Starcraft II Tips

I wish I had more time to ladder.

But my ZvT is frustrating the hell out of me. I've had 12 ZvT's the last week, and I lost all of them, lost 140ish points. ZvP is doable just by making mass muta/ling. But ZvT is disgustingly hard to play. I literally cannot scout his base with ovies because of stim marines, and vikings. He can just scan me if he wants scouting information, or just float a rax over my base. Zerg has such bad anti-air before lair.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to main Protoss now. Zerg is just too frustrating for me at the moment and I feel terribad playing Terran.

Also the SC2 ranks thing sounds pretty cool.

 

Wow. I get the exact opposite feeling. Every time I try and manoeuvre tactically I feel like the maps are filled with confined spaces and semi-chokes with little room for flanking and such.

 

LOL. Did a 1v1 Practice round in Steppes of War, took a chance just for fun. Since the entrances are blocked off in practice rounds, I didn't build any additional scv's, just banked 400 crystal, moved my base over behind their blocked off portion and took one of their expansions, built a new base back home while the orignal base was moving, lol. It cut off their supply from the beginning and worked pretty well.

Obviously huge risk on my part because I was without resourcing minerals for a good minute or more. My management of units and resoures sucked, but I was just starting to mount up for a big aerial attack since he kept decimating my marines with siege tanks, then he ran out of resources and quit.

Novice Steppes of War (2).zip

Just watch the first five minutes to get a good chuckle and say lolwut?

 

Agreed.

Eye of the Storm, Poloaris, Heartbreak, Fighting Spirit, and Andromeda, still have some small chokes but the majority of the map is huge ramps and open spaces. Where flanking, high ground, and maneuvering is so important.

SC2 is freaking claustrophobic compared to SC1 maps.

 

Just had a pretty epic 2v2.
Went for mass blink stalkers, managed to get around 62 of them + level 3 weapons. Partner backed me up with lots of carriers and void rays as well. I felt i had been really productive, and that my APM was really high as well so I was confident. So we send every single one of our troops out and yeah. Enemy has like 30 carriers, 30 battlecruisers, countless thors and 12 collosi. Oh and backed up by several Motherships. And while this main battle was going on (I had a chance in the central battle), a huge force of dark templars and reapers (like seriously 30+) flank and destroy all my probes. Nice. Numbers might not be possible but that's seriously what I felt I was coming up against.

I really don't know how some people can be fast enough to produce at such a rate :/ and THEN, have the ability to not only produce units while engaging in battles, but multitask and control other groups of units as well. All while winning the main conflict. Urghhh.

 

My roommate is ranked #7 on Platinum here. I watched him on a Terran vs Zerg run. It was intense. Watching him play was interesting, his quick keys, movement of his units was very fast. For this fight he used Medivacs, upgraded Marines, a few Vikings and Seige Tanks only.

Course used the supply depots as guard, and whenever zerk rushed, let them in Marines cut them down with Seige Tanks also.

His strategy was harrassment. Where there would be gaps, like a crevice on the map, let the seige down, and bombard then move the marines with Medivacs and as soon as zerg swarm again, move away. Of course this is happening way faster than I can do.

His strategy was also to use 3 expansions. He sacrificed two for his win. So whenever his opponent made a move, he has his Medivac with Marine and Seige at the ready to move and flank his base.

As the game neared the end, his opponent made a move for his 2nd largest base. He decided, this is it, and let him take the base. Moved over every single Marine he had to the zerg's main base and raped. And then moved onto the two smaller one. His control over the marines with medivacs hover over was impressive. Just mowed over everthing, a lot of cat and mouse and dodging to get it down. Took down everything with maybe 20 or so Marines.

At the rate his opponent expanded with his Zerg we both thought he lost. But that last minute move was epic for a win. Earlier he lost a lot of units with his harrassment.

Plasma, yep, roommate does the multitasking. His hands never stop moving furiously. He said that's the key. Even during the first few minuts, during a lull, always move furiously. It keeps the pace up and the mentality up. So even if it means quickly moving your marine around the base randomnly and then having a SCV scout ahead looking for a new place and keeping tabs on his opponent. Always do everything furiously. He double clicks everything, seems to work.

