Terran Vs Zerg... possible whinge-warning....

DeVore

I dont seem to have a means to defeat a capable Terran player who goes for the MMM (marines, marauders and medivacs) bio-ball approach.

Played my placement games there, lost two to terrans by EXACTLY the same means. (got into Gold though, w00t!)

Standard start, have it down nice, get out some zerglings, find his base, back off from the choke (I'm just checking to see he built it in case he's a n00b )

Build lings, get crack, get queen, get hive, get fliers and hydras, die to bioball which rolls in.

I generally have about 30 cracklings, which do some damage but nothing like enough, might have 3 fliers but not enough to kill his 2-3 medivacs, and a handful of hydras which go down like wet paper.


Its ****ing snoreworthy at this stage, the game is descending into a game of chicken as to how much you are willing to sacrafice the economy in mid game to go cheese rushing...

I swear the next Terran I play I'm going to 6 pool the mofo.

Anyone got a suggestion? Banelings?

DeV.

Funky

TvZ is the matchup people are complaining most about these days. From what I've seen the most effective strategy is to open with speedlings just to protect against early pressure from reapers or whatever, transition into mass mutas which you use to pick off any units/buildings around the edge of his base but not actually engaging his army. You basically want to use them to get complete map control, maybe secure another expansion. Once he sees you going mutas the most likely thing he'll do is mass more marines and less marauders, so you go banelings. Then when you engage you rush in your mix of speedlings/banelings focusing more on getting your banelings into his ball of marines cause if just a couple of them can land that's alot of dead marines. Gotta be careful with your mutas until you land your banes in the marines cause the rines will rip apart the mutas in no time. But once the rines are dead the mutas will be able to clean up pretty much anything that's left.

Mass tanks can be a problem against this since they'll squash all the banes before they get near his army, in this case I'm not sure what the best route to go is. Maybe keep massing mutas with some roaches as a meat shield and trying to keep him contained/discourage him from making any pushes, then secure more expansions and go for ultras.

The Mad Hatter

I'm not nearly a good enough player to have ever tried anything like this myself, but I've seen in replays smallish groups of banelings make mincemeat of the bio ball.

Also, don't know how it would work against terran but maybe you could go for a mega-nydus approach like this guy.

NeoSlicerZ

I'd actually f/e ZvT, get extra queens, drone up to the max, you'll need it. MULEs give terran a 20% eco advantage or so.. Get a roach warren and a few roaches, try and survive the pressure, don't make too many, you need drones more. Positioning is KEY, a lot of reaper users will jump up cliffs... and die, use transfuse if you need to aswell!

Honestly unless they're high diamond, they're not going to be able to put enough pressure on with reapers AND macro very well at the same time. The key thing is not to overract and drone up. You probably need like 150 apm though to macro and micro at the same time. If he goes mass mass reapers, transition into mutas. If he goes mech, wait till his army moves out then run slings into his expo mineral line. You do not face mech headon, that is simply asking to get raped.

Heck, simply a moving your entire army, will get you raped. Zerg need nice concaves and surrounds otherwise, well they die. If you MUST break a tank line, get overlord speed and drop capability. Start dropping banelings onto tanks, or broodlords. Zerg has no cost efficent way to do otherwise since Ultra will get held up by a MM screen.

SirJolt

Does the Neural Parasite not destroy Terran bio? I presume they're not going to have ghosts too often against Zerg, which will mean you won't have to play careful with energy and avoiding EMPs. If you can immobilise the bioball and knock down medivacs you should be sitting pretty

Banelings are also a force to be reckoned with

Kirby

Banelings. lots and lots of banelings. Absolutely kills the MMM ball. The problem you will have is when he backs his bio ball with siege tanks and ironically starts to "creep" towards your base . Banelings usually struggle then to do damage.

What I tend to do against decent terran players is go mass ling and mass baneling and try and keep occupied while i rush like a mad yoke to tier 3. If you can get ultralisks out before he masses his thors and siege tanks you should be okay.

If he turtles, let him. There is no effective way to get past a terran wall in. Nydus worms will get shot down and an overlord drop army will likely get shot down on the way if he is turtling heavily. Instead, focus your efforts on taking the rest of the map with hatcheries and creep. Eventually he will run out of minerals and try to expand but by that time you should have total map sight with your creep and overlords.

And I think SirJolt means Fungal growth. Locks the units in place and does damage over time. one of the Infestors special ability. Very useful but they die easily as hell so you have to micro infestors very well in order to get some use out of them. I try to build atleast 4 early on against terran. So use Fungal on a bio ball and if he masses thors, use their neural parasite to take control of a few in an engagement. Can work. A nice harass tactic is to also build 4 or 5 and burrown them to his Mineral line. They can spawn like 20 infested terran from underground and then escape quickly.

SirJolt

You're 100% right, Fungal Growth/Neural Parasite always get confused, I'm a filthy protoss player, so Zerg spells all blur into one horrifying menagerie

BlitzKrieg

And I think SirJolt means Fungal growth. Locks the units in place and does damage over time. one of the Infestors special ability. Very useful but they die easily as hell so you have to micro infestors very well in order to get some use out of them. I try to build atleast 4 early on against terran. So use Fungal on a bio ball

research burrow...i think infested terrans can be launched while burrowed which is always good cover then a quick pop up behind the distraction and fungal growth.

but burrow is worth picking up if going banelings as when he starts to climb your ramp you have alot of them burrowed just behind him and bring them out to hit the marines from behind roaches/speedlings from the front

TheDoc

Terran in this matchup as standard should be opening with an offensive reaper push. Oddly enough its the matchup where zerg tend to be defensive.

