EPTA Second Look at Zerg Openings - Page 4
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Communism
United States176 Posts
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jdseemoreglass
United States3773 Posts
On April 10 2011 10:12 Marzocchi wrote: This may seem like a basic question... but for those of us Noobs out there... 11 Overpool means.... ? 11 Overlord Drone back to 11 11 Spawning Pool? Am I right? Thanks for this info man. Really great stuff. =) 11 Overpool means using the extractor trick to get to 11 supply, making an overlord, and then making a spawning pool. It works out fairly well, because by the time your overlord finishes, you will have 3 larvae that can quickly produce 3 drones to catch up to 9 overlord builds fairly well. It is much better than pool followed by overlord, because there is a significant time when you are larvae unspendable due to supply cap. I really want to thank everyone for all the positive feedback on this. I was really disheartened that I put all this work into it and then it practically died, but luckily someone bumped it for more people to see and get some much needed analysis. I'm not sure yet about doing an analysis of hatch first builds. There are so many complicating factors that make comparisons difficult, such as maynard timing, spine timing, queen timing, etc. Also in hatch first builds there is a deficit of minerals, making gas timings very complicated to hash out efficiently. There is a lot of disagreement as far as the best queen timing, speed timing, etc. For example, spanishiwa seems to be in favor of very late gas in his builds. These things cannot be scientifically analyzed imo, they have to simply be tested in game first to make determinations. | ||
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SoylentCreep
Korea (South)176 Posts
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onmach
United States1241 Posts
Frankly, I watch tourneys and watch people like idra get bunkered and quit, and destiny get cyber cores in his nat into 4 gate, morrow getting pylon blocked from their nat by an FE toss on taldarim, and fruit dealer losing 4+ drones early to marines and it seems so pointless. According to my tests with a drone scout, a 14 pool has a measly 50 mineral bonus after 7 minutes. All because they refuse to have a slightly earlier pool and end all the useless aggression and hatchery delay tactics. Compared with potential for zerglings 25 seconds earlier, 25 second earlier queen and inject or tumor, no hatchery block possible, period, and certain early expands by toss become unviable on certain map positions, it should be a no brainer. Every pro should be using it. So thank you, man. Cheers. | ||
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LaLuSh
Sweden2358 Posts
I used to 10 overpool in the beta (in all matchups), and I want to explain my thought process behind abandoning the build. http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Lalush_build (long time ago... =) ) The reason I didn't do the gas trick to go up to 11 drones, was because i wanted to make a queen and 6 lings instantly upon completion of the spawning pool at 13/18 supply. Then I'd drone from 16/18 to 18/18, after which I took my gas to go down to 17/18 while making another drone to minimize the downtime. After that larva inject and an overlord, and then like 7-8 drones. The build lined up real nice. Back then people had bad multitasking because the game was so new, so the lings would almost always pressure them into making mistakes. Additionally. Roaches were totally awesome with 2 armor and 1 supply. ZvZ was all about roaches. Lings were a total waste. And the 10 overpool build let me put on pressure while building 7-8 drones from the early larva inject, and then use the next round of larva for roaches. I always came out ahead because no one would open speedlings back then. What made me abandon 10 overpool in ZvZ was the 14gas 13/14 pool build after roaches were nerfed. You have a huge problem in that you cannot use your first batch of larva on purely drones. You have to use them on slow lings to stay alive. And those slow lings are USELESS. They only serve as a placeholder to keep you alive until you get roaches (which your economy is way too bad for if you have to make lings instead of drones with the first batch from larva inject). ZvZ is all about who can get away with making the most drones without dying. A non speedling build simply cannot put pressure on a speedling build, and it cannot keep tabs on if the opponent is making drones or continuing to make units for an all-in. Thus, it became an indesirable build order. Whereas I used to be able to keep tabs on my opponents (when they didn't open speedlings), now they are the ones keeping tabs on me. From me keeping them in the dark, they are now keeping me guessing and in the dark. That's why 10/11 overpool sucks in ZvZ (unless your opponent goes for a non instant speedling build). ZvT was the first matchup I gave up 10 overpool in. Making 6 lings and pressuring had 0 effect vs a wall-in. Furthermore, you could not expand with slow ling vs reapers. You would have to put down a roach warren before you'd expand. Back then, at least in the beginning of the beta, hydras were awesomely good (+10hp and higher fire rate). So I'd often get away with roach warren into expo, or just 1basing