Starcraft 2

[Lukie]

i've played mostly 1v1 so far as zerg and protoss (protoss more recently).

a couple fun void ray openings...

PvZ pylon, gate, gas, pylon, core (put gateway and core at ramp so you can wall with 1 zealot), fast 2nd gas, stalker to chase away ovie, fast stargate.

save chrono boosts for void rays (usually i'll get 3-5). i'll attack wtih something like 3 zeals, stalker, and void ray while expo'ing to my natural (i'll only take the ground forces with me if they are getting too greedy with drones/queens).

1 void beats 1 queen, and once the void is charged up it becomes retardedly powerful. 2 voids generally beat 2 queens. try to force hydras with your voids which you counter with 2 base stalker/sentry/collossus/void ray ball.


PvT i do a lot of different stuff. one that has been getting me a lot of early wins is to open with a 12 gate, 14 gas, 15 gate, 15 core, 16 pylon (cut probes) then make 2 stalkers rallied to the opponent's ramp when the 2nd gate and core finish (chrono boost both). abuse stalker shields to widdle down marine numbers, try to force your way up with stalkers, if not, wait until you get a void ray for vision up ramp and to end the game if they went too heavy on marauders. if not it should be good for an expo, transition into speedlot + templar heavy army (awesome vs terran).



PvP normally i just do boring generic 4 warp gate into robo, whee

[boost]

also, i get the sense that a terran nerf is coming sometime in the future.

ldo

[ensign_lee]

ldo

F, everyone said that during beta and terrans just kept getting buffed.

Next patch will be like "Marauders +20 range." *&^#&*%^#^&%#

[boost]

F, everyone said that during beta and terrans just kept getting buffed.

Next patch will be like "Marauders +20 range." *&^#&*%^#^&%#

lawlerific..

maybe they'll just wait til the toss/zerg parts of the trilogy come out to buff toss and zerg respectively.

[KoRnholio]

I found the torrent and a crack for just the campaign and the skirmish's vs AI. Trying to see if I can actually learn the game/maps before paying for it and making a B-net account and playing in the placement matches. Watched a ton of vids on build trees and even learned a few things about hot keys and groupings. Will buy this within the month for sure. Still playing the campaign, which by the way is pretty decent so far, even on Normal difficulty.

You do get 50 "noob league" (unraked/not counted for anything) matches when you first play the game. Though they are slowed down and are custom maps with rock barriers preventing very early rushes. I played about 40 before my placement matches, and I think it was too many. I got used to the rocks and slow game speed

[ensign_lee]

I found the torrent and a crack for just the campaign and the skirmish's vs AI. Trying to see if I can actually learn the game/maps before paying for it and making a B-net account and playing in the placement matches. Watched a ton of vids on build trees and even learned a few things about hot keys and groupings. Will buy this within the month for sure. Still playing the campaign, which by the way is pretty decent so far, even on Normal difficulty.

I can give you a guest pass which will let you play for 7 hours if you want. It's a lot more legit and will prob let you experience the game more. PM me if you want to do this.

[jyms]

I can't seem to stay focused on builds. I end up in a battle or struggling with what I should be building next and end up with a couple thousand minerals and gas and pay the price when attacked. Still trying to get a handle on groupings and hot keys. Did manage to send two nukes into the Zerg in one game for the win. Just not handling rushes well and I really have to learn to scout better.

[KoRnholio]

Wow am I ever glad I got put into Bronze league. About half the time I crush, the other half I get crushed. I'm also learning a bunch of the 1v1 tricks. Protoss pylon near/in your base, Zerg Nyrus worm highway into your base (especially ZvZ), how to barricade yourself from zerg ling rushes, etc. Having not played SC1 I didn't know any of this

[Lukie]

Wow am I ever glad I got put into Bronze league. About half the time I crush, the other half I get crushed. I'm also learning a bunch of the 1v1 tricks. Protoss pylon near/in your base, Zerg Nyrus worm highway into your base (especially ZvZ), how to barricade yourself from zerg ling rushes, etc. Having not played SC1 I didn't know any of this

The concepts of all of the above tricks are all new to sc2. Protoss had gateways that are basically the same as they are now, but without the warp gate upgrade. Zerg did have nydus canals in sc1 (similar to nydus worms in sc2), but they were tier 3 and had to be built on creep (which was much more difficult to spread and generally far less useful).

