On September 29 2019 23:59 BisuDagger wrote: At what patch made zerg this powerful in the late game or has it always been this strong in LoTV? Wasn't Zerg essentially the same in 2018? I'm just curious if it took since LoTV release for Zerg to find its true potential and it had been there the whole time.
Pretty sure the infestor got buffed at the end of last year.
The infestor buff, which by itself wasn't problematically huge in my opinion, went hand in hand with a nydus buff as well a Feedback nerf and the removal of Graviton Catapult (which carriers never recovered from) on the Protoss side as well as a raven nerf on the Terran side. From there it took a few months for the meta to develop after the big end of the year patch until people got the hang of how Zerg late game should really be played.
And to add to all that, recent map pools have not exactly been making it excruciatingly difficult for Zerg players to reach late game in a condition which they feel they can win from.
On September 29 2019 11:21 FBTsingLoong wrote: Soo:"I'm a clean Zerg." lol Serral is still the best Z player without late game.
And we can also see that soO is getting pretty much zero results in current meta.
BL+infestor, nydus and all that ugly stuff is truly bullshit, but is there anything else Zerg can do? Pretty much every ZvT goes into lategame these days because there is just no way for Zerg to really push into Terran mid-game without being super ineffective, and ZvP gets really dice-y with using swarm hosts, roach ravager etc.
On September 29 2019 21:55 NotSoHappy wrote: Maybe that festor nydus play seems a bit imba, but honestly, Trap got outplayed with superior strategies by a better player.
^^this
I really don't think we should base race-balancing on shit play, but rather on high-level play, which Trap's was definitely not. At the same time, ZvP is Rogue's best matchup.
Looking at Aligulac's Balance Report graphs it's easy to see all 3 races being basically tied together currently.
Well if you look at Aliguliac and look for balance in "high level play" you should go to the history section ( aligulac.com/periods/ ) this shows what balance is like at the top, quote from Aliguliac FAQ:
"On the period list you can see OP/UP fields, and in the infobox for each period, the same data is given as "leading" and "lagging" race. This is an indicator showing which races are most and least prominent near the top of the list. Specifically, for each race imagine a hypothetical player with a rating equal to the mean of the ratings of the top five players of that race, and imagine these three players playing very many games against each other. If the players were of equal strength, each of them would score about 50%, however, in reality, one of them may score, say, 10% more than that. The race that scores the most in this scenario is the "OP", or "leading" race, and the race that scores the least is the "UP", or "lagging" race."
So in the history section you will see Zerg is leading by 15% & Protoss is lagging by 14% (Does that mean a top 5 protoss is only has a 21% chance to win each map? surely then they have a tiny chance in a BO7. The PvZ specific rating may be even worse). This has mostly been the trend for many months now. With Protoss lagging between 6-17% since March 2018 (Protoss are often the lagging race historically). Zerg leading mostly in the same period.
Zergs lead % is at its all time peak now (The data goes back to 2010 and 15% is the biggest figure a race has ever had as a lead, only reached by Terran before now and only in 2 periods, Zerg is currently sitting at 15% & had 14% last period). This is when Protoss is still lagging after many moths with a pretty big 14% lag.
So if you "really don't think we should base race-balancing on shit play, but rather on high-level play" then a patch should happen immediately to nerf Zerg by 15% and buff Protoss by 14%.
Despite all this Trap managed to get to have the 2nd most WCS Korea points which I think is the most impressive feat of any Korean this year, considering he was playing Protoss, not Zerg and didn't win a GSL which gives a lot of points (Protoss haven't won a GSL in 2 years so you can't really blame Trap, he came closer than anyone else playing Protoss by getting to the last 2 finals).
Calling Trap a shit player or not high-level play is pretty much the most unfair claim one could make about an SC2 player at the moment. He is playing a race that is 29% behind Zerg, the only race he lost to in the last 2 GSLs .
To be equally blunt, looking at ZvPs from the top Zergs the only times I see them lose is when they have moments of "shit play", otherwise Protoss seems doomed.
Trap is arguably the best player this year, in the last 2 GSLs he won everything that wasn't vs Zerg including beating all the best Terrans and Classic (who was highest rated PvP at the time) in PvP bo7. Protoss don't beat top Zergs, Dark, Rogue and Solar are top Zergs and that is all he lost to.
