[ZvP] 5 Hatch Hydra -> Muta Build

ZvP 5 Hatch Hydra -> Muta Build
From: TeamLiquid's Recommended Threads: LINK
By: w3jjjj

Several ppl have asked me to do a ZvP guide like my standard ZvT. Problem is that ZvP isn't standardized like ZvT is. Every P FE continuation creates different problems, where as most T's FE continuation can be handled by the same defiler abuse. So I've decided to write a guide on the popular 5 hatch hydra --> muta build.

Early game set up:

The goal of this phase is to get 5 hatch, with exactly 28 drones on minerals and 6 on gas before switching to hydra production. I'll give more details as we go.

Whatever opening is fine, be it 12 hatch, 12 pool, over pool, 9 pool, and 9 pool speed are all viable. In my testing, there really isn't much of an econ difference between over pool and 9 pool. My suggestion is that on larger maps use 9 pool, cuz you'll need those earlier lings to force 2 cannons before nexus; on smaller maps use overpool, due to shorter distances an overpool is enough to force 2 cannons before nexus and you get a slightly better econ.

All the openings converge after third hatch, you get gas right away. First 100 gas go lair, second 100 gas go ling speed. In the earlier version of this guide I've stated that you should make units up to supply limit in early game, like 18/18 overlord, 27/27 overlord. But after extensive testing, I've found no real econ difference between this approach and the more common way of making overlords before supply limit. Currently I make overlord before supply limit just because I'm more used to it. I make 15/18 overlord and 23/27, 32/35 overlord (because we will put 2 additional hatch down before going over 35 supply, there is no need for earlier overlord for this particular limit), after 35 supply limit, I make overlord as soon as the previous one comes out.

For defense I base my ling timing on P's gate timing. If I did 12 hatch and he did forge first, I'll only make 2 lings to chase the probe, all drones until his 1st zealot comes out, then 6 more lings to deal with his 2 zeal push. Speed will finish soon so a 3 zeal push is no big deal, you can make 4 more lings After he comes out, plenty of time. Generally, there is no need for a sunken in early game, speedllings should kill anything that comes at you.

Spire when lair finishes. I generally have excess minerals to make 4th hatch around 32 supply, and 5th hatch on 35 supply. Once 5th hatch is put down, I get den and second gas. When den finish I make the evolution chamber, and start upgrading both hydra and ovie speed. +1 missile attack when chamber finish. I always make 4 scourge, so I can scout immediately with 1 pair and have the other pair deal with the corsair. Also this is a good time to get 1 sunken at your nat and 1 at your third. DT is coming, but we have sunken and hydras coming out to deal with them.

As I stated earlier, you want 28 drones on minerals and 6 on gas before hydra production, so the exact trigger supply depends on how many lings and scourge you've made. I have the habit of making 12 lings and 4 scourge, plus my 34 drones, that equals 42 supply exactly, which is when I start hydra production. If you made less lings, you can start hydra production even earlier, as soon as your drone count reach the desired 28-6.

This completes the early set up.

Demos vs computer with cheat codes on, only intended to show the bo.

12 hatch

http://www.repdepot.net/replay.php?id=10806

9 pool

http://www.repdepot.net/replay.php?id=10807

12 pool and over pool are very similar to 12 hatch and 9 pool respectively. 9 pool speed is something I almost never use, but everything flows the same way after the initial opening, so you can figure it out.


Hydra play and transition into mutas

To prepare for mutas, get third gas at 54-60 supply. Then roughly at 60 supply make 5 drones, 1 to replace the drone used for 3rd gas, 3 to put on the 3rd gas, and 1 for 6th hatch in just a bit.

Sometimes P tries to take a super fast third as soon as the first 2 templars come out. You should not allow him to get cannons up undisturbed. With your first 2 groups of hydra/ling, so pressure him. Although I normally recommend not fighting templars until mutas come out, this is a special case, because it is so early in the game where neither of you have many units. At this point P only has 2 storms, and it should not be too difficult to dodge them since you only have 2 groups to micro. For that reason, it is ok to challenge the P if he tries to get a super fast third. If you manage to snipe the templars (or the archon if he morphed it), then that's a big gain for you even if you have to run from the zealots after.

