"It's a well known fact that I have my head up Mark4's ass."
-Punck
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| Zerg Air Is NOT Dead. | | | Author: | | | IP: | XXXX | | Date: | 07/10/99 09:07 | | Game Type: | Starcraft | | Labels: | none | | Report Rating: , # of Ratings: 2, Max: 8, Min: 7
Lifetime Rating for .Praetor: 8.2987 |   | I'm hanging around in NoHunters, but everyone is dead as normal, so I say screw it, I don't want to wake everyone up for a game, and join a ladder ffa on Ashrigo.
BLUE is Protoss (chosen), top right.
YELLOW is Terran (chosen), top left.
BROWN is Terran(chosen), bottom left.
I (.Praetor) am Zerg (random), bottom right.
I'd barely managed to escape Kerrigan's control, and had only done so by slowly throwing my brood her way, starting with my best warriors on Braxis. But here I was, independant at last, and ready to start anew. My single overlord lands five drones on a pleasant world the Terrans have named Ashrigo. Quite awhile later, my humble hatchery is formed, and three larve are quivering, with the genetic heritage of the Zerg. Happily, I order another drone.Vague
psychic emanations have betrayed the presence of two Terran refugee groups, and the new settlement of a Protoss tribe. I worry most about the Terrans, as they have increased their
reliance on science vessels more often as of late. The other parties are not friendly, however, so I decide to gear myself for a long battle. My tenth drone goes to form another hatchery at the resource rich valley below my plateau. I wait and start a spawning pool, then replacing the drone, then starting an overlord, then starting an extractor, then replacing the drone. When my second overlord is done, I pump more drones until I have
18 supply.
I realize I have no defence, but I am in a whimsical mood. I save until I have 300, and start another hatchery, just above the ramp leading into my valley from the outside. I then start another overlord, and put drones on gas. Once my third overlord is done, I start more drones. Yep, sure am safe here.When my third hatchery is done, I deign
to start four sunken colonies, two on each side of the formost hatchery. For scouting reasons, I have started researching burrow at my main plateau. Wanting better
accomodations, I start a Lair in my valley. I soon start gas in my valley as well. Still pumping drones, both bases are saturated about when the Lair and 4 sunkens finish.
One of my overlords is stationed over the middle island, the other near the Protoss valley, unoccupied, above me. The last few patrol my base. I start a spire, queens nest, two overlords, and eight zerglings.When the zerglings are done, they burrow at the four non-natural expansions, excepting the one at the top north, which is occupied by the
Protoss. The others scout natural expansions, with one left over to patrol the edge of my plateau. Brown has a bunker at the site of my third hatchery. The Protoss have cannons
guarding their natural, but no Nexus yet. Yellow has not expanded to his natural, so I burrow my zergling there.I start the mass production of mutalisks, always having believed that air is necessary for the domination of the swarm. I start to research transport, and upgrade my main plateau hatchery to a Lair. My overlord hovering above the island spots the Protoss tribe landing a probe. It immediately starts a nexus and four cannons, despite my spy's presence.I send five mutalisks, who kill the probe, and all the cannons cancel but one, which I promptly kill.
I decide to start an expansion at the south area, for even more gas, as I am running out, and I also make two queens, another spire, and upgrade my plateau Lair to a Hive. My overlords have speed and transport, so I start sight range as well. Eight zerglings fail to destroy the northern Protoss encampment, due to a suicidal storm. I take eleven mutalisks, and run past Brown's foolish spaced line of missile turrets around his plateau. My mutalisks kill the vast majority of Brown's peon line. I then start on his academy, but see marines massing, and pull back, instead hitting the cc. I start to bring my queens over, but one dies to turret fire, so I raze a few more with my mutas, but
then retreat due to oncoming marines. Seeing the opprotunity to hurt the dreaded Terrans, I send in my last queen, infesting Brown's Command Center. Brown marines shot it down fast, and my queen dies to a large number of towers protecting Brown's natural, presumably built in panic against my mutalisks. Successive scouts die to my Sunkens before achieving my ramp.
Pulling my mutalisks back, I hurredly start a greater Spire,
when blue takes out the two overlords above the island, which have deposited three drones. I start a hatchery, and two extractors. Blue and Yellow expand to their naturals,
Yellow having had to wait for detection to find my well-placed zergling.I place an evolution chamber at the island when the hatchery and following drone are finished. At my
south expansion, I have two spore colonies guarding the skies, and a sunken in the approach gap, with overlords patrolling the high ground above, and many drones working.
I start more mutalisks. Fearing a large number of corsair that kill my overlord overlooking the Protoss natural expansion, I start four spore colonies on the center island, soon followed by two sunken colonies, and worker drones. My first twelve mutalisks, I morph into devourers. Blue covers an expansion to the mineral only expansion beteen his base and mine, but retreats from attacking my natural due to devourers.
