EPT
. Also, having to go pee as an answer to a RE? was hilarious to read.[G] Hydra ZvZ: An Introduction - Page 4
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3FFA
United States3931 Posts
. Also, having to go pee as an answer to a RE? was hilarious to read. | ||
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beenizzle
United States141 Posts
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Archaeo
United States397 Posts
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3FFA
United States3931 Posts
edit: Just found where you originally posted this in 2008. I thought this said this was a new build? :o Also, will you be doing any other guides soon? edit: Lots of replays and videos there of hydra ZvZ. Mostly other builds, but it still gives an idea. | ||
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iopq
United States807 Posts
1. Get +1 carapace first. It's more effective against muta bounce, and +1 attack only increases damage by 0.5 (yes, it actually works this way). so first upgrade gives you only 10% more damage vs. mutas, while the carapace reduces muta damage three times (assuming muta +1 attack it reduces the damage to main targets as much, while also having a good effect against the bounce) I think once the mutas do start getting air armor upgrades it's worth getting +1 damage. Going from 4 to 4.5 is now a 12.5% increase at a much lower cost than +2 carapace. I get +3 carapace first in the game, but it's probably not ideal. 2. I go overpool because I'm bad at micro (that's why I go hydra in the first place!) this is the vod, I'm not very good, but my opponent stays on muta after I already got defilers and doesn't have lings because I have lurkers | ||
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SCC-Faust
United States3736 Posts
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B-royal
Belgium1330 Posts
- Opening with 12 pool into a natural hatchery. 12 pool is probably the best all-round ZvZ opening that can still react to anything your opponent decided to do. Do not skip the extractor nor speed. It has too many benefits to not get it (versatility in attack and stability in defense). - Hide your intentions. Don't build your third hatchery at the natural, build it in your main. Hide your hydralisk den in the corner of the map. Hide your hydralisks when you are building them for as long as you can (maybe even play around with burrow). I also want to mention that only going for hydralisks in cross-spawn positions might be a decent idea as well. It depends, there's advantages as well as disadvantages. This way your opponent doesn't see you pulling drones off gas in your main immediately and won't know about your third hatchery too soon. It will also make defending against the first mutalisks slightly easier as they'll arrive slightly later at your main. Of course the walking distance will be greater for you when you eventually move out with all the undesirable ramifications. - Go for a timing attack where you wait for critical upgrades and possibly lurkers to accompany you. I tend to do a 2/1 or 1/2 attack, not sure which one is better. More carapace will be great if he uses lings but if you have lurkers they shouldn't be a problem making more attack upgrades vs the mutalisks more desirable. Besides, I think mutalisks in general waste a lot of shots through overkill which makes carapace upgrades less effective? (Would have to do some testing to verify). - I think a 4 hatchery build on 2 bases is the most you can support for a relatively early timing attack. - Find out optimal spore positioning. I once tested a configuration that consists of 4 spores at the vertices of a square or rhomboid plane. It allowed 3 spores to fire at the same time (not the case for all of the spores) iirc. (Here's an example, for the other naturals it isn't always the same. Plus there's trade-offs, which spot do you want to be covered the most? In this one for example the extractor might be a bit too exposed, so you can mirror it if you'd like. But that will leave the left spores more exposed and vulnerable to be sniped. But that location is more easily accessible by your hydralisks and he's trading time/mutalisks for spores anyway.). ![[image loading]](http://i67.tinypic.com/2eeeq9l.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i64.tinypic.com/313svop.jpg) - Learn the mutalisk timings for all different opening bo's. For example, a lair first 9 pool build will have mutalisks by 5:05 and thus can have mutalisks in your base around 5:20-5:30. Add roughly 25 seconds for a speed first build. Etc. Some specifics: - I like to get my evo chamber around 5 minutes (versus a 9 pool build), and then i'll start mining gas again for my +1 carapace. You should have around 150 gas by the time the evo finishes. - You can start the creep colonies halfway through your evo chamber and they'll finish at the same time. You can delay morphing them into spores if he's targeting overlords instead of moving towards your bases. - If you went for the 12 pool build order with speed, you can put on A LOT of pressure very rapidly if he gets too greedy and to take pressure off yourself (by using the speedlings you still have left over or by making some new ones). If everything's failing, you can still get "lucky" with a near maxed attack or with some defilers and plague (in case he stays on mutalisks). edit: Some problems I'm running into currently are: 1) Guardians 2) Sunken walls 3) Getting scouting information 4) People also going for 3 hatcheries. Number 1 and 3 are very much correlated. My build order does