Walling is exceptionally easy in sc2. Any 2 buildings touching = block. Building + obstacle = block.

SC1 was a nightmare. Every unit had a different collision size. Every structure and obstacle had different collision sizes for every side.

For example, Depot above rax would block zerglings and zealots, depot to the right of rax would block zealots but not zerglings, depot below or to the left of the rax wouldn't block either. All 3 races had tons of possibilities that just made it a PITA sometimes.

For the most part, you can just learn generic 3 building walls, one for each of the 4 ways a ramp can face, and use them on most maps. There are exceptions of course like kulas ravine (no ramp) and scrap station (extra wide ramp).

[Da GOAT]

watching replays, i dont quiet get way people dont always wall themselves in.

anyway, been practicing vs the computer howd i go about harrassing with cloacked helions, banshees and reapers. I suck lol, banshees where kinda the easiest to control but seems to really hurt you if you get rushed.

i suck are harrassing and building, tryin to use hotkeys. Is it possible to have premade hotkeys?? how? i cant work out the hotkeys tab in menu.

[KoRnholio]

watching replays, i dont quiet get way people dont always wall themselves in.

Because 6-8 zerglings on your mineral line before the 3:00 mark is pretty much game over Against the other two races it isn't so necessary.

i suck are harrassing and building, tryin to use hotkeys. Is it possible to have premade hotkeys?? how? i cant work out the hotkeys tab in menu.

The build menus all have their own hotkeys, all you really need to do is hotkey the nexus/factory/whatever. Say you are protoss, you hotkey your nexus as 4 or whatever. Press 4, then E for a probe, C for chronoboost, etc. I don't really use the tabs, I try to keep different building types on their own hotkeys.

[ensign_lee]

watching replays, i dont quiet get way people dont always wall themselves in.

Against zerg, it's definitely a must or else you're just asking to get all your workers eaten by speedlings.

However, against protoss and terran, I don't wall off. Why? Because I lose mining time by going all the way to the choke and because it doesn't really help against either one of those races. You unnecessarily expose your buldings for no real gain.

Walls don't do diddly shit to terrans since all their units are ranged and once protoss have stalkers up, they can just shoot your buildings while you have to get through your wall to get to them.

basically, it unnecessarily risks your buildings.

[jyms]

Look at Youtube. Tehre are tons of vids on hotkeys, macroing and general strats. Search beginner SC2 or hotkeys SC2 or whatever

[Da GOAT]

Look at Youtube. Tehre are tons of vids on hotkeys, macroing and general strats. Search beginner SC2 or hotkeys SC2 or whatever

ha ive spent more time on youtube than playin the game.

ok so walling in has a weakness, ive not playe3d much but im always up against terran so far.

[jyms]

Try using the grid option for the hot keys. It's pretty basic. It's three rows of five just like the keyboard
QWERT
ASDFG
ZXCVB

Just like in the panel in the lower corner, so when clicking on the command center the Q would be an SUV since it's the uppermost left icon.

[boost]

Try using the grid option for the hot keys. It's pretty basic. It's three rows of five just like the keyboard
QWERT
ASDFG
ZXCVB

Just like in the panel in the lower corner, so when clicking on the command center the Q would be an SUV since it's the uppermost left icon.

WAT.

I did not even realize this was an option now. I would probably use this, but I am so used to sc1 and a lot of the hot keys are the same, and are always on the left half of the keyboard (nothing is hot key'd to any letter passed B.)

Also, walling in as T is probably a good standard up into platinum league (cant be positive, havent gotten there yet.) But I think you'll see some pros not doing it at the higher levels of play because they can out micro a ling rush, or whatever. So the idea I think is that with superior micro you can forfeit the advantage of walling in for the security of not having to protect bot your wall and your mineral line should they somehow make it past your wall. Also, unless I'm doing something wrong, to properly wall in I need to build my second supply well before I need it, which sets back my build by a little.