Did I mention he's a S. Korean studying abroad here? And he says he is completely casual player, doesn't care about win loss and gets raped against the hardcore players in Korea. If he is casual S. Korean SC2 player, I wonder what a hardcore is like At his rate I think he'll be in Diamond soon.

But I still don't have much interest to play. Seems very stressful for a game. I play games to relax.

 

Im trying to play FFA to get some achievements and I swear every one of them so far is just ..... upseting me for lack of a g rated world.

Last one I did last night I had my closest opponent a zerg rush me with like a 8 pool and just kept sending zerglings one after another for a while. I fended him off but lost a lot of SCV's and was not mining for a long time using my SCV to fight. Finally got enough marines and a bunker so he stopped the rush. I took 2 minutes to get enough forces to go get him and punish him for the rush, and as I am about to wipe out his base a protoss who probably had nobody attack him the entire game came in with like 25 stalkers and basically wiped me.

Would have been fine but no I had the one noob in the game that things its a good idea to 8 pool rush ruin my economy.


The game that was similar except no rush and after I fought off 2 guys and was about to go take one of them the 30 voidrays and mothership came into my base from the last person that must have turtled in with cannons and so thats why they attacked me and they let him get a game winning force.

 

There's more terrain in the way but fewer spots to fire off a sneak attack from. I'm thinking in terms of HT psi storms or defiler plague from on top of a fogged cliff or lurkers stacked on an otherwise innocuous looking ramp. I would LOVE to have the perdition turrets from the campaign in multiplayer.

 

I presume his strategy is to make the opposing team's GPUs overheat and crash?

 

Hmm I think maybe they updated the AI for the computer. I just now decided to try to get the 1 vs 4 VHard AI outmatched achievement and cannon rush does not work anymore. The computer is very smart to both use workers off the line to take out pylons and chase your probe around.

Been trying all day to no avail to win this battle.

 

It does seem like they updated the AI Last time they ignore any pylon warping in even if it's right there in the middle of their mineral line. Now they just pull workers and it asap

 

Btu why play against the AI? laddering!!!

 

Meh I play against AI for lulz and if I want to warm up before some games I don't really ladder until my internet gets better or maybe when I get back to UK

 

Im vs AI for achievments or when I cant commit to a game vs players because I may have to go AFK or pause.

Still it seems 1 vs 4VHARD AI is impossible now... Cannon rush is like the only way. I tried to bunker-in with tanks and stuff or just bunker into my own base with cannons and tech up but the VHARD AI will kick out a TON of units at you very quickly and break down any defense you have and own you.

I think they get a minerals boost too since even when I go worker heavy I cant beat them on the resources tab.

 

I think only the insane AI cheats and get boosts, not the very hard.

 

You need to be veeeery careful about where you put your initial pylon and forge. Do it on Megaton and put it in their base but as far away from them as is possible and just slowly build your way through their base with cannons. You don't need to win instantly because as long as they are firing cannons are incredibly efficient cost for cost. You will take out two of them pretty fast and then the other two will follow eventually. Once you take out any computer player's cc/nexus/hatchery he will stop building (unless he has another one of course) so at that point he is essentially out of the game.

 

Definitely doable, as I just completed all the outmatched achievements a week ago. Cannon rush on Megatron is indeed the way to go.

If AI is on top, there's a portion on the bottom left of their bases where it's a bit far away - put your initial pylon there. It'll be on the top right portion if AI is on the bottom. Build your first cannon near the pylon too.

If they send workers over to attack your pylon, run by with your probe and the workers will start chasing your probe. Just circle around

I'll make a replay of the first 5 mins today or tomorrow if it you still haven't beat it by then.

 

Thing is I have cannon rushed AI many times, even insane AI it seems very different now, they will even run outside of there base to get my pylon/cannon now.

I saw enough replays on youtube to see how some people did it and I can tell you definitly the AI is different now than in those videos. All 4 bases probes will come after me and my pylon/forge/cannon and shortly after units will start to pop out.

I did an outside base build and got like 5 cannons up and soon as I started to get into the base they came with like 15 units and took out the first few cannons and before I could reinforce they had 15 more.

 

Here's a replay of me doing it. I did this 1 minute ago, so whatever the AI is doing it's current.

