Tactics discussion - Iron Edge problem solving tool

[Vorte]

Getting 6 pooled? Tired of that 3 gate stalker mass? Just can't seem to destroy that massive army of Mauraders and Marines?

Look no further, we stand at your disposal - we shall aid you to the path of glory. Ask your dielmma in here and let's all do our best to help eachother.

Posting a replay really helps, obviously 

If we can't figure it out, #teamliquid at quakenet can.

[Tyler]

Have you got any good sites for SC2 strats. Something like Arena Junkies but for SC. I would like to read a little while pretending to work.

[Vorte]

www.teamliquid.net is might helpful if you ask a question, as for actual guidies - I think the best way of learning starcraft from scratch is to watch replays with commentaries. There are loads of youtube channels devoted to this, most noticably HDstarcraft's and Huskystarcraft.

[Tyler]

I can't really watch vids at work...

[Vorte]

http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Main_Page

got their own wiki, apparently - should be lots to read!

[Palmar]

It's quite advanced though, there's not a lot of simple solid information out there.

The best ways to prepare for sc2, given that you don't have access to the beta (in which case you should just play 2v2 v AI on easy to get a feel for the game), are probably a combination of those:

1. Watching Starcraft 2 VOD's, I recommend husky and hd starcraft, they're easy to listen to, and some of their earlier sc2 videos had good introductionary material. Whenever you hear a term or a unit you're not familiar with, get info from wikis etc.

2. Play starcraft 1, almost all the same skills still apply to the second game, although management has been made easier.

3. Reading through teamliquid. It's complicated and you'll run into a lot of terms you're not familiar with, not to mention it's hard to put things into context when you don't know the game. But if gaming/videos are off-limits, then teamliquid is basically the best there is. It's also in neutral, work-friendly colours!

[Palmar]

oh, and this:

http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/stet_tcl/How_to_Improve_by_Ver.pdf

Very informative, albeit a bit hardcore approach to learning the game. But if all you want to do is become the best you can be at the expense of anything else (for example, laughing while you cannon rush people) then it's a great way to learn.

[Rash]

some stuff I had to learn the hard way:

1. Make sure you make enough SCVs/Drones/Probes, 2 for each mineral field and 3 for each vespene geyser.
So thats 22 workers per base, try to keep this up, and keep making them so you have (nearly) enough to immediatly mine fully from your new base.

2. When you move your units somewhere, always use A+[click location] so they will automatically start attacking any unit they encounter on the way.

3.1 ALWAYS KEEP SCOUTING, I know its nearly impossibe sometimes, but it's never nice to find some DT's in the middle of your base without having any sort of stealth detection ready to take em out
3.2 ways to keep scouting: hallucinations, air units, sac overlords, scans.

4. Make sure you always use control groups by using control+[random number of your choosing].
This can be done to any unit selection or structure(s). This way you only have to actually look at your base when you're building new structures, and let's you fully focus on your micro  and utilize every unit till it's fullest.

5. Exploit range and movement speed on units, if for example a stalker moves faster than a zhealot, you can take out entire groups of units without taking a single hit in your own unit group. This can be done by sending your units away, and then pressing A+[the direction the enemy units are at]. They will automatically attack the units that are the closest to your units.

6. Pick your battles, don't go in if you don't think you can win at that time. The amount of units you have or the composition of the units only matter for about 60%, the rest is positioning.
examples: exploiting high grounds, choke points and base defense structures like protoss cannons.

7. If you're going to delay the enemy economy (or not) make sure you're economy is always equal or better to his at the same time. And always keep in mind that he simply cannot do much better than you at a certain time, so don't hesitate too long with attacking, or you might get proxy'd or some other faggotry simular to that. Vorte and I lost a game because we left thinking we were too far behind, when we forgot that we completely herassed the shit out of one of our opponents.

hope this helps

[Devlin]

Guess I don't need to make a separate thread, but I would like to discuss some builds, and perhaps that we start sharing builds between us!

Could start off with some good knowledge about how to practice builds. YABOT (Yet Another Build Order Tester) is a great tool for testing out build orders and see how they play out in reality. You can also set up playing your build vs the AI doing another build. Works for all races, however I don't think they are all up to date and it tends to bug sometimes. YABOT is limited to 15 steps currently, so it is strictly for early build orders, to setup the game ahead. Still a great tool to mess around with!

http://www.sc2mapster.com/maps/yabot/

Took some screenshots of how it looks, very basic. The build order I practice here is dimagas vs demuslim on steppes of war ZvT, going for fast mutalisks. Some steps of the build can't be included in YABOT, for example pulling drones off your gas for a while and then back again to maximize mineral gain, but it's a quite good summary of the build.

Seems like pasting the code for the build order doesn't work very well. Anyways, can just ask for it on IRC or something.


Check the mission objectives for build order!




Score screen after your build is done




Main menu, loads of options and builds to choose from!




