Hi all,

I'm a terran player around 4600 MMR and I'm learning Zerg as an offrace. I keep struggling in a few spots and I'd love some help from people who play the race. Partial answers are very welcome, no need to cover everything!

My impressions so far : ZvP: if I try to play macro, I lose 100%. I only win with some custom early cheeses. ZvT: if it's mech or battlemech, I lose 95% of the time. ZvZ: I like ling bane vs ling bane, but I don't really enjoy the midgame in this matchup (roach wars, muta wars, etc)

So my questions are

ZvP - What's a solid general gameplan? Which army comps should I aim for, and how many gas geysers should I take for each? - How do I handle the weird Protoss openers (1-base shield battery robo contains and similar)? What's the best way to answer them?

ZvT - How do I play against mech, especially early battlemech? Which comps and timings work well?

ZvZ - What are the viable playstyles? What builds should I play for ling/bane vs ling/bane, and can I force that matchup without all-inning?

Cheese and general knowledge - Which cheese builds are worth learning, and in which matchups? - How many geysers do I need for ling/bane/hydra, for roach/ravager, etc.? A rough "gas per composition" cheat sheet would help a lot.

Any help is welcome

I really like this change for Brood Lords. It makes them better at breaking sieges and gives them meaningful damage against structures.
I think the biggest benefit is that you can make just a few Brood Lords and still force a response, instead of having to spend your entire gas bank on a big tech switch. You can keep some Corruptors to protect them and pivot into another composition depending on how the opponent responds.
Do you think this is a good change, or would it make Brood Lords too strong?

Patches full mod change

Brood Lord:
Broodling Strike Damage: 20 → 20 (+15 vs Structures)

Broodling Strike Flyer Attack Upgrade Bonus: +2 → +2 (+2 vs Structures)

New Upgrade: Polyembryonic Adaptation (Greater Spire)

Cost: 150/150

Research Time: 100s

Effect: Evolves the Brood Lord to support up to 3 additional Broodlings.

Reasoning: While Fibrous Cartilage served its intended purpose of making Brood Lords stronger in the late game, it was not an interesting or fitting upgrade. Polyembryonic Adaptation replaces it as a strong swarm-focused upgrade, allowing the Brood Lord to strike with 2 Broodlings at once up to three times in a row.

Hi. Im 3200 mmr, currently doing 2 Lurker Drop on game against P & T.
Build goes like this :
(Classic expand)
26 Speed > Keep worker on gas
@ 100 Gas > Lair (Scout to see any agression to defend, the usual...)
@ 50% Lair > 2 More Gas
@ 100% Lair > 1 Gas + Hydra den
Make 2 spore + 1 more queen and stop drones productions when 2 bases staturated.
@ 100 gas > Speed Overloard.
@ 100% Hydra den > Lurker den + Start making hydra + Ovi (avoid supply block)
@ 100% Lurker den > Morph 3 Lurker + Dropperlord (you can hide it if you feel mischievious)
@ 100% 3 Lurker > Keep one for defense put the other two for drop.
At this point I either choose to expand if no big threat / Make more hydra and lings and rally to his natural / Prepare for defense depending on the different info.

As for the drop against the race, if im not able to kill much worker, i can snipe Darkshrine/TemplarArchive/FusionCore that are generaly sitting close to the mineral line.
And depending on the trade off im able to make, if im in advantage, i like to go make a Infestation Pit. Can be great against Heavy thor composition with neural parasite, or if i want to demoralize the opponent I go for Hive and Ultra.

The more I progress the more I get it tighter and faster. Kinda fun to play as the meta is a bit boring to say the least.

...when they decided to just completely gut offensive anti air for zerg.

Yeah P/T have to wall off else they get ling flooded but having AA locked behind lair so that 1 void ray or liberator can just shut you down so that instead of outright finishing a game its "gz now you can expand and have a huge lead and PROBABLY still win later"

I'm 3200ish mmr and yeah i win some lose some and im not really complaining about balance per se just how insanely unfun it is to not only deal with droning vs army / creep spread but also constantly guess/scout on what to tech else you just get hard countered.

I'm fully aware theres plenty im bad at or doing outright wrong but at least around my mmr it feels like i have to be on top of 5 different things at any moment whereas my opponent gets 1 unit out and can otherwise afk.

Edit: People seem to have it confused - i am not talking about defending air. I am talking about dealing with air units when attacking - especially early / early mid game.

So no queens are not the fix. And hydras are gated behind tech/cost and simply being glass cannons - my opponents can only make 1 unit at a time sure but it feels like ive 0 choice in early game unless i want to all in leaving my eco in shambles.

Again im not necessarily complaining about balance - more like how unfun it is to play this way where you have such limited options to deal with air units compared to other 2 races.

