Category:Zerg versus Zerg

Introduction
This section will mainly revolve around the Missile Style, focusing especially on making the Roach a shining superstar. In the ZvZ match-up the Roach is very stable and very easy to use costefficiently. You will not need that much APM, just the proper scouting and decision making.

Opening Building Timings:
 * 9 Overlord
 * 14 Hatch First ~2:05 complete ~3:45
 * 15 Pool ~2:40 complete ~3:45
 * 18 Overlord ~3:20 complete ~3:45
 * @Pool&&Hatch&&Overlord 2x Queen ~3:45 complete ~4:35
 * @Queen First Inject ~4:35 complete ~5:15
 * Early Pool
 * 1) 6 Pool
 * 2) 7 Pool
 * 3) 8 Pool
 * 4) 9 Pool
 * 5) 10 Pool

First Overlord Timing:
 * 9 Overlord ~
 * 10 Overlord 1x Extractor Trick ~
 * 10 Overlord 2x Extractor Trick ~

Building Placement

 * Pool: Behind your mineral line, reduce surface area as much as possible.
 * Spine #1: Needs to cover ramp, mineral line and Natural Hatch. If possible reduce surface area building it next to the Hatch or obstructing with a Evo Chamber.
 * Spine #2: Needs to be build out of Baneling splash range from the first Spine. Other than that make sure to also cover ramp and Natural.
 * Tech Buildings: Build them in a cluster between your Main and ramp. We build them in a cluster so we can defend all our tech versus Mutalisks easily with few Spores.

Creepspread
The importance of good Creepspread is often overlooked in ZvZ, because the speed bonus also helps the opponent Zergs' ground forces. But there are several reasons why spreading Creep is still superior to not doing it. Firstly, only you gain the vision provided by the tumors, which is huge. Secondly, it does not help the oh so common Mutalisks, while helping your Anti-Air a lot. Hell you can even build Spores where Creep is. Thirdly, it diminishes the opponent's defenders advantage, when you push for your Roach timings.

Of course since we are on only 2 Hatches, we focus on Larva Injects first. But as we have more than 2 Queens, we can easily get a nice Creepspread going, providing us many benefits.

It is also very beneficial to snipe the opponent's Creep Tumors, because then we can go for little Roach hit squads which will snipe Queens and Drones while keeping tabs on his tech.

Scouting

Hatch-Tech Match-Up
Description:

In this stage you should focus on setting up as good of an economy as possible, while not dying to any all-ins. You should also get your key tech and upgrades running at optimal timings.

Punishing Hatch First:
Normally we are the defender to aggression, this time we choose to be the aggressor. We can do it here, because our opponent can at most be a few seconds up on Metabolic Boost, and we have the defender's advantage with plenty Zerglings and 2 Queens (just shield your Queens) already to defend.

Targets:

Queen: ~(50*4/40)= 5 Larvae ~= 5 Roaches, 10 Lings, 10 Banelings

Drone: ~50 Minerals/Minuite

Starting Overlord:

The first Overlord you get when the game starts needs to be sent right towards your opponent's Natural (therefore I veto out all 4 player maps, even though I play macro Zerg. But if you prefer 4 player maps for the ZvT and ZvP matchups you just need to send out a Drone Scout towards the other direction). It is that important because our early defesnse relies heavily on figuring out the opponent's Opening Build Order, which we can figure out by how the Natural Hatch Timing of the opponent is compared to our 14 Hatch First.

1) Same Time: the opponent also went for a 14 Hatch First


 * Here you can use the fact that your opponent has to worry about early aggression as much as you do and builds some defense first, so I exploit that by being extremely greedy. As long as you maintain good scouting you can get away with 0-1 Spines and 2-3 Queens for the first minuites, and add additional stuff only when you see him planning to be offensive.

2) ~lil slower: 15 Hatch First

3) slower: 14 Pool 15 Hatch

4) bunch slower: 15 Pool 16 Hatch

5) No Hatch before XXX: EarlyPool | Gas -> Pool | Pool -> Gas (maybe with 20-21 Hatch) 6 ~3:14 (19) Hatch (initial 14 Pool ~1:50 -> 16 Gas ~2:17, Lingspeed complete ~5:31)


 * Here he got his Hatch ~1:09 later, so obiously he lacks some Larva. Additionally by opening with Pool and Gas he basically *has to* do some damage to a Hatch First player, if he does not want to fall behind. The only way he can get even is if we overdefend *hard*. Just get 2 Spines and 3-4 Queens completed before ~5:31. If the attack does not hit until ~6:00 but you see he is in fact still low on Drones, then add on more and more Spines and Queens. If you figure him out well enough you might also get vanilla Roaches out to directly end the game.

