[Statix]

This has been a thing getting on my nerves of late and i think its only because of luck im only JUST winning against it.

I see the terran coming with the 2 medivacs really early and produce lings ready for defence. i put a couple spines in my lines and a spore in each base , replace the drones and then continue to make units , terran comes and i do a reasonable job of holding them, i make a counter straight after with the remaining lings and 10 - 15 roaches and hes back in my base killing everything. however roach=goodunit and thats making mince meat in his base and hes lifting off everywhere and im killing drones and having a party.

i dont want to over react with sines and spores everywhere i think the 6 DE units i put down is wayyyy to much . . .but then again my base is ransacked after the drop . . shoulkd i be throwing more???

The question is this. I lose so much to the drop EVERYTIME, im winning most of the games when this 9min push or so comes but some players trash my base ruining my econ while they happily fly away with a ^^ on their face. How can i minimise drop damage, when those dropped MM's come in they just do sooo much damage

[EveMassacrisM]

The standard way to deal with drops is simply to scout it,, expect it, and split your army efficiently to repel the drops with minimum losses. Its a clash of multitasking mostly, except it's more annoying if you're Zerg.

[Fairyking]

Play more defensive = profit

[Cyanide]

Day9's new daily, Nerchio vs BratOK, actually kinda touched on how to split your zerg army against terran. He also talked about how terran can hit zerg with many things between the 6-10minute mark when zerg doesn't have lair tech yet. It's mostly about how to take expansions as well as how to defend them. Not sure if it helps.

[NDG.Stitch]

If you see drops come so early in the game, just defend it. If you have a roach ling army that you can attack with, split it up and deal with the medivacs, there is no rush to end a Terran so early like that. Defend drops, out macro him and out-tech him and you are bound to win with a bigger push.

[Statix]

nice one peeps get what ur saying, maes sense will watch the vids, it just happened again, a 9ish minute push, ovies all over the map sayw the entire thing, make about 16 lings and put spines on perim of bases 3 per base then hugged them with lings (slow) so i pushed out with the 15 roaches i had. He again did massive damage but the roaches rolled his base all the while i spammed lings at the drop, seems to be effective but i think this will only work against the gold played im playing.

Just another question, ive asked this before but when units pop from their eggs, how do you get them to insta attack? Ive noticed that my units walk to rally immediately, if i move them away from the base then they just sit there if im having to deal with something else. Are there any tips for this?

[FLuX]

When I play against fast medivac drops (usually from 1 base), I'll scout that there's no CC at their natural before 7 mins; so I can assume that there's some sort of attempted "game ending" strategy the terran plans to throw at me. Run a zergling up his ramp and see what his army looks like, and see what structures he has in his main/near his ramp. If you don't get a decent scout off, then sac an overlord to see if you're feeling nervous about it. By the time you scout what's coming, you should already have a macro hatch, and a good supply of larvae to boot. Also by the time he hits you, you should be on a good, fully (or nearly so) saturated two base economy, with the ability to put on heavy counter-aggression after his push.

Originally Posted by Statix

Just another question, ive asked this before but when units pop from their eggs, how do you get them to insta attack? Ive noticed that my units walk to rally immediately, if i move them away from the base then they just sit there if im having to deal with something else. Are there any tips for this?

What I do is hotkey my eggs; so say I'm spending 12 larvae and making 24 zerglings. I simply hit 4 (my hatcheries), S (select Larvae), Hit Z x12, then shift+1 (or whatever control group you keep zerglings in). Now when you select your zergling group, the eggs will change their rally points with every move command you make.
Also, a handy tip is that if you click Ctrl+Shift+Larvae, it will get rid of the larvae in that grouping (in case you're supply blocked, or want to use those larvae for something else), leaving only the eggs in the group.

Hope this helped

Quick Comments

ETL.Branno:

just ctrl click the eggs instead

[breadfan]

You definitely want those medivacs gone, so focus them down with your 5 range queen while your units clean up the rest of the drop. Less medivac healing means a less effective drop (because you can actually kill the units), and also that he can't pick up and keep harassing you. If he's dropping you off of one base, just take a 4th and get ready to crush him.

Also remember that zerglings aren't very good dealing with drops in the mineral line because they can't get any surface area to surround the marines - that's why terran does it.

