The Zerg Players thread

[Aldrius]

Okay, I'm really frustrated and I'm sure whatever I'm doing wrong is obvious, but could anyone lend me a hand with my ZvP? I'm pretty good at ZvZ unless they mass ling but my ZvP and ZvT need A LOT of work.

[Gradius]

ZvP is the matchup I'm most familiar with so I'll take a shot:

1) After your hatch goes up at your nat, you can't have 21 drones in your main, and 3 at your expo. Your expo needs to run out first so you can mine from both bases as long as possible. Transfer more than half your drones as soon as it finishes building. Your income really suffered b/c of this.
2) You kind of forgot about your spawn larvae. Both of them got up past 100 energy. You missed 4 spawn larvae cycles for each of your 2 hatcheries. That hurts alot.
3) This guy read you like an open book. An observer was flying through your base for literally the entire game and you were rallying your roaches to his base right where he could see them walking by his cliff. You don't need your units rallied to his base, because you can't reinforce, you can't defend back at your own base, and he could trap your army with force fields, which if he did he'd crush you because you have no creep and you're too far away from your base.
4) Use the Y hotkey to set the rally for your army. You kept forgetting about units you had made.
5) You have to be ahead in upgrades as a Zerg. He had +1 weapons over you. Most Zergs slam down double evos & start pumping out the upgrades, but I'm not sure of the timing.
6) You just got outmacroed. When the toss has more harvesters than you for most of the game, you can't expect to win. You didn't spend enough larvae rounds on drones, which is mostly because you missed a bunch of injects.
7) Not very good scouting. You want to send an overlord at 5-6 minutes, not 13. It's lucky he went gateway units for most of the game, but scouting is the most important thing you can do because it lets you know when you're safe to spend your larvae on drones.

So basically if I could pick one thing for you to work on it would be hitting all your spawn larvae rounds while determining if it's safe to spend your larvae rounds on drones.

[Aldrius]

Thanks a lot, Grad. That seems to have helped a lot.

Here's one I just did now.

Ignore the guy telling me that I suck and whatnot.

The Xel'Naga caverns game is a bit more interesting. Though my play obviously still has some flaws. My macromanagement being the largest.

[GnaReffotsirk]

Lol. That guy. He seems to be only teasing though. GG

In the past, where I was successful, ZvP, I use the 3rd Inject output and the next to produce lings. This includes any subsequent larva that comes out from the hatches.

Then double evo when lair completes, or evo instead of roach warren.

ZvT, is to just keep denying and out macroing? Not really sure.

One thing's for sure though, if your opponent Protoss goes FE, do the fast muta. The one zerg used to do during the beta and the early weeks of release.

[Aldrius]

Kay, sounds good.

Here's another game, this is a problem I run into a lot in ZvT is that I can never seem to END the game and get an advantage. I don't know if it's because I have trouble microing (my computer can lag from time to time) banelings and infestors, or if I just get outmacroed and can't deal with so many tanks and marines or what.

[Gradius]

So now that I don't really play much anymore I've just been doing zerg in customs & what not. ZvT seems to be my best matchup. ZvP will be next once I get more experience.

But here's a fun ZvT where he does a few tank/marine all-ins. His execution wasn't the greatest but the Zerg race is surprisingly resilient against this kind of stuff. :P

Kay, sounds good.

Here's another game, this is a problem I run into a lot in ZvT is that I can never seem to END the game and get an advantage. I don't know if it's because I have trouble microing (my computer can lag from time to time) banelings and infestors, or if I just get outmacroed and can't deal with so many tanks and marines or what.

tbh I don't know how to end the game either. I usually wind up going for a contain.

[bakabaka]

I've been away from the game for a very long time and recently decided to start playing again. I played the 5 placement matches and won 4 out of 5 placing platinum. Unfortunately, I am probably a bronze/silver level player. The games I won were typically those where I had units, and my opponent presented no opposition

The biggest problem with my play is that I can't transition into any sort of mid game. Early game I plant a spawning pool, I expand, I build up either a roach or zergling base army, and then I attack. That's it. This attack will often do some damage, but I am completely incapable of transitioning into anything past this, or even reinforcing it properly. Naturally, since I'm playing opponents significantly better than me, I've been losing every game since the ranking, and it shows in the mid-late game capabilities (often whenever the enemy decides to attack).

The question then would be the following: Is there any obvious (and by this I mean natural) transitions that I am missing or am I doomed to lose until the system realizes it has ranked me incorrectly. I feel that if I had been ranked lower I would be able to experiment with different buildings and units but I am currently getting punished for mistakes I cannot find the time to fix. Is there a way by which to redo the ranking process?

[Twilice]

No, not really. Apart from playing and losing/winning more.
If you feel like experimenting you should go ahead.

[Todie]

I agree. take the losses. settle for small progress. start with figuring out what general gameplans you want and continue with figuring out how to open your games on the more detailed level.

if you have the right midnset, you will adapt, learn adn usnterstand more and more as you play. talking (or typing) about the process can help, but there are no shortcuts, you need to play the games and accept the losses along the way.

... i beleive your matchmaking rating is fairly volatile after the 5 placemnt matches anway, so if youre really that bad you will be facing equally bad players within 10 games or something, np.

[dar474greg]

Why do I have this feeling that zerg's new units are not that crazy strong.. Thank god Hydras are back in the mix

If you have a lot of Zerglings or their army isn't very bolstered yet you can skip the minerals and focus on their army, just be sure to not get lured into any "choke points". Ideally you can fight in the open where you can surround your opponent's units. Zerglings are the fastest ground units in the game, so use them to chase down scouts and retreating units after failed attacks. Send your Zerglings IN FRONT of the retreating unit so that they're surround him rather than chase him.