History ZergRush / AnimeAndManga

* A non-violent version appears at the climax of ''LightNovel/{{Durarara}}'''s first season, when [[UnfazedEveryman Mikado Ryuugamine]] publically confronts [[MadScientist Namie Yagiri]] in a crowded hotspot of Tokyo nightlife: admitting he has neither "the power nor the wisdom" to [[LoveMakesYouCrazy reason through her delusion]], he will instead rely on numbers, and presses the "Send" button on his cell phone. ''Every phone for at least a city block'' goes off at once with an incoming text, [[spoiler:simultaneously revealing every single person present to be a member of the Dollars, and Mikado himself to be their mysterious, urban-legendary founder]], intimidating Namie and her mere handful of armed goons into retreating. Well, okay, [[spoiler:Celty driving down the side of a building and going berserk]] may have helped that along a bit, but still.

* In ''Manga/{{Hellsing}}'' Alucard's level 0 releases the sum of all the millions of souls he's collected over the centuries, literally drowning entire armies in them. [[spoiler: The irony is that a variation of this trope is The Major's tactic against Alucard. First he let's the vampire battalion murder most of London resulting in above ''3 million'' deaths. Then the Vatican's army arrive and fight the vampire battalion. Alucard shows up and uses his level 0 state to kill them all. The goal is not to hope that his large army will kill off Alucard but to trick him into believing that this was their plan causing Alucard to believe he had been victorious. This would cause him to start to absorb all of the blood (and with it the souls) of all the millions that have died. Then Schrödinger would kill himself and be absorbed so that Alucard would gain his reality warping powers which would cause Alucard to cease to exist.]]

** This tactic is pretty much useless now against the protagonist and in the majority of the New World. The ability "Conquerer's Haki" allows the user to impose their will on someone, and, if the target's will is weak enough, knock them out. Luffy used this ability to knock out '''''50,000''''' {{Mooks}} in one blast - and the only reason he didn't knock out the other 50,000 is because his crew needed someone to fight.

* On both Lion Anime/{{Voltron}} and the original GoLion, the Red Berets were a small but terrifying force, whether in the very bloody original or the bowlderized adaptation. In both instances, either through murder or just creating terror and chaos, they had the population shuddering inside the Castle, demanding angrily that their heroes protect them and on the edge of despair if not revolt. But when the Berets show up even there, they swarm Black Lion and explode, their dust covering the lead Lion with gunk that renders it immobile and therefore unable to join the others when the giant enemy monster shows up. This all may have been a sign of the growing desperation of the evil lead trio, in that they didn't think this through. The Berets were causing a lot more damage and terror than many of the enemy attacks, but were traded for disabling one of the Lions, which by that late point in the series, the heroes had gotten very good at undoing.

* In ''Manga/PokemonSpecial'', a whole bunch of Unown that the Sinnoh trio saved in a previous occasion bombard the Galactic grunts blocking the entrance to the Veilstone Galactic Building so that Pearl can sneak in unnoticed.

** In the movie, the ELS mostly rely on this because in their first few encounters with humanity, they don't have ranged weapons. Of course, they also assimilate both organic and inorganic matter on contact, so they probably would have resorted to ramming speed anyway. One character in the final battle bemoans that the human forces are outnumbered over 10,000 to one... and it's not clear whether this is intended to be hyperbole.

** A large horde of Titans rush to [[spoiler:the Female Titan]] and eat their target before they can be stopped.

* In ''Anime/ValvraveTheLiberator'' the Dorssian forces often launch these kinds of attacks-its less because numbers are all they have, and more because the heroes have a very small force. The [[SuperPrototype Valvraves]] can stop most of these, but often they need superior tactics, provided by [[DesignatedHero L]] [[TheChessmaster Elf]] to win, and sometimes they just have to run away.

* This was part of the defense of ''Manga/OnePiece'''s Enies Lobby. A 10,000 man force of {{Mook}} Marines and other forces set to defend against any attempt to attack against it. While Luffy single handedly defeated a good tenth of that force and more fell to the allies the Straw Hats brought with them, the power of the Zerg Rush kicked in after the Straw Hats got to where their battles with [=CP9=] would take place and their allies were subdued and captured.
** Don Krieg and his pirate armada presumably utilized this tactic as well. While they call themselves the strongest pirates in the East Blue, Luffy informs them that they're just the one with the most people.
*** Fifty ships. 5000 men. East Blue calls it an invasion force. The Grand Line (Mihawk in particular) calls it '''''target practice'''''.
** This tactic is pretty much useless now against the protagonist and in the majority of the New World. The ability "Conquerer's Haki" allows the user to impose their will on someone, and, if the target's will is weak enough, knock them out. Luffy used this ability to knock out '''''50,000''''' {{Mooks}} in one blast - and the only reason he didn't knock out the other 50,000 is because his crew needed someone to fight.

