[SC2] Dominion of Psionic Swarms

[Masami]

I honestly don't believe maurders should have stimpack, makes stim running into bio counters, such as collosi a bit too easy.

ALSO, HTs do pwn in PvZ simply because roach/hydra is very weak to storms. :')

[Blood Red Lucario]

Originally Posted by Masami

I honestly don't believe maurders should have stimpack, makes stim running into bio counters, such as collosi a bit too easy.

ALSO, HTs do pwn in PvZ simply because roach/hydra is very weak to storms. :')

Well to be honest the whole idea to roach hydra is that the roaches tank the damage and the hydras do the dps to counter the immortals making the roaches go pop. Hydras are glass cannons in general so when the storm drops they melt away (thank goodness). Lately I've been impressed with the durability of the roaches with that tanking ability of theirs. Once you get enough of them with burrow they are acid spitting steam rollers.

And I can't concur more. Marauders already have an ability to slow units down why would they need to speed themselves up? Plus in the company of marines its already tough to fight a big enough ball.

[Kenny_C.002]

Originally Posted by Masami

I honestly don't believe maurders should have stimpack, makes stim running into bio counters, such as collosi a bit too easy.

ALSO, HTs do pwn in PvZ simply because roach/hydra is very weak to storms. :')

What would our terran buddies do without stim packs? I actually think that this should have been done instead of buffing building HP though. I would think that making concussive shells requiring factory would also help with the problem.

I would however like to point out that the problem unit is the marine. It is by far the best mineral dump of the 3 races (and Terran has 2 mineral dumps in hellion and marine, but hellions aren't that big of a problem in comparison), can be produced doubly with reactors, have 2 major upgrades in combat shield and stim, can shoot (ranged) and shoots UP, and is the most effective when amassed out of the 3 races' mineral dumps. A huge ball of marines should be able to beat a huge ball of zealots/zerglings of the same mineral count if they aren't surrounded. This means that the lower level 1a strats will always allow the marines to come out on top. Heck, we have pros who make a living out of using just marines (I'm looking at you, Rain and MKP).

HT's don't pwn roach hydra nearly as much as MM because of stim and roaches' much higher HP. I'd just prefer colossi over it anyway. It is true that if you catch a hydra in a storm, it's dead, though.

Originally Posted by Blood Red Lucario

Well to be honest the whole idea to roach hydra is that the roaches tank the damage and the hydras do the dps to counter the immortals making the roaches go pop. Hydras are glass cannons in general so when the storm drops they melt away (thank goodness). Lately I've been impressed with the durability of the roaches with that tanking ability of theirs. Once you get enough of them with burrow they are acid spitting steam rollers.

And I can't concur more. Marauders already have an ability to slow units down why would they need to speed themselves up? Plus in the company of marines its already tough to fight a big enough ball.

They stim so they can kill buildings 50% faster during a harassment. This means you only need 1 full medivac to effectively kill off one key tech building instead of needing 2. I think this is one of the main reasons why they haven't taken stim out of marauders. Unfortunately, the other races generally don't have as big of an advantage in that area.

Immortals are pretty much never roach counters because of hydra; one is better off with colossi and HT's. roaches have a natural 1 armour I believe, which helps a lot.

Roaches: It's true that they're very impressive. Almost too impressive. Usually I practice with an insane comp to sharpen my mechanics, and there when it's against zerg, I can always expect the 7-roach push at the 5-minute mark almost without fail. Even when I expect it it still kills me sometimes if I'm not paying enough attention and let a stray marine die or forget to make the extra marine or two. I don't even think a 7-roach push at the 5 minute mark is even possible without sacrificing huge amounts of economy. o_O

[Hoshika]

did you know that insane AIs have a huge mineral bonus at the start of the game :o

they get enough to make a spawning pool right from the start I heard

[Masami]

Considering this place is about learning, I thought I'd upload a replay of a general game for me:
http://uppit.com/9mskrdsz4m9m/MacroZerg.SC2Replay
I play decently, after the first push my macro dips very very much, but that was kinda because I knew I'd won, it was on ladder against a plat, so feel free to express your concerns and opinions.
Also yes, my zerg is very greedy, that isn't going to change. xD

And on the mineral dump point, i can uberly outmacro an opponant and still have 3k minerals, I don't throw down extra hatcherys because really I don't need to, as a zerg you shouldn't be too concerned with higher minerals until even masters, in my opinion.