incorporate overlord speed but I haven't been using it to scout, so maybe I'll have to try to get some scouting information that way. Scouting with lone zerglings is good, but it stops working when they get a single sunken and/or have some units camping at their natural. Number 1 can probably be solved by getting a spire myself, but I'll have to get the scouting information in first. Number 2 is surely a problem but if they can't handle my army and they're investing this much into sunkens I should probably focus on going to hive (for defilers) and securing a third (or more) bases. Number 4. I don't think it's viable to go hydralisks against someone who already has 3 hatcheries. They can get their economy up way too fast. It's also much cheaper to just go mutalisks instead of hydralisks (Hydralisk den, Muscular augments, Grooved spines, Lurker aspect, (Pneumatized Carapace), Spore Colonies, possibly ground carapace and missile attacks <=> Spire, Flyer carapace) meaning they'll get their required drone count TONS earlier than you. And holy shit is it difficult to get drones to build creep colonies exactly where you want them. DRONES BLOCKING, LARVAE BLOCKING, what's next?? OVERLORDS BLOCKING. lol | ||
Ty2
United States1433 Posts
As for getting speed for the versatility of attacking and defending, that isn't needed. I get a sunken colony to devote more larvae to drones for more minerals. Getting 3 hatcheries worth of lings could be powerful, but if the opponent makes an appropriate number of lings then it's all for naught and delays your 4th hatchery. Making lings instead of drones, devoting drones to mining gas instead of minerals, and getting speed all delay the critical 4th hatchery. Additionally, the extractor when it's not mined from is not optimal use. The 4th hatchery is quite critical to supplying the larvae, making a lot of drones earlier on, obtaining a high mineral income essential for hydras, and, overall, getting a higher amount of hydras. Also there's an optimal time when you should start getting hydras. Getting Hydras at 3 hatcheries is quite inefficient and doesn't get that critical mass ball that mutas should fear like they would a lot of M&M. In the use of hydras in timing attacks, I like to strike as early as possible as soon as +1 carapace strikes, which I start upgrading before i get my Hydra Den started. The hydra player takes on a role similar to Terran in TvZ I feel, needing to pressure Zerg to not let them drone, expand, and tech too freely. By attacking early, you strike when a few factors align. You strain the muta player's lack of mineral income, needing to get sunkens. The more time allowed for the muta player to drone freely, they can easily take new bases and properly defend elsewhere, all while harrasing the hydra player's main and natural. Threatening to take out their natural and possible expansions alleviates that pressure and allows you to dictate the pace and get a 3rd base. The critical mass of Hydras is reached, where if a Muta were to engage a hydra at the edge of the ball, the mutas would be in the range limit of nearly all available hydras you have. I think Lurkers are interesting but would delay the push. Also, simple army vs. army engagements I think favor hydras. Overall, getting the 4th hatchery is really important to emphasize larva, minerals, and getting a higher hydra count. In addition, putting the pressure early on is also important to limit the mutalisk player. Edit: I'm gonna make it a tentative claim. You might be right, B-Royal, cuz I just got smashed by a guy who droned like crazy and got a much faster 3rd base than me. I guess a balance needs to be struck of lings and drones. I recall Day9 saying you should make some lings versus a high teching player, but not too many because their play is designed specifically to not lose to that, but just enough to strain their lack of minerals. | ||
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Jealous
10076 Posts
1. I know he is a foreigner 2. I am pretty sure he played in the most recent TSL 3. The reps I have in mind were VOD form If anyone can help me find these, I would love to contribute to this discussion. I think also the VOD was in some "Highlights of Russian Players" or something from ICCup. Anyway, it worked great. | ||
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RedW4rr10r
Germany741 Posts
On January 31 2017 13:58 Jealous wrote: I just want to add a brief note that the player "karate" on I think Fish (might be ICCup though) has been doing this build periodically. 1. I know he is a foreigner 2. I am pretty sure he played in the most recent TSL 3. The reps I have in mind were VOD form If anyone can help me find these, I would love to contribute to this discussion. I think also the VOD was in some "Highlights of Russian Players" or something from ICCup. Anyway, it worked great. I remember a ZvZ between karate and pike on Gladiator that was highly unorthodox. I can't provide the link right now (I'm not at home) but it is in my Iccup profile. It also can be found somewhere on Sayle's YouTube channel. I don't remember who went for the hyd build though. Well... the other didn't just go pure muta/ling most likely due to good game sense. That game is worth watching!  | ||
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Jealous
10076 Posts