From my two spires, I begin double upgrading, as well as researching broodling. With the much gas I have, I make 12 guardians and start on more mutalisks.Deciding to have some fun, I head on over to Brown again, and attack with my guardians, killing several turrets and marines. I pull
back when a wraith comes by, and I am moving dangerously away from the ledge. After I have twelve mutalisks added to my air force, I start on queens, being low on gas. Soon 12
queens also grace the sky. I sacrifice an overlord to examine the close expansion blue has. Seeing four templar, I wait until my Queens are ready, and broodling all his templar. That having been done, I send in my Guardians, then devs against corsair, then mutalisks from opposite sides. I also ensare the corsair, preventing retreat. When that base is destroyed, I pull back, having lost a devourer, and two mutalisks. I replenish my losses, and notice I still have lots of gas. It seems my main and valley are mined out.
Oh well. I load up my valley's drones into an overlord and round out the island miners. At my main I start two deflier mounds. Soon I have three defilers at every expansion, fully upgraded. I even spend money on a carapace upgrade.Just as I reach 200 support, things get hairy.Yellow
expands to the 9:00 mineral only expansion in force, bringing battlecruisers, a science vessel, and several valkyries. Blue retakes the 3:00 expansion, with 2 templar, 2 dark archons, 8 carriers, and 12 corsair. I sit and wait, parasiting the corsair and carrier fleets. Waiting a bit more, I let the carriers move off, and broodling both templar. Blue retreats.
I decide to kill the yellow expansion, and head my fleet off. I send in my guardians first, and find an almost empty base, killing turrets and marines, then razing the base. Finally, valkyries and Battlecrusiers, yellow ships, appear from the Brown base. I take some guardian casualties to valkyrie fire, and two of them are irradiated. Good. Good, you ask? Yes, for the calvary has arrived. I send my irraidated guardians north, but they die to turret fire. I'm happy that my air superiority fleet is untouched. 12 fully upgraded Devourers fire on the battlecruisers, spraying them with acid spores. I count 9 battlecruisers, and 12 valkyries. I order my devourers to fire upon the valks after they unleash their first volley on the battle cruisers. During this time, I have maneuvered my mutalisks to a north and south position, relative to the Terran's center and my devs east. When they are in position, at the time of the second dev volley, AFTER the valks have acquired the devs as their target, I send the mutalisks in.
For fun, I ensnare the 6 valks left when my queen arrives. The final tally is awe-inspiring for the swarm. Five devourers have been lost, six guardians, and just over twelve mutalisks. This is good for the cost of a yellow expansion, and the entire yellow fleet. I believe the Terran commander put it best when he said "Damn" After a Protoss inquiry, the commander only said, "Teal is good."
I morph my remaining mutalisks into replacement devourers, after Brown appears and irradiates two devourers with two sci vessels. They die to concentrated fire, and I send my sickened minions to die finding out that Brown's natual is dead, and there is an impressive crescent carved out of his main. A short time later, 24 mutalisks have been replaced, and I am ready to take the next challenger. I round out the rest of my support with zerglings, but only come to a max of 187.
Blue's carrier and corsair fleet is back at the 3:00 mineral only expansion, supported by two templar and two dark archons. He has also built two cannons. I see the whole scene as a result of some small parasites. Deciding not to attack in force, I bring three defilers to bear on blue. The first plague gets half his carriers. The second plague the rest. The defilers die before I can get his corsair. Angry, Blue proceeds to attack my center island. Knowing that this is my only major source of minerals, I worry, and set up my fleet. Beforehand, however, I broodling the two templar, and chase off his DA's with cannons, sending in my guardians to finish the expansion. That having been done, I position my fleet.
Again, the Devourers attack first, spraying spores first on the carriers, then the corsair. Realizing that the carriers are useless for the spray anyway, I have my devourers focus on the corsair. I bring up two queens and ensare the lot. The mutalisks follow from both sides, as before.
However, this Protoss commander is cunning. He, too, has spell casters, and brings in two Dark Archons and two templar in shuttles. using a combination of maelstrom and storm, the Protoss heavily damages my devourers and mutalisks. Thanks to my three-pronged attack, however, the damage is only severe, not catastrophic. When the dust settles, the Protoss only has four carriers left. I build another flight of mutalisks, only 6 at this time, because of mineral problems. Those 6 mutalisks easily handle the carriers, which had damaged shields in the fight as well as plagued hulls. I lose one mutalisk. I compliment the Protoss on his skills, and the ferocity of the fight. He replies that he was impressed as well.
