The Zerg Roach

here's what you need:
http://www.starcraft2forum.org/index.php?option=com_smf&Itemid=47&topic=6367.0

 

thanks and yea the roach does look too much like the lurker. however know that I look at the two I think that the lurker should change. it doesn't look good at all any more.

 

So I have been thinking about the roaches attack, and while I know nothing about it, I assume it will be a lot like a zerglings, or hydralisks, and that is repetitive and boring. I think the roach should have some spinning spine attack that does aoe damage.

 

What exactly does High Hp mean in terms of gameplay that wasn't already there??

So the unit can do hit and runs, knowing that the roaches will recover faster than the defence, and repeat ? Looks like roaches are actually better for slowing down gameplay instead of mass-out large scale battles.

Roaches also seem to be great at protecting leads during razing a base, since they can handle singular units that pop out of their barracks easily with their regeneration.

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To those that do not like the "roach" name ... would you prefer it to be a -lisk suffix due to it's assault-class unit designation (like the other zergs) or something more about function , like the special class of zerg units ? ?

 

The name. I don't reckon the name is that bad. Meee summed it up perfectly in another thread:

The visuals. At first glance, apart from their blades, they look a lot like Lurkers. However I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed, but I certainly have, that the headpiece/crest-like part of the Roach is actually its back. The head is tucked away under the front of it. I think that it is this that makes it look like the Lurker which also has a similar shaped headpiece. Not sure if people already knew, or if I explained it that well, but once you've differentiated them as two different parts of the body, it's much easier to quickly distinguish which is which. One of them will probably end up being changed though. I hope it's not the Lurker, because I like the Lurker as is.
The concept. It's a wondrous concept, but I think some people might be overestimating the regeneration rate. It definitely has one higher than other units, but that doesn't mean that it'll regenerate faster than it's regenerating. By concentrated or focused fire they probably just mean consistent. If the attack are on and off, it'll be able to regenerate those small amounts of health lost before its attacked again. If the attacks are consistent then the regeneration rate might make it last longer that it otherwise would, but it won't make it extremely difficult to take down.
Strategy. I would love to get one of these into a defeated enemies base and watch him send his newly spawned Marines at it one by one. Marine will spawn, attack Roach, die, Roach will regenerate. Marine will spawn, attack Roach, die, Roach will regenerate. What a perfectly sadistic cycle.
Also, I'm also thinking that this would be a great raiding unit. You would quickly be able to attack an undefended area and do a bit of damage. When they start to fight back you can retreat, wait a relatively short time until they're back at full strength, and try for a different area. What would make this perfect is if they also became the Zerg cliff jumpers. I know they've said that the Nydus Wyrm counts as that, but from my understanding of the Nydus Wyrm, which may or may not be correct, it basically acts as the equivalent to the Protoss Warp In or Terran Drop Pod. Zerg should still get a cliff jumper.
Balance. To compensate for its high regeneration rate, but depending on how fast it is, I'm betting it will have relatively low health. As I've said before people might just be overestimating the regeneration rate, thinking that it'll require concentrated fire to take down, rather than consistent fire.

 

If roach have armor type "armored" then siege tank will do their job

 

I hate how this unit is tier 2 (same with Infestor), while the Hydralisk has been pushed away to tier 3! Why the hell do you get Hydras the same time you get Ultras?! And Lurkers will be like tier 3.5, unless it does not evolve from the Hydralisk (which would suck ).
The Hydralisk needs to switch tech tree-place with either the Roach or the Infestor.

 

Yeah, cut roach, infestor tier 3 hydra tier 2.
Because if roach fo tier 3, would it take the tanking role of the "wtf is the big monster called", because somewhere it was stated that a zealot couldnt do much damage to it (because of the VERY HIGH reg.)!?

 

ehheh you are right, actually I thought the hydra stayed in the role it had, but after watching the action shot on the official page, I was like OMG how could they finnish out a BC soo quickly!!
I think.. the roach will follow the predators and the cobras footsteps... It is kinda imbalanced I think. With a massed roach attack (maybe ling support) every ground enemy is vanished.. You must concentrate fire, but where, if there are more than 10 roaches??

Btw have you noticed that the infester moves underground?

 

"You must concentrate fire, but where, if there are more than 10 roaches??"
Focused fire.
If, like Itza predicted, they have low hit points it shouldn't be too hard to kill them off one by one with comparable force.

