Zerg v Terran

Xenzo

Playing this match up, can someone please tell me how to counter marine marauder medivac combo when there just massed up?? No matter what i seem to do as zerg nothing ever works.

Do people think zerg are underpowered or?

saini

Have you tried using banelings or infestors?

Columc

Infestor zerglings and transistion into broodlords

Manuva

As a terran Player, I try to avoid going heavy bio because Infestors will wreck me with fungal. Mix in some infestors with plenty of lings and blings and you should do ok. remember to get the starting energy upgrade ASAP, can't remember name right now

Edit: Bio terran v zerg will likely be aggressive, use spines and banelings on creep can be very effective.

pixelburp

Rambling thoughts from a Gold zerg'er ...

The key to good zerg play (imo) is to balance drone production with your army production. The quicker you get saturation on your 1/2 mineral lines, the quicker you can dedicate your production to units & subsequently, reinforcements. Without seeing any replays, a classic mistake of lower zerg players is that they panic produce, and either go all drone or all units. Then because they weren't concentrating on drone production, they've no minerals left to reinforce.

Generally you should be able to hold off most initial attacks with just 4-6 lings & some spine crawlers. After that you should drone up. Once I get 100 gas, I get speedling upgrade, then pull the drones off the gas to saturate mineral production so I can expand on 21 and get more spines & queens out. Then around 35 food, I put the drones back on gas, take the 2nd geyser and start with the upgrades.

Also; if you do end up with a lot of floating income - build a "macro" hatchery in your main. A second hatchery that doesn't do anything except create larvae. If you have a spare queen it'll get that army bolstered quite fast.

As a unit composition, I find speedlings & upgraded banes, properly micro'ed, very difficult for Terran to counter. Then yes, like the above posters, I transition into (either) Infestors or Broodlords. I prefer Infestors as they're a little more mobile. I only ever go roaches if I see mass hellions, but a roach warren is a good way to wall off your base, so consider building one anyway.

Terran matchups I think is the easiest for zerg; mirror games & 'toss are where the difficulty lies.

Khazidhea

Erm, just saying that you get infestors that allow you to get hive that allows you to get broodlords. And infestor+broodlord is a nightmare to deal with as terran, that's the ultimate zerg lategame. And then they can add ultras tech and do crazy switches and terran cant just keep up with that.

You cant get infestor+broodlord off 2 base tho.
But I bet if you just do everything right you will crush your opponents with just lings and banelings until you get to masters (maybe diamond).

pixelburp

Khazidhea wrote: »

Erm, just saying that you get infestors that allow you to get hive that allows you to get broodlords. And infestor+broodlord is a nightmare to deal with as terran, that's the ultimate zerg lategame. And then they can add ultras tech and do crazy switches and terran cant just keep up with that.

You cant get infestor+broodlord off 2 base tho.
But I bet if you just do everything right you will crush your opponents with just lings and banelings until you get to masters (maybe diamond).

Ah no, I got what you meant - I just meant stopping at Lair tech and being happy with mass infestors in the mix. Feels like Broods take so long to research that if the game ain't over by then they're not worth it.

But yes, ling/banes in huge numbers is a great way for a fast ragequit

Xios

An important thing to remember

When researching the energy upgrade for infestors, you can start building infestors after 30 seconds of the upgrade is done.

That way when your festors pop out, they have the extra energy and are out asap.

Orizio

MMM is utterly horrible in TvZ. Ling/bling/infesters or ling/bling/muta kill it stone dead. I'm guessing your opponents are just macroing better then you are thats why you are losing.

But really, we need replays.

Orizio

Khazidhea wrote: »

Erm, just saying that you get infestors that allow you to get hive that allows you to get broodlords. And infestor+broodlord is a nightmare to deal with as terran, that's the ultimate zerg lategame. And then they can add ultras tech and do crazy switches and terran cant just keep up with that.

You cant get infestor+broodlord off 2 base tho.
But I bet if you just do everything right you will crush your opponents with just lings and banelings until you get to masters (maybe diamond).

Even mass lings with upgrades is a mother****er to deal with on big maps.

Zombrex

Xenzo wrote: »

Playing this match up, can someone please tell me how to counter marine marauder medivac combo when there just massed up?? No matter what i seem to do as zerg nothing ever works.

