The Zerg Roach

Oops, sorry, forgot about the two attacks. Thanks for the reminder, I'll quickly sub it into the first post.

EDIT: Done. I'll just add that part to this post in case people miss the previous one. I found it extremely interesting as I progressed and found it especially awesome that I came out with a reasonable result as to what their actual regeneration rate may be. However, the single Roach against the single Zealot would be on next to no health by the time the battle's over, so if a Roach is supposed to be able to convincingly beat a Zealot, it'd need to have an even greater regeneration rate than this.

 

Yeah, Zealots do an overall 16 damage against an unarmored foe, in a fairly fast cool-down. If a Roach isn't killed by that, I'd say a Stalker can only kill a Roach because they can focus fire on one, because they've got lower health and a similar cooldown. 4+ damage wouldn't make the difference.

If a Roach with 90 hp beats a Zealot with almost no health gone, then Roaches will have at least 60 hp left from the fight. To get 16 damage at a time for 16 seconds (the time by which a Roach can deal 160 dmg by 10 dmg per second), let's see. Nope, a Roach is supposed to attack slower than this, so let's count 1.5 seconds per attack, and say she kills a Zealot 1 on 1 in 24 seconds. That's about 24 * 16 = 384 damage she turned into 30 by regen.

384 dmg - 30 = how much she regenerated in 24 seconds = 354
354dmg/24secs. = 14.5 hp per second. In each attack she soaks entirely a Zealot attack!

It means that she could take down stacked cannons too, in case they don't focus. Each Roach would soak up to 3 Marines each, almost a full Bunker. Roaches + Banelings = adios base-defense! ;D

 

At least stalkers will do the job, because ranged FF probaly owns them.

 

20 damage Stalkers.

All you need is 5. Then when a few Roaches get close, blink away ;]

 

Roaches also have long range and fast moving speed, remember? lol Although I agree that many stalkers > many roaches, because 5 Stalkers do kill a Roach in one shot, but 10 dmg Roaches need to be in number of 14 to insta-kill a Stalker. Yep, Stalkers do own Roaches. By the time you face Stalkers your Queen better have nicely set up defenses, or else the hit-and-run will end up defeating you. How on earth are Zergs supposed to counter Stalkers effectively??

lol, it just hit me: Zerglings! Numbers > FF. Bingo! Get a speed upgrade and voilá... until they reach a cliff. ¬¬

 

Hmmmmmm.... looking at the stats of both the Roach and the Hydralisk, has Blizzard made the Hydra obsolete?

Hydralisk

Type: Ground/Biological
HP: 80
Minerals: 100
Vespene: 50
Supply: 2
Requires: Hydralisk Den
Mutates From: Larva
Mutates Into: Lurker
Attack:
Damage: 8 Ground/ 10 Air
Armor (type): 0 (Light)
Abilities:
Lurker Aspect

Roach

Type: Ground/Biological
HP: 90
Minerals: 75
Vespene: 25
Supply: 1
Requires: Roach Den
Mutates From: Larva
Attack:
Damage: 10 Ground / 10 Air
Armor (type): 0 (Armored)

I don't like this idea at all! The roach is cheaper and better :-(


Bonus 200 minerals for a great post

 

Yes indeed. Though I dont think its just the roach, I find hydra very obsolete even without it. If I ignore its absolutely terrible new look and mainly the attack animation there is also the thing of extremely large cost compared to other units (vis roach or mutalisk) while being tier 3 and taking 2 population. So unless you get 2 hydras from single egg (which isnt in the current build as seen in the videos) I see no reason in making them other than lurkers.

 

Wich would be extremely dumb, to render the Zerg Icon unit, the most famous of all, completelly uselless.

 

Keep in mind that the attack speed might be better on Hydralisk, making is damage per second above the Roach.

But I see what you mean, Roach is considered armored and Hydra is Light armor, more life and fast regen on Roach... Hydra can morph into a Lurker for another costly cost...

 

Yep.. the Roach has a cool and zergish concept, but I dont like the idea of making the Hydra useless, being always a cool and powerfull unit as it has been.. Perhaps the Roach being a higher Tier unit than the Hydra, being more versatile and cheaper would settle it... although I'd prefer the Hydra to be more powerfull

 

It seems lke hydralisks will only be used against air, or is that just me?
CUT THE ROACH IMO...
In SC1 you saw in ZvP hydras against zealots and zerglings against dragoons, now you will see roaches against zealots and zerglings against stalkers, but where is the hydralisk?

 

do you think it would be better to have the roach only have a GTG attack instead of GTA? It could be a good intermediate unit between the Ultralisk and the zergling. The fast regen would help it stand up against more powerful units and its cheaper cost (compared to the Ultralisk) would still make it useful in the end game. Give it an upgrade or two late game (speed or maybe attack speed) and it will remain useful to late/end game. And that way it wouldn't replace the hydra.

 

It only has GtG (not the right info on the other page)!

 

Its already GtG unit but still. Less supply needed, less minerals needed, less gas needed, more hp, more armor, almost identical attack and ofcourse the regen.
Sure, hydra is GtA aswell and mabye it might move little faster or something but its still nowhere near the standart it should be at and I dont like hydra being an emergency unit to cover you from air until you build corruptors or as a lurker which costs you yet additional minerals and gas.

 

@ Furrer

This post said that the roach also has an air attack. Removing it, as well as lowering the hydra on the tech tree might help remove some of the problems with the current system.

That's what I was referring to.

 

Please note that Jon actually post something on the front page called Unit Clarification :
- The Roach has both a ground and air attack. It's attack is ranged, and it has a high regeneration rate. This is not a melee unit. Other sites are apparently referring to it as a "melee assault warrior" or "large zergling." This is not true.


Personally I don't think that the Roach being tier 1 unit should be only able to attack ground. Since other races has air counter capability at the same point in game ''Marine'' and ''Stalker'', if you remove air capability to Roach Zerg will miss his cheap unit vs air.

What I would propose is to put the Hydra back to tier 1 and remove air capability to Roach and put it on later tier. Boost the Roach stats just a tad so it can fit his tier. Bingo you got an Hydra where people wants it and Roach being tougher to kill but only later in games.

I can't blame Blizzard, most probably the main idea was to have the zerg a bigger threat early in game. In SC right now, you need lurkers to make sure you win any ZvT or ZvP early game, but Lurkers are costly gas wise and tedious to produce. With a Roach (tougher Hydra) they can make the Zerg a real threat early game without the need to nerf other races early game)

Hell remove the roach and give the super regen to the Hydras, problem fix

That makes room for a new Zerg unit....
Hurray

 

Dark Swarm doesnt help it against the splash damage, so i think Banshee could counter it with easy.

 

If i heard correctly Banshee is not splash dammage anymore in the current built, but does more dammage to single targets.

 

Oh, hell. So now indeed terrans have a HUGE problem.Even more than with almoust invincible swarmed lurker.

All hope with a new radar dome, that might warn us against the incoming zerg threat.

 

Indeed, the Radar Tower is a flawless counter to Infesters in Terran bases!