 

Or with really strong weapons. I guess that a bunch of Roaches can be easily killed by a few deployed Siege Tanks. They just have to little hit points to survive that. For the protoss you have the Colossus that takes care of them, and the Zerg will probably use Zerglings. They are the fastest units, and with their high attack speed, about 3 Zerglings per Roach should be enough to kill it.

 

The old colossus would. According to Jon Roaches were the only ground unit that came close to countering colossi in current build

 

I can see that. Let's say that the colossi has an attack that's basically like a valkyrie that can only fire at ground. Individually it doens't do a lot of total damage per unit, but because it can deal damage to multiple units over a period of time, it seems to compensate that. That's different from siege tanks/reavers that rely on first-striking enemies to insta-gib them..which the splash is a 2ndary effect. The splash seems to be the aim of colossus, and obviously the roaches can exploit that. I can see multiple colossus being impervious to banelings, so the zerg coutner to colossus would be roaches ?

Having 4 assault- class zerg units feels odd, but a melee version of hydralisk was something i wanted when i was new to SC

 

But roaches need focused fire, not spray! Their HP regenerate if you don't take it out quickly. Sharing doesn't help.

A counter to roaches should be Hydralisk (and perhaps the reason why they're in a higher tier than roaches). Hydras fire uber fast and can group on a unit. If Hydras are the medicine for Marines and Medics, they're the medicine for Roaches too.

In Protoss, the counter should be something like the Warp-ray, Dark templar (one-shooting them with their huge damage), or perhaps Stalkers' focused fire.

EDIT: I just reminded myself of this: Carriers should have a tremendous difficulty to handle Roaches, because even tho they hit often, they hit low and sometimes the interceptors take a while to come back. A single Roach would occupy several Carriers on its own, in my imagination at least. Now massed carriers wouldn't be so effective against Zergs just because of those. \o/ Also, depending on the regen-rate, a Roach could survive even a Psy storm. Psy storms do 10x10 dmg, at least I read somewhere it would be set to around this, and a Roach is both fast moving (to evade the AoE) and has 90hp, which means that they could in theory regenerate more than 10hp till the Psy finishes damaging, and survive it. O_O Would be absolutely an amazing counter to Protosses' biggest strategies!

 

Overling i think warprays are a weak counter, as it takes all to longe for the attack to "charge up", and it needs to charge up after each kill. Intresting "conclusion" on why the hydra is tier 3! But:

And therefore im against the roach, because you dont have a 2nd choice of unit against air at Tier 2.

 

But don't we get a Queen at Tier 2? She should be the main defense against harassment. She is a unit focused on defense. She should have means for that... (as in, the devs should think of that and devise means for the Queen to handle this)

Also, I agree that Warp-rays wouldn't be a counter. What leads me to think that the Protoss air cannot hit Roaches effectively, and that they'll pull the Protoss towards the ground when used. Roaches could be a good tool for harassment as well, as they're said to be pretty fast.

 

Yes, but using a huge amount of static defense for defending you 3 bases, will give the enemy map control, and he will be able to expand. Therefore you also see pro players never building spore's, because your army will be weaker.
Ofc this only applies if the queens "buildings" cost minerals + gas.
Even if they only cost energy, I think it will be hard to defend 3 bases.
But that was a really good point Overling.
But as you can probably can hear I'm not a friend of the roaches, as i don't really can find a good role for it. Not enough hp for a tanker, no abilities making it a good harasser (not a flier, not a cliffjumper), not a very high dps (at least I don't think it has).

 

So far, do Protoss even have a basic air fighter. The Phoenix is AtA

Protoss seem weak against the Roach since everything fires slowly now. If they had the old Colossus that would be a valid counter since they can't regen while being fiercly beamed by a Colossus.
I never knew Roaches used acid. I thought they were melee units. But they have range, a slow fire at that. So in effect could the Roach work like a ground Devouer since those were hard to kill with long cool-down.

 

I think you are mixing up regeneration rate to armor (or at least damage resistance).
When you say that focus fire would work better against roaches, but then circle back and say that carrier's interceptor focus fire won't work .. something's messed up.

High regen could make for good hit-and-run, just becuase you're likely to recover faster than your opponant. However, zerg to me used to be throwing your units at them, and if your troops die you hope your opponant won'tbe ready for the 2nd wave

 

The roach, certainly it lives up to its name. You can't kill the damn thing.