Various Starcraft 2 Overseer Tactics

The Zerg player who wants to succeed needs to apply some Starcraft 2 Overseer tactics during play. The application of these strategies and maneuvers makes the difference between success or failure due to enemy cloaked units infiltrating your bases.

The overseer is a somewhat sturdy air unit that is morphed from the overlord once a Lair has been created by the Zerg player. They cannot transport units like the upgraded overlord however they come with other abilities and a faster movement speed to compensate. The overseer also provides the same supply of 8 as the overlord.



One of the crucial abilities of this unit is that it detects invisible units automatically. The overseer also has a couple of other abilities that need to be manually activated by the Zerg player. The first ability that we will look at is the contaminate ability which is used against enemy structures.

The contaminate ability will cover the enemy structure in slime for 30 seconds. During this time the enemy cannot produce units or research upgrades at the targetted building. Given that this ability uses a lot of energy it's important to prioritize which structures you wish to contaminate depending on the damage that you wish to inflict.

For example if you wish to delay an upgrade for your opponent then you should contaminate your opponent's research structure. On the other hand contaminating a headquarters building stops that building from producing additional workers and can hurt your opponent's overall economy.

This ability is very effective against Zerg opponents as all of their units are produced from larvae spawned from their headquarters building. Using contaminate on the Zerg hatchery will stop them from producing new units entirely from this structure for 30 seconds.

The overseer also has a second ability called spawn changeling. This ability requires far less energy than the contaminate ability. This ability spawns a changeling which can move around. Once it moves within range of an enemy unit it will morph into the basic unit of the enemy player. The changeling can morph into either a Zergline, Marine or Zealot.

Changelings can be used to keep tabs on enemy movements and they can be used to scout ahead, leaving the overseer behind in a safer position. Once the changeling has morphed it needs to be manually targeted by the enemy in order to be killed and its true form cannot be detected.

The overseer along with the overlord also benefits from the pneumatized carapace upgrade researched from the lair which increases the movement speed of these units. As overseers are always faster than overlords they can sometimes be used to directly scout an enemy base and then escape without being killed.