so guys as you all know Roaches counter Zerglings right? but is that really true? hehehhe.... okay so first you must know that Roaches cost 100 ressources and 1 Ling cost 25 ressources wich means that: 1 Roach = 4 Lings so i did a little test on a testing map with Lings and Roaches and surprisingly.. Roaches doesn't actually counter Lings unless they have that CRITICAL NUMBER.... (1 roach cant really take out 4 lings) And i found out that if they have NO upgrades you would actually need 21 Roaches (or more) to get that critical number (no micro included) And if they both have only SPEED upgrades the critical number is 32 Roaches (or more) (still no micro inclueded) BUT if they have no upgrades and you KITE the lings (even though Lings are faster than roaches with no upgrades) The critical number is about 3 roaches (of course my micro isn't perfect) And if Roaches have speed but zerglings DOESN'T... the roaches can just kite till death wich means the critical number is at 1 single Roach (obviously) ^^ and of course there is no cliffs or chokes that the Roaches can abuse i also noticed that since roaches deal 16 damage and lings have no armour it takes about 3 shots to kill 1 zergling but i you upgrade the roaches attack just once so that they deal 18 damage it takes 2 shots (unless the zerglings can regenerate fast enough wich they just barely cant do) so its just like zealots ^^ (if you know what i mean) but i havent tested that out yet you know... when the roach have 1 attack upgrade xD SO.... All this stuff really surprised me and i hope that you'll understand it and that it would make early ZvZ a bit "different"...... but yeah thats it :3 Also ive tried doing Mutalisk vs Vikings and it came out that with 8 Vikings vs 9 Mutas (they both cost 1800 ressources) The Mutas would actually win O.O so thats cool i guess ... xD (for the Zerg players at least )
Roaches counter banelings, banelings counter zerglings, zerglings counter roaches. I don't know where you got that roaches countered zerglings Basically if your opponent goes for roaches you need to stop teching and focus on zergling production.
Why Roaches can counter Zerglings is that theyre less Larvae intensive, and that means quite a lot for Zergs. Also, If the Roaches are bundled up at a choke, they can kill quite a lot more Zerglings than else. Were the Roaches spread out or close together, by the way?
correct. it is at the end not the mineral cost but how fast you can generate the army to reach the critical. roaches are not superior when facing mass lings, but since they are not larva heavy you can quickly regenerate your army and re-inforce, whilst the lings takes much longer to restore army size.
What happened to the fact that you can make zerglings a lot sooner and a lot cheaper? They also allow for later gas, and the drones the roacher dedicates to harvesting gas are not generating minerals. Moreover, a roach has a slow attack rate and an overkill on a zergling of about 80% of its damage. Anyway. I always counter roaches with lings and they've been working.
Phoenix pretty much summed it up above. Another thing you have to note is that once the guy with Roaches has access to banelings your speedlings, in terms of matching up against his Roaches/banelings, are screwed. Roaches will also be a bigger problem once they can burrow. I find in most games that early on a speedling build will beat the Roach build, but the longer the game drags on the person with Roaches will have the advantage in a direct fight. Again, this is in terms of a direct fight only. In situations where you can't stand toe to toe with their army a dedicated speedling build should be taking advantage its ability to pose near instantaneous base threats, simply avoiding the other units using their superior speed (roaches or mutas) and keeping them confined at their base since your speedlings can get into and cripple/raze their base much faster than they can yours.