 

dang got close last time i tried, took 2 out but the other 2 kept coming in droves and took out most of my cannons, war of attrition but then they teched up and beat me.

 

LOL, after watching that 1v4 Protoss very hard I realized very hard is just fast building but not too smart. They had two expansion bases that they weren't using to gain resources, they had a path to sneak past your cannons. Not saying I could do it, but looking at that I see now kind of how the AI operates.

 

Ok got it finally, i see the secret is to move slow and have all cannons back to back so the AI runs away from them. I was moving faster trying to get to the nexus before they teched up too high but it seems it actually made them tech up faster probably has something to do with 3 of units the AI has. If they have there zealots & stalkers running away in a ball they wont make new units or tech up until those are dead.

 

Glad to help

 

I kinda feel this way sometimes (might be a little salty, and some of the links to other stories definitely are):

If StarCraft Was Even More Complicated - Funny Videos | Cracked.com

 

LOL yeah. That's me playin...

 

Quick question,

Are stalkers good against mass void rays? If so, how do you micro them with Blink? Any videos?

 

Yeah stalkers works good against void rays, just blink them to & under the rays as fast as possible so more of them are in firing range. The faster you take out voidrays the better. If they charge up they are easily 5x more deadly.

 

I think? phoenixes are the way to go, especially since stalkers are armored. But blink stalkers should definitely work out too.

Edit: On hindsight, I find it somewhat odd that I've never once encountered a voidray in my solo matches...

 

I hate using Void Rays!

One of my friend always uses them, a bunch of us play 4v4 and he walls in (gate, core, pylo), builds 3 stargates a beacon and just pumps them out while the rest of the team goes terran mass marine... annoying!

I have a few ideas but they seem risky for 4v4..

I might try proxy pylon with observer vision into his base since he never has units, but with marine backup, I can get taken out easily.



So question of the day, what are your 4v4 tips/tricks?

 

So what time tonight is the nbr mob planned for? I want to nap now and be prepared for fun later

 

Yeah some phoenix are better vs void ray probably but in most cases I prefer the stalkers since you can pump them out fast with warp gates and after the voids are dead you have a versatile unit to go offensive with, an army of pheonix are not exactly deadly in most situations

But I under rate the phoenix probably.

 

fun playing with yous last game ended up bad xD

 

Didnt see too many of us online last night, I was so tired that I ended up going to be earlier than I had planned. I was just playing horribly.


Anyways today I present to you my first demotivational poster for SC2

 

Which is the better strategy for protoss? Usually takes me some time to an army of stalkers, but i find that is a bit slow because when we start normally the enemy team attacks. And like mysteriously touch me almost every time, my team is a whole ball of noobs that does nothing, i end defending them (but instead of helping and recovering they surrender, i end in a match of 1vs3 (or 4 if that is the game).

How you think that i can improve?

 

Start going to less team fights or go into team fights with someone you can trust

A strong starter would be the 2 gate to robotics build. Get that observer out asap to know opponent's army composition and if you see lots of armored units (Roach, marauders, stalkers) chronoboost immortals and always get 2-3 sentries to buy you enough time to get at least 2 immortals before defending. You can skip the early zealot and go straight to stalkers unless you scouted your opponent attempting an aggression build (Early spawning pool, early barracks or 2 gateways by the time you scouted).

After defending, you can probably go to Dark Templars if you're within the silver league and below since it seems that people in those level tend to not react quickly to get detectors... You can even attempt to do a warp prism backdoor at their mineral line with a few zealots if you have the minerals since most of your defending units are gas heavy (sentries, immortals)

 

Im gonna try that, thank for your help

About the Dark Templars, recently i tried that but if there is a terran normally they detect them and i end without them. There is another tip to replace them? Seeing this i lke to save them until the enemy has no more units (or a good defense) to make some time and send a second attack.

 

Thing with using dark templars against terran is that the opponent always has the orbital sweep or better known as "scan". The easy way out of this is simply, make him waste it. Make about 6-8 dark templars. Send them in one by one to their mineral line. They're bound to end up using the scan on each one of them unless they start building missile turrets. Better yet, send 2-3 dark templars to each of his expansions. People tend to clump up all their units together so they tend to send all their units to one dark templar spot while the other simply deals as much damage as possible. Oh, be careful of ghosts. EMP will reveal cloaked units for a short while.