Reapers early on will put a hault to a fast expansion and do some serious damage. With the nitro pack upgrade reapers completely dominate zerglings.

It very much forces the zerg to go roaches with speed and zerglings with speed.

As a terran player I'm finding zerg very easy.

The only difficulty comes when the zerg player transitions to roaches, but my arrival of marines, marauders and medivacs finishes it of very easily.

My point of concern is that your not encountering reaper trouble, and the amount of terran players not utilising reapers against zerg. It is literally the match winner.

DeVore

I still need something to take out the medivacs, plus all of this is reactive to counter him, when does T have to react to Zerg??

You have to remember, the ball rolls in at about 6-12 units after I (rush) to tier 2, so there isnt a lot of time for fancy stuff.... getting to Ultralisks (tier3) in order to deal with Tanks (tier 2) is massively imba.

I'm really thinking of playing protoss for a while, I'm sick of being fodder.

DeV.

SirJolt

DeVore wrote: »

getting to Ultralisks (tier3) in order to deal with Tanks (tier 2) is massively imba.

I'm really thinking of playing protoss for a while, I'm sick of being fodder.

As a 'toss player, you still need tier 3 to beat that bio ball really, whether you go colossus or storms, you're teching a fair way to slap down those early terran pushes.

Of course, forcefield makes it that bit easier to hold them off

NeoSlicerZ

You don't need tier 3 to beat basic MM, if you do, your early game is screwed. To beat the early MM push you can do it with pure zealot/sentry and a stalker or two. Even if he has stim. Split his army/forcefield so he can't run away, if he can't kite zealots will rape his bio ball. This is a good skill to have anyway since you can kite chargelots fairy easy with some timing.

BlitzKrieg

Neo we are talking zerg here over protoss.

I still need something to take out the medivacs, plus all of this is reactive to counter him, when does T have to react to Zerg??

thats the issue with zerg. Of the three sides they are the one that relies most on reacting to their opponents tactics. Terran only needs to react in small amounts while zerg need to shift their entire army to get an advantage over specific builds.

To list of a few things

Hydra's must get the range boost...with that they outrange the ball and can if you use focus fire pick off medivacs fairly quickly and can kite only on creep. You'd use hydra's with a roach/infestor build over a zergling build as the roaches can take the hits and act as a wall between the ball and the hydras while the infestor can trap the ball if its careless with fungle growth or boost the hydra range fire with infested terrans. Continue the tech march up and bring out ultralisks which will end the MMM ball threat and change the game focus to a matter of attrition and map control.

Banelings can slaughter marines which is why they are paired more with a mutalisk build as that is a much more heavy on harrasment and having a fast ground/air force to keep the terran forces back at base or focus on defending their resources/expansions etc. This is more micro heavy and gas heavy with mutalisks needing a 100 gas each. The idea is if your banelings/speedlings kill the marines with a surrond then your mutas can clean up the ball. You need to focus fire the marines first with a surrond or baneling trap then when you know your muta can handle their numbers bring them in finish off marines and kill medivacs and mauraders.

Your biggest risk is as someone outlined earlier the horribly strong reaper opener. I tend to cap his gas to delay it or get a second queen over lings if I didnt cap in time. if I see it is clearly coming and to roaches over lings as reapers cant one shot them and on creep they can chase them off quite easily. But it is very difficult to fight off early reaper. If you see its not coming then expanding quickly is a better to expand early and out eco your opponent. but two queens and roaches can easily fend off reaper and the 2nd queen can be used to boost the creep and then the expansion while roaches can lead into a roach/hydra build.

DeVore

So let me get this straight, I have to do all of that while the Terran player just masses MMM , assigns to Ctrl-1 and Attack-Moves the back of my base?? yeah this game is balanced.

Sorry, just got rolled over again by a terran in 7 minutes and cheese rushed by protoss. this game, in 1v1, is very fncked. I'm bitterly disappointed with the balance and the game play, I havent yet had one game (either way) which went to anything like tier 3, its all rush rush rush with the low level troups en masse and its become Excel-In-Space.

DeV.

TheDoc

DeVore wrote: »

So let me get this straight, I have to do all of that while the Terran player just masses MMM , assigns to Ctrl-1 and Attack-Moves the back of my base?? yeah this game is balanced.

Sorry, just got rolled over again by a terran in 7 minutes and cheese rushed by protoss. this game, in 1v1, is very fncked. I'm bitterly disappointed with the balance and the game play, I havent yet had one game (either way) which went to anything like tier 3, its all rush rush rush with the low level troups en masse and its become Excel-In-Space.

DeV.

It is going to be like that though, SC1 wasnt balanced over night, it will be a balance feast for a long time.

Sure you just have to see the matchmaking system to understand things need time to pan out. Beta hardly gave them much of an insight into how balanced the game was, its only on mass release, give it a month of games and watch the tournaments and see what needs fixing.

It is not so much Zerg are weak, it is probably terran are overpowered.

I've had two zerg games today as Terran that were a breeze, it will get fixed soon enough I'd say, but the balance has to be so that terran dont start getting ****ed against protoss.

