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[D/H]Ultras in ZvZ - Page 4

Forum Index > StarCraft 2 Strategy
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Turbogangsta
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
Australia319 Posts
June 15 2012 02:56 GMT
#61
sorry for not reading thoroughly through this thread but i wanted to get my idea out there and get some feed back. i was under the imppresion that ultras were good because they come out very fast, are very tanky, great splash against fungled units, fast, and arent stopped by fungle. i was also under the impression that having alot of high energy infestors with burrow was a counter to brood lords if they have support because they can spawn an army of infested terrans beneath the broods. I feel like if u get enough brood lords then they start to counter ultralisks (though ultras have lots of mobility and with drop/nydus they could counter broods), so i was thinking to counter infestors spamming infested terran under your broods you would have a handfull of banelings behind your army to clear out any IT spam before they even do any damage. this allows you to hold your ground with broods. these banelings would be unstoppable by enemy infestors because of brood lord range. am i missing a key factor or could this become a thing?

perhaps a game of ZvZ should evolve from using queens and ultras to stay alive and tech into broodlords and then use your own nydus defensively with ultras to counter enemy nydus and then you can use bane brood infestor spine to start zoning the map very slowly. i know this is a really extreme case and probably untouchable for a very long time but i think the banelings to kill infested terrans beneath broodlords is very viable and worth while at lower levels where players arnt able to abuse mobility so much (low master kinda level).
Esports is killing Esports.
TangSC
Profile Blog Joined July 2011
Canada1866 Posts
June 15 2012 03:35 GMT
#62
Stephano does a really sick ultralisk style in ZvZ: http://www.twitch.tv/mstephano/b/320060897 probably 10 ZvZs in here with him doing it, I've been experimenting but I straight up die to a lot of roach timings.
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Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-06-15 04:18:33
June 15 2012 04:17 GMT
#63
^ moar spines. thanks for the link.

. i was also under the impression that having alot of high energy infestors with burrow was a counter to brood lords if they have support because they can spawn an army of infested terrans beneath the broods. I feel like if u get enough brood lords then they start to counter ultralisks (though ultras have lots of mobility and with drop/nydus they could counter broods), so i was thinking to counter infestors spamming infested terran under your broods you would have a handfull of banelings behind your army to clear out any IT spam before they even do any damage. this allows you to hold your ground with broods. these banelings would be unstoppable by enemy infestors because of brood lord range. am i missing a key factor or could this become a thing?


No way. Maybe with just a few unsupported broods, yea, but once you have about 10-12+ broodlords, any amount of infestors gets owned by them. The 13 range on them is just sick, when you have 12+ broodlords spewing broodlings everywhere and doing that much damage, no infestors is getting anywhere near those broodlods.

Also, pure broodlord/corruptor is way stronger than broodlord/infestor. It's just a matter of hitting that critical mass of broodlords where suddenly infestors become useless. Which is the rub of 'standard' roach based zvz in lategame - make too many infestors, and you will get owned by mass broodlords that come quite quickly if the opponent realizes you are making lots of infestors and then 'counters' by just banking up and going straight for mass broodlords, make too few infestors and you get owned by mass roach, especially if you go just roach/hydra into broodlords.

Yes, enough broodlords can 'counter' ultras, but there are 2 huge problems with this:
1. To get that many broodlords that can kill ultras in anything less than 6 seconds (the time an ultra will ran into range and then past the broodlord, roughly), takes 6+ bases, and while you can be greedy against this sort of ling/infestor/ultra play, you just simply cant mine gas fast enough to get that many broodlords in time to fight against just 3-5 ultras with mass ling/infestor.
2. Ultras just run past your broodlord army and kill off your new bases. If you ever try to attack with your broodlords, the ultras just go kill your bases.

Broodlords can be okay against this style on maps like metal or shakuras where you can split map it really easily and mass spines, but there's a problem with this too - the ultra player will just add a spire, and get some corruptors. Yea, maybe you will have your own corruptors too, but the ultra player will have map control, he'll have better melee/carapace upgrades on his ultras and broodlings when he gets broodlords himself, and finally he'll have a bigger infestor count to support his corruptors too.

Banelings are not a counter at all to IT. The same unit that casts It can also cast FG, and he'll have ultras and upgraded lings, which will laugh at unupgraded banes (good luck getting 3/3/3, mass roach, broodlords against someone who only needs 3/3, ultras, and didnt make roaches).

