The Zerg Roach

I'm really skeptical about this unit.. I mean if it doesn't work as intended, Blizzard can always patch changes, but they still should aim for the best right upon release. It seems alittle too powerful to me and slightly untrue to Zerg gameplay. I don't really see the true role of this unit; perhaps a gap between Zerglings and Ultralisks? I just don't want to see this Roach taking the roles of both Hydralisks and Zerglings at some point in the game. Unless it has a fairly weak attack, i'de personally like to see this unit reconsidered.

 

^ agreed. I just hope it doesn't become a unit that makes both the ling and the lisk obsolete.

 

Make the ling and lisk obsolete? Nevar. Lings are dirt cheap and do way more damage. Hydralisks have longer range and can hit air, which a Roach can't. Hydralisks can morph into Lurkers if it suits the situation, while the Roach is a Roach. I think Roaches will require a lot more micro too.

 

hey ive, got an idea, if Hydras evolve into something that burrows underground and cant hit air, why not give the Roaches the chance to evolve into an air unit (it has wings anyway) that can give splash attacks like the devourers corrosive acid but in a weaker mode and that it can also splash those on the ground...

just an idea though since they counter each other in the offense and defense department....

 

That isn't a bad idea, it would have to be tier 2.5/3, but not the Devourer or anything similar, and there is room for another mutation since the Mutalisk only changes into the Guardian.

I'm blank of suggestions tho...

 

Naw I don't think giving the zerg opposing units again is that smart of an idea. the devourer and the guardian were a pain to deal with when your guardians moved slow and were intercepted by AtA attacks and you devourers were still in production.

 

i think the roach could evolve into a cool unit, maybe an ant-air unit with the roach regeneration ability would eb cool. It would have to move pretty slow though so as not to outpace guardians by too much.
Also at gasmasguy I pretty sure the roach can hit both air and ground with its ranged attack, but I may be wrong. IMO the roach is a tanker for the mid game period.

 

The Roach doesn't need to evolve into an anti-air unit, we have Corrupters and Hydralisks for that.

"Currently, the Roach is a ranged unit, giving it added utility at choke points. It has possessed the ability of attacking both air and ground units, though is currently ground only."

Source: http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Roach

I could be wrong, but I think the Roach will be somewhat useful all the tiers. It replaces the Hydra in the tech tree, so it will be available at tier 1, and it currently has a tier 3 upgrade that greatly boosts it's already crazy regen-rate.

 

The Roach does not have enough health to be a tanker. Tanks need copious amount of health, which the Roach doesn't have. Take it to the extreme, just for the sake of clarity. A unit with over a million health but with no regeneration will be a much more effective tank than a units that has one single health point but a regeneration rate of over a million health per second. See what happens? Having a small amount of health but an extremely large regeneration rate is not necessarily a good trait for a tank as it can easily be taken out with concentrated fire.

 

i have to disagree on that, because if you put the "regeneration rate of over a million health per second" on the unit that has "over a million health" what happens to that unit ? it becomes even more of a tank, the enemy requires even more units / focus firing just to take it down, because the health keeps coming back at a very fast rate, making its job even easier, to draw fire away from its comrades for as long as possible, while the roach is not much of a tank, it is still a tank at the low tiers.

 

But that's not the case. There isn't a unit in StarCraft2 that has both an immense amount of health as well as a high regeneration rate. There's the Ultralisk, with lots of health and the standard regeneration rate, and there's the Roach with low health, but a very high regeneration rate. There's no middle ground, so giving an example of a unit with tonnes of health and an amazing regeneration rate doesn't prove anything. All in all, the Roach does not have enough health to tank effectively, even at low tiers. A relatively small group of Stalkers can both kite and one-shot them due to their bonus against Armoured units, and Marines and Marauders can also kite them, plus use Stim Packs, plus there's the Marauder's bonus to Armoured units. In extremely small battles, yes, Roaches will be able to tank, but even at early stages of the game, focused fire will rip Roaches apart.