BlitzKrieg

NeoSlicerZ wrote: »

It's much harder to defend than attack and as zerg you MUST be cost efficient. Zerg mechanics are brutally uncompromising. If you manage to build drones while defending vs reapers you're doing well. Again, the key is flanking as zerg. You MUST be one base ahead or have some godly one base play to gain map control. You MUST make the opponent afraid to step out of his base. There was a good post on TL about the evolution of playstyles, we're starting to see more f/e styles but as terran you can put immense pressure while keeping your eco strong and FEing.

Sauron zerg playstyle is probably the best, that is defending multiple bases with the bare minimum then bam, an army and roll over the terran.

Your statement about MMM and 1a2a3a is probably apt for lower levels of play but at higher levels this gets punished, hard. MMM is powerful because it is mobile! Though thanks to the marauder it isn't as fragile, you need infestors so they don't kite or map control. Get upgrades!

I need to emphasize this, you need MAP control as zerg, if you see him moving out, run slings into his base. Playing zerg is rather like guerilla warfare, if you meet him on anywhere near equal terms, you're probably doing something wrong.

DeVore wrote: »

So let me get this straight, I have to do all of that while the Terran player just masses MMM , assigns to Ctrl-1 and Attack-Moves the back of my base?? yeah this game is balanced.

Sorry, just got rolled over again by a terran in 7 minutes and cheese rushed by protoss. this game, in 1v1, is very fncked. I'm bitterly disappointed with the balance and the game play, I havent yet had one game (either way) which went to anything like tier 3, its all rush rush rush with the low level troups en masse and its become Excel-In-Space.

DeV.

well I put up two flows not one whole.

you dont go muta and hydra

its one or the other.

Muta is much more gas centric and is much more focused on a player who is comfortable in map control and map awareness which at the moment with the op reaper (which is being nerfed) is rarer. You would more likely go mutaling against protoss then terran.

Hydraroach is for someone who is less gas focused (75 gas for hydra and roach while 100 for 1 muta) and might be one basing. This is where you intend to to micro an army and push and shove his back and forth. Allows you to drop quick expansion to saturate minerals behind the line or an in base hatch to up the numbers.

it also effects where you intend to fight. Mutaling is useless at most chokepoints unless you threw in banelings aswell as you need the surrond. While hydraroach benefits alot more from a choke cause they are all ranged and an upgraded hydra can outrange marines with groove spikes upgrade. Which with the high ground at base choke points helps alot and throw in that a roach can take a fair few hits they can block the choke and cover for the hydra.


The advtange of mutaling is the speed you can hit back if you win a battle, you can go straight into a base harrasment with them at high speed putting the terran on the back foot. While the hydraroach is much slower.


One tip I recently heard on a youtube video somewhere cant remember which one is that with zerg every battle won you should move forward in some form, either expand, move up map control or make a big tech jump. Getting in the habit of reaching out after every battle really puts terrans on the backfoot.

NeoSlicerZ

It's much harder to defend than attack and as zerg you MUST be cost efficient. Zerg mechanics are brutally uncompromising. If you manage to build drones while defending vs reapers you're doing well. Again, the key is flanking as zerg. You MUST be one base ahead or have some godly one base play to gain map control. You MUST make the opponent afraid to step out of his base. There was a good post on TL about the evolution of playstyles, we're starting to see more f/e styles but as terran you can put immense pressure while keeping your eco strong and FEing.

Sauron zerg playstyle is probably the best, that is defending multiple bases with the bare minimum then bam, an army and roll over the terran.

Your statement about MMM and 1a2a3a is probably apt for lower levels of play but at higher levels this gets punished, hard. MMM is powerful because it is mobile! Though thanks to the marauder it isn't as fragile, you need infestors so they don't kite or map control. Get upgrades!

I need to emphasize this, you need MAP control as zerg, if you see him moving out, run slings into his base. Playing zerg is rather like guerilla warfare, if you meet him on anywhere near equal terms, you're probably doing something wrong.

DeVore

Thats all good advice but the games are not getting past tier 1 significantly, he need 3 fliers from Tier2 (medivacs) and its over. I cant stop him getting the ball together because of the choke point, cant rush air because I have to defend against an 8 marine rush usually which can often kill me, or make me choose between army and eco (a decision he doesnt have to make because he has two buildings which produce troups to my one, which is also limited in production!)

I just dont see where Zerg gets an advantage these days to make up for the restrictions. eg:

Toss: summons building with drone, walks away
Terran: builds building with drone, but can queue up several.
Zerg: Drone *dies*, so every game is like having had your supply line attacked and losing 3-4 drones.

Toss: Can choke
Terran: Can choke
Zerg: Cant build on anything but creep.

Toss: Moves at normal speed
Terran: Moves at normal speed
Zerg: often moves very slowly off creep.

Toss: Gate generates troups leaving the base building drones
Terran: Rack generates troups leaving base building drones
Zerg: Chooses between troups and drones and is also limited by larva.

Meh... I know it sounds like a whinge but they have balanced the units without taking into account the inherent restrictions in Zerg .... having 3 drones die to get gas and troups is sick. Getting two lings used to be an advantage but now, without crack they are fodder, and even then they are no match for a similar cost bio-ball.

DeV.