Edit2: It's almost hilarious at this point how many people bring MMR / balance / win rates or telling me to just macro when i explicitly said this isn't really about balance but enjoyability.

Knowing how to deal with something doesn't mean you have to enjoy the gameplay it forces on you - and being higher mmr doesn't magically invalidate someones criticism of game design.

Some of you are too busy explaining how to win or how bad i am instead of addressing what the discussion is aactually about.

Tunneling Claws Quality of Life Change: Burrow Move
Add a dedicated Burrow Move command for Roaches with Tunneling Claws, similar to Stalker Blink. The player selects a destination, and the Roaches automatically burrow, move to the target location, and unburrow upon arrival.

Optional limitation: Add a maximum range similar to Blink. Longer movements would still be possible by manually burrowing, moving, and unburrowing.

Reasoning

Improves usability: The goal is to improve the usability and efficiency of the uncommon Tunneling Claws upgrade by making its existing burrow movement easier to control, while giving Roaches more micro options than stutter-stepping or A-moving.

Creates tanking and flanking opportunities: Players could send a group of weakened Roaches underground to draw out scans or force the enemy to invest in detection. While underground, the Roaches continuously heal as they retreat, move to the enemy flank, or emerge within an enemy army and draw friendly fire. This would create a new swarming feel and make Roaches live up to their name.

What up team. I got sick of either getting cheesed or getting out econ-ed by Protoss, so I've made the decision to always go pool first against P for the time being. Not sure how well this will work in general though. Help me dissect this replay. Currently Platinum 1.

Some things I have questions on:

• Could this guy have gotten his shield battery down earlier? What about the stalker?
• How typical of a wall off is this? He plugged up the hole with a pylon which I feel like is standard. How well was that executed?

Some comments:

I messed up a couple things... I accidentally canceled the third right outside his base which probably cost me 15 seconds. I didn't start zergling speed on time. Accidentally left drones on the gas. I usually try to take them off early on until I get 3 or 4 queens.

I did like the timing of the overlord to scout the main when the zerglings first hit. I didn't do that on purpose this time, but I'll do it more in the future.

What else should I be thinking about on this replay?

Replay: https://drop.sc/replay/27583902

I don't want like excessive micro advice but plainly speaking I feel like I need to stop f2ing. It's not actually f2 on my controls it's like cntrl+cap and I have a habit of then binding them all to 1 but never actually using 1 and just f2ing every time and it's honestly pretty noticeable I spend a lot of time f2ing that could have been used doing basic micro or going back to macro. For the most part I don't think much actually needs to be bound ahead of time besides maybe spellcasters and scouts and everything else is just green boxed and then your only really supposed to f2 to regroup or retreat or something.

Hello first of all sorry if there is misspell im not a native english speaker

Link to the replay : https://drop.sc/replay/27579504

So i come back to SC2 with the last patch i never got out of platinium with 300 game in 2 years
im by no mean good but im trying to do things properly this time im following PIG B2GM 2023 with ling bane flood and 1/1 attack
im having a lot of fun and im winning 50% of my matchc so its cool but i really LIKE REALLY strugel against skytos and specialy when they buld massive statik defense (LIKE 10 canon att each base ????)
I nearly Always manage to get a lot of eco dmg with 1/1 attack sometime even fully destroy there economies but then i just cant get to end the game and destroy all building in the mean time the protos build full air and trutel till i just cant destroy hes death ball and die
I will link a replay wherei think i could have won if i know what to do i had litteraly all the map taken even if my macro got bad with the stress of the late game BUT MEN this protos was not even controlling hes army hes just let it sit on top of the base and cannon and waited for me to do mistake and im of coursed a made a lot of them

SO i wanted to have your opinion and what should id focus in this situation i know the best thing against skytos is to not let theme get here but its already what im trying to do with attack timing
I also know my macro is FARRRR from perfect and im improving after each game but im think my army gestion is just too bad to get out of platinium

I know its a long post and the replay is long too but i really appreciate if one of you could help me thanx for all

PS: dont mind the ennemie chat i think hes angry after 23000 game on skytos XD

This is so dumb, toss and T can decide whether they want to play a turtle/macro game or all in 100% of the time, and if zerg doesnt guess correctly it's gg.

Literally at what point in the game is zerg better than toss or T? Worse macro until the point in the game where toss and T have their 200/200 and then you have to play 2x better with spellcasters and spreading units perfectly or its over

This is so lame, toss has had a higher WR at ALL stages of play for 2 YEARS, Z good for a couple months and blizzard reverts everything xd

Mostly vent post pls dont start whining about balance whiners GRAZI!!!

