As zerg I tend to be a very macro oriented player. What are some techniques to prevent my opponent from massing a huge death army and rolling me over while I'm droning heavily? How can I abuse zerg's unit mobility, deal damage, and escape with no loses?
Starcraft 2: Effectively harass as zerg
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Related Solutions
There is no unit that will magically let you beat a Zerg air mix, even Thors fall to mass Muta with a little micro. Instead let's break down what there is and discuss possibilities:
One of the things you need to ask yourself is: Is he Corruptor heavy or Muta heavy? This question will influence the result. If he's Corruptor heavy you're going to want more of a ground response. If he's Muta heavy, you're going to want more of an air response. I'll break down units for you based on this decision.
Corruptor Heavy
This is usually an indication he's going Broodlords, so its not a bad idea to build some extra Thor/Phoenix/Corruptor
- Marines. Any Terran bio structure will have these. They're more cost effective than Muta and with Stim they'll really tear through them. Highly recommended.
- Ghosts. Zerg air is all bio, and a full Ghost gets 8 shots (360hp) which means that Ghosts eat through Muta. When they're out of energy, you're left with a beefy unit (100hp) with +light damage (and Muta are light). Always a good choice.
- Thor. Without SCV, Thor tend to die to Muta very quickly. What's worse, SCVs get hit by bounce. Unless you have a bunch of these guys backed by 15+ SCVs I wouldn't make them the bulk of my strategy (plus corruption will really kill them).
- Missile Turrets. Surprisingly effective vs Muta, especially if you get the range/armor upgrades.
- Hydralisks. For a high dps unit you can't beat the Hydra. Their low hp means you're going to want to engage on creep where you can abuse your longer range.
- Infestors. AMAZING against Muta, especially with Hydra. Use fungal growth and "lol" at your opponent as he watches his 50+ Muta helplessly die.
- Queens. Mass queens are nasty anti, and the healing means you can win this battle without losing a single one (and not spending any gas either).
- Stalkers. Blink micro is the way to go. If he's big enough to push, don't blink in. Instead blink out Stalkers at low HP, they have a longer range than Muta.
- High Templar. You actually aren't going to get a ton of damage in with these as Muta are very fast, but sometimes you have to work with what you got, and these aren't bad.
- Archon. Too slow, too short range, skip them.
Muta Heavy
Against a Muta heavy force you're going to have more success with air to air as every air to air unit stomps on Muta (and breaks even with Corruptors). You're going to want to back this up with a mineral heavy ground force (Queen/Marine/Stalker).
- Phoenix. The anti Muta; they move while they shoot and have a longer range and faster speed. If he chases you he's dead.
- Voidray. Not the best as the Corruptors will eat them up, but if you can get charged you'll win. To help charge a large force spread them out and do NOT focus fire.
- Carriers. Completely nullify the bounce. Unfortunately you die fast to Corruptors so focus fire them down first.
- Corruptors. This should be obvious: Corruptors beat Muta.
- Muta. Ok, who has the bigger Muta ball. The reality of this battle is, if you can get off 1 fungal growth, you'll win almost instantly.
- Vikings. Longer range means you're going to have to harass with these. Don't get into a straight up battle unless you have backup or superior force.
- Battlecruisers. Not great vs Muta, but better than nothing. Bring some SCVs if you want to win.
- Ravens. Little known fact: most large air forces are decimated by Seeker Missile... with the exception of well played Mutalisks. This is very much an estimation of your opponent. If he hasn't shown heavy micro, this is a good way to go. If he has, it is unlikely Seeker Missile will be useful. It's worth noting that both of the Raven's other abilities work against Zerg Air, so it's still useful to keep a couple of these around.
Remember, if you see Muta/Corruptor you need to think "How can I use what I have?" NOT "What should I build?"
If he's got cannons + gateways just outside your ramp, chances are he has minimal forces at his main base. Get a few mutalisks and/or Nydus worms to harass.
