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A lot of what's discussed here is based on some interesting findings in the unit tester, things that are very counterintuitive, so I would appreciate you didn't just post here with a "WHAT THATS RIDICULOUS?!?" post without reading, opening up unit tester yourself, or watching the replays.
Diamond Zerg/Diamond Random NA
So the Protoss deathball and ZvP in general has been a source of large frustration to Zerg players. It's not so much strategy, but the unit composition that just sucks. Forcefields just prevent Zerg from doing anything, and Colossi just make roaches and hydras horrible. In fact, I used to think it was ridiculous when Protoss ever opens stargate - don't they know why their race is OP? So I decided to set out a new style of ZvP, because the status quo just sucked - and what I found was that the Zerg deathball is much stronger than the Protoss deathball, that Roaches, hydras, and broodlords suck - and now any time I see Protoss going for a deathball, I smile because I know it's an easy win.
The first step is the unit tester, because roach/hydra is just horrible , and here are some interesting findings:
For equal supply, Roach/hydra/Corrupter just gets owned not only by equal supply Stalker/Colossi, but 160 vs 200 style armies. At best, you have Corruptors left over that are useless. Corrupters just take up way too much supply. In other words, you might as well go pure roach against mass void rays (mondragon games aside of course).
So Roach/Hydra/Corrupter is bad... so what, just a bunch of QQ? Well here's some interesting stuff:
Ultralisks own Protoss deathballs. In fact, at 70% supply they still own. 70% Ultras will even beat a Voidray/Colossus with any variation of gateway units, as Void rays can't even kill Ultras with ridiculous armor fast enough to prevent not only their ground army from being wiped out, but a Nexus or two going down before they are all killed. Broodlords, on the other hand, don't do enough damage, and if you don't have sufficient Corrupters, the Colossi will live long enough to roast your ground army - the only time Broodlords are good in combat is very, VERY ideal situations where somehow you got a huge supply lead. So the conclusion there is that Ultralisks are the end-game goal over Broodlords, but we all know Hive is very late... So how do you stay alive until 4 bases?
![[image loading]](http://images.wikia.com/starcraft/images/c/c9/Ultralisk_SC2_Rend1.jpg)
Ultralisks: The hard counter to Void Rays and Deathballs!
Ling/Infestor handles standard gateway compositions pretty well. The key is massing upgrades, and if the opponent goes for a hardcore 2 base timing attack, like 6 gate, you really won't be able to sustain the pressure without mass spine crawlers - which is very viable, but macro will be discussed later...
Ling/Bling/Infestor, is just as strong as Ultra deathballs. You can pretty much wipe out any Protoss ground army with Ling/Bling/Infestor - you will need over 6 Infestors if he goes heavy air play (either chain FG, IT, or NP), and I would say best results are more infestors to 'counter' more air play (12 being the most you really need in any situation). Now NP generally won't work in midgame because a lack of both energy and infestor count, but the Protoss won't have a crazy t3 deathball of VR/Colossi or lots of air units anyways at that early in the game. The hard counter, however, is sentries - which we will discuss later.
![[image loading]](http://michaelkrukar.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/steezy2.jpg)
Colossus: The Hard Counter to Colossus
Finally, upgrades are amazing. 1/1 vs 0/0 is no competition.
So the conclusions in unit tester, while simple, seem to give results that not many are utilizing. Thus:
Ultras are amazing - once you have about 10, the game is over.
Infestors are amazing, as is NP - with a melee based army, you can feasibly pull off NP because of the 9 range and the melee units preventing the infestors from being sniped.
Ultra+Infestor w/NP is the core of a Zerg lategame deathball, Ling/Infestor into Ling/Bling/Infestor w/FG is the core of a midgame Zerg deathball.
Roaches are horrible in ZvP
Hydras are horrible in ZvP
Broodlord/Corrupter is not great in ZvP
The Zerg deathball trashes any Protoss deathball for both supply and cost
Banelings are bad in ZvP, unless in mass - in which case they are amazing.
Zerglings are amazing in ZvP
Upgrades are amazing
So how to apply this in actual gameplay? Well, a neat way is to just sit on 3 or 4 base, turtle hard, and roll out with the deathball a la Cruncher... but here's a more in-depth way.