I have started to play Zerg, so any solid early build order tips are welcomed!

[Palmar]

well I don't really use build orders after I get my pool down, I just open and then react to whatever my opponent is doing.

my openings are as follows:

12-pool
when I'm afraid of a 2gate, 6pool or anything stupid

9 Overlord
12 gas
12 pool
12 scout

Get zergling speed, then pull the drones off gas and set yourself up for an expansion, make enough lings to feel safe and pump drones.

13-pool with +1 armor against zerg

This one is quite interesting, did you know that lings with +1 armour actually survive a baneling hit? This is my counter to baneling zergs, you have to micro like hell...

9 Overlord
13 gas
13 pool
13 scout
14 evo chamber

as soon as evo chamber pops, get your armor upgrade started, then when you have 100 gas more get zergling speed, then pull all drones off gas. If the opponent is going for mass banelings, I recommend another hatch in your base, just to pump more lings, you only need like 18 drones to support 2 hatches of lings.

14 pool

This is my basic opening (for example against random players), and against protoss when I'm not afraid of a 2gate zealot rush.

9 Overlord
14 gas
14 pool
14 scout

Get ling speed as soon as you have 100 gas, then pull drones off and get ready for an expansion. get enough lings to stay safe and remember to scout. If I see a 4gate, 3rax, 3gate robo or whatever coming my way I pop down a spine crawler or two, they're cheap and you'll have the better econ anyway.

12/10 hatch against terran

this one is fun.

drone till 10/10
double extractor trick to 12/10
12/10 hatch
11/10 overlord
11/18 pool

pump drones and get down a spine at your expansion, delay your queen if you have to.

14 pool -> roach spam

This is a bad build, but it's very easy to pull off and it's one of the better 1 base zerg play I've come across, sets you up nicely for 1 base muta.

9 Overlord
14 pool
when pool pops do all of these at once:

gas
gas
roach warren
queen

put 2 drones on one gas, three on the other.

Start pumping roaches, and remember to overlord alot, roaches cost fuckton of supply.

This opening is _okay_ if you really want to just play 1base and if executed properly you can get to plat with it.

[Yoica]

As Zerg how do you handle early(ish) turtling terrans using siege/turrets around 2 bases?

I end up just throwing wave upon wave of muta's and out macro them, but that generally only works 1/2 the time, because your screwed when they finally do their 200/200 thor/siege/marine or banshee/BC push.

[Vorte]

As Zerg how do you handle early(ish) turtling terrans using siege/turrets around 2 bases?

I end up just throwing wave upon wave of muta's and out macro them, but that generally only works 1/2 the time, because your screwed when they finally do their 200/200 thor/siege/marine or banshee/BC push.

Upload the replay, or watch it, if you didn't! Generally mass expanding and harassing early is the key to victory

[Rash]

Mass expanding and making sure the terran doesn't expand to more than 2 bases. Herassing isn't easy, especially when you wanna outmacro the terran.
So I'd just focus on getting expansions and make sure they all have many larva ready so you can instantly replenish your army with new countering units if your army dies.

[Yathezai]

Bumping this because it's really useful!

Alright so I played 6 games today, 44 more unranked to go...and even though it's been an amazing experience today I'm kinda looking for beginner's help. I never played RTS, let alone SC, so, yeah. Everything below is TvT.

In these 6 games I managed to win twice because there was no harassment from the other team. I could build fancy Battlecruisers and whatnot and just overrun the enemy having a huge resources advantage in quite long games. But now I came up against people with more experience that harass early with Reapers. How can you counter this without slowing yourself down too much? I'm usually a lot faster getting enough workers etc. in the first few minutes. After that point I'm quite clueless what I could do next, build Barracks, get Docks (whatever they're called, to build ships), or well, anything and in the meantime the opponent starts catching up.

I found slight bits of info around the internet about Terran playstyles but it's either too complicated or 'too' basic. And if there are some fancy starting builds out there I'd love to take a look at them.

Thanks in advance!

[Rash]

Send out a scout after you build your first supply depot and hang it around in his base. You should be able to see a fast refinery (maybe before the barracks or at nearly at the same time) and a fast techlab on the barracks before a marine comes out. If this happens you will get reapers in your base pretty fast. My way to deal with it is to get atleast 2 marines out for the first reaper (and make them attack together obviously). By the time the second reaper comes out you will have atleast 3 or maybe 4 marines. If the guy is a retard and still engages with his reapers, kill them by pulling back whatever marine took some damage, so you don't lose any, and even if you don't micro them that well, 2-3 reapers lose to 4-5 marines for sure. In the meantime you can't forget to keep producing SCV's, supply depots and get a second barracks or a factory, so you can still tech up at the same time.

If all that doesn't make you feel secure, or you're behind on unit production for some reason, build a bunker in, or close to your mineral line. After all, marines in a bunker have pretty huge range.