You might want to build a second hatchery to facilitate unit production. The reason a contain (not a 'cannon rush', as you labeled it) works so well against Zerg is because they typically need that second hatchery to keep up with (or surpass, usually) their opponent's unit production.
If you can, use your overlords to scout -- a protoss cannon contain might be annoying, but until he expands, you're just as well off economically as him.
Related Topic
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- Starcraft – How to Macro effectively as Zerg
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- Starcraft – How should Protoss respond to a Zerg expanding a lot
Best Answer
So there is no easy way for a Zerg to stop a giant Terran/Toss death ball from forming, but there are ways of making him pay for it, and ways of breaking him before he can form it.
Speedlings
Zerglings in general continue to be one of the most underestimated units in the game. This is party because you have to build such a large number of them to compare to a similar sized army (60 Zergling is the equivalent of 15 Roaches). Additionally, Zerglings rely heavily on their Speed to be effective. If you want to use Speedlings effectively to harass (or Cracklings) you have to remember only one basic thing: Don't pit them in a stand up fight. As a harassing unit, Speedlings largely exists to judge an enemy army strength and look for holes or backdoors to exploit. If that Protoss deathball moves away from his expo, shove 20 Speedlings in his backdoor. Even with just +1 attack upgrade they'll probably destroy every Probe at his natural before he can recall that slow army, and you'll get away with 12-15 of them still alive. Don't be afraid to hit buildings either, cracklings in particular are wrecking balls and can seriously dent his production facilities. Another good suggestion is to back Speedlings with Banelings. Speedlings get it and are frusterating, while Banelings hit the Worker Line.
Mutalisks
The other main staple for harassment has always been the Mutalisk. While Muta-micro has lost some of its allure since Broodwar, Mutalisks still remain one of the most annoying units in the game. Remember, never attack with less than 5 Mutalisks (9*5=45), preferably 6. In Muta harassment your number one priority is to keep those Mutalisks alive. The Muta-ball has its strength in numbers and if you start losing a Muta here and a Muta there, your ball is never going to hit that critical mass that allows you to use it for more than harassment (and Ultimately if you're investing enough in it to Harass you need it to get you to end game). Remember that while Workers are always great targets of opportunity (Hold Micro still works for this), that buildings can be great. Abuse cliffs, and be willing to swing around the entire map to attack from another side. Mutalisks are just that fast.
Infestors
I know this hasn't caught on on the NA servers yet, but in Korea this is a big deal. Infestors are the Dark Templar of Zerg. You get Burrow and then sneak them into your opponent's expo while engaging him else where. While this sounds like a lot of micro its actually fairly easy to perform if you'll take a second away from the battle. You don't have to un-burrow them just through down ~30 Infested Terran and they'll clean up a base. The best part is that he'll never get a warning until they've hatched, you just have to keep his attention away long enough for that. I cannot count the number of games I've lost to Infestors this way. Its what makes Roach/Hydra viable.
Overlords
Zerg units have two nice properties: fast to build and cheap; as a result you don't have to feel that bad about losing units on an overlord drop. Take 2 dozen Zerglings and drop them in the back of his base and watch how quickly he comes apart. Since people are paranoid about drops, often times dropping a couple units in the back of someone's base will cause them to move their main army away from the front, this provides an excellent opportunity to attack. There is nothing I like to do more against a Bio Mech based Terran than a quick drop in the back and watch him run all his Marines away from his Tank line... just fantastic. You can also do the same with Nydus channels, but there you're counting on him not noticing it.
Every Other Unit
Technically there is no unit you can't use to harass an exposed opponent (I frequently use Roaches just for this purpose), but the key is having a retreat path and re-macro-ing lost units. As you get used to when to hit and when to pull away, you'll find that as long as your harassment is cost effective you actually don't need to keep as much of your army alive. Unlike Terran and Protoss you can rebuild your army very quickly, so try to use that to your advantage. By the same point, don't throw your army away either.