I'm sure lukie/JV/lee/whoever can give better answers though.

[dsmrolla06]

you can always use another rax or factory to wall in if youre against zerg to prevent baneling busts as well.

[boost]

you can always use another rax or factory to wall in if youre against zerg to prevent baneling busts as well.

ya, this is good, but unless you are going 2rax, it leaves you open til your fact is up.

[WildBobAA]

Awesome game right here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEV9niTmeOU

[boost]

Awesome game right here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEV9niTmeOU

wow.. that was seriously epic.. and just when you think its a forgone conclusion...

[Da GOAT]

2nd placement match lost due to someone camping in my base with a barracks. god damn. does everyone just scout there own base with a scout at the start??

[boost]

2nd placement match lost due to someone camping in my base with a barracks. god damn. does everyone just scout there own base with a scout at the start??

with T/P you should throw up a supply depot/pylon in the fogged parts of your base to give you vision here. With zerg simply use your overlords to give you vision of your entire base.

[KoRnholio]

2nd placement match lost due to someone camping in my base with a barracks. god damn. does everyone just scout there own base with a scout at the start??

I hear ya. All you really need to do to combat this is A) watch the minimap and B) send one worker to chase that intruder down. If he stops to build, he dies.

Sometimes they do it even worse than barracks, I've seen guys attempt to cannon rush with protoss. Enter base area, build pylons+cannons towards your base. If you get caught on this one, try to take out the pylons that power the cannons if they are in poor spots (ie, no overlap).

There's all sorts of dirty tricks, most of them involve having vision/things in your base. So shoo them away.

[ensign_lee]

I hear ya. All you really need to do to combat this is A) watch the minimap and B) send one worker to chase that intruder down. If he stops to build, he dies.

Sometimes they do it even worse than barracks, I've seen guys attempt to cannon rush with protoss. Enter base area, build pylons+cannons towards your base. If you get caught on this one, try to take out the pylons that power the cannons if they are in poor spots (ie, no overlap).

There's all sorts of dirty tricks, most of them involve having vision/things in your base. So shoo them away.

NO NO NO!!!

If you see this before the cannons are up, ATTACK THE CANNONS. It's so easy to just to place another pylon. They build stupidly fast. Once that other pylon is up, boom, cannons up. ALL YOUR GUYS ARE TOAST.

Pull probes to attack the cannons if you have to. 4-5 probes per cannon BEFORE they warp in. Once the cannons are warped in...you're kinda Fed.

Save up enough minerals for an expansion and start again there. Or, if you're terran, liftoff your CC to your nat and starta new base there.

[ensign_lee]

2nd placement match lost due to someone camping in my base with a barracks. god damn. does everyone just scout there own base with a scout at the start??

Well, no. I scout the other guy's base. If there are buildigns that should be there that aren't, that prob means that they're building it somewhere else (LIKE MY BASE).

[oskar]

If it's a really early cannon rush you're usually screwed by the time the cannon is finished. Your best bet is probably to take whatever units you got and attack. Chances are he built the forge before the the warpgate and has little if anything to defend.
I'm noob... maybe it pays off to take them out, but it's definitely more resource intensive on your part. I think it's better to counter attack.

[boost]

well it really depends how far hes gotten with the cannons when you notice them. If hes not able to hit your mineral line/CC, and you are walled in, then I'd def look to snipe the probe. Without a probe, his advance is halted and you can just tech up to siege tanks and his rush is worthless.

[KoRnholio]

Good calls both of you. Though just like medicine, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Keep the lamers out of your bases! Even those "harmless" overlords. The Nydus worm transport highway thing can be spawned anywhere the zerg player has vision, and not just on creep either.