Sometimes P is extra brave and he skips cannons for earlier gateways, betting his life on the chance that you won't make mutas. This may sound stupid, but there is no way for Z to know whether P made cannon or not until scourge gets there, by which point it would be too late to change your unit choice. This risky gamble can actually pay off big for P, since every cannon is the equivalent of a gateway, skipping 2-3 cannons translates into 2-3 earlier gateways and much faster zealots. This can create a challenge for Z in the hydra vs zeal/archon fight, since P will have more zealots than usual, it doesn't necessarily make P's army superior, but it will be more demanding on Z's unit formation. If your scourge gets to P's base and you realized that he skipped cannons for earlier gates, make a mental note of it and get ready to face more zealots, pay extra attention to your unit positioning. Also, once mutas come out, remember to go check his base, sometimes P forgets to add more cannons in time after initially skipping them, and you can do some good damage there.

Assume P player normal with proper cannoning, adding 5 gates after archive, and does not seek to expo super early . You should keep making hydras up to 85 supply, you should have 43 hydras plus the earlier lings for 4 groups of hydra/ling. Get ready for muta switch.

Note: through experience, I've found that the 9 minute mark is a good point to do a supply check. For example, if you opened with overpool and did everything correctly with a no rush 9 agreement, at the 9 minute mark you should have 85 supply with 4 groups of hydra/ling, your opponent should have 95 supply with an army of 2-3 archons and 15 ish zealots. Now typically in a real game with early harass and less than perfect macro, you can be happy with 80 supply at 9 minutes, and P can be happy with 90 supply. However, if you have even lower, then there is something wrong with your early execution and you must find it and correct it. No build can be effective if you don't produce enough units. The supply count at the 9 minute mark varies in other openings, check my opening reps vs computer posted above for more detail.

Here, if :
1. P made 2-3 archons and try to pressure/expo with zeal/archon, you have the ideal counter, 4 groups of upgraded hydras easily get the upper hand in this fight. However, army positioning is crucial, you must keep all your hydras clumped together, so that only the front line hydras take damage, with the rest abusing their range attack safely in the back. Despite the army advantage, you can lose this fight if your hydras are poorly placed and all those zealots can find a target to stab. I've lost battles here even with superior army, simply due to poor army positioning, so be careful.

Usually P will not fight you without storm once he realized you have enough hydras, so he'll go back to get those new hts. Z here should make several overlords ahead of time so he can make 11 mutas quickly, all the mineral and gas build up will pay off right now. As you make mutas, take your 4th expo.

You want to snipe the templars and gain map control with your big blob of about 50 upgraded hydras, with muta support. Micro is important, as with all muta builds...You must kill all or at least most of the templars so your hydras can rule, otherwise it defeats the whole purpose of this build.

A particular control problem came up in my practices, which is large army control, 48 hydras will take up 4 hotkeys, plus your mutas also take up a hotkey, so that's 1-5 occupied. For Z like me who use 4-0 for hatcheries, putting 4 and 5 on units may hurt our macro a little. The solution I've found is to use f4 to replace 4, and f3 to replace 5, so I can just tap the f keys and quickly manually produce from the un-hotkeyed hatches. If you have more hydras, I don't think you need to group them all, 4 groups is enough.

2. Less ideal is when P feels bold and does not make archons, he will have 4-6 templars with storms, (which would have left him vulnerable to an early muta attack...), but we made only hydras so we'll just let him be comfortable for a bit, until our mutas come out.

Several times I've tried to out micro the zeal/ht army with my hydras, and I've lost every one of those games. If you think about it, the point of our build is to use mutas to snipe templars and then dominate with hydras, if you fight with hydras first, even if you win the fight (vs 4-6 storms depending on how early you fight), there won't be much left of your hydra army after the battle. And what's the point of making mutas anymore when the templars are dead? My advice is to just stay away from templars unless P attacks you.