The biggest problem this build can have is 2 base all-in midgame timing attacks (like 6 gaet) and sentries. So here are way to deal with it:
1. The popular 3 gate Sentry expand leaves a huge opening for speedlings at around 30+ supply. Going with about 4 larva injects worth of speedling at this point, or mass speedlings after 30 supply, will cripple Protoss. This is around the time they try to expand, if the Protoss doesn't play super greedy, just don't make the speedlings. But as soon as he's trying to push it, a large number of speedlings from 30-45 supply will be unmanageable by the 3 gate expand. He will be forced to cancel, or lose not just all the energy on his sentries, but risk losing them completely (which puts you in a great position for your ling/bling/infestor army). I usually find it completely worth the huge sacrifice in economy and tech doing this does, if I know the Protoss is going 3 gate expand.
2. 2 Base all-in's simply cannot be held off without roaches (ie as we know, 6 gate is 'countered' by burrow roaches). To defend against such a push, you really need to mass spines. With the low gas cost of this build (all 4 of your gas is going to infestors, save for the first 100 for speed), you can easily afford mass spines and mass queens. If you know the opponent is going for such a doom-push, you can never make too many spines. Continue teching to infestors - they are generally too late to stop a 6 gate, but if you have mass spine, you can delay the push to make 4-6 infestors viable, which will shut the 6 gate down. Tech to speed banes/bane drops on 2 base, and you will be in a great position to take a third or push back.
3. With the speed of lings, you really need to force the Protoss to waste forcefields by constantly prodding him and trying runbys. Use the lings like mutalisks - he will be forced to turn around to deal with the lings, while they are essentially free to you in being only minerals and larva (a macro hatch is necessary, which will be addressed later). The ideal situation is to get Hive before banelings, but if you sense the Protoss may be aggressive, you will want to go for ling/bling/infestor. Fungals can kill sentries in 3 shots, and baneling drops are very useful in the midgame before mass stalkers w/blink are out. And of course, if he comes into a spinefield, the sentries will have a very hard time.
Macro
The best execution I've found is 14 gas 14 pool 15 hatch. Pretty simple, take drones off gas and get ling speed, and sort of go 'Spanishiwa' afterwards. The problem with this build is you are very weak in the early mid-game, so you have to rely on mass spines and queens until infestors are out. It is imperative to have a macro hatch, and I generally throw one down after lair, very quickly - I almost always get a macro hatch before 3rd, even if I know I can grab a third uncontested (which I just grab immediately afterwards). With the tech straight to infestors, and no gas used on roaches or hydras or spire, you can get Hive pretty quickly. You can't really mass ultras until 4 bases, so you need to figure out if you can either go Ultra/Infestor w/NP, or ling/bling/infestor on 2 base to get your third (and from there either end the game or grab the 4th and get Hive).
The idea is that the Zerg deathball is way stronger than the Protoss deathball, to use gas solely for upgrades, infestors, and get a fast hive, and to prevent the usage of roaches and hydras which the Protoss can easily handle with Colossi.
There are a few different ways to really 'get there', but here is what I can gather so far:
* Spanishiwa's "Ice Fisher": The weakness is the complete lack of aggression early game, allowing Protoss to match you in economy when you are playing a style that usually involves a late third due to the relative frailty of the composition before Hive tech or 8+ Infestors - which is very deadly, particularly considering the strength of 2 base timing attacks against this composition. The lack of aggression also allows the sentry count/energy to get too high to deal with until Ultras are out, which may be too much to ask for against an aggressive Protoss. Also, the big problem with the Ice Fisher build is the late tech, or lack of tech. Put simply, the build is extremely vulnerable to tech - blink stalkers, or Immortals. The Ice Fisher will lose to a 1 base Immortal or blink push because of the sore lack of tech from the Zerg.
*14 gas: With speedlings you are able to take advantage of any time the Protoss gets too greedy, moves out of position, or doesn't have enough units. Given that forcefields are the only way for Protoss to survive against ling/bling/infestor, it is absolutely crucial you are able to harass his sentries and waste their energy going into the midgame. Also, a Protoss recognizing a Spanishiwa style can easily win if they go for Immortals or blink stalkers, but speedlings handle both Immortals and Blink stalkers fairly well, particularly when combined with lots of spines. If you know the Protoss will not be as aggressive, you can also forego the mass queens to be more greedy, or even be more aggressive, but I prefer following up with a late Lair and 4 queens a la Spanishiwa due to the inevitable weakness before Infestors. However on larger maps with small chokes, such as Tal Darim, speedlings may be nullified quite easily, and an opening like FFE will put the Protoss ahead in economy and pretty much makes sure 14 gas puts you further behind.