[boost]

holy shit.. check out this sick sick base trade...

sick base trade.SC2Replay

I'm royally pissed that I lost this match. I just needed to micro a little better when it came down to it. I also probably should have floated away my main cc as soon as he attacked my expo. But I should have tore through this base much faster, killed the turrets, and then kept him from floating away. Also I had no way of realizing that he didn't have an scv... if I had known that I would have just set up an expo and defended that shit, no way he wins that fight. Oh and ya.. I know I made a huge blunder in the last seconds by not just running up the ramp with rauders/rines and seiging from below the cliff and just targeting the rax.. Such a sick game.. so pissed managed to lose when I def out played him until the final minutes of the game.

edit: I need to incorporate turrets into my TvT for sure.. I am getting owned by drop ships, and turrets are cheap and like 5x as effective as they were in bw...

[boost]

lee/anyone in plat/dia, what do you think of my replay? I know I made mistakes, and I pointed out the ones I noticed, but do you notice any other major ones?

[Da GOAT]

is battle net not working or something, wont let me login or play offline. message comes up sayin ive to create some joke on website but websites wont load.

[Da GOAT]

its ok now, peerblock was messing me up

[iLike]

I have been playing BroodWar (Zerg) for about a year or so (was C-ish level on iccup) and switched to SC2 (Protoss) with the start of beta phase 2. Played until a week ago and then got sick of ragequitting vs every Terran.
So I switched to poker instead.

@boost: I watched your replay and wrote down my thoughts on it. I'm not a Terran but player tho (dia Protoss).
I hope my criticism is not too harsh.

At first i noticed many little things which might not seem like much, but a lot of little things add up to a pretty big disadvantage eventually.
- Build your first supplydepot @ 10 supply, this way it will be done right away when your 11th SCV finishes. This way you won't be supply blocked and you never have to stop/pause your SCV production.
- Alway build SCVs constantly!!! I can't even describe how important it is to always build SCVs. This doesn't mean you should queue 5 of them, but you should try to produce them throughout the game. At some point you stop producing SCVs and you are stuck at like 20 SCVs. Each gas and each mineral block need 3 harvesters to be fully saturated and since we have 2 gas and 8 mineral blocks, we want at least 30 SCVs. More are even better because some will be building buildings and later on you might want to transfer some of them to your expansion (this way your expansion will pay off much earlier).
- Always keep your rax/facs producing. Especially early on, when every second counts. @ 5:30 your factory is idle for quite some time.
- Don't reveal your banshee @ 8:50. He already saw your tech with his scan, but what if he didn't? Then you would have given him a time window to prepare.
- @10:00 you have 1200 minerals, which is way to much. If you have to many minerals, build more production buildings. This would have been a great time to expand also. After your banshee harass you are way ahead and he is pretty passive.
- I really don't like your attack. You have a huge advantage. Just sit back, siege up, build 1 or 2 expansions and let him come to you. He is the one who has to react.
- I'm not too sure on this one, but I think it would have been better to just run back to your base, after you saw him attacking you. This way you lost your advantage and traded 2 bases (main+expo) for 1.

I hope this helps a bit.

[boost]

all of this was very helpful. A lot of it I already know, but are just symptoms of low apm and poor macro skills.

The last line is the biggest help though I think. The 2 base for 1 makes much more sense now. I think a big thing I need to work on TvT is turrets. Having scvs with your mech ball is good because they can repair, but they can also just throw up a few turrets everytime you advance. This does a lot to give you air dominance which pretty much wins games TvT.

Again it still makes me sick that I lost this game. Even with all those mistakes, all I needed to do was stim and rush up and attack the rax and siege it from below. Before he could lift off it would have been dead.

Anyways, thanks a ton for your comments and criticisms. And I hope you come back to SC2.. I'm sure blizzard will nerf T soon enough.

edit: btw I dont think TvP is all that unbalanced. T crushes early/mid game, but once P has templars, sentries, carriers, etc on the field its pretty hard to do much as T.

[dsmrolla06]

the hell... played two games after the casino last night and won both. Neither of which counted for points nor went to my record. im sour,l it woulda pushed me into 2nd in my division and been 7 straight wins

[JKDS]

The ranking system was down last night for awhile. Im not sure if the rankings are or have been affected by them yet.

[WildBobAA]

Well I won 3 games in a row and battle.net decided to give me 0 points for all of them.

[Da GOAT]

EU-MoJu's profile - SC2 Ranking

check this site out guys, all your rankings and leagues. just search your name.