Do people think zerg are underpowered or?

Get a few mutas out, this will cause the Terran player to build marines, probably more than he needs. Then baneling the marines, they are devastating against marines, and send the mutas against the Marauders and finish up everything with zerglings.

This will work against most bronze/silver players. If the Terran knows what he is doing he will ensure that his Marauders engage your banelings first, and keep marines back for the mutas. But to be honest, once he sees a few banelings and a few mutas he will probably panic a bit, so he will have to have good micro to stop you swinging your banelings around and destroying his marines.

Also remember to spawn larva with your queens, and having an early second expansion should allow you to have far more zerglings/mutas out. Remember your upgrades as well.

freepower

Xenzo wrote: »

Playing this match up, can someone please tell me how to counter marine marauder medivac combo when there just massed up?? No matter what i seem to do as zerg nothing ever works.

Do people think zerg are underpowered or?

Sounds to me like you just got outmacro'd.

You can counter this composition fine with just ling baneling, if you have enough of it. Try and steer the banes into the marines and get the splings to surround them so they can't escape.

To beat this, just work on spending your money and nailing your injects. If you do that then you'll have more drones and a much bigger army.

Laisurg

Banelings work wonders against marines, get burrow early on and burrow some around the place, they're not the best against mauraders but if the marines die your spine crawlers will be able to clean them up, another tactic i've found quite useful is delaying gas for a while to get up spine crawlers and a few queens early on to avoid getting cheesed by MM, infestors are awesome against marines as well, muta harrass can keep them away from your base quite well sometimes and you can macro up, getting expansions and whatnot during that time.

Spread creep all over the shop, try put some pressure out on him as well, i find teching up roachs/hydras with double evo chamber can work quite well against terran mid game, even better if you can throw in two or three infestors as well, but banelings are essential though if the terran has a load of marines.

A nydus worm can be great too if your opponent doesn't notice it, chuck one down while he's busy doing something else, then bash his mineral line with a load of banelings :cool:

Zombrex

And if all else fails you can just leave the game when you are winning, ala Idra

Skip to 23:40 for the good bit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNacXTN6S2E

Xenzo

Thanks for all the feedback guys, i'm loving the zerglings, banelings and infestor combination its great against it.

Another problem I have is a lack of scouting, I didn't really realise how important it was, i'm trying to work on it now.

IRL_Sinister

Terran is clearly underpowered.

godspal

You know how I know that all races are pretty even its that everyone complains that their raced is UPed and every other race is OPed.

pixelburp

I think it's more a case that all races are generally even, but some have more easily-exploitable drawbacks than others, which in the right or wrong hands can be taken advantage of. For instance, zerg's lack of wall-in options means they're vulnerable to early pressure and cheese. Terran's relative lack of mobility makes mass-mutas a good option & so on. So when you get pummelled by a concentrated exploitation of this weakness, it can feel like the other race is completely OP. I get the complaints about mutas from a lot of terran players

Khazidhea

I think Sinister is trolling ...

Tenger

pixelburp wrote: »

I think it's more a case that all races are generally even, but some have more easily-exploitable drawbacks than others,.......... I get the complaints about mutas from a lot of terran players

Good point. If Terran could counteract the threat of mutas simply by building vikings then they would not seem as tough. However to defend/beat mutas you need a combination of turrets/vikings/thor's/stimmed marines which is not as straightforward.

Orizio

Tenger wrote: »

Good point. If Terran could counteract the threat of mutas simply by building vikings then they would not seem as tough. However to defend/beat mutas you need a combination of turrets/vikings/thor's/stimmed marines which is not as straightforward.

Ummm no. You need rines - which you are going to have regardless - and some well placed turrets. A Thor is helpful but not essential and vikings are utterly worthless unless broodlords are out. More then anything, you need to keep attacking him constantly, whittle down his Muta count and keep his economy manageable - people who sit back in their bases whilst their opponents get 30 Mutas out deserve to lose.

Xios

Orizio wrote: »

Ummm no. You need rines - which you are going to have regardless - and some well placed turrets. A Thor is helpful but not essential and vikings are utterly worthless unless broodlords are out. More then anything, you need to keep attacking him constantly, whittle down his Muta count and keep his economy manageable - people who sit back in their bases whilst their opponents get 30 Mutas out deserve to lose.

