Just having entered Platinum league and beginning to lose more games I don’t want to fall into the trap of switching to other builds that require more micro or multi-tasking. Both my (friendly) opponents and also the great mates over at the /r/allthingszerg Discord server tell me from time to time that just switching up my build or army composition (Roach/Hydra) would greatly improve my game and/or win rate.
This might be true, but I am not comfortable doing so, because I am pretty sure this would come with a price. I would maybe win more games but also gain a false sense of improvement. Instead I want to take a look at my close games and the games where I was just stomped. Games where I have stomped my opponents are becoming rare and if they happen, it’s mostly because my opponents mess up.
After I can pin point the things that went bad I want to try to just make minimal adjustments to my current game plan to mitigate these.
Identifying weak spots
Losing too many workers to harass
I have played quite some games where I was economically way ahead my opponents but then lost a shit ton of drones to harass like Liberators, Marine drops or Hellion drive bys. Especially versus Terrans this has been a huge problem and over the whole game I sometimes lost between 80 and 100 drones. Even more surprising that I still won some of these games, but more times than not I was playing from so much behind that if my opponent did just enough damage and then followed up with an all-in, the game was over.
Timing Attacks + All-ins
In other games I feel quite comfortable because the early harass is missing. I drone up to 60+ drones within the first 6:00 Minutes and have just my 6-8 safety Roaches until this point. Right at the point where I take my 4th base and want to start building Hydras as the second batch of safety units I get hit by timing attacks or all-ins. If I get enough units out to hold the first wave, I can sometimes hold and even turn it around with defender’s advantage. But if they manage to kill my 3rd in the process and keep all-inning me, they successfully wear me down. Especially if at the same time they send liberators or a drop to the other bases, that are not being pushed. The other scenario where I lose the edge of these games is when I hold the first push, try to fix my economy but then basically over-drone and get steamrolled by a follow-up all-in.
Maxing out and throwing away my army
Sometimes I am able to defend harass or timing pushes, which usually leaves me ahead or at least even. In these cases it happens from time to time that I max out on Roach/Hydra but then push out and lose way to much of my army for too little damage done. If this happens, I should be able to re-max again before the counter push hits, but continuously bad engagements kind of negate my production advantage at some point. I think it’s a mix between composition and army placement or engagements. I try to do pre-split my army before engaging but I also do look away from the fights to not fuck up the macro here, since I will need to re-max soon.
What’s the problem here?
I am planning to only make minor changes to the current game plan to make the changes achievable. When I look at all the weak spots they have one common denominator:
Bad game awareness
How do we increase game awareness? Correct, by scouting. And looking at the examples above again, there are multiple aspects of scouting that need some love.
Creep spread
In some games I was able to get some creep on my side of the map that not only connected all my bases but also covered some ground around my bases towards the enemy. In these cases I could not only see harass or pushes coming and position my army to take engagements heavily favoring me, I could also deal with drops and other harass way easier.
Creep spread is already part of my game plan, but before it was kind of nice to have, now it becomes a necessity.
Overlord scouts
My first Overlord always scouts for an Extension around the 2 minute mark and if there is none, all my spider senses are tingling. Sending in an Overlord between 4 and 5 Minutes can be really helpful to spot the difference between the opponent preparing a timing attack or all-in and them teching up for a longer macro game.
The other aspect of Overlords for scouting is having them in the air space on the edge of the map to spot drops or air-harass like liberators. PiG is teaching this from the beginning whereas ViBE is mentioning this only in his Platinum 3 to 2 video.
Spotters
Another really good tool to be able to see the opponent moving out for a push. Especially when they deny Overlords it can become crucial to have either lings or changelings at the move out paths of the opponents base(s). If all other scouting fails, this is the one insurance not to have 14 more drones building directly before a timing attack hits one of my newest bases. And not only on the opponents first attack, but also to see if droning is safe after an attack or if it’s an all-in and I can expect just the next wave of the same size.
Slow lings like PiG does it would be the lazy, but more expensive way. Changelings do not cost anything but are also not free, because they need to be renewed constantly. I am already trying to get some changelings on the other side of the map to pre-scout for vulnerable bases to attack, but this kind of spotting would need to start way earlier.
Game plan
- Scout for cheese and deal with it
- ViBE’s B2GM (‘21) “Platinum”: Max before 9:00 if uninterrupted
- Don’t get supply blocked
- Spend larvae
- Measures agains worker harass:
- Active creep spread
- Static defense if necessary (e.g. Spores at 4:00 vs T)
- Know about incoming attacks
- Overlord scout base/tech
- Again: Creep spread
- Have spotters on the map
- Pre-scout before attacking and pre-split army