Yea, you are definitely missing it.

here's some replays where I go this ling/infestor into ultra play. In one of the games, I actually get mass broodlords, since you will eventually need to transition out of ling/infestor/ultra into pure broodlord/corruptor, but you should have already won the game by that point.

http://drop.sc/197897 (i eventually transitioned into broodlords, to bust his mass spine wall, so I had a pure bl/ultra/infestor crazy army. but once I had ultras out, I denied the opponent's 5th base, and even killed his 4th. it was only as close as it was because he got a clutch double fg and killed like 12 of my infestors all at once. he was a better player than me for sure though)

http://drop.sc/197898 (didnt make enough spines. epic base trade where my ultra/ling army was just way more mobile than roach/hydra. i screwed up by not making enough spines and losing too many infestors though, and not enough ultras because i had to remake infestors)

http://drop.sc/197899 (vs mutas, he had a lead but this style is just so epic i dont give a fuck how far ahead you are, bitch i get 3 bases and then its ultras gg)

http://drop.sc/197900 (focused 3 hatches down, and i wasn't being overly aggressive or anything, the opponent played standard fast third roach, and I completely droned up 2 bases and was teching to infestors before making any lings, but it was that map condemned ridge where the 3 bases are all far apart and wide open so I just split up my lings into 3 parts and focused his 3 bases down before my infestors even popped, and when he counterattacked I had mass spine and infestors so its pretty obvious you can handle any mass roach attack with this style)
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FYRE
Profile Blog Joined January 2011
New Zealand314 Posts
June 15 2012 04:36 GMT
#64
since when are drops gimmicky
Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
June 15 2012 04:57 GMT
#65
since they cost 300/300 and can be easily stopped if he has good overlord spread.

If you are playing standard fast third play, you simply won't have enough roaches in time. By the time you have drop tech, he has infestors out, so he'll have mass infestor/ling, which will just be stronger than the roaches you can afford if you massed them off 3 base vs someone who is staying only on 2 base, and was given the time to get infestors out (since you had to research drop tech, and went lair much, much later).

Obviously, there is a lot you could probably do if you do some sort of 2 base lair roach all-in against this, but that's simply a matter of "hey, look, he's all-inning, I should make more spines and units and pay attention to drops/nydus".

i was asking how to beat it by playing a standard, fast third before lair, roach based game, and quite frankly i don't see any way to beat it. Which is why I've completely converted to playing this way, and so far, i haven't lost at all in zvz (about 10 games so far, oddly havent run into who did it also yet). macro simply doesnt matter when you play like this, its just derping a deathball and making sure you make enough spines/lings to hold aggression.
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Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-06-15 06:07:03
June 15 2012 06:05 GMT
#66
http://drop.sc/198170

Here's a very interesting replay where I play this style against someone playing standard fast third before lair roach style.

So there were definitely problems in what I was doing, as I'm still new to this. He actually ended up getting a lair quicker than me, simply because I made so many drones so early on (i guess i was playing how I play 2 base muta in zvt vs reactor hellion expands that force macro hatch), and there was a key period I could have killed him, and I probably lost the game because I let him FG all my infestors that I oddly left wayyyy out on the map away from my army or anything, and I could have taken a quicker third and fourth (maybe not, but I should have attempted to and just cancelled if a push came).

But his response I think is worth noting.

he sees what I'm doing, so he does a few things. First, he throws a 2nd evo for double evo right away, drones up his third, and he does get roach speed and +1 attack like normal, but he makes very, very few roaches, just a few so he can secure his third against mass upgraded lings. He then goes straight for infestors, and a very quick hive, morphing his just a few seconds later than I did. With his roach/ling/infestor army with heavy upgrades, he takes a fourth before me. Now he goes for broodlord tech and mass spines, and at this point I could have just killed him (i denied his fifth over and over but I should have just straight up killed him), so I guess what he did there would not have worked normally, but if he had gone for ultras instead, I think he would have had a good chance (i mean.. a good chance against a good player whos doing this build right).

I'm going to keep doing this build, but I think the concept the guy had was the right idea - play normal, if you see this infestor shenanigans, you just transition into double ups ling/infestor, don't make any more roaches, and go for ultras.

Seeing as you identify it's a 2 base lair build early on, you aren't making roaches against mutas or infestors, and you are going infestors anyways in case of mutas (and imo as best response against infestor openings too). Then just get lots of upgrades, take your fourth, then get ultras and spines I guess. I guess your ultras will be later than the fast infestor player, but with spines maybe you buy enough time.