* 'Standard': The weakness with 'standard' play is that you are extremely weak until your first infestors arrive. You absolutely need either mass spines, queens, or even both, if you are going to hold any early aggression. However on larger maps that are quite defensive like Crevasse, this may be best if you know the Protoss will have a harder time being aggressive.
By combining Spanishiwa's extremely defensive play and the 14 gas, you will have the tech to deal with Immortals or blink, to ability to be aggressive and seize upon openings or mistakes, and a better defense. The downside is the lack of economy compared to pure Ice Fisher, but the upside is you can be more aggressive to counteract that cost, and be even more defensive should you need to be. This is of course up for discussion, and there is a lot more to a build.
I am not here to glorify this composition, and the key difference is when you are strong. Roaches/Hydra is extremely strong, but is pretty much almost completely rendered useless with the introduction of 2+ Colossi, whereas my proposed composition is weak until the time 2+ Colossi are out (which is the time you will have 6+ Infestors with energy).
Composition
The 'big deal' about what I've found here, in my opinion, is the composition. I was extremely frustrated with how 'imba' ZvP was because roach/hydra just sucks so much, and so I decided there MUST be a better composition and hashed it out in the unit tester. I rarely saw baneling, infestor, ling, or ultra play in ZvP, and after my findings, I realized the biggest problem was execution (Hive is a long ways away). Recently, we are seeing Zerg's using these units with seemingly miraculous success, and when employed it is usually to the surprise of everyone. We saw Sen use roach/banelings in the NASL to great effect, and we see Losira try NP. In almost every instance of bling, infestor, or ultra play, it is a complete shock, but I envision a day when they will become standard.
So there's 2 different compositions which I've been referring to all thread long, the lair tech and the hive tech. Both are amazing, and both have their strengths and weaknesses. Here I will address what I've gained a small semblance of understanding in how and when with each Zerg unit. Knowing that Ultralisks are amazing doesn't really help much considering it's pretty hard to get that far, and many Zerg go roaches before lair - so if I'm able to contribute anything, it's at least how to get there. You generally stick with lair tech, and only go for Hive if the opponent is massing up a t3 scary ball of lots of Colossi and/or Void rays.
Hatchery
Roaches - 2 gate Zealot, proxy gates, mass zealot rushes, that's pretty much it.
Lair
Speedlings - If the Protoss goes for an Immortal or Blink push, you will want lots of speedlings to complement a bunch of spines. In battles, the less Colossi/Templar the opponent has, means the more speedlings you should have.
Banelings - if the Protoss is heavy on gateway units, you need lots of banelings. If the opponent is heavy on Colossi, you need lots of banelings too. Lots of banelings.
IFungal Growth - Fungal Growth is important in dealing damage and preventing micro. Ling/Bling is enough to kill deathballs by itself, but it won't work against good positioning and micro. Use FG to deal with zealots, air, and prevent micro.
Hydras On smaller maps or against an opponent who has lots of feedback, you may want to go for Hydras to deal with Void Rays instead of more infestors - but only if the Colossi count is lower. With how fast lings die though, I advise against hydras until you have ultras to keep the targeting AI busy.
Hive
Ultralisks Weak against Zealots
Banelings For the weakness of this composition, zealots. A baneling or two that go off is all it takes to make Ultras crush Zealots.
Neural Parasite NP is important in dealing with Void Rays, Immortals, and Colossi. While not necessary, it will do a lot to minimize losses. NP was for a long time not seen as viable, because it isn't good when used with ranged units like roaches and hydras. When used in conjunction with melee units, Colossi targeting AI will focus on the Ultras that never die, and prevent gateway units from pushing forward to snipe them out. It is possible for Protoss to FF the Infestors, but the idea is you will have enough infestors to make that pretty hard and useless.
Due to how weak Hive is against zealots, a desperate opponent at the late game who has no chance of winning may just spam his mineral bank into zealots, and have a few void rays or immortals which will just completely prevent you from counterattacking, as ridiculous as it may be. In this instance, just going mass roach/hydra or corrupter can be useful in delivering the killing blow.
