[Starcyph3r]

Hey guys, A plat zerg here who for whatever reason cannot win at this matchup. I can beat diamond terran fine when their favoured, but at times I cant even beat gold protoss when I'm favoured. I need a replay analysis asap before I embarrass myself and continue rage quitting in zvp as I did in this replay. Obvious mistakes are blind corrupters which I usually make just because I have so many experiences of being beaten by protoss with a collosus push. And I was also afk for a few secs in the early game so please dont comment on these things. This replay isnt one of my finest moments as I rage quite considerably at the end but its a product of a days worth of zvp. Please help me so I do not end up hopelessly frustrated by this matchup, causing me to abuse unsuspecting protoss players

http://sc2rep.com/replays/%28P%29San...20110730/11872

[Hybrid]

i started to DL the replay but for some reason it isn't working, i will have a look tmw if i can dl it, i am super buggered right now. any way don't rage quit to much, its a game just rage at the person. gl with any games you play,

[ProAnnn]

Most zerg struggle against protoss because of 2 things.
1. Poor Scouting
Overlord saccing is very important. Especially if your opponent forge FE as he most likely wouldnt able to stop your overlord from scouting his techpaths. Against 3 gate sentry expand u also have to try to overlord sac but you can sac 1 at 7 min another one at 11 min when u have overlord speed
2. Poor Reaction
Scout stargate? Start making queens and spores. Scout 6 gateways? Start make lings/roaches /spines. Scout 6 gateways AND a twilight council? Throw infestation pit and tons of spines and a spore of course. Scout robo? Throw a spire! Zerg IMBA

Quick Comments

	Maynarde:	Excellent response, OP should take not of this
	TADivinity:	Exactly the problems I fixed myself, now ZvP is a strength
	lolwut:	great answer!

[Maynarde]

Originally Posted by ProAnnn

Most zerg struggle against protoss because of 2 things.
1. Poor Scouting
Overlord saccing is very important. Especially if your opponent forge FE as he most likely wouldnt able to stop your overlord from scouting his techpaths. Against 3 gate sentry expand u also have to try to overlord sac but you can sac 1 at 7 min another one at 11 min when u have overlord speed
2. Poor Reaction
Scout stargate? Start making queens and spores. Scout 6 gateways? Start make lings/roaches /spines. Scout 6 gateways AND a twilight council? Throw infestation pit and tons of spines and a spore of course. Scout robo? Throw a spire! Zerg IMBA

Completely agree with you, as usual.

The major difference between the zergs that can handle protoss and the zergs that can't are either of those things or a mixture of the two. Scouting and reacting right is so important it's insane to ignore.

[Starcyph3r]

[QUOTE=ProAnnn;29226]Most zerg struggle against protoss because of 2 things.
1. Poor Scouting
Overlord saccing is very important. Especially if your opponent forge FE as he most likely wouldnt able to stop your overlord from scouting his techpaths. Against 3 gate sentry expand u also have to try to overlord sac but you can sac 1 at 7 min another one at 11 min when u have overlord speed
2. Poor Reaction
Scout stargate? Start making queens and spores. Scout 6 gateways? Start make lings/roaches /spines. Scout 6 gateways AND a twilight council? Throw infestation pit and tons of spines and a spore of course. Scout robo? Throw a spire! Zerg IMBA[/Q

I dont like the stylistic choice of fast overlords unless I'm swimming in gas. Slow overlords take forever to get to toss on large maps. Most of the time protoss just shoots it down when they attempt to get me to make units by having their army take the towers. Worst of all is that their not invisible :P

[Geekpeek]

Originally Posted by Starcyph3r

I dont like the stylistic choice of fast overlords unless I'm swimming in gas. Slow overlords take forever to get to toss on large maps. Most of the time protoss just shoots it down when they attempt to get me to make units by having their army take the towers. Worst of all is that their not invisible :P

I would suggest you play around with overlord speed a bit more. It's definately worth the resources and the info you gain is something you desparately need. I would even sac an overlord or two on occasion. Point is, it does seem like a scouting issue and it won't hurt to try it out for a few more games.

[matthras]

Originally Posted by Starcyph3r

I dont like the stylistic choice of fast overlords unless I'm swimming in gas. Slow overlords take forever to get to toss on large maps. Most of the time protoss just shoots it down when they attempt to get me to make units by having their army take the towers. Worst of all is that their not invisible :P

You WERE swimming in gas in that game in general. Also, once you've scouted your opponent's position it's normally standard practice to situate your first overlord somewhere where you can easily run it into your opponent's base.

You lost because you had no idea to expect, and blindly went towards the standard Roach/Hydra/Corrupter composition even though your opponent made no air units whatsoever.