On January 31 2017 16:33 RedW4rr10r wrote: I remember a ZvZ between karate and pike on Gladiator that was highly unorthodox. I can't provide the link right now (I'm not at home) but it is in my Iccup profile. It also can be found somewhere on Sayle's YouTube channel. I don't remember who went for the hyd build though. Well... the other didn't just go pure muta/ling most likely due to good game sense. That game is worth watching! I think that is the one I particularly had in mind, but I know there are others! I've found the game I think you are referring to: Actually, the game I was thinking of was different, now that I found this. I think Karate was bottom left and went for a similar build to this game; his opponent was top left. It was also on a Shakuras tileset, but it might have been Jade and not Gladiator. | ||
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RedW4rr10r
Germany741 Posts
On February 01 2017 00:41 Jealous wrote: I think that is the one I particularly had in mind, but I know there are others! I've found the game I think you are referring to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxyUdq8k98o Actually, the game I was thinking of was different, now that I found this. I think Karate was bottom left and went for a similar build to this game; his opponent was top left. It was also on a Shakuras tileset, but it might have been Jade and not Gladiator. Yup, this is the game I was referring to. If you find the one you thought of, lemme know^^ | ||
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iopq
United States807 Posts
On February 01 2017 00:41 Jealous wrote: I think that is the one I particularly had in mind, but I know there are others! I've found the game I think you are referring to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxyUdq8k98o Actually, the game I was thinking of was different, now that I found this. I think Karate was bottom left and went for a similar build to this game; his opponent was top left. It was also on a Shakuras tileset, but it might have been Jade and not Gladiator. he way over-committed by making 12 spores and he placed his first hatch wrong (because it was far away from his spawn he had to place spores to protect that area as well) I usually bunch up my buildings and get by with just 8 spores unless I see more than 11 mutas | ||
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B-royal
Belgium1330 Posts
edit: I also updated my previous post to include some caveats and difficulties. | ||
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[sc1f]eonzerg
Belgium6415 Posts
but yeah it was 12 hatchery,im not sure i can have the same sucess doing 12pool or 9hatch | ||
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B-royal
Belgium1330 Posts
edit: I'd really get lurkers next time if the plan is to wait for hive. Once you have lurkers, all zerglings of your opponent are useless and you can actually start using swarm in fights as well. I'm making a replay pack, seeing how far I can go until it stops working/gets impossible. One unfortunate effect of my build order is the mass speedling battles happen too often for my liking. Some comments about my own games so far: 1. Return your second overlord towards your natural again after you've identified his position. Be sure to keep any other overlords in your natural/main. You can not afford to lose more than 1 overlord or it can set you back a lot during the period where you NEED to spend all your minerals on drones/spores. 2. Spore positioning is SUPER Important. I think I've finally figured out the spore positioning for all naturals. 3. I'm going to play around with burrow (hydras) a couple of times to see if it can help with really hard harass. Might fail completely, who knows. It's also not cheap. I'm trying to cut corners where-ever and whenever I can. 4. Getting a spire versus guardians is quite effective! It'll just be a matter of knowing if they're coming. 5. If I see my opponent getting 10 or more sunkens etc I just put down a queen's nest immediately so I can tech towards defilers. Then I focus on getting a 3rd base and 4th base. 6. Getting a third base is quite doable since they're so close by on fighting spirit but a 4th base is really difficult. He has a lot more mobility so can engage with full force where he likes but you're forced to split up your army too much. | ||
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B-royal
Belgium1330 Posts
====> Download www.dropbox.com <==== I think my build order is solid*. Every game I lost had a ton of easily fixable mistakes. This is primarily because of a lack of experience with the build. I am confident I would win those same games if I was put in the same situation today. Some strategic mistakes included: + Show Spoiler + 1. Failing to realize I can attack into the sunkens (in case there's only 2-4). 2. Not knowing how to deal with guardians initially. 3. Being outsmarted, not defending multiple locations properly enough. 4. Not going for hive. Some games did not feature any hydralisks at all because it ended before I could get them. You can easily check this with BWChart. I will work on analyzing all my losses and adding it here in case anyone's interested in that. I will also continue to play and release my replays again when I have 50, and then I'll see if I want to continue going on with it (as I did only play zvz for like a week straight lol). edit  I did only do one single build order that consisted of a 1/2 (attack/carapace) timing attack including lurkers. One particular game (a hydra vs hydra game) made me realize that this is a HUGE investment, delaying my attack by a lot. In other words, I think it could be a good thing to try out a different variation where I focus less on upgrades etc and purely on hydra. Hopefully this attack would hit much earlier with a really high number of hydralisks to take them by surprise.edit2: analysis of my losses + Show Spoiler + HydraRock vs Bad]ForYou: ------------------------ 1. lost 1 ling due to inattention, should never happen 2. took bad engagement causing me to lose 2 and eventually 3 drones. This hurts my economy badly. 