 

"focused fire will rip Roaches apart" which is what it is supposed to do, it causes less damage on the other units around it, which at tier 1 is just the zerglings, Blizzard has stated somewhere once, that they wanted to give the opposing player a choice, to either focus on the roaches and let the zerglings come to you, or fire at the zerglings and let the roaches give you the damage, imo, the roach will be a early tier tank, but as of right now from the latest new that we heard of all these tier one units you are right, with the protoss at least(i still think the roach can be good against the terrans, =P lets play the new game of whack the roach), but balancing still needs to be done, and in the final build it will be an efficient tier one tank, imo that is.

i have my opinions, and you have yours, and im not the kind of person that will try to force someone to change their way of thinking, nor am i a pugnacious person, nor am i saying that you are one either.

 

If the enemy is focusing fire on the Roaches, then it will not be able to tank as it will have no time to make use of its heightened regeneration. It'll basically end up as a normal unit with ninety health, so you'd probably be better off tanking with a Lurker or Infester. The amazing regeneration will only benefit the Roach if it is not a primary target, which tanks, like the Ultralisk, are supposed to be. Granted, it will be able to hold off Zealots much more efficiently than anything the Zerg has ever seen before, but I wouldn't consider that as tanking, as it's not really tanking the damage for anything else, as its one of the only units there.

I'm not saying that you're wrong either, or that they cannot possibly tank in any way, shape or form, I'm just explaining my views. In my opinion the Roach does not have enough health to be an effective tanker as focused fire will rip them apart, making them no better at tanking than Lurkers or Infesters.

 

correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the role of a tank to draw fire, and the roach and 10 hp/sec regeneration. IMO thats enough to survive the focused fire of 10 units for at least a few seconds, say average 5. This means that while the enemy is shooting one roach, the rest of the horde could be booking it towards the enemy ready to rip and slash. And that only accounts for one roach. If you were to have several roaches, the fire would be drawn for longer, allowing more of your army to attack unharmed.
I know these aren't the actual stats and my numbers could be off, but I think that the roach is a pretty good tank, especially against units that have a average damage, and a high rate of fire. Against siege the roach is useless.

 

The Roach will certainly draw fire, but it won't take it like a normal tank would. Against focused fire, the Roach practically has ninety health and no regeneration, as it has no time to regenerate the damage that it's taken. With no time to regenerate, the Roach is no better off than any other type of Zerg unit with a similar amount of health, like the Hydralisk or Lurker. You would never use a Hydralisk, which has eighty health, or a Lurker, which has about a hundred and twenty-five health, to tank as they can be taken down way to quickly. The same goes for the Roach. Although it has a high regeneration rate, when faced with focused fire, it has no time to make use of that regeneration rate.

Going back to a previous scenario we were told about, when a Roach is up against a Stalker, the Roach will win hands down, but when five Roaches are up against five Stalkers, the Stalkers will win hands down with very little micro. This is because the Stalkers can one-shot the Roaches, basically negating their regeneration rate, because Roaches get ripped apart by focused fire. Seeing as the role of tanks is to take all this damage, they wouldn't make efficient tanks.

 

im done with the little argument thing that is / was going on here(for i doubt that either of us will change theor mind on whats considered to be a tank). so now ill just post of information, thats likely going to be a little off, sourcing from both SCArmory and starcraft source. (for they are the only ones that have a unit database, if this site is going to have one soon, i would like to offer my service to keep it updated to the fullest.)

They both have said that the Stalker cost 125 minerals and 50 gas right now, thats 25 minerals less than 2 roaches, while blizzard had said that 5 roaches vs 5 stalker is suicide for the roaches, if the stalker use basic micro, that sounds a little like paper talk (imo), 5 stalkers cost wise is 625 minerals and 250 gas if we go by what those two sites have said, while if we use the same amount and put it into the roaches budget that will = to 8 roaches with 25 minerals and 50 gas to spare, we also have to consider that all the shots will not hit the roach at the same time and thats like giving the roach 15 more health, 105 total, making it need another more shot to be taken down, if there was no bonus to armor to the stalkers 20 points of damage and there might not be, all we know about its damage was that it keeps on being flipped around, i also would like to point out that the cooldown time+health/shield for the stalker and the damage+cooldown time for the roach is a complete mystery, armory said the health of the stalker is 120/60, while sc source said it was 100/40, but the cooldown times for both of their attacks is essential to really make this complete.

BUT this is still more paper talk, and we will have to wait and see when we are much closer to the release date of SC 2.