When you're scouting, it's not so much just the tech and what buildings he has up, but also his army composition.

Other points:

- Minimap awareness. There was a long minute where you were simply checking your upgrades yet the Toss army was sitting in the middle of the map doing nothing - having checked the composition earlier would've allowed you to appropriately react, or suicide your army early in order to remax.
- Eco management. As mentioned already, you were banking a fair amount of gas. I wouldn't have minded if your gameplan involved making a bunch of Ultras/Broods/Infestors all at once, but none of such was apparent. A solid gameplan also includes a solid idea of what kind of economy you'll need to support the production.
- Engagement. Zergs' power in ZvP/ZvT is their ability to replenish their army faster than a Protoss can. The initial engagement is important because you need to buy yourself time in order to replenish/remax your army. That said, again you could've drawn the Protoss army closer to his base (thereby buying yourself time), so that you'd have time to remax once your initial army is destroyed.

[PiG]

If ur so angry learn a variety of all ins like drone drill and roach long all-in and you can make yourself feel better with ez wins :P. Knowing all ins is vital for punishing greedy players. However if you'd rather improve in the long run you probly need to fix ur macro mechanics. On mobile now so will post more later on this but I stream alot of coaching covering how to improve zerg macro: www.justintv/altpig even the bronze lessons I give rules that can apply across all skill levels.

[Starcyph3r]

Hmm I feel just as cheap as the protoss if I all in :S

[ProAnnn]

I dont play zerg but for whatever reason all my zerg opponents WILL have overlord flying into my base at 7-8 min mark and scouting EVERYTHING inside. Overlord speed enables even easier scouting.

[ToRDeathsFang]

Your quote failed. Just sayin'

Quick Comments

Aean(::

dont copy me :(

[Muldeh]

Okay I have a question... how do zergs beat mass archon/zealot? I mean like 15+ archons.. my last game sure i got infestors but i only had the gas for 4, fungaled the zealots and neural parasite 3 of the archons, had heeeeaps of spines, but it wasn't enough. I know i'm just silver and theres a lot more wrong with my play etc etc.. whatever.. I know what I need to improve on there and I'll work on it.. but when it comes to scouting archons all i really know if to build infestors, if theres any other way to deal with it.. please. :S

[matthras]

If you've let your opponent get 15+ Archons, then you would've had the opportunity to get just as many Infestors OR have easily outmacro'ed him. I get the impression you weren't too sure what your mid-game plan and unit composition was. Apart from that, I can't comment on anything else without a replay.

[Muldeh]

I guess that's true, I shouldn't wing it so much..

Most of my gas was used for a lot of mutas, though my harrass only cleared up his third.

15 archons > 30 mutas.

[Starcyph3r]

Originally Posted by Muldeh

I guess that's true, I shouldn't wing it so much..

Most of my gas was used for a lot of mutas, though my harrass only cleared up his third.

15 archons > 30 mutas.

And 15>300/200 worth of roaches

[Starcyph3r]

Also what is the universally agreed upon hard counter to zealot archon? You criticise me for using roach/hydra but I would have thought it would one of zergs strongest forms of ground army while waiting for broodlords. Also the reasoning for staying back in my base is A) Because I needed to engage on creep and B) I was waiting on the 3/2 upgrades which would give me the edge against his army.

[Xeen]

Originally Posted by Starcyph3r

Also what is the universally agreed upon hard counter to zealot archon?

Stop using this term. Stop thinking this term. Hard counter implies you're playing rock paper scissors and not Starcraft, and there's a way to hilariously roll over the composition. Standard compositions do not have 'hard counters', that is why they are standard.

The best 'counter' to archons is that they are very singular units, and expensive at that. Having a lot of stuff usually nullifies this (and any other build that relies on key, costly units) - beyond not doing anything silly (ling-heavy builds probably aren't going to cut it), you'd be fine with any sort of midgame so long as you focused on limiting the Protoss's ability to take bases and secure gas. I'd just go mass roach while securing gasses for infestor/brood and harass throughout the midgame because zealots are hilarious and archons aren't a threat if they get split apart.

Originally Posted by Muldeh

Okay I have a question... how do zergs beat mass archon/zealot? I mean like 15+ archons.. my last game sure i got infestors but i only had the gas for 4, fungaled the zealots and neural parasite 3 of the archons, had heeeeaps of spines, but it wasn't enough. I know i'm just silver and theres a lot more wrong with my play etc etc.. whatever.. I know what I need to improve on there and I'll work on it.. but when it comes to scouting archons all i really know if to build infestors, if theres any other way to deal with it.. please. :S

You lost a game where he had 15+ archons yet you 'only had gas for 4' infestors. I'm going to let you look at those numbers and think about the implications of that sentence. That is why you lost. You should not be thinking about tactics or what to build, you should be fixing your play so you have more stuff than your opponent.