into hydras and expo. But the nerf of hydras and the emergence of the reactor hellion build made me give up on hydras as well as the 10 overpool build in ZvT. You simply cannot make drones at the timings you need to make drones in order to make the 10 overpool economical. ZvP was the matchup where I held on to the 10 overpool build the longest. I still believe it might be a viable and functional build (although I wouldn't transition into hydras today). What made me TOTALLY give up on 10 overpool in ZvP was the invention of the 4gate rush. I simply could not hold a 4gate with an 10 overpool without being absolutely economically crippled. Sometimes I'd hold it for 5-10 minutes but eventually die because his crappy 1base economy pretty much matched mine. Once the sentry numbers start to go over 10 (even if he is on 1base and has no intention whatsoever in expanding), shit becomes reaaaal hard. You simply cannot find any space/time for building up drone numbers while defending a 4gate with an early pool opening. Early in the beta hydras were much better as stated before. Also, the common protoss 1base "all-in" build was 3gate robo immortal. Which 10 overpool into hydras absolutely destroyed, since that build struck so late. Fast expansion builds were also pleasant to play against, as this build allowed you to drone up heavily while teching fast and doing extremely fast 2 base hydra "all-ins" (which always worked). At least until people started making shitloads of sentries while rushing to colossi. The protoss 4gate build is the absolute most extreme and earliest rush though. And it cannot be effectively held with a 10 or an 11 overpool. It alone is pretty much the reason not to use 10/11 overpool. You can pull it out in certain situations in boX series. It's excellent in providing easy wins vs forge FE protosses (either through the early lings or through quick roach follow ups). And it might be effective against a sentry expand style as well. But the thing is that an experienced Protoss player will know to 4gate vs it. Problem for Protoss players is that this build is so out of style that they likely would not know how to properly react. And thus it could be used a couple of times with great effect. Anyway. I just thought I'd provide an outlook on 11 overpools practicality in high level play, since I consider myself very experienced in using the opening. It was the only opening I used for months into the beta. | ||
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LaLuSh
Sweden2358 Posts
Additional larva are of no use unless they can consistently (vs a wide range of strategies) be used to make drones. Sadly, SC2 is just a bit too fast paced of a game, the rushes are just a bit too extreme for the 11 overpool to be viable (at least in my personal experience). The reason top players opt for the mineral bonus is that they maintain that bonus throughout defending a cheese or an all-in strategy. The timings of the 11 overpool simply don't line up nicely enough to be able to make drones at the times you need to while defending your (delayed) expansion with a tech disadvantage compared to the 14pool. 11overpools main disadvantage compared to 14/15hatch is the extreme delay in expansion timing. And the fact that the expansion, the bonus larva from inject, and the situational need for a roach warren or a speedling upgrade all compete for your resources at the same crucial timing in the game. 11overpools main disadvantage compared to 14pool, is its inability to match 14 pool's tech while maintaining a decent economy (the mineral bonus issue). Also: what was written two paragraphs above, the timings don't line up as nicely in juxtaposition with the opponent's possible build orders. 14/15 hatch and 14pool don't put you in the position to make impossible choices. That's what ultimately makes them the best. | ||
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IzieBoy
United States865 Posts
is there an analysis on 15 to 20 pool? just for completeness? keep up the good work! P.S. I wish there are some build testers for protoss that can crunch out viable amounts of sentries to protect an FE. Also, i've always had an itching question to know when it is worth it to cut probes for an expansion. on another subject...it kinda bugs me that there is no auto-probe production, auto-inject, and the like... also it would be kinda nice to have some kind of build tester that speed plays a given build (to account for unit movement and drone transfer). | ||
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jdseemoreglass
United States3773 Posts
I like most of your analysis, however, note that in my testing the 11overpool IS a speedling build. It gets gas at the same time as the 14gas/14pool, and has a larvae advantage in comparison. I agree that 11overpool in ZvT is not economical and ZvP is not safe. However in ZvZ I think it still has real potential, both in it's larvae advantage and in it's flexibility. | ||
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Usyless
54 Posts