I don't know. There were a lot of mistakes, I was way ahead, but I played the broodlord/corruptor/infestor part of the game completely wrong. he did some drops, and they didn't do too much damage, i handled them pretty well for the most part. But something to note - I think if you play this style, you should re-root your spines that you massed when taking your third, when your ultras pop, to be around your bases to deal with roach drops or harass, something I failed to do but probably would have helped a ton and let me push out and kill him instead of dealing with drops.

There were mistakes in my play, i should have just killed him, i bungled the bl/corruptor part when I had a clear lead, i should have expanded quicker, and I definitely should have teched a lot quicker. But maybe this guy was on to something with his cut roaches, go for upgrades, infestors, fast hive style.

I'm also going to do some testing in unit tester, to see how important upgrades really are. I know with lings generally upgrades are useless a lot of the times (ie +1 carapace is great against +0 mech, but +1 or more mech doesnt care if you have 0 or 3 armor, +1 thors dont care what armor your mutas are unless they are +3, and +2 vikings dont care if its +2 or +3 carapace on broodlords, for example) to see if we can maybe cut some of the upgrades out. 2/2 costs a ton.
How to build a $500 i7-3770K Ultimate Computer:http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?topic_id=392709 ******** 100% Safe Razorless Delid Method! http://www.overclock.net/t/1376206/how-to-delid-your-ivy-bridge-cpu-with-out-a-razor-blade/0_100
Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-06-15 06:46:05
June 15 2012 06:45 GMT
#67
Some testing I did in unit tester

Note, when 2 melee units fight, whichever unit was issued an attack command first, will get the first hit off. So 1/0 lings and 0/1 lings are equal against eachother based on this. I tested how lings may be better by testing with issuing commands first to both sides, and if one side wins even if it gets last hit, that's clearly a better ling.
+ Show Spoiler +

+1 armor vs +0 banelings, ling survives with 1 hp
+Any armor vs +1 banelings, ling always dies (even +3 armor vs +1 attack)

1/1 lings beat 2/0 lings
1/1 lings equal to 0/2 lings

2/3 and 3/2 lings equal

3 0/0 lings beat 1 0/0 roach


4 0/0 lings beat a 1/0 roach
3 1/1 lings beat a 1/0 roach
still takes 3 1/1 lings to beat a 0/0 roach, so there's not a huge 1/1 timing to hit (i mean obviously it will be stronger with more numbers, but it's not some super huge critical timing, like +1 attack is for roaches vs lings)

+1 roaches will 2 shot a 0 armor ling, but +1 roaches will kill any armor ling in 3 shots (1 to 3 carapace wont matter if he has +1 attack on roaches). From then on, as long as the roach player keeps up in attack upgrades, he will 2 shots the lings.
So..
+2 roach takes 3 shots to kill +3, 2 shots to kill +2.

So maybe armor isn't as useful if playing against a roach style, besides +1 carapace (which is extremely useful, 1 more shots for both banes and roaches). It's unlikely you will hit +3 armor before a roach player gets +2 attack, since they always go 2/0 before 1/1 (and generally focus on upgrades anyways).

It still takes 3 3/3 lings to kill a 1/0 roach, but it leaves it at very low life.

So +1 carapace just counteracts +1 missile. But +2 armor does not counterattack +2 missile. +3 armor counteracts +2 missile. So dont rush +2 armor? but get it and 3/3 eventually.. just maybe after hive? Melee is of course always useful.


tldr, 1/1 is great, further carapace upgrades dont seem that great, attack upgrades are cool but dont add any important critical numbers, although Im sure is useful when you have a mass of lings. So I guess get 1/1 quickly, but 2/2 and 3/3 isn't super important (ie maybe get that hive or more infestors out quicker instead of upgrades, get ultra den before 3/3).
Attack upgrades are probably always useful, but not so much on carapace
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blade55555
Profile Blog Joined March 2009
United States17423 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-06-15 06:53:45
June 15 2012 06:53 GMT
#68
You are getting 2/2 3/3 not for the lings, but for the ultra's. Ultra's with 5/3 upgrades are fucking powerful and that is your goal when going this style. It doesn't matter if it doesn't benefit zerglings that much, you are aiming for ultralisks and trust me 5 armor upgraded ultras are incredibly powerful. You don't want to skimp on upgrades because you don't think it's worth it for lings
When I think of something else, something will go here
Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
June 15 2012 07:23 GMT
#69
yea i should test with the ultras. I do think the upgrades are very important, but what I took away from the tests was maybe get that infestation pit before 2/2, get the ultra den before 3/3. Maybe get attack upgrades, but delay the carapace. (ie get 1/1, then get attack upgrade and infestation pit, carapace, hive, attack + ultra den then +3 carapace).
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Turbogangsta
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
Australia319 Posts
June 15 2012 12:21 GMT
#70
On June 15 2012 13:17 Belial88 wrote:
^ moar spines. thanks for the link.