Otherwise, mix in a few in your main army if you're zealot heavy. They tend to not notice the dark templars in the mix until you've done considerable damage to them.

Get High Templars. If you see a raven, feedback it. People usually don't use the raven that much except for mobile detection so it always has high amounts of energy.

If you never used colossus, use them They're expensive but they're quite worth it when you get more than 3 of them. Make sure you have the thermal lance upgrade finished by the time you push out with them (Chronoboost that upgrade). If your army's stalker heavy, you should be able to snipe out vikings that try to attack the colossus.

 

As Reizo said, try going in with some team mates you can trust^^

All his suggestions sound great, but you will need to expand in order to pull off the economy required for those units

 

How fast are 1v1 games? On average, how long do they last?

 

Depends really... If it a mirror matchup, usually less than 15minutes especially ZvZ. If it's an epic match up, it can go up to 50-60minutes. Usual games last for 20-30minutes.

 

Great tips Reizo, thanks!

I love playing protoss and getting robotics bay instead of stargate... any tips on what situations I should get 2 robo bays?


Also, should High Templar be saved for people with more micro skill? Does Feedback do nothing against Zerg?

Does Ghost EMP do anything against Zerg either?

 

EMP his queens. Do this a couple minutes before attacking, and do it multiple times, so he can neither spread creep nor spawn larvae, and will fall way behind in production.

Feedback also works on queens, but also useful against corrupters and overseers (and infesters if you can find one). Perhaps less useful than EMP just by virtue of ghosts being able to cloak, but still not totally useless.

 

Eh, I'd say a long game is 30 minutes, for 1v1.

 

Well get 2 robo bays if you plan on getting a lot of those robotic units and can afford to produce out of them (At least 2 bases). They're quite gas heavy so you'll probably need to sneak in a third expo and mine the gas first before slowly saturating the minerals.

High Templars doesn't exactly need a lot of micro. They're as simple as keeping behind your army or in the middle, storm the opponent as you see them moving towards you (Storm in front of them and one behind them in case they run away).

Feedback is useful on zerg too. Use it their overseers. Those tend to have full energy as most people use them for detectors only. They cost 100 gas so 50 energy is simply worth it. Use them on infestors when you see them too.

Ghost EMP isn't as useful on zerg as they are on protoss. However, as Histidine mentioned, EMPing a queen will cause them to slow down on their unit production. I do personally prefer to just snipe the queens by cloaking and shooting them down though. They'll have to waste 150 minerals and have no queen to inject larva for the time it takes to train a new one which is pretty much longer than it takes for one that got EMP'd to recover 25 energy. Ghost EMP is very useful on infestors though. Especially if you have thors or battlecruisers, zerg players tend to get infestors for the neural parasite.

Oh, if you only see a single infestor, just cloak and snipe it twice. It'll die and you save some energy. Snipe is quite underused

 

So after losing the majority of a string of games, (partly due to playing while drunk and trying to mothership rush 3 games in a row) and then winning 3 in a row against vastly lower-level teams, I have been randomly promoted to diamond in 2v2 random.

It's almost as if Bnet thinks I'm good at this game.

 

EMP works on queens? It works on organic units?

 

Anything with energy

Its most deadly vs protoss since the shields they have are also energy, but any unit that has castable abilities that consume an energy pool can be effected by it.

 

Even command centers. They can't scan your ghost if you EMP the orbital commands' energy.

 

Diamond YUSSS.

 

As I've stated in older posts, SC2 is my first RTS and I'll say that I blow @ it. I've got thick skin, so it doesn't bother me that I'm mostly losing; its all part of the learning experience. I have a friend who's pretty decent and he and I like to do 2v2 together. The only viable strat that I've been able to use to do well in 2v2 with him is a 3x or 4x rax marine rush. I don't even go for gas until I'm attacking my enemy. I play Terran and he plays Protos. What are some good strats that he and I can use? He always does 4 warpgate stalker pushes with a few sentries mixed in. He brings out colossus in the late game. Any advice?