Why no roaches?
By abandoning roach/hydra, the idea is to use Zergling's extreme mobility, infestor harass, and baneling drops to harass Protoss extremely effectively. Of course, one may think to themselves "so Ultras and Infestors and banelings are awesome, why not go roach/bling or roach/infestor?" Well, opening roaches will make both a third and infestors very late. The idea is that in the early to mid game, all of your gas is going into infestors, and upgrades. That's it. You generally have saved up enough to get 4 infestors right away, but you want to keep getting infestors until you have about 8. You really can't have too many infestors, although 12 is around the sweet spot for mass NP and any ridiculousness that occur throughout the entirety of the game.
Once you have 12 infestors, you can go for roaches and hydras if you like, but that would be pretty hard to do even on 3 base. The light mineral cost of infestors allows for a lot of zerglings, and the gas isn't hard expensive so you'll have enough for banelings which I believe is better than roaches or hydras. Of course, ultras and lings may have trouble against a hard turtle, so once you clear his army out, you can tech switch to roaches to break mass cannons and defenses.
I wanted to see the discussion on this, and there are a few things still open:
1. A lack of offensive capability. Zealots do extremely well against lings, ultras, and infestors in the end-game, and prevent you from simply running into his base after you destroy his army. Banelings can wipe out zealots obviously, but sometimes you can't simply a-move to the enemy base like you can with roach/hydra after a decisive victory in a battle.
2. When are roaches, hydras, and spire necessary? Hydralisks can be extremely useful against air heavy templar instead of Colossus armies, but are slow and costly (making them bad on large maps like Taldarim, but good on maps like Shakuras or XelNaga), but are also bad against late game mass zealots.
3. When is it best to get baneling drops and banelings (ie before or after ultras, before or after a third, in response to what kind of decisions from Protoss).
Replays
Of course, here are some replays:
http://www.sc2replayed.com/replay-videos/1440
Can't quite break the opponent due to zealots beating Ultra/Infestor, but at no point in the game did I feel threatened. As soon as I saw he was just massing up a deathball, I was extremely confident. I had 8 infestors up and that's all I really needed to have the game in the bag. I may have been vulnerable going to Hive but it was pretty clear to me I'd win when I saw his army was too small.
http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/173977-1v1-protoss-zerg-shakuras-plateau
Templar/VoidRay
This and above replay probably best examples of play.
http://www.gamereplays.org/starcraft2/replays.php?game=33&show=details&id=209387
Protoss was pretty bad, I massed spines because I 'scout' 4 gate (1 gas, stalker first) and then he makes fun of me for letting him expo, but he did 4 gate just didn't attack. Anyways pretty BM guy, game is pretty poor play but I use hydras with Ultras, and is a pretty textbook example of how the compositions play out if nothing else. He just sits on 2 base and tries to a-move, which would have worked against roach/hydra, but not against this special composition he had never seen before. Good to understand Zerg isn't screwed against the deathball, and a few funny things happen. 
Since doing this composition, I have never lost to Protoss if it got to end game or more than 2 bases. I was in Platinum (the last replay I believe was Plat vs Diamond) and while completely dominating in ZvZ and ZvT (over 70% easily), my ZvP was horrid. Once I started to think outside the box, I shot to high Diamond within a couple weeks. I am by no means a top level player, but I believe my macro and play should be sufficient, and what I'm saying be understood.
The execution is obviously the most difficult part, but the biggest point of this thread is the unit composition: Ling Infestor into Ling/Bling Infestor into Ultras, are all amazing units, and that roaches, hydras, corrupters, and broodlords are bad. Maybe everyone knows this now, but from what I hear and see and watch, I don't think many really grasp a full understanding of Zerg units in ZvP.
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I didn't read most of it i must confess but this is basically my overall strategy in ZvP also. I also think ultralisks are quite under-rated at the moment.
EDIT, I found ling drops (from 3-5 overlords) and multi-prong ling drops really really effective in this style of play.
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Masterleague zerg here. I've been working with zergling-infestor a LOT. And it does pretty bad against the new archon fad. Since you don't have anything to fight off archons if you go pure zergling/infestor/baneling, you're pretty much dead in the water.
Also, I disagree with the statements you are saying. ( Mainly the line that says 'Ultralisks counter voidrays', I mean what? ).