* [[FacelessMooks The Safeguard]] in ''Manga/{{Blame}}!'', since they have many a MookMaker on hand and act as little more than a kind of elaborate anti-virus system (if the virus was humans).
* ''Anime/MobileSuitGundam00'' has problems with different versions of this throughout its life.
** In the first season, the three superpowers believe the only way they stand a chance against the technological superiority of the Gundams is to dog-pile them with as many mobile suits as possible (with varying degrees of success). Once the playing field is leveled by a mysterious benefactor handing the militaries their own GN Drive-powered mecha, the Gundams had to start fighting smart just to survive.
** In the final battle of the second season, [[spoiler:BigBad Ribbons Almark's master plan involves cheap mass-produced mobile suits, piloted by clones, which use Trans-Am to become almost unstoppable kamikaze missiles.]]
** In the movie, the ELS mostly rely on this because in their first few encounters with humanity, they don't have ranged weapons. Of course, they also assimilate both organic and inorganic matter on contact, so they probably would have resorted to ramming speed anyway. One character in the final battle bemoans that the human forces are outnumbered over 10,000 to one... and it's not clear whether this is intended to be hyperbole.
* A non-violent version appears at the climax of ''{{LightNovel/Durarara}}'''s first season, when [[UnfazedEveryman Mikado Ryuugamine]] publically confronts [[MadScientist Namie Yagiri]] in a crowded hotspot of Tokyo nightlife: admitting he has neither "the power nor the wisdom" to [[LoveMakesYouCrazy reason through her delusion]], he will instead rely on numbers, and presses the "Send" button on his cell phone. ''Every phone for at least a city block'' goes off at once with an incoming text, [[spoiler:simultaneously revealing every single person present to be a member of the Dollars, and Mikado himself to be their mysterious, urban-legendary founder]], intimidating Namie and her mere handful of armed goons into retreating. Well, okay, [[spoiler:Celty driving down the side of a building and going berserk]] may have helped that along a bit, but still.

* Used in ''LightNovel/BakaAndTestSummonTheBeasts'', Class F sets up traps so that they can overwhelm Class A students one at a time. Pretty effective until the rest of Class A breaks down the desk barrier Akihisa set up. In another summoner battle, Akihisa tricks the FFF cult to sacrifice themselves by declaring their enemy has a girlfriend. It works well enough to let him slip by.

* The aliens in both ''VideoGame/GunparadeMarch'' anime series follow this trope only by virtue of their superior numbers and mindlessness. Individual units are ''stronger'' than even the HumongousMecha of Earth (let alone more conventional vehicles, which are present in greater numbers) and the latter are forced to survive via better tactics and superweapons. ''Orchestra'' does show humans finally catching up with genetically engineered {{Mons}}.
* ''Franchise/LupinIII'':
** ''[[TabletopGame/LupinIII Lupin The 3rd: The Board Game]]'' starts the game with at least 8 cops to support Zenigata, so that player can ''try'' to Zerg Rush Lupin and the others. It probably won't work any better than it usually does, though.
** ''Anime/LupinIII'' anime episodes and movies sometimes have hundreds of police officers with Inspector Zenigata on the "Lupin Taskforce" to capture Lupin by sheer numbers. ''Anime/GreenVsRed'' reversed it by having a rush of hundreds of Lupins at one point. ItMakesSenseInContext.