DeVore

NeoSlicerZ wrote: »

It's much harder to defend than attack and as zerg you MUST be cost efficient. Zerg mechanics are brutally uncompromising. If you manage to build drones while defending vs reapers you're doing well. Again, the key is flanking as zerg. You MUST be one base ahead or have some godly one base play to gain map control. You MUST make the opponent afraid to step out of his base. There was a good post on TL about the evolution of playstyles, we're starting to see more f/e styles but as terran you can put immense pressure while keeping your eco strong and FEing.

Sauron zerg playstyle is probably the best, that is defending multiple bases with the bare minimum then bam, an army and roll over the terran.

Your statement about MMM and 1a2a3a is probably apt for lower levels of play but at higher levels this gets punished, hard. MMM is powerful because it is mobile! Though thanks to the marauder it isn't as fragile, you need infestors so they don't kite or map control. Get upgrades!

I need to emphasize this, you need MAP control as zerg, if you see him moving out, run slings into his base. Playing zerg is rather like guerilla warfare, if you meet him on anywhere near equal terms, you're probably doing something wrong.

In a game thats supposed to be balanced, what you seem to be saying is just "be better" or "play a dumb terran". Thats not balance, thats inherently being better at the game.

From my experience, a 30-unit ball, goes where it wants, kills what it wants and I can "guerilla tactic" all I like but unfortunately, I cant lift my buildings off the ground.

If you allow him 3 Medivacs, you can only allow me 3 tier 2 units or else you arent comparing like with like. What does 20 Marines, 10 Maurauders and 3 medivacs cost and what can I spend that amount on to get something any way close to stopping that ball. Its just not going to happen as far as I can see unless you presume that the Zerg player is inherently better.

I'm sticking to 2v2 for the next while, I'm genuinely sick of playing the same 10 minutes of game with the same basic troups over and over in 1v1 and feeling like I have to get lucky.

DeV.

SirJolt

If you're concerned that you're only building from one place, then knock down a second hatch inside your main base. It'll give you extra creep and allow you to build closer to your choke, if that helps at all?

NeoSlicerZ

Zerg advantages are mostly late game when creep is spread and you reinforce with ungodly speed. I really don't know how you play so I can't comment on that but if I played zerg, I'd probably f/e everytime and try and make it work. But yes, the game isn't really balanced at a lower level because you NEED those apm, heh.

seraphimvc

DeVore wrote: »

So let me get this straight, I have to do all of that while the Terran player just masses MMM , assigns to Ctrl-1 and Attack-Moves the back of my base?? yeah this game is balanced.

Sorry, just got rolled over again by a terran in 7 minutes and cheese rushed by protoss. this game, in 1v1, is very fncked. I'm bitterly disappointed with the balance and the game play, I havent yet had one game (either way) which went to anything like tier 3, its all rush rush rush with the low level troups en masse and its become Excel-In-Space.

DeV.

yup, thats the exact problem right now in sc2 multiplayer game:o

you need to be relatively better in macro and micro to beat an average terran player. i believe it is not too hard to find alot diamond terran who has APM like 20:pac:

it makes sense tho, this is Wing of Liberty pack, so it is meant to get people to use terran:( i strongly feel that zerg is a crippled race atm.

check out some pro's comment from TL:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=144149
a long post pretty sums up every problems of zerg atm.

seraphimvc

NeoSlicerZ wrote: »

Zerg advantages are mostly late game when creep is spread and you reinforce with ungodly speed.

spreading creep is no easy job (you have do it throughout the game and manage it with the larva inject) but yet the opponent can be easily destroy them without any trade-off.

i feel like zerg player get hard punishment if we make some mistakes, like the base macro management: forget to inject larva means you are fcked; if you forget to chrono boost?boost them 4 times in a row! forget MULE?call them down now! and if zerg did a wrong thing in picking a tech, it is basically meaning a gg, zerg tech switching is harder than the other 2 races.

Xios

I beat a few of the terran i played tonight, but it was such a struggle, had to pull out all the stops. But i mainly won through intimidation, keep him on the defensive despite their armies would massacre me.
I had to engage a MMM + tank army outside my base on the Scrapyard map, i had to use a nydus to get roaches behind him and then just sandwiched him. But i won mainly due to his mistakes rather than my good skill. Since i only realised he had the gold expansion to the south after i destroyed his main, so he technically had 3 bases to my 2. So he was a noob.

The match before that the terran went straight up mech, but only opted to build thanks and thors (no marines or marauders thankfully), and by then i had 4 bases a large roach/hydra army and 6 gglords+4 ultras. But again i had to out manouver him, even though his army was half the food cost of mine, he still killed off 75% of my units had like 7 hydras left, 4 roaches, the 6 lords and 1 ultra. so i built more then pushed his main and then gg.

And scouting is suuuuuch a pain
Overseers should be upgradeable at t1, but their ability to delay buildings should be t2. Cause overlords just get taken down by 2 marines before you see anything.

TheDoc

This replay here shows all thats wrong against Zerg as Terran, a game I just finished

NeoSlicerZ

Xios concurs I see, . The mass hellion opening is going to be much more popular btw thanks to TLO. Barbequed drones.

BlitzKrieg

spreading creep is no easy job (you have do it throughout the game and manage it with the larva inject) but yet the opponent can be easily destroy them without any trade-off.

you do know every creep tumor you put down can produce one more for free after it has settled. Depending on map you only need to put down 2 creep tumors via queen after that you just keep expanding them via this ability every now and then.