On April 10 2011 12:42 LaLuSh wrote: It doesn't matter how small a mineral bonus a 14pool theoretically has after 7 minutes. If your opponent does an aggressive opening, you'll see why top players opt for the mineral bonus as opposed to the larva boost. Furthermore, you are stuck with a tech disadvantage and less flexibility using an 10/11 overpool. Additional larva are of no use unless they can consistently (vs a wide range of strategies) be used to make drones. Sadly, SC2 is just a bit too fast paced of a game, the rushes are just a bit too extreme for the 11 overpool to be viable (at least in my personal experience). I think you're missing the versatility of 11 overpool openings. I don't think one should open 11 overpool to get 6 lings and pressure. For the reasons you mentioned, you can't do damage to justify it and it sets you behind economically to the point you can't defend things like 4 gate. Instead, the 11 overpool (into 14-15 gas) is an opening that's comparable to 14 gas 14 pool except that one trades a handful of minerals for some extra larva. if you open with only a pair of zerglings to deny scouting and poke at the front, 11 overpool holds 4 gate just about as well as 14 gas/14 pool. Expanding at 21 (a few seconds after gas pool), you can afford pure zergling production while still building up enough for spines or a baneling nest against a 1 gas 4 gate, and you have more larva with which to produce those zerglings. When it comes to 4 gate defense, you effectively trade a short time on spines/tech for more speedlings. The speed on 11 overpool 14 gas is only a couple seconds behind 14 gas 14 pool. The timing on the injects and speed for the build is actually perfect for making speedlings with your second inject and using the lings to delay a 4 gate or expansion. In TvZ, 11 overpool is again, I think, best used as a speedling opening. It has an easier time with aggressive 2 rax play than the alternatives due to the extra larva, and if no such aggression is forthcoming, then the larva give you plenty of drones to power econ with. Similarly, in ZvZ, 11 overpool 14(15) gas is a variation on speedling/(baneling) that trades seconds on speed for more larva. It's a perfectly viable alternative to gas/pool, and the relative advantages and disadvantages of each are fairly subtle. I would use this opening anytime I wasn't hatching first. Even gasless 11 overpool openings don't lend themselves best to lots of early slow lings. For instance, 11 overpool into extractor trick to get an expansion at 19/18 with a pair of lings to scout and deny scouting is effectively on par economically with any other pool/hatch opening. | ||
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jdseemoreglass
United States3773 Posts
On April 10 2011 13:05 IzieBoy wrote: do you have a thread on hatch first somewhere? what's the scenario when you would do 14 gas/14 pool? i think it greatly depends on scenario, but it is intuitive that a later pool means more minerals. is there an analysis on 15 to 20 pool? just for completeness? keep up the good work! From my testing I concluded that getting a pool beyond 15 supply was kind of a waste because you will have 200 minerals in reserve anyways, so there is really no reason not to get it. I did do some analysis on hatch first, and concluded that it is always the most economical option. Hatch first should be your preferred option, however it runs into problems in regard to early pressure, particularly in ZvZ, and also hatch blocking against protoss. | ||
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meep
United States1699 Posts
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Usyless
54 Posts
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LilClinkin
Australia667 Posts
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Usyless
54 Posts
On April 10 2011 13:44 LilClinkin wrote: What good is larvae if you don't have the income to support it? Yes, zerg players want larvae to produce units, but you want to arrive at a state where your income matches your expenditure on larvae. This is why you see pros favor econ over larva builds. If your larvae production exceeds your income, it's the equivalent of a terran building 5 barracks when he can only produce out of 3 simultaneously. A zerg needs to determine what units he wants to produce (ie. cost per larva) and then add drones to increase his income such that he can then increase his larva output and continue producing more and more of the same unit. Alternatively, he can change the unit he is producing (ie. from a roach to a mutalisk, effectively doubling the cost of each larva) and not add any further larva production, or even enter into a state of excess larva. With 11 overpool, if you play it economically (i.e. produce only the early pair of lings for chasing off the scout), you have more than enough income to support your extra larva. | ||
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OmyVi
United States137 Posts
Thanks for your work! I've always been curious as to what the differences between these builds were. I always blindly follow the pros. lol Cheers, | ||
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Airact
Finland366 Posts