* In ''Manga/{{Hellsing}}'' Alucard's level 0 releases the sum of all the millions of souls he's collected over the centuries, literally drowning entire armies in them. [[spoiler: The irony is that a variation of this trope is The Major's tactic against Alucard. First he let's the vampire battalion murder most of London resulting in above ''3 million'' deaths. Then the Vatican's army arrive and fight the vampire battalion. Alucard shows up and uses his level 0 state to kill them all. The goal is not to hope that his large army will kill off Alucard but to trick him into believing that this was their plan causing Alucard to believe he had been victorious. This would cause him to start to absorb all of the blood (and with it the souls) of all the millions that have died. Then Schrödinger would kill himself and be absorbed so that Alucard would gain his reality warping powers which would cause Alucard to cease to exist.]]
* In ''Manga/InuYasha'', [[BigBad Naraku's]] minor yokai do this almost every time, with nearly identical results.
* Seen in ''LightNovel/SwordArtOnline'', when the Aincrad Liberation Front (also known as just the Army) rushes a floor boss with precisely zero preparation. They didn't even ''scout'' first. The ones who [[BigDamnHeroes rescued them]] are more than a little pissed at their stupidity, and explicitly call them a "zerg-rush guild." It later turns out that there is a political fissure in the guild, and the leader of one faction managed to trick members of the other into using this tactic.
* The main tactic of the Invid in ''Anime/{{Robotech}}'' is to overwhelm the enemy with ''enormous'' numbers of technologically inferior mechas. Best seen in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLzlwR2z4yE their assault on Tirol]] in the ''Sentinels'' movie (in which the defences of Tirol's capital exact a heavy toll on the attacking Invid scouts and a squadron of bioroid apparently manages to stalemate them... And then three Invid carriers show up and unleash ''six hundreds shock troopers''. [[FromBadToWorse That's just the vanguard, the first wave is still arriving]]. Note that here the Invid are at their ''weakest and less numerous'') and [[https://youtu.be/WEzwGcPmxUs?t=13m6s the Battle of Reflex Point]] at the end of the series and ''WesternAnimation/RobotechTheShadowChronicles'' (in which the Robotech Expeditionary Force shows up with a large fleet, opens fire on the Invid carriers to inflict as much losses before they can launch... And the Invid ''still'' come in such numbers they grind down the REF fighter complement and manage to ram their motherships. This is with a ground assault on their main installation tying up much of their forces).
* On both Lion Anime/{{Voltron}} and the original GoLion, the Red Berets were a small but terrifying force, whether in the very bloody original or the bowlderized adaptation. In both instances, either through murder or just creating terror and chaos, they had the population shuddering inside the Castle, demanding angrily that their heroes protect them and on the edge of despair if not revolt. But when the Berets show up even there, they swarm Black Lion and explode, their dust covering the lead Lion with gunk that renders it immobile and therefore unable to join the others when the giant enemy monster shows up. This all may have been a sign of the growing desperation of the evil lead trio, in that they didn't think this through. The Berets were causing a lot more damage and terror than many of the enemy attacks, but were traded for disabling one of the Lions, which by that late point in the series, the heroes had gotten very good at undoing.

* ''Anime/MobileSuitGundam00'': Gundam 00 seems to have been plagued by this one because in the series, a lot of Devines and Brings and also the [[StarfishAliens ELS]] in the movie.
** To expound: in the beginning, the only way Earth felt it had any chance of defeating the Gundams of Celestial Being is by overwhelming them with numbers (with varying degrees of success). They were that powerful by comparison. Once everyone has access to GN technology, Celestial Being had to focus better on tactics than just being a few overwhelming powerhouse units to deal with the same mass of forces.
** Played straight in the last battle. [[spoiler:Ribbons attacks the combined forces of Celestial Being, the A-Law group that defected, Katharon, etc.. with a continuous swarm of Trans-Am-equipped Gaga units. They do little more than activate Trans-Am and kamikaze everything.]]
** This is also the main tactic of the ELS, most of which don't even have projectile weapons ([[spoiler:until the final battle, in which they begin copying human weapons]]), but there are just so ''many'' of them that it's nearly impossible to shoot them all. One character in the final battle bemoans that the human forces are outnumbered over 10,000 to one... and it's not clear whether this is intended to be hyperbole.

* On both Lion {{Voltron}} and the original GoLion, the Red Berets were a small but terrifying force, whether in the very bloody original or the bowlderized adaptation. In both instances, either through murder or just creating terror and chaos, they had the population shuddering inside the Castle, demanding angrily that their heroes protect them and on the edge of despair if not revolt. But when the Berets show up even there, they swarm Black Lion and explode, their dust covering the lead Lion with gunk that renders it immobile and therefore unable to join the others when the giant enemy monster shows up. This all may have been a sign of the growing desperation of the evil lead trio, in that they didn't think this through. The Berets were causing a lot more damage and terror than many of the enemy attacks, but were traded for disabling one of the Lions, which by that late point in the series, the heroes had gotten very good at undoing.

[[ZergRush Back to the main page]].