With that you can spread creep really f*cking quick on some maps.

Quite frankly the biggest pain for zerg is the map selection.

small 1v1 maps allow for easy creep expansion and base extension etc but have heavy reaper difficulties.

larger maps tone reapers down but make it much easier for terran to ball up and lock up their base with no scouting or early harrasment.

All maps practically have base choke points and there is a big emphasize on height advantage at numerous points. These are elements zerg are either too costly to take advantage of or quite frankly dont do at all in a manner thats worth trying.

the best zerg maps are probably is scrap station as its easy to scout and reaper harassment etc has a long route to go.

xel naga caverns because of its watchtower placement and ease to spread creep.

Delta quadrant because it is ridiculously open where zerg can get an advantage early game.



kulas ravine personnally is the worse as it is so easy for medivac and siege tanks to kill expansions and it never really opens up.

Metalopalis is proabably the most fair maps for all 3 sides.

blistering sands is ok except holding the natural is hard but if you can and push into the centre its good.

desert oasis is just hard...mostly cause it is so different to the other maps. in theory for zerg it should be bloody easy to lock your opponent in but the reality is its a map that is heavy on air tactics from all sides.

Lost temple is ok...Its easy to expand but the the air dropped siege tanks and so on make the middle a difficult fight.

steppes of war...Can be good but its outright a staight up fight regardless of any side and thats a hard slog for zerg.

mass hellions are dangerous but they need to be micro excessive when against speedlings (which outrun them and if you get cornered and a surrond occurs = dead hellions.)

the main issue with hellions is most terrans seem to think of them as an winning move and dont think of where to go next (reactor on factory is useless after hellions have
been countered and needs to swap with something) which if you focused on speedlings and have amassed them enough you can hit back quickly enough before they shift their build order to MMM or siege tanks. Then there are those who are paying attention and have brought in banshee straight after hellion which can be very damaging if only speedlings and queen on field.

Xios

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vO_JWqogRNc says it all really.

Of the 3 games they played, the terran opened with mass reapers from 5 rax each game. the 4rd game could've been won by idra had he macroed more, but still. Quite frustrating that reapers decemate zerglings so quickly and crush spine crawlers, so roaches are the only viable option because terran can get them soooo quickly and in much larger numbers than zerg can get units

seraphimvc

BlitzKrieg wrote: »

you do know every creep tumor you put down can produce one more for free after it has settled. Depending on map you only need to put down 2 creep tumors via queen after that you just keep expanding them via this ability every now and then.

With that you can spread creep really f*cking quick on some maps.

:pac: we do need to do a new creep tumor on the new expo. by 'spreading creep' i also meant expanding them, macro econ+larva inject+click the creep create a new one throughout the game = not a easy job at all( i just keep forget to spread the creep...). when the creep spread to the map centre the opponent will always kill it anyway, the 'alive' creep tumour will be auto targeted is just dumb

kulase ravine is 100% a Terran map. i HATE that map:mad:

scrap station is a good map for zerg/protoss i'd say, caused reaper fails in that map lol (not really they still make good scout but i rarely see reapers in scrap). mutas/voids are awesome in this map.

all the other maps are okay but i feel like they are mostly terran orientated, eg they have to fix desert oasis again soon due to terran exploit.
read this you will know how can terran exploit desert oasis:
http://www.scaudios.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=51:terran-exploit-cheese-desert-oasis-map&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=59

speaking of imba!

BlitzKrieg

kulase ravine is 100% a Terran map. i HATE that map

only map I have on my veto list

seraphimvc

Xios wrote: »

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vO_JWqogRNc says it all really.

Of the 3 games they played, the terran opened with mass reapers from 5 rax each game. the 4rd game could've been won by idra had he macroed more, but still. Quite frustrating that reapers decemate zerglings so quickly and crush spine crawlers, so roaches are the only viable option because terran can get them soooo quickly and in much larger numbers than zerg can get units

there are some people said that reaper play has some 'conspiracy' behind it:D

So, in my personal experience, no one is ever quite so excited to have taken bronze in a tournament. Now, Dimaga seems to be a nice guy with a good personality, so we could simply chalk it up to that, but I think it goes a bit deeper.

Dimaga, knowing there was a grudge between Idra and Morrow, coached Morrow on the reaper play which he utilized quite effectively in the win over Idra. The grudge essentially ensured that Morrow would use whatever play available to win, and the $5k on the line was also a great motivator to apply the reaper pressure.

Since Dimaga couldn't win the tournament, he coached Morrow into using a strategy which Morrow himself acknowledged was imbalanced (source: http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/9092028 ) so that it could gain global exposure.

The greatest victor in this tournament was Dimaga, who utilized clever political meta-meta-game to ensure that reaper play gets a nerf. Does anyone else appreciate the beauty of this strategy?

link here:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=146615

Dustaz

ahh, good old terran whine. It makes the world go around.

Before i start. My name is Dustaz and I am a terran player. There, saying it is half the battle. Im in platinum, but really i got there by having one strat pretty well nailed down and im actually just a gold player really.

A couple of simple points.
1. Terran are currently imbalanced. The game is only just out and not 4 (?) years old like BW when it attained greatness. We are still to get the first balance patch (next week folks and terran are getting nerfed!) so yeah, theres going to be problems.