No issues before 8 worker patch. Obvious gained a little mmr during. And now after the revert I'm getting mauled. Am I missing something

VIRTUAL PETITION NOW!!! ZERG WEAKEST RACE FOR 3 YEARS NOW AT LEAST KEEP THE QOL BUFFS!!! KOWTOW TO OUR DEMANDS OR WE START POOPIN EVERYWHERE

Short version is that I decided to try getting somewhat decent at SC2 after playing SC1 way back when and playing all other versions of RTS, from OG Warcraft to Total Annhilation to C&C, etc. You get the idea. Problem is that I could go even with all of my equally bad friends, but past a certain point even the most basic of computer in the campaign would beat me.

So, since I'm off work medically for the time being, I thought I'd do something and get better at SC2, specifically Zerg, cuz why not? I'm not looking to be Serral, but just be better than I was. As it is, I've at least made it to where the Medium AI isn't wrecking me inside of 10 mins now. I understand expansions, etc a little better, and am slowly learning to use the various upgrades of the different units.

I've tried to read various "I'm new threads" to see what talks there are of what starting builds should be. I saw one I liked, thought it just gave the basics, so here is how I've been starting and what I feel is an issue.

Build to 11 drones ASAP. Spawning Pool at 200. Right here is an issue as there is a big lull; typically I'll make another drone for some extra minerals, but it may not be worth it overall. One pool is done, drone 11 becomes the Roach Warren and then a Queen. From there, I can build into my first expansion.

The basics the person listed were:

• Spawning Pool

• Queen

• Warren

• 2nd Base

I like how it plays, but again, feels like there is a big lull while you wait for the spawning pool to finish. I usually throw a couple overlords as I start the warren and build into the 2nd base, but does this feel like a good start or how would you modify that?

My recent experience has been the toss blocking my natural exe with a pylon and then following my drone to the next possible base. I dont feel like i can attack them because they have a wall and go quick stargate. I feel like i cant play zerg anymore. Please help me with some advice.

If i go reactive pool all my eco is delayed so much that toss can take a safe third before im done with my second base. I feel like there is no counter play on 8 workers against pylon block.

Do i just have to accept that hatch first is no longer possible on 8 worker start, and i have to play the game from behind?

I really liked this video from ViBE where he handled battlemech very well. There's not a lot of commentary, so I will try to write what I saw on that video:

1. He detects it very early. Sacrificing the first overlord to find that the Terran was going factories early was worth it here.
2. He prioritized minerals heavily early (at one point he has 1k minerals and almost no gas).
3. Creep spread is key. There's a moment at around ~7:00 where the Terran removes some tumors and he diligently plants a new one for the receding creep
4. Starts with just roach/ling
5. Don't let them snipe any economy early. I don't understand how he did it so whell, though. It looked like he knew where the terran was going to attack. I know that in the same position I would have left one ramp or flank open, the hellions would have entered, and killed all of my drones before my roaches arrived.
6. Set up surrounds with multiple groups. At around ~8:00 he almost successfully kills the whole Terran army by trapping them in the middle bridges.
7. Does some economy damage to the opponent at around ~9:00. I don't know if it was worth losing the whole army for the damage done, but he did mention that it was important.
8. Eventually he goes up to infestors for fungals.
9. All of it while injecting and spending larva and money constantly though.

Anything that I have missed? I would be very interested in knowing how he achieved 5 in particular. Overall battlemech looks much easier to execute than to defend for me.

So i just started playing starcraft a few days ago and i like to play zerg cuz they just cool and all but ive been having a hard time using them. Here's a replay of a game i played earlier. Did i do good or naww?

https://drop.sc/replay/27559350

For everyone getting beaten up my mech out there! This was probably my best engage on mech ever.

We made a cartoon styled version of Starcraft but with Insects instead. I always thought there should be a game with insects colonies as factions so over the course of 4 or more years I finally created one! Im planning to launch next month and would love for you guys to try it out!!

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I used to 10 pool most games against protoss, but I am at a high enough mmr now that its no longer viable. A lot of the guides I've seen online are outdated since the patch and I feel totally lost in the early, mid, and late game. I play standard 32s triple hatch into hydra-ling off 66 workers. I struggle a lot with adept harass, since my natural often gets blocked. I also feel like I get steam rolled by colossi and archons as soon as my opponent gets them out and I don't know what late game comp to transition into.

what builds do you typically follow and what is the general gameplan I should be striving for?

Just getting back into the game after years away. I got placed into Gold 3, won two games and went to Gold 1. And now I'm only getting matched against Diamond players every match even though I was never even Diamond when I was better at this game. It's a little demoralizing that I'm at a serious disadvantage.

I'm a bit disappointed that it's just a Terran game where you kill zergs much like SM2 and Tyranids... Always shooting at the minis I'm painting ...