!!Examples

* The Gunmen of ''TengenToppaGurrenLagann'' appear in massive numbers when engaging in large scale combat, at the command of their respective leaders. To a much more frightful degree, the attacking forces of the [[spoiler: Anti-Spiral race]] work in deadly efficiency. Fresh troops come in increasingly greater numbers as fast as they fall, pulling out the wrath of lethal bait-and-switch tactics designed to kill an enemy the moment the underestimate their foe.
* In ''{{Hellsing}}'' Alucard's level 0 releases the sum of all the millions of souls he's collected over the centuries, literally drowning entire armies in them. [[spoiler: The irony is that a variation of this trope is The Major's tactic against Alucard. First he let's the vampire battalion murder most of London resulting in above ''3 million'' deaths. Then the Vatican's army arrive and fight the vampire battalion. Alucard shows up and uses his level 0 state to kill them all. The goal is not to hope that his large army will kill off Alucard but to trick him into believing that this was their plan causing Alucard to believe he had been victorious. This would cause him to start to absorb all of the blood (and with it the souls) of all the millions that have died. Then Schrödinger would kill himself and be absorbed so that Alucard would gain his reality warping powers which would cause Alucard to cease to exist.]]

* The main tactic of the Invid in ''Anime/{{Robotech}}'' is to overwhelm the enemy with ''enormous'' numbers of technologically inferior mechas. Best seen in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLzlwR2z4yE their assault on Tirol]] in the ''Sentinels'' movie (in which the defences of Tirol's capital exact a heavy toll on the attacking Invid scouts and a squadron of bioroid apparently manages to stalemate them... And then three Invid carriers show up and unleash ''six hundreds shock troopers''. [[FromBadToWorse That's just the vanguard, the first wave is still arriving]]. Note that here the Invid are at their ''weakest and less numerous'') and [[https://youtu.be/WEzwGcPmxUs?t=13m6s the Battle of Reflex Point]] at the end of the series and ''WesternAnimation/RobotechTheShadowChronicles'' (in which the Robotech Expeditionary Force shows up with a large fleet, opens fire on the Invid carriers to inflict as much losses before they can launch... And the Invid ''still'' come in such numbers they grind down the REF fighter complement and manage to ram their motherships. This is with a ground assault on their main installation tying up much of their forces).

* The aliens in both ''GunparadeMarch'' anime series follow this trope only by virtue of their superior numbers and mindlessness. Individual units are ''stronger'' than even the HumongousMecha of Earth (let alone more conventional vehicles, which are present in greater numbers) and the latter are forced to survive via better tactics and superweapons. ''Orchestra'' does show humans finally catching up with genetically engineered {{Mons}}.

* ''MobileSuitGundam00'': Gundam 00 seems to have been plagued by this one because in the series, a lot of Devines and Brings and also the [[StarfishAliens ELS]] in the movie.

* The main tactic of the Invid in ''Anime/{{Robotech}}'' is to overwhelm the enemy with ''enormous'' numbers of technologically inferior mechas. Best seen in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLzlwR2z4yE their assault on Tirol]] in the ''Sentinels'' movie (in which the defences of Tirol's capital exact a heavy toll on the attacking Invid scouts and a squadron of bioroid apparently manages to stalemate them... And then three Invid carriers show up and unleash ''six hundreds shock troopers''. [[FromBadToWorse That's just the vanguard, the first wave is still arriving]]. Note that here the Invid are at their ''weakest and less numerous'') and the Battle of Reflex Point at the end of the series and ''WesternAnimation/RobotechTheShadowChronicles'' (in which the Robotech Expeditionary Force shows up with a large fleet, opens fire on the Invid carriers to inflict as much losses before they can launch... And the Invid ''still'' come in such numbers they grind down the REF fighter complement and manage to ram their motherships).

* Seen in ''LightNovel/SwordArtOnline'', when the Aincrad Liberation Front (also known as just the Army) rushes a floor boss with precisely zero preparation. They didn't even ''scout'' first. The ones who [[BigDamnHeroes rescued them]] are more than a little pissed at their stupidity, and explicitly call them a "zerg-rush guild." It later turns out that there is a political fissure in the guild, and the leader of one faction managed to trick members of the other into using this tactic.

* In ''{{Hellsing}}'' Alucard's level 0 releases the sum of all the millions of souls he's collected over the centuries, literally drowning entire armies in them. [[spoiler: The irony is that a variation of this trope is The Major's tactic against Alucard. First he let's the vampire battalion murder most of London resulting in above ''3 million'' deaths. Then the Vatican's army arrive and fight the vampire battalion. Alucard shows up and uses his level 0 state to kill them all. The goal is not to hope that his large army will kill off Alucard but to trick him into beliving that this was their plan causing Alucard to belive he had been victorious. This would cause him to start to absorb all of the blood (and with it the souls) of all the millions that have died. Then Schrödinger would kill himself and be absorbed so that Alucard would gain his reality warping powers which would cause Alucard to cease to exist.]]

