, the biggest "I need to scout" threats are 4gate, void rays, banshees, and marine/scv all-ins. Less common rushes such as Dark Templar are also possible. In addition, many "normal" Terran builds can kill the Zerg player that isn't properly prepared, even the somewhat silly mass-hellion. Failing to scout one of the above builds with plenty of time to prepare is GG for the Zerg player.
Zerg has 2 methods for scouting in the early game: Overlords and checking the front. In the past, this has been effective on most maps and in most circumstances. However, it has still been possible for a player to deny both methods of scouting by means of hiding tech and revealing units from the front and keeping marines or stalkers patrolling around the base to shoot down overlords. This problem is exaggerated on large maps.
I think Zerg players are going about scouting the wrong way. Scouting is always thought of as "looking into the opponents base to see what he is doing". Even that can be totally useless if your Protoss opponent proxies a Stargate or Twilight Council somewhere else on that large map you are concerned about.
But what could be an alternative? IMO the Zerg should switch their focus from trying to scout the enemy base fast to scouting the possible "points of access into their base" early. This close scouting is done best with EARLY CREEP and it could also prevent that stupid pylon - which allows the Protoss to warp into your base - from being built. Try along the following lines:- expand early,
- get two Queens for two hatcheries,
- use the first energy on a creep tumor for both Queens and dont forget to cover the back of your base with creep,
- only build a few Zerglings (6-10) for mobile scouting,
- drone up and build LOTS of Spine Crawlers (enough to crush early rushes and withstand four warpgate) ... certainly more than the 1-2 because they have an awesome range and can block your chokes easily,
- build more Queens which can spread more creep (it is a LARGE map after all and the sooner you start the better) AND which can be used for Transfuse on Spine Crawlers and as air defense.
Day[9] isnt taken too serious by certain progamers, but the "non-stop Queens funday monday" showed a style which might even work on the pro level. Sadly Zerg players are too much into the "build a horde of Zerglings" and "Queens are only good for Larva inject" mantras.
Seans usual sentence of "thats a Spine Crawler which he didnt want to make" is somewhat stupid IMO, because it doesnt figure in the MOBILITY of the Spine Crawler. Sure in BW the Sunken Colony was immobile and totally wasted if the enemy never comes to it, but in Starcraft 2 you can pick up your Spine Crawlers and take them to the middle of the map and create a "fallback position" with a ton of Spine Crawlers into which a force of pursuing Stalkers or terran bio would not want to follow your retreating Hydras. One of the complaints about the Hydra was that it lacked the mobility and that you couldnt really retreat. Be creative and give them a safe place to retreat to!
The bottom line is:
I think Zerg players are playing inefficient in the early game when they dont really have the resources to produce and reproduce an "unlimited" amount of Zerglings. Defensive structures and Transfuse are underused and keep their usefulness later in the game and should be used to create early defenses which can withstand early pressure no matter what is knocking on your front door or comes sailing through the skies. Queens and Spine Crawlers = no early scouting is needed as desperately as people make it.
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On April 04 2011 16:42 JDub wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2011 16:33 Zerokaiser wrote:On April 04 2011 16:28 Jumbled wrote:
You shouldn't ever be assuming you can scout perfectly in any case. There's always a slight possibility your opponent has managed to hide something tricky from you. You point out that protoss has even more scouting limitations early on, and that suggests that one approach is to try a similar solution to that used by protoss. Look for a safe early build that can handle most things that might be thrown at it.
There are a lot of techiques currently used that can make the early game a lot safer, such as a spine at your expansion covering your ramp when FEing, extra queens for general defence, AA and creep spread, and making sure you have detection available by the time banshees and DTs become a serious threat. You cannot prepare for 4gate and voidrays at the same time. Even if you invest heavily in defenses and could, hypothetically hold off both a 4gate and voidrays, it means you have an abysmal drone count and will lose to any normal build in the game. Check out Spanishiwa's 16h/15p opening. Queens + spines + good creep spread is safe against 4-gate and VRs, and has an enormous drone count.
This was my first thought as well. Queens + Spines can hold a lot, and they don't cost larvae (okay the spines cost a worker).
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On April 06 2011 15:41 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2011 16:10 Zerokaiser wrote:
A notorious Zerg complaint has been lack of viable scouting options and being reduced to guessing what the opponent is doing. More so than Protoss and Terran, Zerg has very limited options and specific responses to many Protoss and Terran builds which will kill the Zerg player outright if the Zerg doesn't have ample preparation time.
The problem with that is that those builds which will kill the Zerg player all hit before Zerg has access to better scouting methods. While it's true that Protoss also suffers from poor scouting before hallucination or robotics tech, Protoss walks less of a razor's edge leading into the mid-game and has more "catch all" builds that leave the Protoss player capable of responding to most threats.
