Guide: Mid level ZvT. Standered MMM+mech.

Intro: Keep in mind, I'm not on Fruitseller or Idras level. I'm a mid 1000 diamond Zerg, hoping to help out people in TvZ, what most zergs have the most trouble with.(Myself included) This is a guild on the standered ZvT. I won't be including any super indepth info on everything that can happen.
I might make a guild later on heavy mech play and on defending some of the terrans hurrasments.
This guide will refer to all current unit stats for patch 1.1.1, although there will be major changes in the years to come, just like brood war.

-Core Units-
This section will give a breif explaination of each of the zergs core units, and the normal uses for each.

Speedling: In most ZvT situations, your ground army will consist of speedlings and banelings. The speedling is an extremly fast unit, allowing you to get those ever so important flanks and catch your opponent out of position.

Baneling: The hardcounter for marines. Very fast, and if you catch your opponents MM ball in a good spot, you can decemate much of his army, allowing your speedlings to clean up the rest. MutaLingBaneling is going to be your best friend.

Mutalisk: in most cases, your greatest asset. Most new players think the mutas MUSt cause damage, or it's a fail.
False. This is your map controling unit. Keep building up mutas, and he can't push out of his natural expo.

Roach: Tanking unit. Not much use in standered ZvT, other than 4rax reaper counter. Maurauders rip these guys in half.

Hydralisk: Slow, but good DPS. Only use it if your opponent is going for an extreamly fast banshee, and you can't get enough queens out in time, as the hydralisks den is a very short build time.

Infestor: Fungle growth baby Use it to immibalize a MMM ball, and bring it down.

-The basics-
ZvT is a matchup won or lost based on if you can get the good positioning you need, and outmacro the Terran. Map control is super important.
The main unit composition in ZvT is Muta-Ling-Baneling.
Why you ask? It's the only units the Zerg has until ultralisks that are fast enough to get flanks, and get positioned well. Unlike broodwar, Zerg is slow as butt with most units. Mutas will get you map control, allowing you to expand and simply power over the Terran. I'll go more indepth about army compositions later on.

-Scouting-
Scouting is the most important thing a zerg can do. Zerg units are made as counters to other units.
Things to look for:
No barracks inbase. This is a simple one. Proxy rax.
First gas going up as barracks is going up. Possible reaper. If he produces a marine first, it's generally just standered marauder marine play.
2gas early: Heavy mech play, or 1-1-1. If he builds a reactor on the barracks, it means he's going to swap it with his factory, and make 2 fast hellions. Be prepared. Watch for possible Vikings or banshees.

-Early game-
Stay alive, drone up. I won't be giving build orders or anything, because I feel like that's more preferrence than standered timing. I prefer going for an expo around 15, unless he's going for some shinnanagins that forces me to 1base. Your main goal is to stay alive until you can tech to mutalisks. I always get a banelings nest and a good amount of zerglings to defend against any early push from the Terran.
Once your mutalisks are up, you control the map. If he's not prepared, go kill workers. If he has turrets up, pick shots at anything you can. make him stay in his base.
This is the point where you control the map, and you have the game where you want it.

-Midgame-
Keep spending gas on mutas and banelings, while spending minerals on drones or speedlings. You have the map, so this is when you take your thir or possible a 4th expo. The Terran will secure his natural if he has not already.
Your mass of mutas by this point is large enough to bust through a line of turrets, but he will likely go for some thors, ending your hurrass basicly. This is where I like to slow mutalisk production, and transition into late game tech. By this time you probably have 3-5 expos, the Terran is securing his third.

-Late game-
There really is no guide for this. Build what you need to counter him. He has a vide varraity of tech options In the late game, as do you, unlike early and midgame where it's mostly just marine maurauder with a few Vikings perhaps.

-Engaging the Terran-
If he's pushing out with MM tank early In the game, be ready to flank him. Set up an ambush, and let your banelings and speedlings flood him. The banelings will soften up the marauders, and kill most marines. Zerglings have no trouble at all against marauders and tanks.
Never get greedy and try to bust up a ramp and end it unless your sure you can. Breaking a terrans ramp even with banelings is quite hard.
Magic boxing mutalisks: a handy trick that has won me many of games. Thors rip mutas apart because of splash damage. Run your mutas directly over the terran army with your speedlings and banelings supporting, and press stop on your mutas. They wont clump up at all, and you take zero splash.

-Common mistakes-
Over estimating zerglings. Although 30 zerglings may seem like enough to stop an early push, it's accually not much. Build slot of speedlings, cause thier very fragile.

Not spreding creep: Creep is a must. It gives a speed boost, and you get vision.



If people like this guide, I'll update it more often and maybe write more.
I hope this helps with your ZvT play, and you can have a good time playing sc2!

 

Horrible spelling, outstanding tips. As my sig shows, I need every little crumb of advice I can find thanks. Interesting that infestor use is not emphasised as fungal growth is rather effective against MMM, especially on marines to weaken their force and on medivacs to stall engagement. Plus you need a pit to tech anyway, so it's no detour, only a little investment.

I have a question though. Lately I've been pondering how to group my units to engage with, more specifically, whether to group units of a kind to their own control groups, thereby allowing me to position them to best utilise them, or to have an assortment of units in each group to facilitate flanking. Do you have any advice on that? I know grouping is up to personal preference but I would think that theoretically unit composition within groups should not be. Or is that a matter of taste as well?

 

Quick question what is a 1000 level refering too ?

 

Very nice guide. It is in sharp contrast to the Zerg players who go Roach/Hydra against me and then start whining about Terran being IMBA!!1 when my bioball tears them apart.

 

Ah well, I figured there would be spelling errors. I typed this up on my iPod
And about your grouping question, I like to have seperate units in groups when I have zerglings and banelings.

and by 1000 diamond I ment 1000 ladder points

 

You typed all this on your ipod? Zomg! There's some dedication, lol! Thanks for the tips, I wanted to give zerg a few tries recently and working on some stuff I'm curious about

Cheers!

 

Sounds good, I've been going roach / hydra in some games, and been wondering why it didn't work. Maybe it's just best to stick with speedling and banelings with few infestors and mutas.

I got a few questions:
1. Is it enough spread against thors, when you just let the mutas spread automatically, instead of manually moving them around?
2. When banelings burst, will they do friendly fire, as in hurt your own zerglings?

 

1) No. You either need to use the method the OP is calling magic boxing (which still requires they not be clumped up when they arrive, various ways to do that) or spread them out manually. If you wait for them to do it on their own they are going to take too much splash damage.

2) Baneling explosions do not cause friendly fire damage.

 

Thanks Khayman

Yeah, I think I've understood the magic boxing. It just takes so much time to spread out 8-10 mutas. Especially because with the flyers it's hard to see where they really stand.


I've tried some games now to go straight mutas (lair before queen). The last 2 games I've had success with that, gotta try some more.