Also MMM is too strong with stimmed maruarders vs a toss going collosi, but I don't play anything other than zerg atm, maurder viking is a very strong counter to all toss play.


EDIT: I should also point out roaches are my favourite unit.

[Kenny_C.002]

Originally Posted by Hoshika

did you know that insane AIs have a huge mineral bonus at the start of the game :o

they get enough to make a spawning pool right from the start I heard

As far as I know, they just have double the income per worker.

Originally Posted by Masami

Considering this place is about learning, I thought I'd upload a replay of a general game for me:
http://uppit.com/9mskrdsz4m9m/MacroZerg.SC2Replay
I play decently, after the first push my macro dips very very much, but that was kinda because I knew I'd won, it was on ladder against a plat, so feel free to express your concerns and opinions.
Also yes, my zerg is very greedy, that isn't going to change. xD

And on the mineral dump point, i can uberly outmacro an opponant and still have 3k minerals, I don't throw down extra hatcherys because really I don't need to, as a zerg you shouldn't be too concerned with higher minerals until even masters, in my opinion.

Also MMM is too strong with stimmed maruarders vs a toss going collosi, but I don't play anything other than zerg atm, maurder viking is a very strong counter to all toss play.


EDIT: I should also point out roaches are my favourite unit.

I'll take a look at it when I have time. I may not be very strong a player, but my analytical skills are much higher. lol

In general an auxillary hatch is usually a good idea in the late game scenario, since you tend to miss injects a lot more often.

Watched replay:
General comments:
Hotkey setup needs work. Hotkey your queens so you can do shift-V click click click on hatches. Your macro slipped several times, mostly due to you being in battle. You should work on queen injects a bit more as you were missing quite a few. Your creep spread was non-existent. If your opponent decided to go phoenix/VR, you would have been boned. I must admit that macro-macro-macro is a good thing though.

Early game:
You were really greedy once you saw the forge. Be careful as some protoss would have done a 1 lot 1 stalker pressure at this point in time and you would have basically taken massive economic damage. You were missing a queen on your main for quite a while. I recommend getting at least a pair of lings to hold the watch towers.
Your scouting drone: what were you looking for? I noticed that you only caught a glimpse of stuff on the front (forge/gate), but didn't check the number of probes in the area. Also, you technically could have hidden the drone in the vents for later scouting instead of having to suicide the overlord later on in the game.

Mid game:
Leave a zergling on the third to know exactly when your opponent is thinking about expanding. Hold watch towers for as long as you possibly can. Upgrade faster and earlier.

Late game:
Your opponent did a grand total of 1 push and sunk most of his cash into colossi, which is why your corruptors did all that (he didn't have enough stalkers). Not much else to say, since you pretty much rolled over him once the BLs were out.

[Masami]

Originally Posted by Kenny_C.002

As far as I know, they just have double the income per worker.



I'll take a look at it when I have time. I may not be very strong a player, but my analytical skills are much higher. lol

In general an auxillary hatch is usually a good idea in the late game scenario, since you tend to miss injects a lot more often.

Watched replay:
General comments:
Hotkey setup needs work. Hotkey your queens so you can do shift-V click click click on hatches. Your macro slipped several times, mostly due to you being in battle. You should work on queen injects a bit more as you were missing quite a few. Your creep spread was non-existent. If your opponent decided to go phoenix/VR, you would have been boned. I must admit that macro-macro-macro is a good thing though.

Early game:
You were really greedy once you saw the forge. Be careful as some protoss would have done a 1 lot 1 stalker pressure at this point in time and you would have basically taken massive economic damage. You were missing a queen on your main for quite a while. I recommend getting at least a pair of lings to hold the watch towers.
Your scouting drone: what were you looking for? I noticed that you only caught a glimpse of stuff on the front (forge/gate), but didn't check the number of probes in the area. Also, you technically could have hidden the drone in the vents for later scouting instead of having to suicide the overlord later on in the game.

Mid game:
Leave a zergling on the third to know exactly when your opponent is thinking about expanding. Hold watch towers for as long as you possibly can. Upgrade faster and earlier.