[Ghosty]

You should try playing against a Zerg that drops... 4 Infestor hit squads are devastating O.o

[PiG]

Spines don't deal with drops they just delay them. Spores only deal with drops if they zone out every area of the base. Zerglings only stop drops if you have 10+/dropship and are directly underneath when it unloads. Simpler solution to building all these spines/spores is to just defend with more lingbane or lingroach. At the moment your defending it extremely cost inefficiently by rallying units in a few at a time.

So:

1) Defend with more stuff. If you want to skimp get right underneath the dropships by using move command to follow them.
2) Zone out the edges of your main and 3rd with spores, only works on some maps like antiga, daybreak etc.
3) Just don't counterattack and leave your whole army intercepting the drops while you continue to macro up

[Statix]

thanks again, here are two replays against the same guy, is there anything i could have done better (i hope these are the replays . .didnt rename them

[DarKcS]

Did you have spores? They buy time. Lots of time.

[RVLiveR]

PiG pretty much summed it up. Static D doesn't stop drops completely unless you make a LOT of them. You need to split army. A good ovie spread helps scout lots of drops, and sometimes after I transition into Infestors, if I still have a couple of mutas I patrol them around the map.

[Statix]

yup all good info TY!!

[DarKcS]

Some maps have very good chokes for spores that are not avoidable via normal drop pathing (Cloud Kingdom), and on others (Shakuras) Terran just needs to realise and come in from a different angle. Anything below masters really you can probably assume that Terran will not have the micro to do 3 drops, avoid spores AND spines. 100 mineral investments to save 300 minerals + Drones + mining time + queen deaths..well, it pays for itself later if he is going bio!

[Statix]

is there anyone out thee as a T willing to PP me? Just want you to drop me for an hour or so will donate real monies if you dont want to be so kind and do it for fun!!!!

The issue im having is im trying to bench mark to 60 drones on 2 base before on 8 mins then time an attack at around 10mins when 1/1 is done (ling or roach depending on what im doing) of course my macro is slipping and im working hard to achieve this BUT the goddamn drops! I dont play terran so im not sure how to judge what his econ may be like compared to mine cos hes zoned my ovies out at this point.

I am going back to think my main issue again is scouting, im not doing enough. My game seems to roptate in circles . . need to improve macro, dont scout focus, need to scout, macro slips, need to do something else, everything slips!!! sigh . . i love this game

[YurickHarmon]

Drops are difficult to deal with as they stress multitasking (and at silver/gold level, no offense but you probably feel as though you are too slow to get units where you want them, i know i did). As a last ditch effort if you can't seem to handle it, you can try switching into a muta style, it makes drops much more risky (they cant lift and fly away as the mutas catch them and get the medivac+marines for free), and also forces the marines to stay in the base and deal with the mutas. This turns the multitasking element of it back on its head, he has to stress out dealing with mutas the same way you do currently with drops.

Ideally you don't have to change your style, but worst come to worst...

[Shieldz]

overlord positioning is very important also 1 ling should be on patrol between 2 or 3 bases so u have map vision that will help u a lot more to defend drops

[Statix]

yeah i usually stay away from mutas as i cant seem to secure 3rd base really well to start getting the gas i need to produce enough but yeah im sure 20 or so suppy might make this prob go away if i concentrate on overlord spread to spot it. must look at minimap, must look at minimap, must look at mini map . . and so on!

[Hijung]

Here's the thing I've learned from playing Protoss who's had problems with Terran drops: It's about the mindset, really.

His intention is to cripple my economy, my intention all game is to kill his army, and kill him outright.. -all game-.

So, instead of being in that mindset of 'I want my opponent to die and I want to kill him outright' (which will lead to many base trades, a large majority is a coin-flip, but generally with a Terran you'll lose a base-race, every time.) instead focus on increasing the size of your army, your injects, and your creep spread. But not killing him outright.

As a newbie Toss, I've gotten better because I've basically outmacroed my opponent, thus beating them. I can't emphasize enough how important it is to simply out-macro your opponent, especially in lower leagues. Focus on that, and be in the right mindset, you don't want to kill your opponent outright, on too many occasions I've outmacroed my opponent but have no army to support. Focus on the fundamentals, and the rest will follow.