Show nested quote +
. i was also under the impression that having alot of high energy infestors with burrow was a counter to brood lords if they have support because they can spawn an army of infested terrans beneath the broods. I feel like if u get enough brood lords then they start to counter ultralisks (though ultras have lots of mobility and with drop/nydus they could counter broods), so i was thinking to counter infestors spamming infested terran under your broods you would have a handfull of banelings behind your army to clear out any IT spam before they even do any damage. this allows you to hold your ground with broods. these banelings would be unstoppable by enemy infestors because of brood lord range. am i missing a key factor or could this become a thing?


No way. Maybe with just a few unsupported broods, yea, but once you have about 10-12+ broodlords, any amount of infestors gets owned by them. The 13 range on them is just sick, when you have 12+ broodlords spewing broodlings everywhere and doing that much damage, no infestors is getting anywhere near those broodlods.

Also, pure broodlord/corruptor is way stronger than broodlord/infestor. It's just a matter of hitting that critical mass of broodlords where suddenly infestors become useless. Which is the rub of 'standard' roach based zvz in lategame - make too many infestors, and you will get owned by mass broodlords that come quite quickly if the opponent realizes you are making lots of infestors and then 'counters' by just banking up and going straight for mass broodlords, make too few infestors and you get owned by mass roach, especially if you go just roach/hydra into broodlords.

Yes, enough broodlords can 'counter' ultras, but there are 2 huge problems with this:
1. To get that many broodlords that can kill ultras in anything less than 6 seconds (the time an ultra will ran into range and then past the broodlord, roughly), takes 6+ bases, and while you can be greedy against this sort of ling/infestor/ultra play, you just simply cant mine gas fast enough to get that many broodlords in time to fight against just 3-5 ultras with mass ling/infestor.
2. Ultras just run past your broodlord army and kill off your new bases. If you ever try to attack with your broodlords, the ultras just go kill your bases.

Broodlords can be okay against this style on maps like metal or shakuras where you can split map it really easily and mass spines, but there's a problem with this too - the ultra player will just add a spire, and get some corruptors. Yea, maybe you will have your own corruptors too, but the ultra player will have map control, he'll have better melee/carapace upgrades on his ultras and broodlings when he gets broodlords himself, and finally he'll have a bigger infestor count to support his corruptors too.

Banelings are not a counter at all to IT. The same unit that casts It can also cast FG, and he'll have ultras and upgraded lings, which will laugh at unupgraded banes (good luck getting 3/3/3, mass roach, broodlords against someone who only needs 3/3, ultras, and didnt make roaches).

Yea, you are definitely missing it.


you say the infestors cant get close enough to broods to spam infested terran (which i disagree with since they are burrowing under roach/ultra which tank) and then you say that banes cant be used against infested terran since infestors will fungle them. these two point contradict a bit. i think you should acknoledge that infested terran are actualy a threat to broods and i feel the best way to deal with this as the brood lord player is to have either a handfull of banes or a hand full of infestors. (the banes being much more effective). In this situation unburrowed infestors from the non brood palyer will be prioritised by broods so they wont be able to fungle the banes.

this method kills brood lord very effectively and even with infestors to fungle the infested terran they will still kill a decent amount of broods and then you can run at the cost of almost nothing while broods take forever to morph. i feel like broods need banelings to kill infested terran spam.

i agree with ultras being the best hive tech unit in ZvZ and i have been using them late game ZvZ since i can remember. i feel though that i could definatly have lost some games to brood players that had they gotten banes to kill infested terrans (though this ignores the fact that ultra+nydus/drop is so good)
Esports is killing Esports.
Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
June 15 2012 22:40 GMT
#71
^ if you have an overseer or some FG, you can't burrow infestors like that under the broodlords.

I'm not exactly sure what you are saying.

The end-game goal for zvz is definitely pure broodlord/corruptor, but ultras are better to get first, according to this style. In one of the replays you can see I go bl/corruptor after mass ultras, as you need a couple broodlords to break mass spines
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Turbogangsta
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
Australia319 Posts
June 16 2012 00:51 GMT
#72
On June 16 2012 07:40 Belial88 wrote:
^ if you have an overseer or some FG, you can't burrow infestors like that under the broodlords.