Let's say I go for a early +1 Ling/Bane aggression opening, the matchup being ZvZ. The opener I use at this moment is: 14 Extractor 14 Spawning Pool 15 Overlord Take no workers off-gas. Make as much Lings as possible, a Baneling Nest when you have 50gas after Ling speed and when the opposing scout is away. An Evolution Chamber at ~20 supply slightly after the first Queen is out because I start having excess money due to larva shortage. +1 when it's done, the Chamber is done near 100gas. Take a worker off-gas if you don't need that many Banes. Attack and expand when you get the chance. The analysis says that I should Overpool in ZvZ if I'm not going for an FE. Is that the case here? I need minerals for Zerglings, Banelings(25 isn't much but still...), +1 and the buildings required for the three. I also want to expand when I have the chance. I usually make one Drone after my pool is done, usually after the Evo, to cover the loss from the Baneling Nest and the Evolution Chamber. The Overpool probably requires me to be way more sharp with my Droning. Can an Overpool support all this? Considering that I probably need to drone up before I can start the aggression, does it make any difference compared to 14/14? | ||
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Usyless
54 Posts
On April 10 2011 17:49 Airact wrote: A question to everyone who is willing to answer: Let's say I go for a early +1 Ling/Bane aggression opening, the matchup being ZvZ. The opener I use at this moment is: 14 Extractor 14 Spawning Pool 15 Overlord Take no workers off-gas. Make as much Lings as possible, a Baneling Nest when you have 50gas after Ling speed and when the opposing scout is away. An Evolution Chamber at ~20 supply slightly after the first Queen is out because I start having excess money due to larva shortage. +1 when it's done, the Chamber is done near 100gas. Take a worker off-gas if you don't need that many Banes. Attack and expand when you get the chance. The analysis says that I should Overpool in ZvZ if I'm not going for an FE. Is that the case here? I need minerals for Zerglings, Banelings(25 isn't much but still...), +1 and the buildings required for the three. I also want to expand when I have the chance. I usually make one Drone after my pool is done, usually after the Evo, to cover the loss from the Baneling Nest and the Evolution Chamber. The Overpool probably requires me to be way more sharp with my Droning. Can an Overpool support all this? Considering that I probably need to drone up before I can start the aggression, does it make any difference compared to 14/14? I don't really like the build you're doing, but I tried 11 overpool 14 gas, droning to 15 (no scout), making one pair of zerglings, queen, overlord, then two drones (making 17 drones) and then pure zerglings and the rest of the tech you wanted, and you can just barely constantly produce lings if you're perfect with spawn larva. You can't afford an expo unless you skip an inject or make more drones early. However, overpool is nice in that your injects come so early that you can afford the larva to make extra drones and still have the potential to be aggressive. The timings will be a little different - try it yourself (maybe drone to ~20, if you want an expo?) and compare them. | ||
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onmach
United States1241 Posts
The hatchery is not delayed by anymore than the average 14 pool. Sure a 16 hatch is earlier, if you get it up on time, but about 50% of the time it doesn't go down on time on a 14 pool. I've been watching tourneys and some zergs give up putting down a hatch until zerglings spawn at 22+ supply, often times they have to knock down a pylon for even longer. With an 11 overpool your hatch goes down at 18, before the overlord every time, unless there's an engineering bay in the way. That is early enough in my experience to have the hatch up completely by the time 4 marines arrive at your base, and if you build the crawler when the hatch is at 20% in your main, you can run it down to your lower hatch and have it burrow the moment the hatch pops, rather having to delay marines with drones while you wait for spines to build. Besides clearing out pylons, those lings can perform scouting for bunkers and pylons around the hatch so you can send your overlord someplace more interesting. I would really like to know which builds it is not viable against so I could practice it with a friend and find out myself if there is indeed a build that I cannot hold against. The only one I've had trouble with is 4 marines, 6 scvs hits at just the right timing, but it is harder to hit that timing with the larger maps these days. Edit: Also as for the, can't spend minerals on drones on first inject thing, I take up a tact where I get gas early on toss, and just use the first inject on a tumor. The tumor will have time to extend into my nat and that gives me a lot more leeway in defending a 4 gate, and connects my bases quickly so that I can deal with air a little better early and use my queens for defense. Against zvt, if I'm being two raxed, I can use the larvae for extra lings. Since the queen came out 25 seconds earlier, and that's 60% or so of an injection timing, it's almost like free stuff. I'm not totally sure whether this is optimal, but it feels good. | ||
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LaLuSh
Sweden2358 Posts