Late game:
Your opponent did a grand total of 1 push and sunk most of his cash into colossi, which is why your corruptors did all that (he didn't have enough stalkers). Not much else to say, since you pretty much rolled over him once the BLs were out.

Yeah my overall general play is preety greedy, but thats fine by me, once I see a forge I feel preety safe.
I normally grab the towers, no excuse to why I didnt really.
The hotkeys were a bit messed up, I know hatch's normally go on 4 or something but I will ALWAYS stick to 1, I used that in bronze now im so used to it that it doesnt bother me.
Also this isn't my top game, it's just a decent game I had where i did okay, I'll be sure to post more replays if I play some interesting games.

[Kenny_C.002]

Originally Posted by Masami

Yeah my overall general play is preety greedy, but thats fine by me, once I see a forge I feel preety safe.
I normally grab the towers, no excuse to why I didnt really.
The hotkeys were a bit messed up, I know hatch's normally go on 4 or something but I will ALWAYS stick to 1, I used that in bronze now im so used to it that it doesnt bother me.
Also this isn't my top game, it's just a decent game I had where i did okay, I'll be sure to post more replays if I play some interesting games.

Hotkeys: it doesn't matter HOW you hotkey them. It only matters that you do use them as much as possible. Stick to what you're used to is my recommendation. I know there's a pro that does 1 hatch, 2 hatch, 3/4 queen, army for rest.

My hotkey setup:
1/2 army, 3 scout, 4 hatch, 5 queen, 6-9 (I need to use them...), 0 scouting overlord/overseer
This is pretty common for a hotkey setup, but I trained myself to start with this setup so I stuck with it. HOTKEY YOUR QUEENS. What I do is this: 5, shift-V, click, click (on hatches on the minimap) --> two larva injects without even going to the screen. Train yourself to do this and you'll be a lot more efficient on your injects. Even now I haven't managed to do it, but it is known to be a good set up.

An alternative is instead of hotkeying all of your queens together like I do, hotkey them separately. This way you do something like 5,5,v,6,6,v (5/6 for your queens in main and natural). This is good for the first 2 hatches and even the 3rd hatch (on 7), but it gets harder the more you do it. HOWEVER, this set up is stronger if you use auxillary hatches because you can't click on the minimap for auxillary hatches without being really precise.

So I would recommend you do something similar, like perhaps 1 hatch, 2 queen, 3 scout, 4-6 army, 0 scouting overlord/overseer. Just remember to hotkey those queens!

btw, consider getting an early 3rd queen for creep spreading. They're also a great safeguard against FE into VR, banshee rush, early blue flame hellions, etc.

Top game or not, you wanted a critique so I gave you one. I think it's a good thing to have some critique on yourself if you plan on being good. You're not like me, who can't spend time to train and don't really care that I'm in like gold.

[Masami]

Originally Posted by Kenny_C.002

Hotkeys: it doesn't matter HOW you hotkey them. It only matters that you do use them as much as possible. Stick to what you're used to is my recommendation. I know there's a pro that does 1 hatch, 2 hatch, 3/4 queen, army for rest.

My hotkey setup:
1/2 army, 3 scout, 4 hatch, 5 queen, 6-9 (I need to use them...), 0 scouting overlord/overseer
This is pretty common for a hotkey setup, but I trained myself to start with this setup so I stuck with it. HOTKEY YOUR QUEENS. What I do is this: 5, shift-V, click, click (on hatches on the minimap) --> two larva injects without even going to the screen. Train yourself to do this and you'll be a lot more efficient on your injects. Even now I haven't managed to do it, but it is known to be a good set up.

An alternative is instead of hotkeying all of your queens together like I do, hotkey them separately. This way you do something like 5,5,v,6,6,v (5/6 for your queens in main and natural). This is good for the first 2 hatches and even the 3rd hatch (on 7), but it gets harder the more you do it. HOWEVER, this set up is stronger if you use auxillary hatches because you can't click on the minimap for auxillary hatches without being really precise.

So I would recommend you do something similar, like perhaps 1 hatch, 2 queen, 3 scout, 4-6 army, 0 scouting overlord/overseer. Just remember to hotkey those queens!

btw, consider getting an early 3rd queen for creep spreading. They're also a great safeguard against FE into VR, banshee rush, early blue flame hellions, etc.