Realizing I have a problem, I send my guardians to attack the Protoss, razing his natural. My 6 mutalisks kill his three defending corsair, due to spreading. My guardians continue, and I broodling three templar before they can cast storm. Unfortunately, I make the unwise purchase of three more mutalisks instead of a hatchery at an expansion. I am now mining only a few small piles on the island, and long distance mining from the 9:00 mineral expansion. I do have the assurance that no one else is mining at all.
My guardians die to newly produced corsair, even as they kill the cannons around the Stargates, and two of those structures themselves. Seeing the gates continue to glow, I decline to save them with my mutalisks, and instead let the guardians die. Things die down a bit, the Protoss producing, I'm mining long-distance, and the Terrans are oddly silent.
Things begin to grow worse when the Protoss realizes I am not about to kill him. A full group of corsair sallies out from his damaged and burning base, killing overlords over my long-distance mining site. I only avoid storming of the line by three quick broodlings. I continue to mine, as my forces fail me all over the map. Corsair run rampant, and my overlords cannot even find refuge on the middle island, when the corsair come and d-web the spore colonies. My overlords wear down their pneumatized carapaces running all the way around the map, my queens as well. I am constantly giving orders, retreating from one base to the rest.
My best hope now lies in the west, where I have retreated my six mutalisk and some overlords. I pull up my burrowed drone, and start a hatchery when I finally achieve 300 minerals. I continue long-distance mining from the 9:00 position.
My position is bad, but survivable. I have plagued the corsair, and my ground defenses and tech buildings have not been harmed. But the hammer truly falls when Yellow appears from Brown's base, shortly after that Terran is eliminated. Two battlecrusiers and eight valkyrie emerge from the darkness, and a full control group of land forces arrives over the ridge of my southern expansion. Four tanks take up seige positions on the rige, and two firebats, two medics, and four marines take station on the other side. Blue ambles along, and d-webs the spore colonies before retreating from valkyrie fire. After my sparse air defense falls quickly, the yellow fleet moves on, and takes station over my ramp's sunken colonies. The battlecruisers start killing my sunkens.
I unburrow my defilers, grimly deciding that at least the Terran will have to pay money for repairs. Blue has continued to hunt my overlords and queens. I have found refuge for a few of each, at Brown's now vacant plateau.
My hatchery finally complets at the 9:00 expansion, and I detour some overlords and a queen to my main, to distract Blue's rampaging corsair. Once they are there, I ensnare the corsair, and take most of my long-distance miners to the 9:00 expansion.
Two of my choke sunkens have fallen, and the hatchery was bleeding profusely. But the Terran has remained, despite a second round of plagueing. Smelling success, I hatch four scourge at my main, and bring one mutalisk over by my main. The four scourge successfully kill the now twice-plagued battlecruisers, and my super-mutalisk kills eight 1/250 valkyries. In three shots!
Deciding to finish the blow, I bring all my remaining queens to my southern expansion, which currently consists of an extractor. After three broodlings, his tanks are destroyed, one by the vicious attacks of my new warriors swarming on the last tank. The other queens destroy the medics and firebats. Complimenting my play, the second Terran resigned. Unfortunately, the Protoss corsair spotted my re-massed queens, and came in for the slaughter. Unlike previous occasions, the squadron proved willing to split up, and so decimated my queens, and my overlords at Brown's main.
Despite my success killing orange, my hold on this game is still tenous at best. However, my mining has beeen paying off. I have enough money to morph all six of my mutalisks into devourers. But I am also at the limit of my supply. The corsair's campaign is paying off, and I have only 40 supply left. Most of those are drones. I transfer more drones to my expansion, but I have enough money to start three more overlords, now an unprecedented expenditure.
After checking out my zero grouping, I discover that Blue has missed two very damaged queens. After mining for a bit more, I manage to start three more mutalisks. Blue soon find my base after these are done, but when he loses a plagued corsair to my devourer's first volley, he retreats.
After another mutalisk hatches, I bring my forces to the Protoss expansion at 12:00. I morph my mutas into guardians, and raze the base. The Protoss says uh-oh. Finding my two queens, I broodling two unwary templar, loosing a queen. After plaguing the cannons in front of the Protoss's natural, I destroy the cannons and reinforcing corsair. My devourers destroy them, at the loss of two guardians and four devourers. As I slowly destroyed the cannons, the Protoss evacuated with the rest of his forces.
I celebrated late, my battle for indepenance having been won. Oh, Kerrigan would hear of the Praetor Cerebrate again. Yes, she would.
When the final tallies were in, I outscored the nearest competor, the Yellow Terran, by a factor of two. The Protoss was near the Yellow Terran.
.Praetor
www.sclegacy.com/phoenix/ |
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