I'm not exactly sure what you are saying.

The end-game goal for zvz is definitely pure broodlord/corruptor, but ultras are better to get first, according to this style. In one of the replays you can see I go bl/corruptor after mass ultras, as you need a couple broodlords to break mass spines


I assume detection. I did some unit testing and I was able to break 8 ish spines 12 broods 2 spores and 2 overseers that where spread decently with I think 8 full energy infestors and 25 ish roaches. Though I wasn't microns the broods after I set it up. Both sides had full upgrades including air attack/armor. Next time my friend is on I'll get him to play the other side but I'm not sure it will make much difference. If I added in hydras it was very easy to break. If the brood lord player had infestors then it's not pure brood lord corrupt.

I don't have mouse click bound to my mouse wheel for instant mass infested Terran but I still came out on top killing everything and having ~5 infestors and ~20 roaches each time.

This test also had much less gas invested into the Infestor player ~1000 less and also had about ~2000 minerals left. But I don't think the minerals count since its defensive spines. Not to mention the amount of gas that went into tech and upgrades for the broods. I think if the brood player keeps a few infestors and about 10 bane lings behind their army then I wouldnt even be able to kill 1 brood lord.

So now I ask how is a player to get such a large number of broods when they have roach hydra Infestor with eventually ultra or perhaps ling ultra Infestor attacking them. Also nydus/drop and ultra will kill all the production of the brooding player should they get too many broods. I think broods still have a place in ZvZ as a game ender once your ahead but I feel that ultra+queen and Infestor is much better if your ahead.

Also to clarify my infestors aren't exactly burrowing under the broods they are just getting close enough (whilst staying under the roaches) to launch infested Terran into range of the brood lords.
Esports is killing Esports.
XXhkXX
Profile Joined June 2011
170 Posts
June 16 2012 03:18 GMT
#73
I'm not sure whether this is exactly a solution to the problem, however the premise of the ultra fast ultra build i thought was to get to lair fast to keep upgrades going, then wouldnt it be pretty weak while transitioning into lair since the upgrades wouldn't have kicked in? Some sort of roach bane timing would be really all in but wouldnt it effectively beat the build, since they would have nothing but lings and banes and some spines, without upgrades? If they don't have enough spines its a win, and if they do have spines u could attempt to run by them, or if there is a small army just take them down. I mean realistically, it seems that spending gas into roaches would put u very far behind tech and upgrade wise, unless u somewhow find a way to bypass that gas shortage by maybe cutting ling speed and using defensive banes, but that seems like a pretty stupid idea as there is no definite way of knowing that they are going this build until too late into the game, where ling speed would be necessary o.o.

Maybe something along the lines of this with some effective micro?
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=224227
Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
June 16 2012 07:33 GMT
#74
I assume detection. I did some unit testing and I was able to break 8 ish spines 12 broods 2 spores and 2 overseers that where spread decently with I think 8 full energy infestors and 25 ish roaches. Though I wasn't microns the broods after I set it up. Both sides had full upgrades including air attack/armor. Next time my friend is on I'll get him to play the other side but I'm not sure it will make much difference. If I added in hydras it was very easy to break. If the brood lord player had infestors then it's not pure brood lord corrupt.


This sort of unit testing makes absolutely no sense at all. You use broodlord/corruptor only to 'counter' broodlord/infestor, and you need infestors to 'counter' mass roach. You don't go pure broodlord/corruptor or 12+ broodlords if the opponent is only on mass roach or roach/infestor, broodlord/corruptor isn't really that good against mass roach due to counterattacks and base denial and eventually massing enough corruptors because he's still mining and then just kills you with more corruptors eventually while you arne't mining.

What I was saying, is that once you have 12+ broodlords, infestors don't work anymore. I didn't say roaches, I said infestors. You can't go pure infestor and beat 15+ broodlords, you can't use FG or IT spam to beat 15+ broodlords. You just won't get in range at all, and it's not cost efficient at all as you maybe kill a couple broodlords while the rest just fly away and then you have no energy at all, not to mention lost a ton more infestors in the process.

I don't really want to continue this discussion, sorry. I think it's kind of absurd. I'm wrong, you are right. I don't know what level you are, I'm 1.2k points masters zerg last season, and my average zvz game length is 17:58 minutes long so i run into broodlords and infestors and hive tech a lot.

Once you have just a critical mass of broodlords, infestors don't work anymore. Broodlord/infestor gets owned by pure broodlord/corruptor once the pure broodlord/corruptor army meets a critical mass of 200/200 pure 12+ broodlord and the rest in corruptors.