Top game or not, you wanted a critique so I gave you one. I think it's a good thing to have some critique on yourself if you plan on being good. You're not like me, who can't spend time to train and don't really care that I'm in like gold.

You do realise that you can press backspace to cycle through bases much quicker than clicking the minimap? It's called fast injection technique.
I normally do.
1 Hatches. 2 Army. 3 Half of Army. 4. air Units. 5.Nothing.6.Nothing.7.ScoutingOverlord 8-0. Nothing.
Thats my general hotkey usage.

It doesnt matter what league youre in bro :P
I'm in gold but I play against diamonds daily because thats the kinda level I'm start to get to.
I normally get a 3rd queen against terran, but I neglect it against toss, which is something I should work on.


I can do the fast inject technique but if I mess it up it slows your play down say if you accidently hotkey something wrong, which is also something i need to improve on.
I also need to improve on not getting close spawns on metalopolis x.X;

[Kenny_C.002]

Originally Posted by Masami

You do realise that you can press backspace to cycle through bases much quicker than clicking the minimap? It's called fast injection technique.
I normally do.
1 Hatches. 2 Army. 3 Half of Army. 4. air Units. 5.Nothing.6.Nothing.7.ScoutingOverlord 8-0. Nothing.
Thats my general hotkey usage.

It doesnt matter what league youre in bro :P
I'm in gold but I play against diamonds daily because thats the kinda level I'm start to get to.
I normally get a 3rd queen against terran, but I neglect it against toss, which is something I should work on.


I can do the fast inject technique but if I mess it up it slows your play down say if you accidently hotkey something wrong, which is also something i need to improve on.
I also need to improve on not getting close spawns on metalopolis x.X;

Oh you use the backspace technique. I don't tend to use it because the minimap technique is easier to do and really doesn't take that much longer (if any, since you never actually view the hatch on the screen anyway). If you are using the backspace tech, that's fine as well. lol

Yeah I tend to standardize my hotkey setup since I use other races as well. ;)

[Masami]

I can play protoss sufficiently, at about a gold level, my terran is probibly about silver, considering I've played them like 4 times.
Atm Im playing against diamonds privatly and plats on ladder.

I played against a gold terran the other day with 1400!!!! games as terran, and still in gold....It made me sad.

I've also been experimenting in PvT, since muta ling bling was a little dull, and I started to try infestor roach, it was very strong, I never got chance to perfect it but I've been practicing it a little bit, if you're good with analytical play and quick thinking, if you get those infestors into the right positions, it's not even funny how hard you win that fight.
It also crushes the classic 3 tank push.

EDIT: Also, I plan on buying an american version of SC2 once I get some money spare, which might not be awhile, unless I ask my team, but it's a bit trivial really.

[Kenny_C.002]

Heh. My zerg is my weakest race. I tend to overdrone when I play, which usually ends with me having like 70 drones and no unit when I get rolled over. Yeah, good times. :3
Totally gonna experiment with mass/no queen strategies though.

Infestors are awesome units. They're basically toss's psi storm except more OP because it locks down units. lol

[Masami]

I just won a 1 hour game against a terran on lost temple, he 3 tank pushed me, contained me for a long time, came back and won it. He took all of his bases, and I won.
Im so fuc*ing proud right now, then he called zerg OP and blocked communications with me before I had chance to reply LOL
It's funny cause he was a platinum and he shouldve won, but i somehow pulled it back.

I mined out every base on my side of the map by the end.
Won with ling/bling/brood lord/muta.
Love me. LOVEMENOW.

[Blood Red Lucario]

Originally Posted by Masami

I just won a 1 hour game against a terran on lost temple, he 3 tank pushed me, contained me for a long time, came back and won it. He took all of his bases, and I won.
Im so fuc*ing proud right now, then he called zerg OP and blocked communications with me before I had chance to reply LOL
It's funny cause he was a platinum and he shouldve won, but i somehow pulled it back.

I mined out every base on my side of the map by the end.
Won with ling/bling/brood lord/muta.
Love me. LOVEMENOW.

You had me at you beat Terran

[Masami]

LOL
I was preety happy with the win.


I also just had a 45 minuet game against a diamond toss, close spawns by air on metalopolis.
After 45 minuets he had 287.700 score and I had 287.050 LOL
Was a very close game, the mothership won it him.