As far as Zerg goes, the biggest "I need to scout" threats are 4gate, void rays, banshees, and marine/scv all-ins. Less common rushes such as Dark Templar are also possible. In addition, many "normal" Terran builds can kill the Zerg player that isn't properly prepared, even the somewhat silly mass-hellion. Failing to scout one of the above builds with plenty of time to prepare is GG for the Zerg player.
Zerg has 2 methods for scouting in the early game: Overlords and checking the front. In the past, this has been effective on most maps and in most circumstances. However, it has still been possible for a player to deny both methods of scouting by means of hiding tech and revealing units from the front and keeping marines or stalkers patrolling around the base to shoot down overlords. This problem is exaggerated on large maps. I think Zerg players are going about scouting the wrong way. Scouting is always thought of as "looking into the opponents base to see what he is doing". Even that can be totally useless if your Protoss opponent proxies a Stargate or Twilight Council somewhere else on that large map you are concerned about. But what could be an alternative? IMO the Zerg should switch their focus from trying to scout the enemy base fast to scouting the possible "points of access into their base" early. This close scouting is done best with EARLY CREEP and it could also prevent that stupid pylon - which allows the Protoss to warp into your base - from being built. Try along the following lines: - expand early,
- get two Queens for two hatcheries,
- use the first energy on a creep tumor for both Queens and dont forget to cover the back of your base with creep,
- only build a few Zerglings (6-10) for mobile scouting,
- drone up and build LOTS of Spine Crawlers (enough to crush early rushes and withstand four warpgate) ... certainly more than the 1-2 because they have an awesome range and can block your chokes easily,
- build more Queens which can spread more creep (it is a LARGE map after all and the sooner you start the better) AND which can be used for Transfuse on Spine Crawlers and as air defense.
Day[9] isnt taken too serious by certain progamers, but the "non-stop Queens funday monday" showed a style which might even work on the pro level. Sadly Zerg players are too much into the "build a horde of Zerglings" and "Queens are only good for Larva inject" mantras. Seans usual sentence of "thats a Spine Crawler which he didnt want to make" is somewhat stupid IMO, because it doesnt figure in the MOBILITY of the Spine Crawler. Sure in BW the Sunken Colony was immobile and totally wasted if the enemy never comes to it, but in Starcraft 2 you can pick up your Spine Crawlers and take them to the middle of the map and create a "fallback position" with a ton of Spine Crawlers into which a force of pursuing Stalkers or terran bio would not want to follow your retreating Hydras. One of the complaints about the Hydra was that it lacked the mobility and that you couldnt really retreat. Be creative and give them a safe place to retreat to! The bottom line is: I think Zerg players are playing inefficient in the early game when they dont really have the resources to produce and reproduce an "unlimited" amount of Zerglings. Defensive structures and Transfuse are underused and keep their usefulness later in the game and should be used to create early defenses which can withstand early pressure no matter what is knocking on your front door or comes sailing through the skies. Queens and Spine Crawlers = no early scouting is needed as desperately as people make it.
Day9's prime example for non-stop queens was Catz, and Catz himself later debunked it. Throwing that out there.
The only thing spine crawlers are usually useful for in the late game is defending against drops, creep is far too easy to destroy for Zerg to hold a position in the middle of the map with them, and it takes too damn many (with exceptions when you're maxed for 10 minutes and you are clearing supply).
Siege tanks and a protoss ball don't really care about any number of spinecrawlers.
Going through the other part of your post...
Who is putting pylons right in your base?
Pros already get 2 queens and use the energy of one on a creep tumour.
This next part really demonstrates that you don't understand the zerg early game, so I'm gonna kind of link them together.
You recommend "droning up and makings LOTS of spinecrawlers", but you also recommend getting 6-10 zerglings, which is already grossly overmaking lings. If you asked most pro zergs, I bet they'd tell you that making 10 zerglings that early is equivalent to all-inning. Not only that, but LOTS of spinecrawlers take LOTS of drones. We lose drones when we make buildings.
You say imply that spinecrawlers and queens are enough to defend against a 4gate, and I really don't believe this is true. If you want to go into custom games and test that, I'd love to try. For it to be true, you would need to cover every angle on your natural with enough spinecrawlers to hold off ~20 protoss units, and by that point transfuse doesn't do anything. Spinecrawlers are only effective with support from an army. The point of defending a 4gate is to surround the protoss units in range of the spines, but where the spines can't be hit back.
Not only that, but let's think about the numbers involved here.
You want at least 2 queens, 6 lings, it would probably take 8-10 spinecrawlers to make a protoss turn away, so that's 8-10 drones down the drain at 150 minerals a pop.
Best case scenario, even without making any lings, you're recommending a 1500 mineral, 8 drone investment by the 5:40 mark solely to defend against something that might not even be coming. There is literally no way in fucking hell that the zerg player is even close to economically even at this point, even if the protoss player did exactly what you wanted and 4gated directly into spinecrawlers and stood there for 20 seconds on hold position.