And no micro involved is ridiculous. The whole point is the broods just back off if you spam IT's, and then the infestors no longer have energy and you push when the ITs are gone.

That's all I really have to say on this subject. You are correct, I am wrong. Thanks.

So now I ask how is a player to get such a large number of broods when they have roach hydra Infestor with eventually ultra or perhaps ling ultra Infestor attacking them. Also nydus/drop and ultra will kill all the production of the brooding player should they get too many broods. I think broods still have a place in ZvZ as a game ender once your ahead but I feel that ultra+queen and Infestor is much better if your ahead.


The whole point of this discussion is that roach/hydra play sucks and this new ling/infestor 2 base into 3 base mass spine/ling/infestor into quick 3 base hive ultra/infestor just owns standard fast third roach based play (as well as any sort of roach based play, including muta play into roach/hydra/infestor/bl or muta into speedbane/ling/muta/ultra). So no, there is no way to get a critical mass of broodlords in time against the ultra player. You probably shouldn't be making so many infestors to 'counter' the broodlords though, it's better to just make quicker ultras so you can deny the roach players 4th and 5th bases while securing your own, and then add a spire to deal with the broodlord/infestor army or roach/hydra/infestor/broodlord.

I'm not sure whether this is exactly a solution to the problem, however the premise of the ultra fast ultra build i thought was to get to lair fast to keep upgrades going, then wouldnt it be pretty weak while transitioning into lair since the upgrades wouldn't have kicked in? Some sort of roach bane timing would be really all in but wouldnt it effectively beat the build, since they would have nothing but lings and banes and some spines, without upgrades? If they don't have enough spines its a win, and if they do have spines u could attempt to run by them, or if there is a small army just take them down. I mean realistically, it seems that spending gas into roaches would put u very far behind tech and upgrade wise, unless u somewhow find a way to bypass that gas shortage by maybe cutting ling speed and using defensive banes, but that seems like a pretty stupid idea as there is no definite way of knowing that they are going this build until too late into the game, where ling speed would be necessary o.o.


That has nothing to do with this build, that would be like saying "maybe a 6 pool can counter this?"

Roach/ling (btw more roaches > banes, and mass banes will just get owned by 6 defensive banes and well placed spines) will just get owned by any good player, who realizes the opponent cut drones at like 28 and thus has an empty mineral line compared to yours. You just handle it like you would handle any roach/ling all-in - you don't take a third, and tech up to lair, defend with mass spines (maybe a few roaches or lings or queens even), and then counterattack for a complete win with mutas/mass speed roach with burrow/infestors.

4 gate doesn't counter fast third play because the zerg won't take a third against it, and will just beat the 4 gate easily as zergs nowadays know how to. Similarly, roach/ling all-in is terrible and isn't a 'counter' to this. it's early game aggression that is handled specifically by teching up and turtling behind spines, using a tech advantage since you can't take a third but you do still have an econ advantage by drone count.

User was warned for this post
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Hijungle
Profile Joined February 2011
Australia67 Posts
June 16 2012 13:22 GMT
#75
I saw this today on Idra's stream.

Basically, from what little I saw.. He massed ling/bling.. And he played really defensively, droning up quite heavily and getting to three fully saturated bases while getting quick upgrades. The ultimate intention was to win with the ultra push, I think.

I use the word 'passive' quite lightly, he used his lings to deny expansions etc.. but not to outwardly kill him. That was never the intention (I think)

Ultimately, you make a lot of spines back at home, ling/bling infestor w/quick upgrades into 5/3 ultras, the engagement was basically ultras in the front and fungal growth to keep the opponents roaches still, and then lings to surround.

It's a fun strat to use, but from my experience you're playing a big risk not getting roaches, imo.



Yoshi Kirishima
Profile Blog Joined July 2009
United States10324 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-06-20 09:34:50
June 20 2012 09:30 GMT
#76
On June 16 2012 16:33 Belial88 wrote:
Show nested quote +
I assume detection. I did some unit testing and I was able to break 8 ish spines 12 broods 2 spores and 2 overseers that where spread decently with I think 8 full energy infestors and 25 ish roaches. Though I wasn't microns the broods after I set it up. Both sides had full upgrades including air attack/armor. Next time my friend is on I'll get him to play the other side but I'm not sure it will make much difference. If I added in hydras it was very easy to break. If the brood lord player had infestors then it's not pure brood lord corrupt.