If P does show aggression, try to snipe templars with hydras when he is moving, and then do a perfect surround at the last second pinning him to a cliff somewhere.

Normally if P did not morph archons, he will try to take an early expo. Cuz if he really wanted to attack, he had to morph archons and attack with zeal/archon just in case you made muta. So by preserving templars he will most likely expo. Z should stop hydra production and get mutas right away.

Earlier I said you should try to gain map control in this situation with earlier muta hydra, but after practice I've found that is not the best approach. Since you are doing an earlier muta switch, you are not gonna have enough gas to make 11 mutas right away, and when you make mutas you won't have gas to make hydras at the same time. Therefore, I recommend making mutas and drones until you have 11 mutas, then resume hydra production.

This is actually a significant diversion from our standard strategy above vs zeal/archon. In this case we are actually getting more economy and less hydras due to earlier mutas, so Z should abandon his original plan of winning map control early with mass hydra, instead he should play a bit more defensively until his hydra count catches up. What we sacrifice in map control, we gain back in better econ, and a faster transition into 7 hatch lurker/hydra/ling, so it's a good trade.

A particular problem I've found in practice is that by getting earlier mutas and less hydras, our hydra army will not be strong enough to take on P's ground force by itself. Therefore, you must use the mtuas in any fight on top of the hydras to win. And that means when you are busy sniping templars, your hydras will be vulnerable without their critical mass. My advice is to pull back the hydras whenever you are busy sniping and your mutas can't help the battle. Pull hydras back until your mutas can rejoin the fight. Keep this in mind before you make enough hydras to hold the ground on their own.

3. P decided to go mass goon/templar. This is the build that counters our muta/hydra build, since he'll have many goons before he comes out, and templar sniping becomes dangerous for the Z, since for every shot you get off your mutas will take a lot of damage. When P gets about 20 goons muta sniping becomes practically impossible, and your hydra army is trash vs goon/ht with many storms.

If this is the case, you don't need too much gas because vs mass goons the best combo is your basic mass hydra/ling. Abandon muta transition, take drones off third gas, get 2 more chambers and mass hydra/ling, upgrade lurkers but keep in mind lurkers are supporting units in this case and you are not gonna make too many of them. Good thing is that with this setup you have 3 bases fully running with 36 drones on minerals and 6 on gas, soon your 4th will finish, so your econ is at least good.

Hydra/lurker/ling follow up

Discard situation 3 with goon/ht. For the previous 2 where our hydra/muta build works, you want to get lurker upgrade when you are making mutas, supply around 110, that should spend all of your gas, after lurker upgrade start, 2 more chambers to catch up normal upgrades while you get +2 missile attack. Make another round of drones, this is the strongest timing of our build, with 1 group of mutas and 4 groups of hydras, a very safe timing to boost our economy a bit.

Assume that all went well and you gained some map control, either denied or at least delayed P's third expo, when lurkers come out you can play hydra/lurker for a contain while going hive. When you are making those first batch of lurkers, get one more round of drones to saturate your 4th base, and make an additional hatchery so you have 7 in total. You should have 45 drones now for a very good econ. Unless you have comfortable map control and you want to saturate a new expo quickly, there is no more need for full rounds of drone production anymore, just slowly add a couple here and there from time to time to keep growing and concentrate on units. 7 hatch full units production is equivalent to 9 gateway production. P needs to have 3 base running to keep up with your 4.

If things didn't go so well and you have lost map control, due to mis micro of mutas and then lost hydras to storms, you will be in a great disadvantage...I would stop hydra production, make pure lurker/ling and turtle to cracks, defilers and drop, get islands, and eventually retake map with upgraded ultra/ling, but it's hard to fight an uphill battle so don't pay too much attention if your turtle fails, concentrate on perfecting your muta/hydra build so you Don't get into a situation where you can only turtle to survive.

Well, that's the general flow of things in this build.

Go watch F91 vs JF on destination, that's where I learned this build in the first place...

My illustration games:

Vs gns.i-cruzado, A- P.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=6IS2MBGE