Do this, and get armour upgrades for the rines, the amour seriously stops the mutas attacks, plus getting the amoury out unlocks thors

Tenger

Orizio wrote: »

Ummm no. You need rines - which you are going to have regardless - and some well placed turrets. A Thor is helpful but not essential and vikings are utterly worthless unless broodlords are out. More then anything, you need to keep attacking him constantly, whittle down his Muta count and keep his economy manageable - people who sit back in their bases whilst their opponents get 30 Mutas out deserve to lose.

I was making the point as seen from a lower level player. They need to have a simple answer to seeing mutas heading their way. Constant attacking is difficult for lower ranked players to achieve. As Pixelburp pointed out above, a player who gets killed regularly by the same tactic will consider them overpowered/unbalanced. A low rank terran player would probably love to be able to just make vikings to counter mass muta.

Personally I go thor/marine versus muta as well as planting turrets in my base.

Orizio

Tenger wrote: »

I was making the point as seen from a lower level player. They need to have a simple answer to seeing mutas heading their way. Constant attacking is difficult for lower ranked players to achieve. As Pixelburp pointed out above, a player who gets killed regularly by the same tactic will consider them overpowered/unbalanced. A low rank terran player would probably love to be able to just make vikings to counter mass muta.

Personally I go thor/marine versus muta as well as planting turrets in my base.

Just a-move in the general direction of the Zerg's base.

Anyway, my general point is that telling someone to make vikings to deal with mutas is incorrect, low player or otherwise.

Tenger

Orizio wrote: »

Anyway, my general point is that telling someone to make vikings to deal with mutas is incorrect, low player or otherwise.

I didn't say that, I meant that less experienced Terran players would love to learn they could just counter mutas with vikings. But they can't. So some players think mutas are OP as they do not have a direct counter. For some, going mass marine may not seem the best choice. Others then go overboard with turret meaning they have a small army, and then lose the game.


As an aside, I miss 6-8 player FFA with my mates in SC1. We always had a no rush policy (made for better games in our opinion) so seeing 4 dozen mutas wasn't uncommon!! (16 BC/carrier armies were another favourite!)

Orizio

Tenger wrote: »

However to defend/beat mutas you need a combination of turrets/vikings/thor's/stimmed marines which is not as straightforward.

pixelburp

Or battlecruisers!

Tenger

I'm not trying to spread great wisdom or give tips.
I am merely saying that many low ranked players would like to be told "use unit C to counter unit B" In the TvZ anti-muta situation this logic does not hold up too well. I didn't say 'just get vikings to counter mutas'. I did however include vikings in my list of possible units to build if you see them. The 3 units I mentioned all shoot up, so all can help against an air threat.

You stated that thors and vikings are not needed against muta's, well if I am getting attacked by them I will build any and all anti-air units I can. So yes, I will get a combination of turrets/marines/thor/vikings. It is called panic! Vikings may be weaker than mutas but anything that can shoot them is fine in my book. (If I kill all the mutas I can still use the vikings to snipe overlords while he rebuilds) Is this inefficient and/or wasteful? probably, will I win? maybe not. But I will have fun playing a game I love.

No need to show condescension towards a lower ranked player who is not as experienced as you.

RoyalMarine

what ive seen very effective is vikings sitting over thors+marines.

mutas cant get near them, and the vikings seriously outrange the mutas, so it forces zerg to pull back.

Manuva

For ages i used to dread mutas as terran. I used to spam turrets and thors and marines to try to stop them and sat in my mineral lines doing nothing while zerg got 6 bases up.

Now I love to see that a zerg player has gone mutas. Because for one thing, Mutas do sooo much less damage than a nooby terran player thinks. They actually suck. A few marines with stim and +1 armor and a medivac or 2 will kill or cripple a laughably huge amount of mutas. Meanwhile 1a the rest of the army at the zerg main and collect yo ladder points. Watch out for banelings.