2. The real problems that manifest due to this imbalance is mostly at higher diamond level play. This is the only place that one can truly compare 'like for like'. Everyone is roughly equally skilled, has more or less the same hidden rating etc.

3. Complaining about terran is FOTM. Outmacro'd? Terran is imba. Outmicro'd? Terran is imba. Flat out beaten by a better player? Terran is imba. Theres a WORLD of a difference between linking a replay of morrow (for the most part actually outplaying idra) and talking about gold level play.


Dev, you said youd done your placements and got into gold and are finding it tough. I assume you are somewhere about 50 games played in that division? If this is the case you havent played out your 'hidden rating' fully yet. It takes a lot of games for that to truly come into play and you play players that are definately at your level. Are you sure your not just getting beaten by players that are just better than you? At gold level, 'Having more stuff' beats faction differences hands down. Even at platinum level, if you have more stuff, youll win. Yes, terran are imbalanced, but you will still win if your a better player (in gold). I get beaten by zerg pretty regularly when i could have probably won if i was just a little better at utilising the Awesome Power of Terran. Then again, that goes for most matches i play.

Seriously. Stop whining about terran and start practising macro and reactionary strats.

AtomCannister

Add me,
Atom.329

I'm terran, I can help you out if you want.
I'm diamond so I could tell you 1 or 2 things, just to get you on your way.
I'll also try save some replays for you of good zerg play.

hf

BKtje

What does 20 Marines, 10 Maurauders and 3 medivacs cost and what can I spend that amount on to get something any way close to stopping that ball.

2300 minerals and 550 gas but that doesn't include any of the upgrades needed.
I hope i did my sums right

Jonny7

Just a quick backround to this whole thing..

Blizzard balances the game from the top down, i.e. highest level players play the game and they fix it from there.. now, most of these players are Korean, and for whatever reason a lot of them actually played as Zerg from the beginning.

Also against Zerg was the fact that during the Beta Zerg was incredibly strong, roaches were ONLY 1 supply and came with 2 armor - crazy, hydras had more HP, queens moved faster, spinecrawlers moved faster and burrowed quicker, creep tumours were quicker.. basically their whole early game was very strong..

Blizzard had to curb all this early strength, and by the end of the beta the game wasn't fully balanced since so many changes were being made (there was a patch almost every week) the game was set as of the last patch which turned out to be good for Terran, average for Protoss and not the best for Zerg.

Personally, I feel Zerg are strong in mid and late mid game, but yes weakish early on. This is amplified for newer players, however Blizzard knows this and will try to address in new patch. Indeed check the server rankings and races, Zerg is generally the least popular race by quite some bit (although some of this is also be due to their odd mechanics)

Solution to all this?
Well, tough it out and wait for the patch OR.. the best option - play Random..

The Protoss mechanics literally take 3 or 4 games to learn..
Keep making probes, learn to build a building then shift click the probe back to the minerals, remember to build pylons and make 4 warpgates, thats it.

Terran are intuitive, like any strategy game, use your hellions to roast the Zerg mineral line and force them to go ground defence, while you build a starport, then float onto the reactor and switch buildings to pump vikings and rape all their overlords, then very slowly go for battlecruisers while Zerg sits there sweating. Basically you can be the bad guys and take all your Zerg frustration out on.. Zerg.

So, the game is cool, balance patch soon, and Zerg playing Random for 'research' purposes is manly.

seraphimvc

it is just annoying that people knows terran is imba right now and all jump in to abuse it - P/Z players who beated by them feel unfair and then can lead to stop playing in the worst case(happened to my toss friend caused he insist to use toss and hate to lose).

and yes you can argue that if a player is good enough, even at the current situation, he can still manage to get in plat/diamond. Which is the reason i still play 1v1 sometimes but not very often - i know the game is imba right now and i cant persuade myself to play more imba game (especially bad to me zerg), can i?:pac: on the other hand if i am a terran i will probably rush to diamond before the patch lol

all in all, it is just a game in the end of the day, it is for entertainment purposes (to people like me who is not looking forward to make money from the game in pro scene). dont forget BW spent 5 years( i read that somewhere so i am not 100% sure lol) to be balanced and SC2 is a goddamn new game. the beta certainly helps making sc2 at least is not a unplayable broken game.

balance will defo be made in future (you wait and see, maruader!!:pac:), or else, i will simply stop playing so:P have faith in blizzard tho.

NeoSlicerZ

People who QQ about balance instead of simply trying to improve their play. Sure the matchups might be favoured against you, keep trying despite this. If stuff gets patched cool, you'll be even better then. Rather than this **** about sitting on your hands moaning. About your toss friend losing PvT and quitting, lol seriously, protoss players don't have much room to complain, basic MM can be beaten, tanks are not the complete and utter bogey men some players think they are. I have issues with how powerful Thors and battlecruiser are but apart from that, PvT is pretty balanced.

pixelburp

haha, only just read this thread now, having spent a frustrating weekend of being mushed by repeated Terran cheesers. Nearly all the thoughts that ran through my head then have been echoed here, from the general imbalance against the Zerg, to the hatred for the Kulas map (impossible to win as Zerg).

