There are basically “emeregent properties” of balance which are not explained by data files alone, that’s what “emergence” means.
And so Zerg has what I call “time reversed macro” in some situations, and there’s a fine balance between what makes the zerg too weak nad what makes the zerg too strong.
there are situations where one minute, the Zerg is at an extreme disadvantage, but the T or P doesnt’ se ethat and hit the Zerg then and there and punish the Zerg, then literally one minute later the Zerg has a hage ADVANTAGE and then the Terran or Prootss is like, “How is that possible, I wrecked his economy, nd I killed that hwole wave of lings, nad he’s still alive”…
Well, it’s an emergent proeerty of the hatchery and drone mechanics.
Like for example, when you ling scout and overlord scout and see a protoss is going zealot all-in, then you make the correct amount of sunkens and then so yo upretty much wrecked you r own economy to defend an all-in, right?
Well herees the thing, the protoss doesnt’ know exactly hat your units are and exactly what you drone count is, and hopefully you defend this attack with as few sunks as mortally possible, which is why expert Zergs don’t finish morphing their sunks or spores utntil EXACTLY when they are needed, so in this way you can “time reverse” the next hatchery, if you’ll pardon this language, so ti come sout earlier tan if you just made all your usnks fully blown sunks right away, but if you ar eplanint a third hatchery, before a late Zelalot all-in comes, then you have like 3 half made sunks behind the hatchery, sonow the zealots cnanot get in there to kill the sunkis, and now you are safe until mass dragoons, evne though you killed your own drone count, now you don’ tcare, because now it’s safe to “drone up” for about the next 2 minutes.
Step 1) So You had a disadvantage in timing iand economy.
2) the solution is to actually wreck you rown economy some more,
2b) make some colonies, but don’t morph then to sunkesn until exactly when they need to be sunkesn
- se the excess minerals to start the 3rd hatch in your natural sooner than otherwise possible, and not a third base. In BW you need macro hatches before you exdspand, otherwise yo udon’t have enough larva ot make an army to dfend the expand anyway.
So yo use what the Zerg did ot the Protoss is turn the Protoss “rpobe power” against itself. Zealto rush is all about protoss probe power cranking out a huage minerals advantage.
Well the Zerg abuses “reverse time mechanics” and some psoitining, and suddenly the protoss “probe power” advantage up to that point of the entire game has suddenly been negated, beause he dumped all those minerals on zealots, and he cn’t get into the sunkesn to attack them, becaue they are pnned between two hatches and can’t be surreound.
So now the Zerg turned the tables against the protoss, and the Zerg drones up to 2 wokerrs per field on main and natural, and safely takes a 3rd…
If the Protoss does something else, the Zerg can’t just do the same exactly thing, you gotta shout, I mena he might go 1 gateway directly to stargate and try to corsair harass you to death, and you gotta socut that and be ready to keep your overlords alive, which is pretty much the so-called “bisu build” but people were doing that buld before bisu even started playing the game.
Anyway, if yo uscout the Protoss is going with a corsiair opener, you cut drones nd make one spore colony per base and crnak hydralisk until you have “critical mass” of hydras (and they don’t suck vs goons or zealots, so in this cae if you triain 1 or 2 more than you theoretically need, that’s not going ot hurt you too much, so err on the side of makign mor erather than less. And now you turned another protoss advantage into a disadvantage, because now if the protoss tries to go back to Zealots, Hydralisk do ful damge vs shields, evne on small units, and hyralisk with ilings beats zealots and goons, nad especially by the time you get lurkers nad so the Protoss ended up kiling his own timing advantage on the gorund by skpping gorund and going for a cheese corsair harass, and now yo ucan go Hydra Hamer the protoss and lurker contain the protoss, nad his high tempar are late, becaue hie’s split his tech all over the pace, or he’s trying ot go reavers from the actual Bisu build, which I never had trouble splitting hdyralisk vs reaver scarabs enough to cost effectively kill reavers with hdyralisk so I didn’t mind if my protoss opponent got a reaver aor two, I just split my hydras and kille dthem witohotu losing much.
So now you just turned the reavers agains th the protoss, and he got no high templar for storms vs lurkers, and you lurker contain the protoss, whereas if the protoss opens tanadard he endsup HT containing the Zerg until the Zerg either gets queen with broodling, or enough hydrals or muts to suicide mission kill the teplars, so the Zerg masy as well get queens, free kills vs bad trade, I think I’ll take th efree kills.
Understand the fiference?
With on eopening, the Zerg getst to luker contain the protsoss, with the other opening the protoss contains the Zerg.
Ether way, the Zeg should make QUEENS and broodlin gthe prootss high templars, which keeps the rest of your amry alive longer, allows you to “drone up even more” and take a 4th and 5 base and 10 to 12 hatches, etc and 3/3 ups on both ground and air and 6 queen 6 defiler, no w curb stompe the protoss.
Anwya, corsair is Bisu’s opening, but it’s nto even a good opening, the Zerg gets to lurker contain the protoss, which its dumb for the protoss to intentionally build himself into getting lurker contained.
and again, while im on the topic of queens, what part of “IT ONE SHOT’S HIGH TEMPARRS” idn’t koerena pro gamers understand?
high tempars massacre hydrelaiks, evne if you mircro reasonably well the hdyras still take about 50% damage from storm,. So if you one-shot kill high templar with a quene, you preent however many storms he ahd enough energy to use, so, you keep your entire army alive longer, and you get to drone up agaagain, and pretty soon you’ll be ~90 to 100 drone zerg with 3/3 everything.
I’ve ried to exlain these mechanics to people over the years, and still cant’ convince Zerg players that Queens are worth training, even though I could literally e ten times beter player than them when I wa shealthy.
It KILLS anyting exept archons and reavers in one hit. If you are not training that unit, you’re a MORON.
end of queen rant.
So while um, this “revere time” economy mechanic is easier to explain in Z vs P than ZvT, so that’ swhy I changed to discussin ZvP “reverse time macro” mechanics and how you can totally reverse the balance of the game within one minute flat, without even “fighting” anything, literally you were behind in macor, the protoss massed zealot all-in, and you correctly got 3 sunks and put the macro hatch in fton, so can’t attakc sunks, now “drone up” and take a third a ssoon as you can protect it with enough lings and hyras.
Sme dal vs corsair opener, he can’t attack ground with those, so you take a FREE expand, and hdyralisk and chase the corsair saway. and if you know what you’re doing you won’t lose very many overlords, like losing one overlord aint going to kill you, bu tjust dont’ lose 3 or 4 or whatever.