 

With very little microing, all shots will be able to hit the one Roach at the same time. It definitely wouldn't require a pro or micro-freak to do so. Just ordering them to stop and instantly ordering them to attack one particular Roach will do the trick, as will Blinking them back, out of the Roaches range, and wait for the Roaches to advance into all the Stalkers' range and ordering to attack. Also five Stalkers will deal a hundred damage, which doesn't include their bonus against Armoured units, so even with a bonus as small as one extra damage to Armoured units, the Stalkers could still be a whole second out without having any effect.

If five Stalkers can beat five Roaches while taking little damage, I'm sure an extra three won't really hurt them too bad. Sure, there are bound to be a few casualties on the Protoss' side, but they'll still come out on top overall. Besides, Stalkers are excellent at quick, surprise attacks, and they also have longer range than the Roaches, so they'd be able to have the opening shot, instantly killing a Roach, by the second shot, which would instantly kill another Roach, the Roaches would probably be get an attack in, but once the Stalkers start running, the Roaches will already be at their maximum range so won't be able to keep attacking, while the Stalkers could instantly turn around and take out a Roach, which goes to show that with a little microing, focused fire will tear Roaches to shreds.

Besides, what are they tanking for in this situation? They're not taking any more than ninety damage each and they're not drawing the fire away from anything else, so how does this prove that they'll be good tanks or that focused fire won't be extremely effective against them?

 

Well I guess this proved me wrong. I will never question your superior intellect again Hex....Just kiding.
But really I see the point you've made and I have to agree that the roach won't such a good tanker after all.

 

please note that i said that, that was paper talk, and that we both have our own opinion on what is considered a tank, you are putting word into my mouth that i never said.

and besides why does it have to be the roaches that runs to the stalkers? roaches are said to be a fast moving unit, so they would have the same if not faster speed to stay out of the stalkers range, forcing the stalkers to blink to the roaches, even if all they did was blink to the max space between them and the roaches so they will be able to hit the roaches, the roaches would have already run out of it with little damage, if they blink to the range of 5 the roaches would be able to turn around and start hitting the stalkers with little movement, and all they lose is the one roach that they would of lost if they were the one to run into the range in the frist place, also if the stalkers still do have the bonus to armor, it would start to make it a mini siege tank, i jsut look where the stalker gets Blink from, and if starcraft source is even a rough idea of how it really is, then the stalkers wont get Blink till some point after tier 1, Blink is research at the Twilight Council, while Burrow is research at the Evolution Chamber, which is still within tier one. so the role of the stalker could be different, from a hunter to the hunted.

but the important thing we dont know whats the HP/SP of the stalker, we dont know the damage of the roach, we dont know whats the cooldown of either of their attacks, all of those things plays an important role of how the battle goes, and while you say that 3 extra roaches will not make a difference, the fact is that you are taking a little more damage and have a little more units to kill could make all the difference on if you win or lose that battle.

 

Roaches can't stay out of the Stalker's range seeing as they have less range than the Stalkers.

Blinking was just one of the methods I suggested, so before Stalkers get Blink, they'd still have practical ways to direct their fire all at one Roach, especially seeing as they have more range to begin with, so it's them who get the first shots in, and not the Roaches.

We may not know the specific stats of the Roach and Stalker, but we've been told that focused fire will rip them apart. Seeing as that's the case, they won't be effective tanks seeing as they only have ninety health. Speaking of taking words out of each others mouths, I never said that three extra Roaches will not make a difference. It may not make a difference to the final win-or-lose outcome, but they'll certainly make a difference to the battle itself.

Besides, this really doesn't prove that Roaches can tank at all. First off, these Roaches are not taking the damage for any other unit. Secondly, they're still dying without making use of their regeneration so in effect they only have ninety health meaning it would be more worthwhile to tank with an Infester or Lurker. Lastly, even if the Roaches could defeat the five Stalkers, it doesn't prove that they can tank. The Stalkers' minerals in Zerglings would probably be able to take them down, seeing as Stalkers are designed to take out larger, Armoured units, and as we all know, Zerglings can't tank in any way, shape or form.

Overall, the point is that focused fire will kill Roaches near instantly. The Roach would only take ninety damage so it is not tanking effectively for the rest of the army. As I said before, you'd be better off tanking with a Lurker or Infester, which each have over a hundred health. They may be able to tank really early on in the very first few skirmishes, but after then they'll be torn to shreds, just like every other Zerg unit barring the Ultralisk, because Zerg are strong in numbers, and not in individual survivability.