Zergling Rush

6 Pool Zergling Rush Strategy

Overview

The 6 Pool Zergling Rush is a do or die strategy that involves getting Zerglings as fast as humanly possible and crushing your opponent within the very early game. This strategy can be both fun and fiercely effective. It is a very high risk strategy but the reward can be a very early win or a large advantage to yourself should the rush be successful.
The purpose of the 6 Pool Zergling Rush is to kill the enemy early game or do devastating damage to their economy before they have a chance to react with the appropriate counters, if the rush is successful then you have either already won or you are now in a very advantageous position. Should the rush fail though you will be left with a meagre economy, a small sized army or no army at all and quite far behind in tech. So it’s important you use the Zergling rush to maximum effect to get the best results, I shall show you how to do this.

Build order
This build order is designed as a straight forward build to forming the strategy, it does not consider any of the multiple various enemy threats that you may encounter. You should only deviate away from the build order should you be pressured enough by your opponent into forcing you to build appropriate counters such as an army or static defence to defend yourself against the threat. Try to stick to the build order as best as you can to achieve maximum results.
*Text in BOLD CAPITAL letters – refers to units & buildings that you will build.
*Text in Italics – refers to what action you need to take with the unit or building)
*Text in underline – refers to a mechanic or ability you need to use.
1. Send Drones to Minerals until you have 200 minerals
2. SPAWNING POOL
3. DRONE
4. DRONE (Send this Drone to scout for the enemy base if you are playing on a map that has 4 potential start locations – you can always use this drone to create a spine crawler in your opponents base if they are Zerg (once you have built a Spawning Pool)
5. CREATE 3x ZERGLINGS immediately when your Spawning Pool is finished building and send them towards your opponents base
6. OVERLORD
7. ZERGLINGS (Whenever you have Larva)
8. OVERLORD (Whenever you reach your supply cap)
9. QUEEN (Create a Queen once you have used all possible Larva for Zerglings and you have enough minerals for the Queen)
*Things to Note
[a] Should the rush fail then you will need to start making as many Drones as you can to boost your economy so long as you are under no real threat
[b] The rush is intended to win and if you are unable to finish your opponent with Zerglings then you will need to play on and choose the best tech line that will help you to win the game

Play style
With a 6 Pool Zergling Rush build you should be aiming to play very aggressively, making Zerglings immediately & sending them to your enemy’s main base as fast as possible and killing as many enemy workers or buildings that will help slow down the enemy production rate (such as Pylons). All the while you are doing this you should be trying to avoid taking any damage from enemy army forces unless you can kill those forces without losing the advantage of the early pressure that Zerglings provide.
Remember, you will increase your chances of winning a great deal more by killing workers over army units as this will slow down the enemy economy and do greater overall damage. The other reason for focusing enemy workers over army units with your Zerglings is that should the rush become stoppable by your opponent then at least you will have slowed down their economy enough to reduce their ability to outnumber you with units, although you will have a small economy yourself due to using most of your Larva for Zerglings instead of Drones.
This strategy is very risky as it is and should only really be used on small 1v1 maps so you know where your opponent is. It’s still possible to use this strategy on smallish maps with 4 main base areas but you will need to scout before your Zerglings are made so you know where you need to send the Zerglings. Time is of the absolute essence with this strategy, you must win fast or risk fighting a long uphill battle.

Micro
*Focus on killing workers with your Zerglings
*Hit and run the workers; Attack the workers with your Zerglings and provoke your opponent into dragging all of his workers away from the mineral line to defend himself, at this point you simply run your Zerglings back and wait for him to return his workers to the mineral line, that’s when you strike again with the Zerglings! Rinse & repeat this method whenever possible. This allows you efficiently damage your opponents economy whilst taking as little damage as possible.
*Kill the enemy army units only if you can still put the pressure on after inevitably losing some Zerglings in the process otherwise dodge the enemy army units and harass their workers instead.
* Burrow: See “Upgrades” Section, Point 4.
Macro
*Spawn Creep Tumors and spread them in a straight line heading towards your opponents base to allow Zerglings faster movement between bases
*Spawn Larva whenever possible to increase the number of Zerglings you can create