Of course he has lower rating, the highest rated protoss on Aliguliac is 10th total, with 5 Zergs ahead. The highest rating for any Protoss in PvZ is 2845 The highest rating for Zerg in ZvP is 3191 This is because Zerg, the race, is easier to win with in ZvP at the highest level statistically. Rogue is 271 rating off of being the best at ZvP. Trap is 241 rating off being the best at PvZ.
So Trap is closer to being the best out of everyone at the matchup playing Protoss than Rogue is to doing that as Zerg. Trap is closer to playing Protoss at its potential than Rogue is to playing Zerg at its potential [If we call current potential best in the world/highest rating] (in all matchups), that is not enough.
Trap has been much more impressive this year, especially when you factor in how Protoss are at a huge disadvantage comparative to Zerg. Thats why he "had to" do all ins, so you can't judge his strategy without taking into account Zerg are at a big advantage and that grows massively once they don't have to make more drones because then they can't get it wrong and make drones as they are being all inned which is mainly how we see Zerg lose in the matchup, not that it mattered vs the adept all in in game 4. Zerg also have a massive advantage once they get to Infestor, Broodlord, Spore.
I would love to see how Trap would do if the game were actually balanced.
I didn't want to type that much but that is something I just have to call out immediately.
Leaving aside the mental gymnastics you had to do to ignore the Aligulac balance graphs (how hard is it to flat-out deny the right-most end of the graph where all 3 races are basically equal LOL), I'm just gonna address the part where it seems to you that Trap's play was as great as it could be, while Rogue was just carried over by the easiest race to play: go look at some of Neeb's wins over Z if you want to see what good PvZ is like.
As far as the 'Trap is the best PvZ player, but nothing to do against the big bad zerg' theory, you can look at Zest's showing against Rogue in the quarterfinal, where he actually put up a fight despite being far from his best form this year and PvZ being his worst MU.
For the record, I don't think Trap is 'a shit player', just that he was massively outplayed in this finals and perhaps he might've done better if Rogue wasn't his teammate.
I also don't think Dark is a shit player just because he got outplayed this time in the semis, although you might be able to find some balance reason for that and I can't wait to read about it
Players have ups and downs, sometimes they do great for a whole tournament just to fall apart in the finals (see soO's GSL finals), while other players struggle through a tournament only to shine on the last day. It's why we play these games instead of just handing out trophies based on ladder ranking.
On September 29 2019 23:59 BisuDagger wrote: At what patch made zerg this powerful in the late game or has it always been this strong in LoTV? Wasn't Zerg essentially the same in 2018? I'm just curious if it took since LoTV release for Zerg to find its true potential and it had been there the whole time.
Zergs also got better, this tends to be the ebb and flow of ZvP since forever. PvZ has basically always sucked in how it flows anyway, we’re just seeing it more in focus lately. TvZ and TvP you can deviate and cheese, or do wonky things but they’re also characterised by trades between stock compositions, and playing ‘straight up’ so to speak and gaining incremental edges.
PvZ unless it’s a really weird game just does not work like that. It’s usually expand, do some kind of tech based harassment and hit a timing attack at some point.
The two races for whatever reasons just don’t dovetail well together. I like PvT more than most, and many love TvZ obviously, so both races can make good matchups, just together not so much.
If Protoss had a comparable lategame to Zerg, or at least viable the matchup would be better because it would give Zergs more to worry about in terms of gameplans.
As it stands Zerg players know Protoss players aren’t even considering playing for the lategame, and are going to try and kill them before BL/Infestor hits its stride.
If you know that to be the case, the more time that passes the worse it will get. Just by experience alone, even without changes and patches.
The likes of Serral/Rogue and Dark have probably played literally a thousand ZvPs since the period around Super Tournament 1 where Protoss were crushing it with Immortal timings.
It’s a crude analogy but I feel the Zerg in this matchup are a bit like the Borg. Every time you devise some new weapon to kill them the collective adapts and it stops working so well. DT drop into Archon prism shenanigans used to do a lot of damage or slow the Zerg down, now it’s defended borderline flawlessly etc etc.
On September 30 2019 02:17 Wombat_NI wrote: It’s a crude analogy but I feel the Zerg in this matchup are a bit like the Borg. Every time you devise some new weapon to kill them the collective adapts and it stops working so well. DT drop into Archon prism shenanigans used to do a lot of damage or slow the Zerg down, now it’s defended borderline flawlessly etc etc.