Roaches are NOT bad, at all. Infact, Roach infestor works just as well as zergling infestor, ifnot better in certain circumstances.
The thing with ZvP is that on the protoss side, anything goes composition wise. Heck, rediculous unit compositions involving tons of phoenix work against zerg. Archons now work wonders because they don't die quickly and deal damage FAST. Mass sentry in some occasions work. Due to this variety, there is no midgame composition from zerg that will ALWAYS work. This is why you have to be careful. The HARDEST decision you will have to make in a ZvP is your midgame composition based on his army. Because its this decision that turns a ZvP into something winnable versus something that looks like a buildorder loss.
Also, ultras as your main army composition is not very good against a reactionairy protoss. Unlike your recommendations, voidrays still kick big ultralisk ass. Immortals do an amazing job against them and archons tank their damage well. Even a random zealot in the path of the ultralisk can make sure there won't be any splash damage on the core stalkerball.
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Ive been using this unit comp for quite some time, the only issue that I find sometimes is that ill get stomped early game cause i get greedy myself  even with spines.
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Amazingly detailed writeup of what should be the new standard for Zerg in ZvP.
As for the "few things still open" part, heres my opinion on them:
1. A lack of offensive capability. Zealots do extremely well against lings, ultras, and infestors in the end-game, and prevent you from simply running into his base after you destroy his army. Banelings can wipe out zealots obviously, but sometimes you can't simply a-move to the enemy base like you can with roach/hydra after a decisive victory in a battle.
This is true, but as some pro once said:
Protoss has the abitlity to decide when to fight and zerg has the ability to decide where to fight.
You can send groups of lings around and deny expos, snipe proxy pylons and just be annoying, but forcefields deny everything else. Also if the protoss doesn't have detection which is unlikely, you can send 2 burrowed infestors with full energy to a Nexus and throw 16 infested terrans, which are enough to kill an entire probe line plus nexus.
2. When are roaches, hydras, and spire necessary? Hydralisks can be extremely useful against air heavy templar instead of Colossus armies, but are slow and costly (making them bad on large maps like Taldarim, but good on maps like Shakuras or XelNaga), but are also bad against late game mass zealots.
I think hydras are very situational but roaches can be pretty useful lategame if you are on the verge of defeating the protoss, have mins/gas banked but need some ranged, larva efficient units to deal the finishing blow.
3. When is it best to get baneling drops and banelings (ie before or after ultras, before or after a third, in response to what kind of decisions from Protoss).
Baneling drops on the protoss army are really good, also you can just keep overlords filled with banelings in your base and just queue a drop command on every expansion the protoss has when he moves out. The timing may be a bit questionable, but I personally don't rely on baneling drops to win, I just use them as an extra lategame when it doesn't matter if I research drop or train one infestor and two banelings for 200/200.
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To Chaosvuistje: Go into unit tester and see how Colossus/VR/Gateway deathball does against Ultras - the ultras will kill everything and then have enough life and number to kill a nexus before the Void rays finish them off.
It's not so much that roach/infestor is bad, the problem is how hard it can be to sustain economically, In ZvZ it works because of the nature of mirror match-ups and how you generally sit on each base for a very long time before expanding. We saw Sen use roach/bling to great effect, so I may be a bit dramatic, but I just think that ling/bling/infestor is much stronger than roach/bling or roach/infestor against Protoss deathballs.
Yes, archons can be a problem. Ultras do well against archons - not great, just well (Husky has a videon on Archon vs Ultra....). Just adding archons won't allow Protoss to win though, and it's pretty hard to mass archons as Protoss unless they have a huge number of bases, as they aren't particularly cost effective? Zealots are probably the biggest problem, but banelings and infestors/ling can make short work of them.
The thing with ZvP is that on the protoss side, anything goes composition wise. Heck, rediculous unit compositions involving tons of phoenix work against zerg. Archons now work wonders because they don't die quickly and deal damage FAST. Mass sentry in some occasions work. Due to this variety, there is no midgame composition from zerg that will ALWAYS work. This is why you have to be careful. The HARDEST decision you will have to make in a ZvP is your midgame composition based on his army. Because its this decision that turns a ZvP into something winnable versus something that looks like a buildorder loss.
