A Look At Starcraft 2 Roach Tactics

Tactics in StarCraft 2 can be rather situational as situations may arise that you can never really prepare for. In that sense, the idea of Zerg Roach Tactics is a bit of a broad topic. However, depending on whatever arises, the Roach may be an ideal unit for certain situations.

The Roach is a great unit, especially when supporting a swarm of Zerglings. In a lot of ways Roaches to Zerglings are what Firebats and Medics were to a good squad of Marines back in the Brood War era of Starcraft. Roaches are similar to Hydralisks in the sense that they use a ranged venom attack, and are therefore, not solely restricted to the use of their mandibles in close quarters combat. However, the drawback of this saliva is that it can only target ground units, making the Hydralisk the more versatile unit.



Still, for the price Roaches are a great unit. They cost less minerals and gas than a Hydralisk, and have more hit-points than both a Hydralisk and a Zergling due to their armored carapace, and they dish out respectable damage as well. They miss out on not being able to target air units, however, and that's certainly a drawback. But Roaches are in no way easy prey to aerial assaults, as once burrow is researched they can burrow underground.

Whilst burrowed Roaches can regenerate their health faster, which can certainly make them a nuisance and it is perhaps ironic they are named after a common pest. Left unchallenged, however, a bunch of Roaches can certainly cause a lot of trouble. Once Tunneling Claws is researched Roaches can move underground and regenerate their health faster underground. The Glial Reconstitution increases their movement speed.

One thing Roaches are great for is destroying enemy structures and workers. Their ability to infiltrate settlements through tunneling is a definite perk. Using air units as a diversionary force whilst infiltrating with Roaches, backed up by Zerglings is a great way at whittling down enemy structures. While your opponent focuses on your air units, thinking that is your main force, Roaches can pop up in strategic locations and destroy buildings and resource gathering units, whilst Zerglings take out any forward facing structures. The generally low cost of Zerglings makes them excellent units to continuously send in large swarms.

If you aren't using a strategy that involves many hatcheries and large unit output, and want to create squads that are more specialized, it doesn't hurt to have a Roach or two in there also.

The best way to get the most out of any early game unit, is to make sure your opponent's scouts do not detect any of the early game buildings that you create. A good idea for hiding any unit related building from potential scouts would be to build your unit structures behind your mineral wall. Typically, if you are defended well enough, enemy scouts will seldom penetrate your settlement enough to detect anything beyond your minerals.

By not cluing your opponent in on any of the units you may be building, you can most certainly provide yourself with a decent advantage, especially if you can scout them out and discover what unit structures they are building, therefore allowing you to spawn the appropriate units to counter-attack them successfully.

All in all, the Roach is a very good unit at taking on opposing ground unit types, but its Achilles' heel is definitely its inability to attack air units and its slow attack. Coupled with Zerglings, however, Roaches make for a strong supporting unit, and certainly add a degree of firepower to any Zerg army which includes them.