That's just a general truth to the game I'd say, just look at TvZ. Cyclone mech after the patch in November started off strong, now the highest level Terrans barely go for it anymore. BC harass openers seemed really strong for a while, but people learnt to handle those well enough relatively fast. Continued BC production seemed really good but then Zergs figured out that they have a working counterplay in infestors (as well as some roach/ravager/corruptor timings). Now if you watch the top Korean Terrans their standard play is bio/tank into bio/mine (the latter was a pretty unexpected comeback).
In general players adapt over time to find solutions, and then people adapt to the solutions and on and on. And when people can't directly adapt to something for whatever reason, they try playing around it (e. g. Soultrain vs BL/infestor). Or beg until Blizzard changes it.
On September 30 2019 02:17 Wombat_NI wrote: It’s a crude analogy but I feel the Zerg in this matchup are a bit like the Borg. Every time you devise some new weapon to kill them the collective adapts and it stops working so well. DT drop into Archon prism shenanigans used to do a lot of damage or slow the Zerg down, now it’s defended borderline flawlessly etc etc.
That's just a general truth to the game I'd say, just look at TvZ. Cyclone mech after the patch in November started off strong, now the highest level Terrans barely go for it anymore. BC harass openers seemed really strong for a while, but people learnt to handle those well enough relatively fast. Continued BC production seemed really good but then Zergs figured out that they have a working counterplay in infestors (as well as some roach/ravager/corruptor timings). Now if you watch the top Korean Terrans their standard play is bio/tank into bio/mine (the latter was a pretty unexpected comeback).
In general players adapt over time to find solutions, and then people adapt to the solutions and on and on. And when people can't directly adapt to something for whatever reason, they try playing around it (e. g. Soultrain vs BL/infestor). Or beg until Blizzard changes it.
Well absolutely, it keeps the game interesting.
Protoss have neither a good lategame vZ, nor the ability to be trading armies and being active that they do have T, or Terrans and Zergs have with each other.
If they had either PvZ would be considerably better, it feels they are very very constrained currently, and it’s easier to deal with their tricks under those constraints.
The race is so, so reliant currently on tricking a Zerg opponent, exemplified by stuff like double hidden Stargate off an ostensible Robo opener isn’t some weird sOs one time build but a relatively common one.
The era of airtoss had its problems too don’t get me wrong, but the matchup was probably at its best then because Protoss could play a passive macro game, which gave them another option and something for their opponent to think about. Which meant they couldn’t cut corners around such a relatively predictable framework as we’re seeing now. Wings had a decent period as well before Zergs plugged holes in their play, where Protoss split armies and used warp prisms to circumvent the composition. It was a pretty cool period with some crazy games from HerO specifically but even Ace played an amazing one. Zergs plugged those holes in their play though and BL/Infestor play got a lot better figured out.
The problem with Zerg is a design one. For a balanced game, each race needs a match up that requires being aggressive, another that requires being defensive, then the mirror gets to be a clown fiesta. When the optimal play by one of the races is to be hyper aggressive all the time or hyper defensive all the time, it causes all kinds of problems in terms of balance and lets one dimensional players over perform. (e.g. ByuN with Terran in 2016)
We had that for a time with Zerg in 2018 with Ravens, but they nerfed them to hell because Serral couldn't handle them even though good Zerg players like Rogue and Dark were having success at that time. (Rogue won Katowice beating Maru. Dark lost 4-3 then 4-2 to Maru)
On September 30 2019 03:31 Wombat_NI wrote: The race is so, so reliant currently on tricking a Zerg opponent, exemplified by stuff like double hidden Stargate off an ostensible Robo opener isn’t some weird sOs one time build but a relatively common one.
And said trickery has been nerfed pretty harshly with changes to warp prisms and overlord speed. PvZ has definitely hit a rough patch.
On September 30 2019 03:33 Boggyb wrote: The problem with Zerg is a design one. For a balanced game, each race needs a match up that requires being aggressive, another that requires being defensive, then the mirror gets to be a clown fiesta. When the optimal play by one of the races is to be hyper aggressive all the time or hyper defensive all the time, it causes all kinds of problems in terms of balance and lets one dimensional players over perform. (e.g. ByuN with Terran in 2016)
We had that for a time with Zerg in 2018 with Ravens, but they nerfed them to hell because Serral couldn't handle them even though good Zerg players like Rogue and Dark were having success at that time. (Rogue won Katowice beating Maru. Dark lost 4-3 then 4-2 to Maru)
TvZ is largely fine and has been a good matchup forever, despite one participant being aggressive generally and the other defensive.