Sacrificial Scouting Zerglings (or Overlord if Zerglings fail):

The next thing we need to get a grasp of is the opponent's Gas Timing. Therefore we build a single pair of Zerglings right when the Pool completes and send them towards the opponent's Main Base to check the Geysirs. You will also want to check how much has been mined and how many Drones are currently still collecting Gas.

Nydus Network versus Mutalisks:

With a Nydus Network our Army becomes even more mobile than Mutalisk/Speedling. So we can easily prevent base trades. It also diminishes the defenders advantage, which is a big deal.

The harder part is keeping the Nydus alive. I suggest always leavin a few Spores, Queens and Roaches next to it, for bodyblock defense and Transfuses. Because of that you might want to build it as forward as possible, so your forces dont get drawn too thin. You might also build more than one exit at a location if you have a huge army and the money.

Punishing a quick Third
Some opponents think the counter to your style without Metabolic Boost is to take a quick Third to simply outmacro you. Dear lord, how wrong they are. First of all, you should always have Overlords in the potential Third locations. If you then see an opponent take his Third before XX:XX (ingame time needs to undergo further research first), simply cancel all your long from finishing upgrades and flood with Roaches (mostly from 3 Geysirs). Try to hide this decision until you are out on the map with ~20 Roaches. Go straight for the Natural and kill him. I cannot stress the last sentence enough, do not waste time killing his Third, you are All-In, you need to win the game with this push. And you will if you did it correctly.

Description
This is the key stage for our strategy, and where will win most of our games. The all important Glial Reconstitution is enabled by the Lair. Also Tier 2 Upgrades, the Nydus Network, and Centrifugal Hooks are important situational ingredients of our strategy.

Beating Mutalisks
Versus Mutalisks we obiously need Anti-Air. So we need to incorporate at least one of the following options:

-Mutalisk | Corruptor: We can not invest the same amount of Gas just to counter it.

-Infestor: Awesome as support, but not good as standalone counter.

-Hydralisk: Good, but again kind of Gas heavy, and can be eviscerated by Banelings.

-Queen: Awesome! Tanky, Transfuse and longest Anti-Air range. Only disadvantage is slow speed.

-Spore: Rips them apart! Disadvantages are helpless to ground and static. Conclusion:

=> We use Spores to defend our bases. While on 2 Bases we use a combination of Queens sprinkled with a few Spores for our army Anti-Air. Once we get to 3 Bases we can incorporate the more Gas heavy options of Infestors and Hydralisks.

Beating Roach/Hydra
If he is going Hydra heavy (less than ~3/1 Roach/Hydra ratio) it is easy to counter with 1-2 dozens of Speedbanes assisting your mass Roaches.

~50 worker + Queen supply on 2-Base. -> 150 Army supply -> 3/1 ratio => 56 Roach + 19 Hydralisk (19*50 = 950 Gas = 38 Banes)

The SEAL Approach
The timing push point (TPP) is when his first round of Infestors spawns. Until then we got to manage several things.
 * 1) Get 2/1 Speedroaches finished for TPP.
 * 2) Get an Overseer when you see his Lair starting.
 * 3) This is the crucial part: Get Contaminate off on the Infestation Pit when he started his first Infestors so they come out with 50 instead of 75 energy.
 * 4) Move out to hit the TPP with pure 2/1 Speedroaches before his Infestors get to 75 energy.

The Mirror Approach
You can also go Roach/Infestor and beating him with better macro, micro, upgrades or decision making.

Beating Swarmhosts
Whenever you fight Locusts you fight a losing battle, even if you only lose a few hitpoints per wave. You have 2 options to counterplay Locust mechanics: //In fact, I consider it way easier to just kill the Swarmhosts, instead of playing a weird basetrade style, where you can not nearly account for most possible outcomes beforehand as much as you can with an orderly strategy.