This sort of unit testing makes absolutely no sense at all. You use broodlord/corruptor only to 'counter' broodlord/infestor, and you need infestors to 'counter' mass roach. You don't go pure broodlord/corruptor or 12+ broodlords if the opponent is only on mass roach or roach/infestor, broodlord/corruptor isn't really that good against mass roach due to counterattacks and base denial and eventually massing enough corruptors because he's still mining and then just kills you with more corruptors eventually while you arne't mining.

What I was saying, is that once you have 12+ broodlords, infestors don't work anymore. I didn't say roaches, I said infestors. You can't go pure infestor and beat 15+ broodlords, you can't use FG or IT spam to beat 15+ broodlords. You just won't get in range at all, and it's not cost efficient at all as you maybe kill a couple broodlords while the rest just fly away and then you have no energy at all, not to mention lost a ton more infestors in the process.

I don't really want to continue this discussion, sorry. I think it's kind of absurd. I'm wrong, you are right. I don't know what level you are, I'm 1.2k points masters zerg last season, and my average zvz game length is 17:58 minutes long so i run into broodlords and infestors and hive tech a lot.

Once you have just a critical mass of broodlords, infestors don't work anymore. Broodlord/infestor gets owned by pure broodlord/corruptor once the pure broodlord/corruptor army meets a critical mass of 200/200 pure 12+ broodlord and the rest in corruptors.

And no micro involved is ridiculous. The whole point is the broods just back off if you spam IT's, and then the infestors no longer have energy and you push when the ITs are gone.

That's all I really have to say on this subject. You are correct, I am wrong. Thanks.

Show nested quote +
So now I ask how is a player to get such a large number of broods when they have roach hydra Infestor with eventually ultra or perhaps ling ultra Infestor attacking them. Also nydus/drop and ultra will kill all the production of the brooding player should they get too many broods. I think broods still have a place in ZvZ as a game ender once your ahead but I feel that ultra+queen and Infestor is much better if your ahead.


The whole point of this discussion is that roach/hydra play sucks and this new ling/infestor 2 base into 3 base mass spine/ling/infestor into quick 3 base hive ultra/infestor just owns standard fast third roach based play (as well as any sort of roach based play, including muta play into roach/hydra/infestor/bl or muta into speedbane/ling/muta/ultra). So no, there is no way to get a critical mass of broodlords in time against the ultra player. You probably shouldn't be making so many infestors to 'counter' the broodlords though, it's better to just make quicker ultras so you can deny the roach players 4th and 5th bases while securing your own, and then add a spire to deal with the broodlord/infestor army or roach/hydra/infestor/broodlord.

Show nested quote +
I'm not sure whether this is exactly a solution to the problem, however the premise of the ultra fast ultra build i thought was to get to lair fast to keep upgrades going, then wouldnt it be pretty weak while transitioning into lair since the upgrades wouldn't have kicked in? Some sort of roach bane timing would be really all in but wouldnt it effectively beat the build, since they would have nothing but lings and banes and some spines, without upgrades? If they don't have enough spines its a win, and if they do have spines u could attempt to run by them, or if there is a small army just take them down. I mean realistically, it seems that spending gas into roaches would put u very far behind tech and upgrade wise, unless u somewhow find a way to bypass that gas shortage by maybe cutting ling speed and using defensive banes, but that seems like a pretty stupid idea as there is no definite way of knowing that they are going this build until too late into the game, where ling speed would be necessary o.o.


That has nothing to do with this build, that would be like saying "maybe a 6 pool can counter this?"

Roach/ling (btw more roaches > banes, and mass banes will just get owned by 6 defensive banes and well placed spines) will just get owned by any good player, who realizes the opponent cut drones at like 28 and thus has an empty mineral line compared to yours. You just handle it like you would handle any roach/ling all-in - you don't take a third, and tech up to lair, defend with mass spines (maybe a few roaches or lings or queens even), and then counterattack for a complete win with mutas/mass speed roach with burrow/infestors.

4 gate doesn't counter fast third play because the zerg won't take a third against it, and will just beat the 4 gate easily as zergs nowadays know how to. Similarly, roach/ling all-in is terrible and isn't a 'counter' to this. it's early game aggression that is handled specifically by teching up and turtling behind spines, using a tech advantage since you can't take a third but you do still have an econ advantage by drone count.

User was warned for this post


Oh, Belial. Warned again? What was it this time? I'm guessing the "I'm right you're wrong" sarcasm/humor (can't tell) or was it some kind of strategy guideline violation...?