I got bronze 1v1 and lost my first game. Guy went 2x barracks immediately, had a rax b4 his 1st depot. Sick of getting rushed, I gotta wall in quickly and choose a better strategy to open.

[boost]

EU-MoJu's profile - SC2 Ranking

check this site out guys, all your rankings and leagues. just search your name.

I got bronze 1v1 and lost my first game. Guy went 2x barracks immediately, had a rax b4 his 1st depot. Sick of getting rushed, I gotta wall in quickly and choose a better strategy to open.

scout scout scout. When you see something like this, click and SCV click B, U, and fill that shit with rines when its done. You really dont even need to wall off, and theres no way he can win vs a bunker. And once his rush fails, his economy will be fucked.

[dsmrolla06]

4 games ive won now across two days with out getting points. this is getting frustrating.

[aka_red]

any news about patches anytime soon. would nice to not be constantly underpowered while playing zerg all the time.

[KoRnholio]

Points/ladder issue appears fixed now. I got points for all the games I played today, 1v1 through 3v3.

[ensign_lee]

Yeah, too bad the ones that you alreayd played don't count. :'(

Also, yeah, sc2ranks rocks!

US-EnsignLee's profile - SC2 Ranking

[dsmrolla06]

moved up from 1st in silver to 2nd in gold in 4 games. holler

[ensign_lee]

way to go dsmrolla!

[boost]

YouTube - HuskyStarcraft's Channel

lol, best husky video yet. "dude, dont make a bunch of stalkers vs double terran." "Its too late, I'm pot comitted."

rofltaco

[ensign_lee]

haha yeah, making stalkers vs double terran was pretty fail.

Though 1/1/1 prob was as well.

[boost]

haha yeah, making stalkers vs double terran was pretty fail.

Though 1/1/1 prob was as well.

I would have loved to see mass ghost. Pretty sure if I find myself in a 2v2TT I'm gonna just pump ghost and laugh as I own their souls.

[WildBobAA]

I hate ZvZ so much. I'm bad at it and I just don't find it fun to play. Thankfully it only comes up about 5-10% of the time. I've resorted to 6-pool cheese just so I don't have to play it for very long.

[aka_red]

sc2 brken? just me?

[JKDS]

Today I learned that fully upgraded ultralisks fail against stimed and shielded medivac marines with no other upgrades. Good to know

[boost]

Today I learned that fully upgraded ultralisks fail against stimed and shielded medivac marines with no other upgrades. Good to know

This is how its always been. This way the counters are constantly looping. So tier 1 < tier 2 < tier 3 < tier 1. Obviously this is not 100%, but it keeps the game from "ending" once you've hit tier 3 units.

[Lukie]

Today I learned that fully upgraded ultralisks fail against stimed and shielded medivac marines with no other upgrades. Good to know

ultras get a huge damage boost vs armored, and aren't meant to be the only unit in your composition anyway (upgraded zerglings tend to go pretty well, since they have insane DPS and share the melee/carapace upgrades).

but in your specific example, your 6 armor, 500 hp war cows will do just fine vs 6 damage marines

[KoRnholio]

I'm playing mostly zerg these days (for 1v1/2v2) and I find the ling/baneling/muta combo to be pretty savage especially against Protoss. Against Terran roach/hydra/infestor seems to work pretty well.

[aka_red]

I think you are wrong ensignlee. Spawing Pool and Hatchery is 400 minerals and can produce as many units as you have larvae. With a Queen it can be very high amounts. Compared to a Pylon and two Gateways which is also 400 minerals. As you can see the Hatchery is able to produce more units then the Gateway Pylon combination. Also you do not need to make additional proxy unit producers. Unlike with a hatchery. You are also able to steal their minerals.

[dsmrolla06]

I think you are wrong ensignlee. Spawing Pool and Hatchery is 400 minerals and can produce as many units as you have larvae. With a Queen it can be very high amounts. Compared to a Pylon and two Gateways which is also 400 minerals. As you can see the Hatchery is able to produce more units then the Gateway Pylon combination. Also you do not need to make additional proxy unit producers. Unlike with a hatchery. You are also able to steal their minerals.