Sure enough, nearly all my Terran losses came against a MMM tactic; now, almost from the get-go my tactic is defensive and reactionary, rather than taking the initiative (bar the odd baneling / speedling harrass); I'm now so scared of the MMM build that I sat back expecting it, barely ever venturing out, only to then get mushed by something even lamer, like mass Battlecruisers :rolleyes: I don't buy this idea of "just get better". That's too glib by half; there's simply no straight counter to the MMM that doesn't involve a mixture of luck & hail-mary play.

Anecdotely, the last MMM I beat (blistering sands) was purely by fluke: the other guy mistakenly drove his force (with siege tanks; Jesus Christ like) up the ramp to my base. He got them all stuck, and I had some upgraded banelings waiting with some +1 speedlings. I think he presumed my force was spent and so took out my expansion before rolling up to the base. I had 3 speedlings to spare by the end. It's all very well saying harass-this and upgrade-that, but the Terrans usually just seal off their base.

That said, I am very proud that I'm currently #2 in my league's rankings & the highest zerg player (there are only 3 in the top 20, that in itself should tell a lot if that's reflected across the other leagues people are in). However, that pride is simply because I feel I am constantly up against it.

Xios

BlitzKrieg wrote: »

you do know every creep tumor you put down can produce one more for free after it has settled. Depending on map you only need to put down 2 creep tumors via queen after that you just keep expanding them via this ability every now and then.

I... Did... Not... Know... This.... :eek:
Been getting 1 more queen than i needed to or been wasting larva, ffs.

BlitzKrieg

Xios wrote: »

I... Did... Not... Know... This.... :eek:
Been getting 1 more queen than i needed to or been wasting larva, ffs.

glad I can help.

seraphimvc

NeoSlicerZ wrote: »

People who QQ about balance instead of simply trying to improve their play. Sure the matchups might be favoured against you, keep trying despite this. If stuff gets patched cool, you'll be even better then. Rather than this **** about sitting on your hands moaning. About your toss friend losing PvT and quitting, lol seriously, protoss players don't have much room to complain, basic MM can be beaten, tanks are not the complete and utter bogey men some players think they are. I have issues with how powerful Thors and battlecruiser are but apart from that, PvT is pretty balanced.

thats what i told him too :pac: quitting the game is just silly to me, sc2 is not like a broken game. there are imbalances in sc2 atm but it is still a fun game to play. it is actually such a good job from blizzard seeing they fix tonnes of stuffs from beta.

but in PvT i think the problem is with Marauder, slow shoot = dead to toss grounds and not everyone can play good forcefield.

and no, i dont agree with the 'Sure the matchups might be favoured against you, keep trying despite this. If stuff gets patched cool, you'll be even better then.'

it is NOT fun to play ZvT at all. i face mostly terran in 1v1 - either i die with their all-in reaper rush(some map is fatal with this) or their MM early rush. MMM is not a big problem to me caused' if i do it right (flank from 2 or 3 directions) i will kill the bio mass. the usual way to win a terran is either he made some stupid mistake or it will be a long game that i need to nonstop deny his expo, starve him out and kill him. and then when i watch the replay and look at every battle we had, why is that i always need a higher value army(with additional micro) to kill his auto attack MMM??

it is just too much micro/macro to outplay a terran - hey i am a common player who loves the strategic elements in this game and if i am playing against someone i dont wanna feel like i am torturing myself:pac: i think i have a replay somewhere i might throw up later.

BlitzKrieg

it is NOT fun to play ZvT at all. i face mostly terran in 1v1 - either i die with their all-in reaper rush(some map is fatal with this) or their MM early rush. MMM is not a big problem to me caused' if i do it right (flank from 2 or 3 directions) i will kill the bio mass. the usual way to win a terran is either he made some stupid mistake or it will be a long game that i need to nonstop deny his expo, starve him out and kill him. and then when i watch the replay and look at every battle we had, why is that i always need a higher value army(with additional micro) to kill his auto attack MMM??

I've been trying to devise map specific openers to counter this. At the moment the best I got is on steppes of war due to its small size I double gas steal terran/protoss from the beginning and use the cancel trick on my own gas to make up for the lost workers a bit. Then tech to roaches for protoss/banelings for terran.

Its not perfect by a long shot but it has stopped early reaper rushes and put a spanner in a warpgate build/fast pheonix.

Aside from that my only notes have been on where to push conflicts (on lost temple you want to keep all the fighting to near the watchtowers as you can defende 3 bases from there with ease. Xel Naga Caverns is sort of the same, you'd want to keep the fights to near the gold as its easy to flank and open to use zerg's advantages.

NeoSlicerZ

You'd intentionally double steal gas on SoW? Really? How have you not been 10/12 dual gated. To get the gas before standard protoss timings you'd need to have them before 14 psi. That's 2 drones + 50? minerals. vT you've basically stopped tech and marauders... but he has such a short rush distance he can just marine rush you to death aswell, OR because your eco's in the toilet f/e.

EDIT: Steppes of war is pretty terrible for reaper play anyway with tiny cliffs between the nat and expo.

TheDoc

Have to agree with Dustaz.

I have a torrid time dealing with Protoss at the moment. I wouldnt call them overpowered or my own race (Terran) underpowered. Majority of the time I'm being beaten by better players, and as a new SC player I'm not used to the stuff protoss can do, once I learn that stuff I'll be fine.

No longer am I getting cannon rushed, but sometimes I still find I'm being pylon rushed or something.