On April 11 2011 03:19 onmach wrote: Hey lalush, you're definitely better than I am, and I'm going to take your word that you've explored this build and found it lacking but I don't feel your main criticism (the delayed hatch) is valid. The hatchery is not delayed by anymore than the average 14 pool. Sure a 16 hatch is earlier, if you get it up on time, but about 50% of the time it doesn't go down on time on a 14 pool. I've been watching tourneys and some zergs give up putting down a hatch until zerglings spawn at 22+ supply, often times they have to knock down a pylon for even longer. With an 11 overpool your hatch goes down at 18, before the overlord every time, unless there's an engineering bay in the way. That is early enough in my experience to have the hatch up completely by the time 4 marines arrive at your base, and if you build the crawler when the hatch is at 20% in your main, you can run it down to your lower hatch and have it burrow the moment the hatch pops, rather having to delay marines with drones while you wait for spines to build. Besides clearing out pylons, those lings can perform scouting for bunkers and pylons around the hatch so you can send your overlord someplace more interesting. I would really like to know which builds it is not viable against so I could practice it with a friend and find out myself if there is indeed a build that I cannot hold against. The only one I've had trouble with is 4 marines, 6 scvs hits at just the right timing, but it is harder to hit that timing with the larger maps these days. Edit: Also as for the, can't spend minerals on drones on first inject thing, I take up a tact where I get gas early on toss, and just use the first inject on a tumor. The tumor will have time to extend into my nat and that gives me a lot more leeway in defending a 4 gate, and connects my bases quickly so that I can deal with air a little better early and use my queens for defense. Against zvt, if I'm being two raxed, I can use the larvae for extra lings. Since the queen came out 25 seconds earlier, and that's 60% or so of an injection timing, it's almost like free stuff. I'm not totally sure whether this is optimal, but it feels good. I used delayed hatch as an argument for hatch first and not 14pool. Hatch first builds pretty much always go down on time nowadays, I don't know what you're talking about. No top zerg player goes hatch first vs Protoss anymore, and that's the only matchup where hatch first builds wouldn't go down on time. Also, excuse me, but you just don't seem to know what you're talking about or you're just talking from the experience of a gold or platinum league player defending 2rax or reactor hellion. The way you describe defending a fast expansion with an inbase spine crawler will never work against a properly executed 2rax. You seen good terran players kite slow zerglings with marines? He will lose 2 marines while you lose 30 zerglings. 11overpool vs Terran is a highly uneconomical build order. You need more tech/buildings/units/drones than you can afford to make. And the extra larva that's the entire point of the 11 overpool build more often than not have to be wasted in order to afford spine crawlers, queens, roach warren, ...every unit/building in general that require more minerals than you can spare and ends up leaving your larva idle. Against reactor hellion you pretty much need to go roach warren before expand. The fact that you even have to go roach warren nullifies the entire point of the build order. The point of extra larva is that they need to be used for drones in order for the 11overpool to be able to catch up to the 14pool in economy. Now you used up 1 early drone for a 150 mineral roach warren. And then you had to build at least 3 roaches instead of urgently needed drones. You will kill yourself using the 11overpool against any decent Terran. You are stuck with 15-16 drones, 2hatches, 1roach warren, 3 roaches, 1 queen. At the same timing a hatch first would have ~22 drones, 2 queens, 2hatches, and 2 spine crawlers defending the same build order. The inefficiency of the 11overpool's opening timings will just keep compounding throughout the game. Against a 2rax 1 spine crawler will be nowhere near enough. Even if you make a bunch of lings and the Terran loses their entire marine force -- if the terran isn't completely incompetent -- a 11overpool will have killed itself from not making drones while the terran was building a CC inbase and constantly producing SCV:s. 1base 4rax all-in builds weren't popular back when I played this build, but I'd say they would be close to impossible to consistently defend with an 11overpool opening (even moreso because you are completely blind with slow lings and marines chilling with 0 risk outside your base). The entire point of this thread is whether greater larva production will result in greater economy in the long run. If you so much as have to waste your first larva inject on lings to defend a 2rax: 11overpool will already start to lag behind. The test in OP tests optimal conditions where you can build drones freely. But having to stay at 13-14 drones for a minute in early game as opposed to being at 17-18 with a resource greedy build will have a great effect on the effectiveness of the build order. Pros have simply realized that with 11 overpool, you will frequently have larva that you cannot use. And excess larva is just wasted larva and a wasted potentially better economy. That potentially better economy in turn enables you to support more larva faster in the future, at a timing where the larva won't just be wasted larva -- but backed up with an economy that can actually support both it and defending a rush/cheese. | ||
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onmach
United States1241 Posts
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