Orizio

Tenger wrote: »

I'm not trying to spread great wisdom or give tips.
I am merely saying that many low ranked players would like to be told "use unit C to counter unit B" In the TvZ anti-muta situation this logic does not hold up too well. I didn't say 'just get vikings to counter mutas'. I did however include vikings in my list of possible units to build if you see them. The 3 units I mentioned all shoot up, so all can help against an air threat.

You stated that thors and vikings are not needed against muta's, well if I am getting attacked by them I will build any and all anti-air units I can. So yes, I will get a combination of turrets/marines/thor/vikings. It is called panic! Vikings may be weaker than mutas but anything that can shoot them is fine in my book. (If I kill all the mutas I can still use the vikings to snipe overlords while he rebuilds) Is this inefficient and/or wasteful? probably, will I win? maybe not. But I will have fun playing a game I love.

No need to show condescension towards a lower ranked player who is not as experienced as you.

Wow...seriously? Your problem is...? I thought we were just having a debate, why take things so personally?

Orizio

RoyalMarine wrote: »

what ive seen very effective is vikings sitting over thors+marines.

mutas cant get near them, and the vikings seriously outrange the mutas, so it forces zerg to pull back.

Again the problem is with inefficiency. You are better off sinking the mins/gas spent on vikings into rines/tanks/medivacs. I mean what you say might be effective - but your army compisition could, imo, be better.

To some up, before there is more angst, the only times you use vikings in TvZ for are (a) sniping overlords early game or (b) killing broodlords late game.

Fringe

Vikings are really bad in ZvT. If you look at the helper thing and look at the viking, mutalisks are one of the units it is weak against. Sure, they might be able to help fight mutalisks but I think you're better off spending that money/gas on upgrades/more marines. 3/3 marines do so well against mutas. The only time you should use vikings are when the Zerg uses Brood Lords. Although a common tactic is for Zerg to take advantage of this by switching to ultras making your vikings take up supply.

EDIT: I missed the post above which pretty much says all I've said.

UnholyGregor

just get a shtload of banelings with roll, and try move comand them into the midle of all the marines, so they dont suicide on tanks or thors.
then send in some mutas to clean up ay medivacs, and mabey a handfull of marines and marauders.
ideally, youl want about 20 mutas, and about 50 or 60 banes/lings

Khazidhea

Tenger just wished vikings killed mutas. But they dont. Take it easy man, no one is being offensive


Yeah banelings nuzzle marines, hug them, love them. Day9

Xios

Khazidhea wrote: »

Yeah banelings nuzzle marines, hug them, love them. Day9

can you link a clip from this? I wanna show a friend.

Khazidhea

It was first game on the last funday monday, which is by the way ONE OF THE BEST AND FUNNIEST funday mondays ever and they are ALL awesome. I still dont get the micro joke tho =\

I wasnt able to find the short version anywhere. But here is the daily:

http://blip.tv/day9tv/day-9-daily-311-funday-monday-no-keyboard-no-problem-5253408

and it starts about 4:30

and micro joke is in the last game ... ah just watch the whole damn episode

Xios

Ty, my friend lol'd

Tenger

Khazidhea wrote: »

Tenger just wished vikings killed mutas. But they dont. Take it easy man, no one is being offensive

Vikings are the way they are, I don't want a change. I was trying to see the problem from the point of a very new player (who probably assumes/hopes vikings counter mutas) and got strongly opposed for giving wrong advice.

Incidently I hate muta harass. Got hit with it earlier today. Spotted it in time so had a thor and turrets up as he hit me. Thor/marine ball defended about 4 assaults before I managed to wipe them out. (I had a small number of vikings which were able to bait the odd muta into turret/thor range!) He stopped the muta play so I was able to use the thor's (and ravens) to help my tanks strangle his creep spread and kill him. Got called a noob though!

Khazidhea

I actually lost one of my first games in beta because of vikings vs muta thing. It was TvZ on blistering sands, I kill his natural but he defends with mutas. Then I remember something about the vikings from the lore:

"In the aftermath of the Brood War, weapon technicians proposed a radical new concept to resolve the critical weaknesses in Terran anti-air capabilities. Viking was designed to be the ultimate anti-air and ground-support weapon system and to replace old and immobile goliaths"

Sweet! So I build a bunch of them and they get CRUSHED by mutas

P.S. Generally when people call you a noob when they lose it means you did something right