About a week and a half ago, WCS America season 1 Premier League had a group (stage 2, group C) with 3 Zerg players. With the patch out increasing Spore Crawler damage against Mutalisks, we got to see what ZvZ looks like when you can actually do different things.
Before this balance patch (which doesn’t have its own number, unfortunately), ZvZ was all Mutalisks. Early game was Zergling and Baneling trades, where the defender usually had the advantage. Once it got to Lair, Zergs would invest gas in Mutalisks, and getting the 1st volley or having 1 or 2 more Mutalisks was the difference.
Post-patch ZvZ looks more like WoL ZvZ. The early game is the same, the midgame is mostly Roaches, and then you mix in Hydras or Infestors (and eventually both) until the late game comes late. Most games would be decided around 3 bases in the midgame, however.
So the builds. Unfortunately, the matchups, cheeses, and technical difficulties mean that we have 3 games between Suppy and Revival and only 1 between Revival and Scarlett, but this is a good set of them. All of those are below in long form. Just a few notes ahead of time. I’ll be updating my Zerg strategy guide based on the recent changes to ZvZ, so read that for the bigger picture.