;O you provide so much insight but always seem to be running into trouble o.o


On June 16 2012 22:22 Rewdant wrote:
I saw this today on Idra's stream.

Basically, from what little I saw.. He massed ling/bling.. And he played really defensively, droning up quite heavily and getting to three fully saturated bases while getting quick upgrades. The ultimate intention was to win with the ultra push, I think.

I use the word 'passive' quite lightly, he used his lings to deny expansions etc.. but not to outwardly kill him. That was never the intention (I think)

Ultimately, you make a lot of spines back at home, ling/bling infestor w/quick upgrades into 5/3 ultras, the engagement was basically ultras in the front and fungal growth to keep the opponents roaches still, and then lings to surround.

It's a fun strat to use, but from my experience you're playing a big risk not getting roaches, imo.





You are talking about Idra doing this, right? Or the opponent doing it? And if the latter, who was he? Thx in advance
Mid-master streaming MECH ONLY + commentary www.twitch.tv/yoshikirishima +++ "If all-in fails, all-in again."
Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
June 20 2012 09:48 GMT
#77
Because im the blue poster TL deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So we'll hunt him. Because he can take it. Because he's not a blue. He's a loudmouth guardian, a memberator. An oft warned and temp banned knight.

User was temp banned for this post.
How to build a $500 i7-3770K Ultimate Computer:http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?topic_id=392709 ******** 100% Safe Razorless Delid Method! http://www.overclock.net/t/1376206/how-to-delid-your-ivy-bridge-cpu-with-out-a-razor-blade/0_100
blade55555
Profile Blog Joined March 2009
United States17423 Posts
June 20 2012 18:36 GMT
#78
On June 16 2012 22:22 Rewdant wrote:
I saw this today on Idra's stream.

Basically, from what little I saw.. He massed ling/bling.. And he played really defensively, droning up quite heavily and getting to three fully saturated bases while getting quick upgrades. The ultimate intention was to win with the ultra push, I think.

I use the word 'passive' quite lightly, he used his lings to deny expansions etc.. but not to outwardly kill him. That was never the intention (I think)

Ultimately, you make a lot of spines back at home, ling/bling infestor w/quick upgrades into 5/3 ultras, the engagement was basically ultras in the front and fungal growth to keep the opponents roaches still, and then lings to surround.

It's a fun strat to use, but from my experience you're playing a big risk not getting roaches, imo.





It's only a risk if you don't get spine crawlers. Seriously you will not die to a roach push if you have at minimum 5 spines and have 6+ infestors with spread out zerglings. (I say spread out because if they are all bunched up fungel destroys them).
When I think of something else, something will go here
Belial88
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
United States5217 Posts
June 21 2012 17:19 GMT
#79
do you get banes off of this? i never get banes. i mean in early game i get a few banes but not like speed banes.
How to build a $500 i7-3770K Ultimate Computer:http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?topic_id=392709 ******** 100% Safe Razorless Delid Method! http://www.overclock.net/t/1376206/how-to-delid-your-ivy-bridge-cpu-with-out-a-razor-blade/0_100
Clarity_nl
Profile Joined November 2011
Netherlands6826 Posts
June 21 2012 18:00 GMT
#80
On June 20 2012 18:48 Belial88 wrote:
Because im the blue poster TL deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So we'll hunt him. Because he can take it. Because he's not a blue. He's a loudmouth guardian, a memberator. An oft warned and temp banned knight.


When people seem to ask questions you do seem to have this air of arrogance around you usually.
Even this reply has it.

That's not to say you don't contribute, you do that more than most posters. But it would be nice to not see you reply in the zerg help me thread with: "Sigh, does no one read my guides?!?! *linklink*, seriously stop asking dumb questions."
A bit of an exaggeration but you get the point.

Anyway I don't mean to derail the thread, so on topic!
I've been playing around with this style alot and the only thing that really kills me is a better player playing the same style, or some kind of roach/bane timing off of 2 base as I'm taking my third (maybe I shouldnt take one before the roach player ever).
These hit just before infestors pop out and I only really hold it if I get some lucky banes on his off, otherwise my lings just get destroyed. I guess with better scouting I can go from 6 spines (since I wanna transfer em to third that I now cancel) to 10 or so? Hard to scout though, maybe put less emphasis on his buildings and more his army size/drone count.

I actually don't see how you can win against this style with your 3rd hatch before lair style Belial, maybe with perfect roach spread and you can take a 4th? Seems rough.
FIGHT THE GOOD FIGHT AGAINST STUPIDITY CLARITY, I BELIEVE IN YOU! - Palmar
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