[ProAnnn]

Roach hydra composition is actually a darn good counter to zealot archon.

[Daboo]

Lets see..
Blind countering colossi tech when he was going for zealot archon.
No vision of the protoss base after your scouting drone died to the cannon.
This was pretty much a NR15 game, where apart form the little attempted runby you tried when he was taking a third.
Location where you engaged was just too close to your base, so he could walk in to your base when he was done with your army.
After all this bming toss player and saying he has no skill.

His army was bigger,and protoss armies are the hardiest in the game once upgraded. Thats just the nature of the game,the downside is they're more expensive, and hence tougher to remax. The advantage that zerg has is to throw units at will and keep making more. Infestors might have helped, and I hear banelings are quite good against zealots.....but I think more than anything this was failure to scout protoss strategy, and being too passive. Toss could've maxed out on anything and won in this game.

[Next_rim]

Xeen,

He clearly stated that he built loads of mutas just to see his opp build archons that (!) counter mutas. He lost his army, tried to rebuild, but had no macro to support tech switch. So he is asking about whether his initial tactics was correct.

OP,

Starcraft is very tactical. You go into the game with a particular build. Every build has strength and weaknesses. If you are playing some1 who scouted you, figured out your weakness, and is making a counter, you can:
1) switch (adjust, or diminish your strength, but strengthen your weak sides),
2) proceed with build (take advantage of timing and first-mover advantage, aka do it before he can do anything to stop you).
3) You can also take an econ risk, and do suicide attack to do some damage, but only do it when you have strong macro to back it up (aka make him constantly trade, relying on your cost efficiency or income efficiency).

You didn't use either of your options, and lost as a result.

As you probably already figured out, your opponent simply built a counter to your opening. It doesn't mean your opening was wrong, mutas are sometimes viable. It means you scouted wrong (or didn't scout at all), and for w/e bad reason decided to proceed with mutas. Which is also fine, but if you chose to proceed with your build without adjustment, you have to do stupid amounts of damage, or secure enough macro behind it to switch in time. You made every tactical error possible.

You played in the following state of mind "o well, i'll build some mutaz and see what I can do with them". This is a wrong approach, you have to better make decision on what to build based on scouting information. YOur game was a typical low-level double blind, where you play your strat with no regard to what your opp is doing. In this case, buildorder losses are typical.

Quick Comments

Insidious:

Good answer lack of scouting or bad response to scouting

[Xeen]

Originally Posted by Next_rim

Xeen,

He clearly stated that he built loads of mutas just to see his opp build archons that (!) counter mutas. He lost his army, tried to rebuild, but had no macro to support tech switch. So he is asking about whether his initial tactics was correct.

If you can build loads of mutas (and let your turtling opponent get 4500 gas of archons), you should definitely have both the map control and gas income to produce more than 4 infestors. Somewhere in there is a serious macro error.

[Muldeh]

Yeah my macro was definitely lacking. However I have improved it a bit I'd say.. my last games I had 20-30 infestors out by the time my opponent had archons, and I had a decent roach army to back it up. Perhaps I have just been playing weaker opponents, but regardless I have improved.

Thanks for the comments.

PS: About scouting, I find it hard to scout for archons, simply because they are formed from templar, which have their own uses. My opponent in the game I talked about in my original post had gone for DTs to harrass, which killed my third as I didn't scout it until the DTs were almost at me.

(That's an issue in itself, the question here being, should I always sacrifice a slow overlord for extra scouting before I get lair, or should I get lair earlier than I normally do just for overlord speed? My usual build has me scouting with a fast overlord between the 9 and 10 minute mark, which i think it a little late for stuff like DTs.)

Of course once I had detection he kept making DTs and morphed them to archons. I knew he was able to make archons, but I didn't know that he would.

[SLCN.Kez]

always sac a slow overlord around 5 mins to see waht is up, also, have a ling or 2 poke up his ramp to count the amount of sentries at the front, any less than 4-5 at around 5-6-7 mins and he is going somethign tech based, with the advantage being spores will do well against both his tech options being dt's and void rays. After this i prefer to get an overseer and drop a changeling to scout when my lair is done as opposed to getting ovie speed (depending which tactic i choose to use) but this is purely a stylistic choice and both will work just fine.
As for the issue of weather or not he will choose to make archons or simply keep making dt's it can be hard to tell, the thing you have to look out for is his stalker count and if you scout a robo or not, and also how quickly he attempts to take his third. If i see a toss trying to take a relatively quick third (around 11 mins to about 13 mins) AND i dont see a robo then i assume he is going zealot archon, or mass blink stalker, but if you did what i said above and look for stalker count then it will be obvious if he is going blink stalkers or zealot/archon. But like others have said, if you're in silver league like 99% of games are won purely because of macro as opposted to actual unit compositions etc. That being said, if i see zealot archon i dont actually change my unit combination from ling/bling/infestor, i merely invest a lil bit more gas into getting out ultras much quicker, taking 4 bases pretty quick(around 13-15 mins) and trying to prevent his third. Hope this helps