Dev if you want to throw some replays up ( or maybe you have) maybe some of us or the more better players can shed some light on it.

I have to agree slightly in that I rub my hands when I play Zerg, because I know that 3 reapers are going to tear the Zerg player apart, and if not outright win delay his units and expansion enough for me to get a big army.

Without watching a replay, but finding that you didnt mention your having reaper trouble ( which is very suprising, its bread and butter against zerg) the most problematic zergs I play usually do the same things.

Expand early and defend it with spines.
Get roaches and zerglings with speed along with banelings.

Thats pretty much all the trouble I get.

I cant even remember your first post at this stage, but if your not getting some serious banelings in your terran matches, you will loose horribly.
Its the one thing that gives me nightmares.

TheDoc

Dev dont know what your moaning about tbh

Three 2v2 games today, 2 of them with blitzkrieg, 6 pool'd the other 6pool and zealot rush.

Literally absolutely nothing you can do, nothing.

****ing stupid.

Skill in this game is literally diamond league only, I feel like sending blizzard an email to bump me into diamond so I've to stop beating or loosing to absolute ****ters.

BlitzKrieg

hehe

yeah it was funny of the 5 games we played. the 2 we won were against diamond and platinum players.

I sort of agree and disagree with TheDoc.

Yeah we got destroyed in 3 games and all 3 involve rushing. But all 3 were different types of rushes.

we had a zealot/zerg rush which put us (a zerg/terran team) in a tight spot cause I needed roaches to deal with zealots and I had gone teched zergling to counter my opposite. Which was completely the wrong tech. If I'd gone fast roaches I would have kept the zealots at bay while his marines would have mopped up the zerglings.

The second rush was zealot/marine rush which is in my opinion somewhat unfair as marines can handle roaches fairly well when zealots tank for them and zerglings are useless against both without speed upgrade or numbers. So I couldnt do anything against that.

The final rush was dual zerg and it was completely my fault. I floundered in my opening BO and went heavy macro to catch up but that put my spawning pool way too late so that rush would have been crushed if I hadnt made that mistake.


So rushing in the game is very strong if you fail to call it. Sometimes it is just worth leaving the drone patrolling a base and be killed to know for sure the opening gambit then to try and bring it back to the line.

Also we really need voice com i'm pretty sure I have ventrilo on here somewhere. If not then skype, msn messenger or xfire are here.

seraphimvc

a rush can be an all-in early attack or a good timing push - thats why Terran is imba atm, either a marine all-in or a MM timing push is hard to be stopped and sadly i think most players(below plat/diamond) are simply stick to an all-in early push, they have no idea what to do if that all-in fails or simple just leave lol. i always scout them and if they are gonna fast push, in team game either we go attack before they come or we fend off and quick counter attack usually will gg the game.

is kinda easy actually to see if a terran can own you or not - he has a nice wall up, use MULE(barely scan you), MM, and tanks. GG!

Dustaz

TheDoc wrote: »

Skill in this game is literally diamond league only, I feel like sending blizzard an email to bump me into diamond so I've to stop beating or loosing to absolute ****ters.

If you cant stop a cheese/all in/timing early push, then your not ready for diamond.

Its exactly the same thing as silver/gold zerg saying that terran is imbalanced.

Im platinum and i get beaten by protoss proxy rush EVERY time. I've tried training it with friends who are diamond and got them to proxy me 5 games in a row. Every time they do it, i know its coming and i cant stop it. Im just not good enough to micro/time it and stop it before im overrun 80% of the time.

When i can stop that, i might be ready for platinum. Untill then, im not.

People need to realise that cheese and all in strats are just that, all in. They are completely and utterly useless against a player who is equipped to repel it and once you can do this, its an instant win.

Practice, Practice, Practice.


Having said all that, it really would be nice to have longer games

NeoSlicerZ

Timing attack =/= all in push though the two overlap at times, a good timing attack is usually when a major upgrade finishes or is about to for you. An all in has no follow up and leaves the player far behind unless they do significant damage.

Longer games require different maps really. I played a 38 min game on scrap station vs my zerg practice partner and a really long one on Desert Oasis. If you want longer games, ladder probably isn't the place to find them. Search for the iCCup maps, I suggest you avoid Fighting Spirit though, it's ****ing huge.

Here's a replay of one of my PvZs tonight on iCCup River Point, huge zerg potential but neither of us were very experienced with the map. There was a lot more he could have done to abuse my nat.

Xios

NeoSlicerZ wrote: »

Here's a replay of one of my PvZs tonight on iCCup River Point, huge zerg potential but neither of us were very experienced with the map. There was a lot more he could have done to abuse my nat.

We need the custom map to view the replay

pixelburp

Dustaz wrote: »

[...]

People need to realise that cheese and all in strats are just that, all in. They are completely and utterly useless against a player who is equipped to repel it and once you can do this, its an instant win.

Practice, Practice, Practice.[...]

Practise is cool n' all - and lords knows I'm trying - but my problem is that as Zerg, I don't feel equipped to counter the MMM steamroller strats of Terran. All I can do is mass banelings at their ramp & say a hail-mary it works, ready to flood the inside with speedlings.

I'm only a bronze, knocking on the door of silver, but I can't find any legitimate zerg strats to breakdown a Terran holed up in his base, building up to that critical mass.