I’m fine with that dynamic personally, think it adds character to the races. Certain styles suit different people and I like that aspect of the game.
Issues arise when the expected aggressor can’t be reliably aggressive without going all-in though, absolutely.
On September 30 2019 03:31 Wombat_NI wrote: The race is so, so reliant currently on tricking a Zerg opponent, exemplified by stuff like double hidden Stargate off an ostensible Robo opener isn’t some weird sOs one time build but a relatively common one.
And said trickery has been nerfed pretty harshly with changes to warp prisms and overlord speed. PvZ has definitely hit a rough patch.
Which should not have happened IMO. It really felt like a patch for a problem that Zergs had already solved, or at least got a lot better at dealing with.
Change maybe one of those things sure, but both at once after Protoss’ PvZ spike seemed to have reverted was overkill IMO.
On September 29 2019 11:35 phodacbiet wrote: Why do players like Rogue and Dark look down or think they are better than Serral in macro game? Serral is a macro/end game Zerg. Both of these guys have played Serral in the late game before and got stomped. Silly Rogue.
Dark is at least 1 tier below Rogue in ZvZ. He just always had a big mouth. Top form Rogue is on Serrals level for sure. And this kind of mentality can only help his chances. Same with Time, he almost swept Serral in Asus ROG. I find it much better then shitting pants even before the match starts, like all the foreigners except Reynor do every single time.
Serral is a god, but he is not unbeatable. I wish more players werent so scared of him, we might see closer games even in the foreignerland.
On September 29 2019 11:35 phodacbiet wrote: Why do players like Rogue and Dark look down or think they are better than Serral in macro game? Serral is a macro/end game Zerg. Both of these guys have played Serral in the late game before and got stomped. Silly Rogue.
Dark is at least 1 tier below Rogue in ZvZ. He just always had a big mouth. Top form Rogue is on Serrals level for sure. And this kind of mentality can only help his chances. Same with Time, he almost swept Serral in Asus ROG. I find it much better then shitting pants even before the match starts, like all the foreigners except Reynor do every single time.
Serral is a god, but he is not unbeatable. I wish more players werent so scared of him, we might see closer games even in the foreignerland.
Alternatively if they approached him with a ‘I’m fucked and have nothing to lose’ mentality that would probably give better games too.
They seem to do the worst of both worlds, they play like they have the pressure of expectation, but they don’t expect to be able to win. If they either believed they could win or said fuck it I’ll play my game and see what happens, both of those I think we’d see better performances.
So even Rogue calls himself a Patchzerg now. SexyBoi likes to run around naked. Find it hilarious if he really said that he found out in Group of 16 only that now is a good time to practice.
Even pro's cant seem to figure out that the issue with Zerg is the map pool. While I'll agree infestor is definitely strong, the map pool is what's causing this nonsense WCS after WCS.
I think the map pool is part of the problem, but I would also love to see some more interesting upgrades added to the game. An upgrade for archons that require both DT and HT tech, an upgrade for voids that requires DT and Fleet beacon, upgrade to zealots stalkers that requires DT Tech to be completed. For zerg, I would love to see upgrades for roaches, Lings, and Hydras that would be researched at the Hive, maybe upgrades for marines / Mauraders that requires BC tech to be completed first, just as examples. I would love for these upgrades to be $$$, but allow these more basic units to compete with late game death balls
On September 30 2019 05:04 balzac1 wrote: I think the map pool is part of the problem, but I would also love to see some more interesting upgrades added to the game. An upgrade for archons that require both DT and HT tech, an upgrade for voids that requires DT and Fleet beacon, upgrade to zealots stalkers that requires DT Tech to be completed. For zerg, I would love to see upgrades for roaches, Lings, and Hydras that would be researched at the Hive, maybe upgrades for marines / Mauraders that requires BC tech to be completed first, just as examples. I would love for these upgrades to be $$$, but allow these more basic units to compete with late game death balls
Zerglings are already insanely good late game for harassment, especially since both Protoss and Terran have worse map vision than Zerg. Anything beyond Adrenal would make it impossible for a non-Zerg player to move out without going super all in.
EPT