[iVnStinger]

Damn man... I suck at ZvT but ZvP isn't that hard imo. You just need to keep scouting them to see if they attack, make ALOT of drones. Like literally, if they aren't pushing out, just make drones. Until eventually you've got your 3 saturated bases and by then if you constantly make units as well you should have a decent sized army. Then just max out and push to kill them. Well atleast this is what I do and it works. (Plat zerg as well)

[Muldeh]

I beat gold terrans consistently, it was just silver protoss I was losing to, but now I think I have it sorted.

Edit: And ZvZ was my best matchup but I see very very few zergs on ladder these days. At silver/gold level anyway.

[Eldrid]

Roach/infestor does well vs all strats/builds, from 9min 6gate pushes, 2base 4-5 collossi pushes (quite rare now-a-days, but still around) to blink stalker to stalker immortal. With proper scouting you can add lings vs the unit comps where you need to, or corruptors against deathball, but roach infestor can easily be your 'core' units in every ZvP.

Against zealot/archon you should attack with your roaches, move back a bit, attack again, rinse and repeat, this way only the zealots can attack, archons don't get many hits in at all as they are slower than roach. Also if you fungal the archon / zealot ball, then roaches can attack while being out of range of the archons attacks.

Quick Comments

PiG:

Amen to that brutha

[Infetrix]

hello, i have a quick question aLt PiG how do you do the all in 'drone drill' im struggling zvp atm and am looking to new solutions such as all ins it would be much appreciated if you could message me

[Xeen]

Originally Posted by Infetrix

hello, i have a quick question aLt PiG how do you do the all in 'drone drill' im struggling zvp atm and am looking to new solutions such as all ins it would be much appreciated if you could message me

If you're struggling in a matchup, learning all-ins is the last thing you should be doing... it'll ensure you don't actually improve in knowing how to play Starcraft.

Quick Comments

nirvAnA:

[Trusty]

Originally Posted by Xeen

If you're struggling in a matchup, learning all-ins is the last thing you should be doing... it'll ensure you don't actually improve in knowing how to play Starcraft.

Not entirely true - if you're struggling with an MU, it can be good to spam a 1 or 2 base all-in build for a while.

it gives you:
a) practice with the build
b) give you some confidence back

Easily 99% of the people on the ladder can't execute a 1-2 base all-in perfectly. So it's not exactly going to hurt you to practice it. Of course, if you KEEP doing it, and don't eventually go back to playing standard, then you're in trouble.

[ProAnnn]

Originally Posted by Trusty

Not entirely true - if you're struggling with an MU, it can be good to spam a 1 or 2 base all-in build for a while.

it gives you:
a) practice with the build
b) give you some confidence back

Easily 99% of the people on the ladder can't execute a 1-2 base all-in perfectly. So it's not exactly going to hurt you to practice it. Of course, if you KEEP doing it, and don't eventually go back to playing standard, then you're in trouble.

Only applies to protoss. It is always better to not allin as zerg since their allin are literally allinnish and have no transition at all

[Meatex]

I believe he means where you stack all your drones so they look like 1 drone going in for a scout
your can click the opponents mineral line and the drones will go straight through the zealot
Usually have an "accidentally" sacced overlord to draw away his first sentry

Im not 100% but i think its 10 pool get up to 14 drones then follow up with nothing but lings
You stack drones by sending one drone to build a gas then grab all your drones and spam click 2 close patches one after the other then quickly click the extractor BEFORE its finished and when they are all bunched up click opponents mineral line and nothing else

Timing is really important this is one with a very small window
good luck

[JuN]

ahahaha oh wow this drone drill all-in sounds like great fun for playing inhouse with friends. any replays of this strat or more specific timings?

[DemisodaSPR]

Scout and hard counter.. There is a grey area before overlord speed but you can usually get by by observing his natural chrono allocation, his building wallin composition, the timing on his 3rd and 4th gas, how sentry heavy he's going, whether a warpin round is being unused, when he changes from sentry warpins to stalker, et cetera. You can usually figure out quite a narrow range because you should already know the buildings in his main at the time of nexus.

[c_kAelle]

reading this thread. zvp is my worst matchup and i need to get improving on it.