3. Unnecessary 2nd sunken. 4. Supply block 19. 5. 2nd spore in main should have been near mineral line 6. Hydralisk den way too early 7. Because of all these mistakes my 4th hatch is about 3-4 minutes late. 8. 2nd sunken is blocking mining from 1 patch 9. A couple of drones too few (4-5). 10. Should have just gone for the 4 sunkens, they do alot of damage but also die really fast versus my army. I most likely would have won the game if I had done that. 11. Nowadays I tend to add spire (if I suspect guardians) and it works really well because one pair of scourge kills a guardian which is 75 gas vs 200. This game I had plenty of gas to afford the spire and scourge. How could I have known though? A. Maybe by spreading out overlords slighly when I know his mutalisks are far away (such as when I'm moving out) B. Deduce it from his mutalisks numbers and the amount of bases he has/has had and how long he's had them. C. In games where opponent only has 1 or 2 sunkens, try to squeeze some lings by into his main (not really possible this game). 12. Probably should have gotten overlord speed a loooot sooner. HydraRock vs eS)Narwhal.: ------------------------- Note: I think going hydras against someone who also went 3 hatches is a bad decision as this gives them a huge advantage economy wise, I've explained this in a previous post. 1. Less than optimal ling battles. 2. Didn't need that sunken near extractor 3. Hydralisk den too early, revealing my strategy. 4. 2nd evolution chamber too late. 5. Fought with my army right before +1 attack, really bad. I probably would have won that fight with that upgrade finished. 6. Didn't start +2 attack 7. Scared of 2 sunkens at his natural, don't know why. Letting him add sunkens and get more units. 8. Bad decision to go to 12, should have retreated and focused on my third base. 9. Didn't have 2 lurkers at my third, this can easily take care of ANY number of lings he sends there. HydraRock vs TSUNAMI: --------------------- Feels bad losing vs a D player. I just overdroned like hell instead of building zerglings. Then I couldn't recover anymore. Don't bother watching this game. HydraRock vs KUZHEC: -------------------- 1. Lost scouting ling due to inattention, although might have been difficult to save. 2. First big zergling vs zergling battle at his natural went horrible for me. Half of my lings weren't fighting, blocked by his drones. Simple micro mistake. I believe forcing him to build lings and waste larvae is the correct choice because I don't want to allow him to drone up right now. I have more hatcheries so I can recover more quickly. 3. Most important mistake in the game. Losing 2 overlords unneccessarily. I forgot to send back my second overlord to my natural and a third overlord is out on the map due to a rally point. This cost me 200 minerals that I can't afford to lose but more importantly, I got supply blocked for longer than a minute (delayed economyY)!! (>600 minerals in bank) 4. Spore positioning at my natural is not good enough. I have found a better configuration such that my mineral line is more protected. Losingn too many drones because of this and delayed hydralisks due to delayed economy. Also I'm missing 2 overlords that could be obscuring vision of my drones at my natural, not that significant though. 5. Morphed creep colony into sunken instead of spore by mistake. HydraRock vs over9kAPM: ----------------------- 1. Mistake to ignore his zerglings, should have just focused on following them or defending instead of going for his natural. Forced me to pull drones from my main towards natural, losing mining time. 2. Not using larva at both hatcheries for quite some time. Probably wasn't sure whether to build lings or drones. Should have gone with drones after taking out so many of his zerglings for free. 3. Really important mistake! Forgot to send my first overlord towards his main. Now I have no clue what his Spire timing is, whether he's building drones,... 4. Then just being super greedy not adding spores, again because I didn't have my overlord in his main... HydraRock vs eMsi.pl: --------------------- 1. When I put down my 4th hatchery I have about 500-600 minerals. Should have made a ton of drones instead of zerglings that will be useless. Or at least half drones, half zerglings instead of all zerglings. 2. His build put me out of my element. I did not know how to continue. I should have just done my build exactly the same, while ignoring spores. This means, I should have researched lair on time (=gather gas, such that I could start +2 carapace on time) and gotten my 2nd evolution chamber earlier. 3. Losing one overlord for no reason. 4. Next I'm really stupid and attack before I have my lurkers despite knowing he had about 30 lings or so left over from the early game. If I had attacked with lurkers, I would have won the game. | ||
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iopq
United States807 Posts
you're already forced into spores vs. 9 pool anyway and the other Zerg is very low econ | ||
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iopq
United States807 Posts
Soma goes hydra in ZvZ vs. S rank Zerg | ||
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Terrifyer
United States338 Posts
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