With a core army of infestors, you can pretty much handle any composition Protoss throws at you. With lings,you can easily morph mass banelings if that is better. Void Rays can be handled pretty easily with infestors even in mass, and zealots can be dealt with FG and banelings.
Also, ultras as your main army composition is not very good against a reactionairy protoss. Unlike your recommendations, voidrays still kick big ultralisk ass. Immortals do an amazing job against them and archons tank their damage well. Even a random zealot in the path of the ultralisk can make sure there won't be any splash damage on the core stalkerball.
I don't believe Void Rays do enough damage against Ultralisks and are too susceptible to infestors. You really need mass zealots or double robo immortals for Ultralisks. Ultra/Ling wil make short work on Immortals, and banelings and/or FG will deal with zealots. I'm not sure what composition Protoss can do to beat this, but I imagine strong macro and mechanics, expanding a lot instead of sitting on 2 or 3 base instead of trying to a-move a deathball, and a mass of zealot/HT for both FB & Storm as a core with Immortals vs Ultras or sentries vs banelings combined with maybe carriers would be the best.
A core 'best' setup is somewhat still in the air, but I find the pure roach based armies of late to be horrible against Protoss that so many Zerg stick to so stubbornly, even with supplement of hydras, corruptors, or broodlords.
edit: that archon/zealot guide looks scary 
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On May 16 2011 22:01 Belial88 wrote:
To Chaosvuistje: Go into unit tester and see how Colossus/VR/Gateway deathball does against Ultras - the ultras will kill everything and then have enough life and number to kill a nexus before the Void rays finish them off.
Oh I wasn't argueing that ultralisks are bad against the cookiecutter deathball of collosus and voidrays, I was just saying that a protoss that reacts to you by scouting will fend off ultralisks quite handily, and they are such a large investment that you cannot just techswitch into whatever the hell you want right after. Which is a big problem in the lategame versus protoss
On May 16 2011 22:01 Belial88 wrote:
Yes, archons can be a problem. Ultras do well against archons - not great, just well (Husky has a videon on Archon vs Ultra....). Just adding archons won't allow Protoss to win though, and it's pretty hard to mass archons as Protoss unless they have a huge number of bases, as they aren't particularly cost effective? Zealots are probably the biggest problem, but banelings and infestors/ling can make short work of them.
That video was of archons versus ultralisks in a vaccuum. On top of that, it was just a blob versus blob battle, in which case the guy with the biggest splash wins. Which at that moment in time ( pre-splash nerfs ) was the ultralisk.
The biggest problem with ultralisks in ZvP is that they HAVE to do splash to be effective. Since archons will move infront of your stalkers due to their range, they will be infront, sometimes only one at a time. And ultras dont do any bonus damage versus archons OR zealots. But indeed, zealots are easier dealt with than archons due to their weakness versus banelings.
On May 16 2011 22:01 Belial88 wrote:
A core 'best' setup is somewhat still in the air, but I find the pure roach based armies of late to be horrible against Protoss that so many Zerg stick to so stubbornly, even with supplement of hydras, corruptors, or broodlords.
Well yes, PURE roach compositions won't do well unless you heavily upgrade them. And even then they only perform against simular to smaller army sizes.
The thing is you mix in roaches with infestors, or roaches with baneling drops. In which case the roach becomes a much, much stronger unit. Because unlike zerglings, roaches can beat down walls and thus enter the protosses production. Whereas zerglings will fall if there is a gateway simcity with cannons behind it.
And yes, that new PvZ archon style that has an attack pretty soon is REALLY deadly to any large zergling force. Going mainly upgraded lings myself I've raged my fair share of games against it.
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Hmm... Sounds viable, going to try it on ladder today. But somehow, I never seem to use my infestors to their full potential against toss. Probably just lack of mechanics on my side
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On May 16 2011 22:35 Chaosvuistje wrote:Show nested quote +On May 16 2011 22:01 Belial88 wrote:
To Chaosvuistje: Go into unit tester and see how Colossus/VR/Gateway deathball does against Ultras - the ultras will kill everything and then have enough life and number to kill a nexus before the Void rays finish them off.
Oh I wasn't argueing that ultralisks are bad against the cookiecutter deathball of collosus and voidrays, I was just saying that a protoss that reacts to you by scouting will fend off ultralisks quite handily, and they are such a large investment that you cannot just techswitch into whatever the hell you want right after. Which is a big problem in the lategame versus protoss
Even if the Protoss hard counters you with Zealot/Archon/HT and forces you to switch up your composition having 2 or so Ultralisks will always be good. They soak up a lot of damage, draw Colossus fire to them, break force fields, etc.