The direct approach: Killing the actual Swarmhosts
First of all, to kill the Swarmhosts, we need mobile detection, that comes in the form of the Overseer for Zerg. Preferably we get Pneumatized Carapace to make our impending assault less obvious, respectively, giving him less time to react. Additionally, we need either a mobile force to go outmaneuver the Locusts and hit the Swarmhosts directly with our Overseer above, or we need an army that can quickly fight through the Locusts and leave a short time window where the Swarmhosts are naked. I consider the latter approach to be inferior, because it is very likely the next wave of Locusts will spawn before you sniped enough, if any, Swarmhosts, giving him time to escape and making you fight his Locust army twice without really achieving anything.

Enough for laying out the possibilities, lets get concrete: We approach the Swarmhost by flanking with Tunneling- or Speedroaches. To make that easier, spread your Creep well, especially on the sidelanes not used by Locusts. If the Locusts threaten your base while they are vulnerable to a sniping flank, safe your base with 2-3 duos of burrowed Banelings. That works, because Banelings 2shot Locusts unless they have 3 upgrades more and because no one sends out an Overseer along with his Locusts.

Try to hit a 2/1 Missiles timing, preferably with OverlordSpeed, Burrow, RoachSpeed/TunnelingClaws and a BanelingNest.

If you got RoachSpeed and Burrow, you can also try to split his attention by move command sending 3 Roaches on every spineless base, or sending a few more at a spined base, right into his mineral lines. If they get caught simply burrow them quickly. You should collapse at his Swarmhost army right when the Roach squads start to hit his economy. Now you either have an easier time taking out his main force, or he will take a lot of economical damage. While this needs some extra APM, precision and decision making of you, it will demand more from him to properly defend all fronts at the same time if carried out correctly.

For proper trading, you can trade 3 Roaches for a Swarmhost and it will be slightly in your favor due to higher Gas cost, but you should not trade 4 or more Roaches for a Swarmhost unless you have a huge upgrade and economy lead.

Description
This stage is where a Melee style shines, because it gets the powerful support of Broodlords and Ultralisks. If you were up against a Melee upgrading player, you should prevent this stage, but that should be relatively easy, as Roaches shredd through Zergling/Baneling. His only chance to get to this stage as a Ling/Bling player, is if he supports it with Mutalisk, which do huge damage. That is why proper Mutalisk counterplay is one of the most important parts of playing Roaches in ZvZ. Hence I advise studying the respective section closely.

If you end up in ZvZ Lategame as a Missile Style player anyways, at least use the power of 3/3 Upgrades, Vipers and Infestors (almost Hive-Tech), also offered by your lovely Hive. Check out the respective section on proper use of these gas-heavy support units.

Using Viper & Infestor
These two spellcasters are extremely versatile, so they are basically a good lategame support versus every composition.

Viper
Abduct can be used very effectively versus Broodlords and Ultralisks. Pull Broodlords out of Queen Transfusion range, and into the range of your Anti-Air. Pull Ultralisks into your army to 1shot them and kite backwards, right before the fight starts, to severely diminish his tanking and AoE potential.

Blinding Cloud can be used extremely effectively versus Roaches, Hydras, Queens, Locusts and Infested Terrans. Infested Terrans will need a significant amount of their lifetime to even step out of the Cloud, but you can easily Fungal them to prevent that from happening at all. Kind of the same applies for Locusts.

Beating Hive-Tech Compositions

 * Ultra/Ling/Baneling: => Roach/Viper/Infestor


 * Abduct the Ultralisks right before he fight really starts. Fungal their Lings and Blings. You can also use some Infested Terran Eggs to confuse the Ultralisks' pathing.


 * Broodlord/Corruptor/Infestor => Roach/Hydra/Viper/Infestor
 * Abuse the lack of mobility by doing Roach runbies. Abduct the Broodlords and focus them down with the Hydralisks, while the Roaches 2-Shot all the Broodlings, Zerglings, Banelings. If he throws out clouds of Infested Terrans or tries to roll Banelings into your Hydralisks, double Fungal these packs into death.






 * Muta/Ling/Baneling: => Roach/Queen/Infestor + Nydus


 * Barrel down their Expansions with your extremely tanky force. Use a Nydus Network for effective offensive Queen usage. Try to get a good Fungal on the Mutalisks to instantly win the game.