* A non-violent version appears at the climax of ''{{Durarara}}'''s first season, when [[UnfazedEveryman Mikado Ryuugamine]] publically confronts [[MadScientist Namie Yagiri]] in a crowded hotspot of Tokyo nightlife: admitting he has neither "the power nor the wisdom" to [[LoveMakesYouCrazy reason through her delusion]], he will instead rely on numbers, and presses the "Send" button on his cell phone. ''Every phone for at least a city block'' goes off at once with an incoming text, [[spoiler:simultaneously revealing every single person present to be a member of the Dollars, and Mikado himself to be their mysterious, urban-legendary founder]], intimidating Namie and her mere handful of armed goons into retreating. Well, okay, [[spoiler:Celty driving down the side of a building and going berserk]] may have helped that along a bit, but still.

** When he begins to seriously utilize them for scouting is after he realizes that [[spoiler: any knowledge the clones gain is assimilated back into himself when he dismisses them. Along with his unusually-high chakra this allows him to summon entire fields of himself to all train at the same time - enabling him to do so hundreds if not thousands of times faster than a regular person and thus allowing him to perfect ninjutsu that takes 20 years to master in less than a week.]]

** When he begins to seriously utilize them for scouting is after he realizes that [[spoiler: any knowledge the clones gain is assimilated back into himself when he dismisses them. Along with his unusually-high chakra this allows him to summon entire fields of himself to all train at the same time - enabling him to do so hundreds if not thousands of times faster than a regular person.]]

* Used in ''LightNovel/BakaToTestToShoukanjuu'', Class F sets up traps so that they can overwhelm Class A students one at a time. Pretty effective until the rest of Class A breaks down the desk barrier Akihisa set up.

** ''TabletopGame/LupinIII the {{Board Game|s}}'' starts the game with at least 8 cops to support Zenigata, so that player can ''try'' to Zerg Rush the others. It probably won't work any better than it usually does, though.
** Anime.LupinIII sometimes has hundreds of police officers with Inspector Zenigata on the "Lupin Taskforce" to capture Lupin by sheer numbers.
*** ''Anime/GreenVsRed'' reversed it by having a rush of hundreds of Lupins at one point. ItMakesSenseInContext.

** ''TabletopGames/LupinIII the {{Board Game|s}}'' starts the game with at least 8 cops to support Zenigata, so that player can ''try'' to Zerg Rush the others. It probably won't work any better than it usually does, though.

* In ''Anime/ValvraveTheLiberator'' the Dorssian forces often launch these kinds of attacks-its less because numbers are all they have, and more because the heroes have a very small force. The [[SuperPrototype Valvraves]] can stop most of these, but often they need superior tactics, provided by [[DesignatedHero L]] [[TheChessmaster Elf] to win, and sometimes they just have to run away.

* In ''Anime/ValvraveTheLiberator'' the Dorssian forces often launch these kinds of attacks-its less because numbers are all they have, and more because the heroes have a very small force. The [[SuperPrototype Valvraves]] can stop most of these, but often they need superior tactics, provided by [[DesignatedHero L]]-[[TheChessmaster Elf] to win, and sometimes they just have to run away.

* ''TabletopGames/LupinIII the {{Board Game|s}}'' starts the game with at least 8 cops to support Zenigata, so that player can ''try'' to Zerg Rush the others. It probably won't work any better than it usually does, though.
* Anime.LupinIII sometimes has hundreds of police officers with Inspector Zenigata on the "Lupin Taskforce" to capture Lupin by sheer numbers.
* ''Anime/GreenVsRed'' reversed it by having a rush of hundreds of Lupins at one point. ItMakesSenseInContext.

* ''Manga/LupinIII: Recap/GreenVsRed'' has a rush of hundreds of Lupins at one point. ItMakesSenseInContext.

* In ''{{Hellsing}}'' Alucard's level 0 releases the sum of all the millions of souls he's collected over the centuries, literally drowning entire armies in them. [[spoiler: The irony is that a variation of this trope is The Major's tactic against Alucard. First he let's the vampire battalion murder most of London resulting in above ''3 million'' deaths. Then the Vatican's army arrive and fight the vampire battalion. Alucard shows up and uses his level 0 state to kill them all. The goal is not to hope that his large army will kill off Alucard but to trick him into beliving that this was their plan causing Alucard to belive he had been victorious. This would cause him to start to absorb all of the blood (and with it the souls) of all the millions that have died. Then Schrödinger would kill himself and be absorbed so that Alucard would gain his reality warping powers which would cause Alucard to seize to exist.]]

* ''LupinIII: Recap/GreenVsRed'' has a rush of hundreds of Lupins at one point. ItMakesSenseInContext.