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I was working on this style for a while, but there are actually a ton of problems with your build:
-Your speedling assessment is wrong about 3-gate expo. They can hold that pressure just fine with well placed forcefields, maybe this doesn't happen at diamond level, but at high masters you're just hoping for a lag spike, you can build maybe 16 speedlings if you want to pressure and just force some forcefields with some dart-in's, but I woudln't do this every game as if you lose those speedlings, against a good enough player, you've almost lost the game right there.
-Opening pure speedlnigs without being willing to get roaches is risky. You say you need spines to defend, which isn't really true except you're forcing yourself to need spines to defend by refusing to adjust your build.
-There's a big question you have to answer when you see templar builds, what are you going to do about them? Archon+stalker is very strong against this composition (neither fungal or banelings do bonus damage), so unless you can scout it and rush straight to broodlords pretty quickly, you might have some trouble, and dt openings actually make a lot of sense against this type of build so there's a second (although less good way) of getting archons there as well.
Some pros you don't really talk about:
If you work a lot on doing harassment with infestors, baneling drops, speedling drops, speedling runby your multitasking will get a ton better and the skill cap on being able to multi-task all those things is pretty high.
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It is very similar to the build I use, but one glaring weakness is the 6gate push. Mass Spinecrawler will defend it but that also means your third will die 100%. So either you don't your third, defend with mass Spines and you're behind in economy or you take your third and pray you can barely hold it with units, since spines will simply be ignored.
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On May 16 2011 23:23 Kraelog wrote:
It is very similar to the build I use, but one glaring weakness is the 6gate push. Mass Spinecrawler will defend it but that also means your third will die 100%. So either you don't your third, defend with mass Spines and you're behind in economy or you take your third and pray you can barely hold it with units, since spines will simply be ignored.
Yeah I've had similar problems with the build. Started going mass Roach again as default and try to transition into Infestor/Bling/Ultra, but you'll end up investing a lot in tech you might not use for the rest of the game and perhaps not even needed in the first place.
Also a lot of pro Zergs seem to be going for muta's again and I really love(d) Muta in ZvP. Atm I'm just completely lost, it wasn't so long ago when Roach/Hydra/Corruptor was the only build considered as viable and nowadays theres a lot of different builds you can do.
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I was working on this style for a while, but there are actually a ton of problems with your build:
-Your speedling assessment is wrong about 3-gate expo. They can hold that pressure just fine with well placed forcefields, maybe this doesn't happen at diamond level, but at high masters you're just hoping for a lag spike, you can build maybe 16 speedlings if you want to pressure and just force some forcefields with some dart-in's, but I woudln't do this every game as if you lose those speedlings, against a good enough player, you've almost lost the game right there.
-Opening pure speedlnigs without being willing to get roaches is risky. You say you need spines to defend, which isn't really true except you're forcing yourself to need spines to defend by refusing to adjust your build.
-There's a big question you have to answer when you see templar builds, what are you going to do about them? Archon+stalker is very strong against this composition (neither fungal or banelings do bonus damage), so unless you can scout it and rush straight to broodlords pretty quickly, you might have some trouble, and dt openings actually make a lot of sense against this type of build so there's a second (although less good way) of getting archons there as well.
Some pros you don't really talk about:
If you work a lot on doing harassment with infestors, baneling drops, speedling drops, speedling runby your multitasking will get a ton better and the skill cap on being able to multi-task all those things is pretty high.
- Okay, I can concede maybe making those speedlings are pointless. Just drone and play like normal then. I guess you can spanishiwa it then too. I feel more comfortable with ling speed first for some semblance of map control.
- I'd be more than willing to adjust based on scouting, but generally speedling + spine is enough to hold 4 gate, the most pressure you could face anyways.
- Archon/Stalker... Ultra/Infestor could take that on with FG and speedlings, and ling/bling/infestor with more speedlings or even hydras could work too. It's not that Ultra/Infestor is the best of the best, Ling/Bling/Infestor is absolutely amazing. Ultras just do better against heavy colossi and aren't negated by sentries. This build isn't about a mad dash to Hive, since Ling/Bling is extremely strong by itself. Ultras are just more cost effective I feel.