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The funny thing is about all this... is that I have the most trouble hiding what my plans are from a zerg when I ladder. I always feel exposed om the early game waiting for that overlord to fly in and scout my plans. Its the same feeling I get when a Terran uses their third MULE for a scan instead and catches my warp prism as it leaves the base towards theirs. I think that alot of zerg players would really benefit from really putting some dedicated time into the other races. I think to really be a solid Masters player you need to have at least put in some offrace effort on the other races to understand yours better.
Part of my "exposed" feeling is due to the fact that I'm actually exposed to them and part of the feeling is due to me knowing what all the tells of my race are... Like for instance... I know what a zerg is thinking, or SHOULD BE thinking, when they poke up my ramp and I have a stalker as my second unit instead of a sentry. I know what that means and I know the effect that getting the stalker and not the sentry means for the early stages of the game as well as know some tendencies that stalker symbolizes. I think alot of zergs below master level probably don't even consider what that second unit means to them or don't know exactly the impact it has on potential builds. Its a delayed expansion, its a guarantee they cant safely move out against a good zerg that went for fast speed, its suggestive of aggressive openings, etc.
I guess the bush im slowing beating around is that... its nearly impossible to have a meaningful discussion about this unless you can guarantee the posters commenting on it are high level. Scouting is a pretty difficult thing to get a grasp of and I think even in high diamond/low masters people don't actually know what it is they're looking at when they see it. Its because people dont focus enough on studying replays. For several months I painstakingly studied replay after replay... my own and others until I really got a grasp of what conclusions I could draw from what I saw... There's nothing innate about it... it just takes alot of time and effort to improve your scouting. Its so worth it though.
IMO, if you're not at the very LEAST very high diamond, I would focus on getting the most information out of what you actually are able to see before asking for handouts from blizzard. I'm 99% there alot of information you are actually seeing, but not processing in your matches that would win you tons and tons of games and make you feel more comfortable. Someone posted midway on this thread about how they really feel safe now after really digging into zerg and making an effort to understand the timings. If you want to be a whiny forum scrub, then ask for buffs, but if you want to get good at starcraft, make the best of the current situation and take your scouting and game sense to another level by studying the everliving shit out of the game.
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I think the real difference in T and P is that with T on any map zerg has time mostly, due to difference in what zerg want to scout for.
Often it's enough for Zerg to see Terrans Army aka scout the front or when he moves out and then respond. but against Protoss because of warp gates and pylons (specially on bigger maps where they can be nearly impossible to find without luck) you need to see what buildings he actually has! as 2/3 of his army will be coming in next to your base and not walk across the map. which makes the response time so much less.
Anyway thats my two cents.
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I don't buy into the whole "Z must adapt builds perfectly to every opening P or T can do to them" complaint that Z's like to use (I am primarily a zerg player). The only obtuse openings that require an extreme reaction IMO are proxy cloak banshee and proxy voidrays, and these have tell-tale signs as has been mentioned earlier in this thread. Every other opening simply requires good micro of queens, speedlings, and a spine or two. In the case of terran openings, baneling nest will have to go up eventually, it's not much of a sacrifice to make a precautionary one early if you scout an add-on to the rax.
Also, I don't buy into the whole 'Z must sit at home and make drones until the last minute' philosophy that many zergs have. I know many players feel 'guilt' if they morph zerglings needlessly that could have been drones. While it is true you sacrificed a slight economic edge by making zerglings instead of drones, those zerglings aren't useless as you can use them to patrol, to pressure the front, to deny any expansion attempts your opponent might make, and to counter-attack when they hit you with some cheesy voidray strategy. They will also make a fine addition to your army later on in the game as zerglings IMO are a severely under-rated zerg unit and not produced in nearly large enough quantities.
edit: I'd also like to add, no one ever seems to mention about what you don't scout as a zerg. If its the 6 minute mark and there are still no signs or attempts from your opponent to expand, and you yourself have early expanded, is it really that much of a stretch to stop and think "hmm, maybe they have units that can kill me sitting in their base?". Maybe its time to stop producing drones 100% and start making an army. You don't need 50 drones on 2 bases to be even with a 1-basing opponent, I'd argue going beyond 30 drones in such a scenario is pushing your luck.
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I really wish people would stop with the "Just make 6-10 lings and many many spine crawlers and Queens and your fine", cause your not. Sure that will hold the 4 gate, but it will put you loooong behind a macro Protoss. People who still says this just feels like trolls tbh.
This thread isn't about how to hold a 4 gate 100% of the time (which will make you loose to every non 4 gate 100% of the time).
This thread is about how the Zerg can't scout efficiently(on some maps like Typhoon Peaks) after the first Marine/Stalker (untill hive Tech), and how if the Zerg make the wrong guess/read. The Zerg will most likely get run over.
A ZvP is very often decided around the 7 minute mark, even if the game last 20+ minutes. Of course good mechanics etc. can save you and change the outcome in the long games. But still a lot of ZvPs gets a clear favorite around the 6-7 minute mark. This usually happens cause the Zerg makes the wrong read, and get run over army wise or behind eco wise.
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EPT
