Zerg players all too often simply spawn masses of hydras and try to swarm opponents under. This is sad for me, because I think the Zerg can be the most subtle and tricky race if played well. Following is a list of tactics to confuse, surprise, and annoy when playing Zerg.

1. As soon as you get lurkers, burrow at least two at your opponent’s choke. The next infantry coming out of their base will die quickly, and with most of them trapped on the ramp, you’ll hit several units with each attack, PLUS only a few will be able to hit your lurks at a time, even assuming they have detection. This is especially devastating against the protoss, because they get mobile detectors fairly late in the game. However, you need more lurks against toss (6-8)

2. If you’re careful, you can burrow lurkers ON TOP of each other. There are several benefits; first, it will look like you have a smaller defense than you actually have. Second, the first shot of all lurkers burrowed on top of each other will hit the same target, virtually ensuring instant infantry KO. And third, units without splash damage will only be able to attack one lurk at a time, allowing your lurks to last longer and get in more attacks. On the flip side, reavers and siege tanks will hit all of your stacked lurkers at once, so don’t stack more then four.

3. So many Zerg players fail to appreciate cliffs. Whenever you have a cliff nearby, you should place hydras and lurkers on it, with an ovie to spot. And yes, lurkers CAN shoot down cliffs, so put them at the edge to maximize their range.

4. Instead of the top or bottom of ramps, burrow ‘lings in the middle. When enemy units try to climb your ramp, unburrow the lings once they’re about half-way up. The lings will block the ramp and slow them down, letting your defenses get in free hits while the enemy clear out the lings. The lings might even take down a couple of enemy units. This also works in non-ramp chokes, but not quite as well.

5. A chevachee (not sure if I spelled that right) is an attack directed towards destroying your opponents economy and causing terror. Cracklings are perfect for this, because their speed allows them to race past even fairly heavy defenses. To do this you need 18-30 cracklings. Split them up into three groups and tell them to move past the defenses in a bunch. DON’T STOP CLICKING UNTIL ALL OF THEM ARE THROUGH! If you do, some will get confused and start running in circles. As you pass the defenses, charge straight for the mineral line. You should still have 8-20 cracklings, depending on how many you used, so attack-move them right into the workers and kill as many as you can. Once all the workers are dead or have run away, attack the production buildings.

An alternative strategy is to use the crackling rush to distract siege tanks/reavers while hydralisks attack the defenses.

6. To take out bunker/tank combos quickly, you will need 3-4 groups of zerglings and 8-12 lurkers. Charge the zerglings into the bunkers so that everything is shooting at them, then move the lurkers up between the bunkers and burrow them. Everything should be destroyed in about ten seconds. This is slightly less effective against protoss because storm and reavers can kill lurkers amazingly quickly.

7. There are three effective ways to stop expansions. First, containment. Burrow about six lurkers in front of your opponents ramp, backed up by 1-2 groups of hydras, a couple of ovies and maybe some ultras plus miscellaneous zerglings. Keep scourge and mutas patrolling the perimeter of the contained area. Unfortunately siege tanks and wraiths can easily break the blockade, or at least open a hole big enough for a dropship to escape. Second, search and destroy. You can have a couple groups of zerglings patrolling expansion areas constantly. 24 lings is enough power to destroy fledgling expansions, and even if defenses are too heavy, that will give you warning. But my personal favorite is to picket expansion spots by placing 3 or 4 lurkers at every resource node, plus key crossroads and bridges. 4 lurkers have enough power to kill small expansion attempts, they provide early warning of expansion, and they are untouchable unless there is a detector nearby, PLUS they act as defense for any colonies you set up in the picketed position! Place lurks just to the side of the best town hall spot, so any worker trying to build a town hall will be destroyed quickly.

8. After someone has destroyed one of your bases, place a few lurkers at the choke and rip them up as they leave!

This last tactic is actually an old one, but very few people seem to use it lately. It will eliminate a protoss player almost instantly if you can pull it off. 

9. I know it sounds weird, but zerglings are the ultimate anti-protoss unit. They may not be able to fight zealots, but if you move fast they might not have to. Good scouting is important to pull this off, but don’t scout with one of your first four drones. Scout with the seventh or eighth drone, and KEEP IT ALIVE. Don’t get it killed by probes, and don"t build an offensive extractor. At your base build another hatchery, and then a Spawning Pool. The pool and hatchery will finish pretty close to one another if you start the hatchery first, and you should spawn 8 zerglings right away. As soon as they are done, send them to the protoss base. The protoss player might actually not have any zealots yet, and at most they will have two or three. Run your zerglings right to the mineral line, ignoring everything else, and kill all the probes. NOTHING ELSE MATTERS! IGNORE THE GATEWAYS! If you kill all the probes your zerglings, plus any others you’ve spawned, can take out the zealots and buildings with ease. By the time you’ve finished killing that player, you should have a bunch of hydras and gas, and now you have a prime expansion area. This also works on terrans to an extent, but they can just float their buildings away, so zerglings can’t totally kill them.