It is very similar to the build I use, but one glaring weakness is the 6gate push. Mass Spinecrawler will defend it but that also means your third will die 100%. So either you don't your third, defend with mass Spines and you're behind in economy or you take your third and pray you can barely hold it with units, since spines will simply be ignored.
I don't think anyone gets a third if they scout a 6 gate coming. As I said, yes 6 gate will be a hard attack to hold, in which case you need to get mass spines up and a macro hatch. The point of the spines is to delay delay delay until the 4-6 infestors can FG everything. It's pretty tight, but 6 in general is pretty hard to hold no matter what you are doing as Zerg. I think if you don't have mass spines or burrow roach it's pretty much auto-loss.
HT arent the greatest with FB since you can usually get NP and FG off before the FB, and you usually have a lot of infestors, more than the Protoss would have HT. Anyways I'm not the highest level player, I merely wanted to bring up a discussion of a composition and how to get there. Hopefully other players can get a lot from this.
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infestor play is really really strong, without HT it almost impossible to win a battle because you can't micro at all.
and just die to vs. mass upgrades.
+ you have complete mapcontrol due to mass zerglings.
+ Baneling drops into the ecoline force the P to do something
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On May 16 2011 23:23 Kraelog wrote:
It is very similar to the build I use, but one glaring weakness is the 6gate push. Mass Spinecrawler will defend it but that also means your third will die 100%. So either you don't your third, defend with mass Spines and you're behind in economy or you take your third and pray you can barely hold it with units, since spines will simply be ignored.
6 gate actually isn't an issue at all I've found. You can defend it like you defend 4gate--just with mass ling, now with upgrades. I typically use my second hundred gas for +1 melee and then go lair on my third hundred gas. If I see chrono on the forge or just extra gateways no tech, I go for a quick extra evo for +1 armor (helps if he's zealot heavy), cut drones a bit and mass lings. Then you just surround, kill the 6 gate army, and counter.
Being sure and scouting it is 6 gate is the trick though. If you're wrong, he expos or templar show up, it's bad. Also hitting his army at the right time and pulling out if the FFs are too brutal (if he FFs all around his army, it gives you breathing room to remacro since he can't push out too, don't overcommit--you can lose 10 to 20 lings to FF in lieu of losing them all). Some maps make this harder to do (typhon, xel'naga) since there aren't great place to engage but on others it's extremely easy (shattered, tal'darim).
If you did scout wrong and are behind, try to harass/drop/nydus while you econ and tech to get back in the game. If you were right though, you will shit on his army and he won't be able to take a third due to ling denying it while you get your economy/infestor ball/upgrades/ultras rolling.
Zealot/archon/templar is a problem for this build though I've found.
(masters zerg)
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^ Actually takes +3 armor (against 0 weapons) to make it 4 hits instead of 3.Just being even in armor is all you need. I'm really surprised you say you can kill a 6 gate army with just lings, I don't think it's really possible to take on 6 gate without spines or burrow roaches? I'd love to see replays or something if you still have them around, 6 gate is really hard for Zerg imo.
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Well, i did some checking on 6 gates, 5 gates, and bstalkers 5 gates, i can say it appears you can defend it quite well if you have perfect timings. But you NEED like 3 spines (tested on those bad spine maps, like meta or xel naga). But it looks like then you just mass lings and stall for infestors, i was able to defend all those gateway 2 base attacks with this build, whicle teching to infestors and upgrading.
BUT i don't think zerg has any room for +1 malee, its awesome upgrade, but you can't fall behind in armor vs zealot attacks upgrade, or your lings stop doing damage. So i think only +1 armor is right safe choice. Yeah, you can see forge upgrading, but if you see it, it means it has started already, usually like 10-50 seconds ago. WIth chrono, you wont be able to get +1 in time if its timing. And then his pure zealot army will rape any number of speedlings
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How could you not love ZvP. Im a high diamond protoss player that literally gets autolossed every time I face a decent zerg player. I am switching to zerg. lol
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This is just getting crushed by mass zealot/archons... this sucks.
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On May 18 2011 14:44 Belial88 wrote:
This is just getting crushed by mass zealot/archons... this sucks.
Roach + infestor while teching to broods plays similarly, and does much better vs zealot archon.
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EPT