Upgrades
With a super fast 6 Pool Zergling Rush there is little chance you will be able to use any upgrades to boost the effectiveness of this strategy, however if the game does continue to play out then this is a list of the preferred upgrades for this strategy should you have the chance to research them.
[Some of the upgrades further down the list may be not be necessary depending upon the units & playstyle you choose to use]
1. Metabolic Boost (Increases the movement speed of Zerglings)
[Requires: Hatchery, Spawning Pool]
This is an exceptional ability that will boost the effectiveness of your Zerglings greatly. They will move much faster and will be able to perform hit and run attacks on workers whilst being able to dodge enemy army units with much more ease. You will gain a lot more control with this upgrade allowing you to really put the pressure on your opponent.
2. Evolve Melee Attacks Level 1 > 3 (Upgrades the attacks of all ground melee units)
[Level 1 Requires: Hatchery. Level 2 Requires: Lair. Level 3 Requires: Hive]
Level 1 of this upgrade will increase your Zerglings damage by 1. This doesn’t sound like much but it’s actually a 20% damage increase for only 100 Minerals & 100 Vespine Gas. Each level of this upgrade increases the Zergling damage by 1 each time.
3. Evolve Ground Carapace Level 1 > 3 (Upgrades the armor of all Zerg ground units):
[Level 1 Requires: Hatchery. Level 2 Requires: Lair. Level 3 Requires: Hive]
Whilst ground armor upgrades don’t tend to be as useful for Zerg units as they are for Terran or Protoss, this upgrade is still worth getting if you can as it will increase the armor of all Zerg units and not just Zerglings.
4. Evolve Burrow (Enables all Zerg ground units to burrow making it invisible unless detected)
[Requires: Lair]
With this strategy this ability is useful for both Zerglings and Banelings in particular. Burrowed Zerglings, if placed carefully, will prevent your opponent from building on the same spot you have burrowed that Zergling. I suggest using this ability with Zerglings at places you expect your opponent to build (like expansion areas) so he will need to go to the effort of detecting your Zergling and killing it before he can build anything.
Burrowed Banelings can act as land mines because you are able to explode them whilst they are burrowed. This can be absolutely devastating if used correctly. The best way to use burrowed Banelings is to spread them out across choke points (most likely your own natural expansion choke point) and wait for your opponent to march his army right over them then highlight the ones in range of his army and press X to explode the Banelings. You can also use burrowed Banelings as a pre-emptive strike, for example, if you suspect your opponent is going to expand then you can burrow several banelings along the gap in between where his expansion and the mineral line is. Then you wait for the appropriate time (preferably when the mineral line is fully saturated) and blow up all of his workers at once. In both cases I suggest you use Banelings in situations where they are unlikely to be detected or if your opponent puts little effort into scouting and detecting.
5. Pneumatized Carapace (Increases the movement speed of Overlords and Overseers)
[Requires: Lair]
This is necessary as you will need to keep checks on your opponent so you can build units/buildings in accordance to how he is playing. Using your Overlords with this upgrade allows you to scout with multiple moderately fast air units (Overlords) which will give you a larger scope of what is happening on the map.
Support
There is very little that can support a 6 Pool Zergling Rush other than more Zerglings. I do have 2 suggestions though if you are able to afford them:
1. If your opponent is Zerg then you may want to send a drone or two to your opponents main. How can this help put the odds in your favour I hear you ask? Well you can attempt to build Spine Crawler(s) at the edge of your opponents Creep either before or during the rush (depending on how confident you feel and how ignorant your opponent might be so they may miss it being built). a Spine Crawler will help provide cover for your Zerglings and should you have the chance to move it within range of your opponents Hatchery then it will deal 30 damage per hit every time it attacks the Hatchery.
2. Should your rush start to fail then try and hide a few Zerglings inside of your opponents main base in the future hope that you can realistically transition them into Banelings should you build a Baneling Nest. Then you simply try and judge the most effective time to send those Banelings into your opponents mineral line trying to take out as many workers as you can.

Counters
Protoss Counters
*If the enemy Protoss gets one Zealot for every 4 Zerglings you have then you will need to focus enemy workers only, unless you can separate the Zealots and pick them off one by one without taking too much damage, otherwise you may need to switch to only harassing with the current Zerglings you have in his base whilst building drones at your own base to boost your economy.
*If the enemy Protoss gets Photon Cannons and you are unable to kill them then you must try and attack whatever you can (preferably workers) providing you are outside the range of the Photon Cannons, otherwise if he has too many then simply stop producing Zerglings and start massing Drones as he will of spent a large amount of his resources on static defence that won’t be useful if you stop attacking and start boosting your own economy.
Terran Counters
*If the enemy Terran manages to wall off his ramp then and it seems unlikely that you can continue the rush then you may need to back off and start building Drones instead for economy
*If the enemy Terran successfully manages to build a bunker inside of his mineral line and houses Marines inside of it then you will be unlikely to hurt the Terran much without losing a greater amount of forces, so just harass whatever you can whilst building Drones at your base for economy.
Zerg Counters
*If the enemy Zerg outnumbers you in army size regarding food cost then you will need to back off and start pumping drones and prepare for a longer game as it is unlikely you will able to kill his Zerglings if he backs them up with Drones.
*If the enemy Zerg successfully builds and finishes a Spine Crawler and you don’t have enough Zerglings to kill it then once again you will need to back off and start pumping drones and prepare for a longer game as it is unlikely you will able to kill the Spine Crawler if he backs it up with Zerglings & Drones.