A spawning pool is 200 min, a hatch is 300

[ensign_lee]

I think you are wrong ensignlee. Spawing Pool and Hatchery is 400 minerals and can produce as many units as you have larvae. With a Queen it can be very high amounts. Compared to a Pylon and two Gateways which is also 400 minerals. As you can see the Hatchery is able to produce more units then the Gateway Pylon combination. Also you do not need to make additional proxy unit producers. Unlike with a hatchery. You are also able to steal their minerals.

The gateways would be in my base... All I need is a pylon in your base (or a warp prism) to warp units into yours once I have warpgate up. So...100 minerals, sinec the only thing I risk is the pylon. And the build time is WAAAAAY shorter than hatchery, build queen, inject larvae, create troops / spinecrawlers.

[ensign_lee]

Yeah, ultras are supposed to be anti-ARMOR, not anti-light, like you'd think.

If you're dealing with mass marine, banelings are FAAAAR more effective.

[Icanhastreebet]

I'm out of commission due to fail university internet. Am very sad

[boost]

I'm out of commission due to fail university internet. Am very sad

I've been super busy lately.. the most sc2 I've gotten in in the past week and a half is a few husky/hd casts while eating food.

[JKDS]

On a different note, ultralisk rushing with nydus worms is fun

[aka_red]

I like to proxy hatchery in their base. That way I can steal their minerals, build spine crawlers, and spawn units directly into their base.

[ensign_lee]

I like to proxy hatchery in their base. That way I can steal their minerals, build spine crawlers, and spawn units directly into their base.

Why don't you just play protoss then? You won't have the telltale creep. If they find you, they only blow up your pylon instead of your hatch. You can spawn more units FASTER... one probe can make MULTIPLE cannons. Every advantage for proxy anything is protoss based, certainly not zerg based.

If you like doing that, protoss is def the race for you.

[aka_red]

Yeah. I was defintely joking. I'm almost 2v2 diamond.

[Lukie]

lets have a king of FTR sc2 battle royale

[oskar]

lets have a king of FTR sc2 battle royale

In so far:

Lukie
ensign_lee
boost
dsmrolla
oskar


Let's do this!

[boost]

In so far:

Lukie
ensign_lee
boost
dsmrolla
oskar


Let's do this!

we would need 3 more for a decent bracket.. Or one more and have several matches in each round.

[KoRnholio]

In so far:

Lukie
ensign_lee
boost
dsmrolla
oskar


Let's do this!

Count me in.

[ensign_lee]

K let's do it.

[boost]

I'll get owned as I haven't been playing at all, but I'm down.

[dsmrolla06]

Ill do it. Maybe pair the good players with a shitty player like myself?

[boost]

I just discovered how awesome PDD is in TvT

[oskar]

woot, I'm in!

btw I got mass thor'ed yesterday so I thought speedlots and immortals should be a decent counter, but I still got decimated. Anyone got a better idea? What about templars for feedback?

[boost]

woot, I'm in!

btw I got mass thor'ed yesterday so I thought speedlots and immortals should be a decent counter, but I still got decimated. Anyone got a better idea? What about templars for feedback?

read patch notes imo

• Thor
  
  • Energy bar removed.
  • 250mm Strike Cannons is now cooldown-based on a 50-second cooldown. Ability starts with cooldown available (useable immediately after upgrade is researched).

I honestly think thors may be OP now. Mass thor vs zerg is almost as good, you just need helions or shielded rines to deal with mass ling. In TvP and TvZ I used to always go 1-1-1 opener, but now I'm going 1-2.

[KoRnholio]

I honestly think thors may be OP now. Mass thor vs zerg is almost as good, you just need helions or shielded rines to deal with mass ling. In TvP and TvZ I used to always go 1-1-1 opener, but now I'm going 1-2.

Yeah I never ever used to see thors, now like 25% of the games (half the time they are terran, half the time they go thors) you see them, en mass. Their AA range/splash damage is pretty ridiculous, I had some absolutely destroy my huge protoss air fleet

I prefer zerg and mutas die fast to them as well, unless you can pull off a perfect magic box...