EPTWhy am I so annoyed, you ask.
Well, matchmaking is weird at the moment. Really weird. My last few games (today and yesterday) have been outrageously unfair. I checked their profiles after (the first guy flamed the shit out of me so I checked his profile)
My current rank is 31 Gold Divison. I have played exactly 240 games.
Now here's the weird part. Three of my opponents (I didnt check all of them, some were normal) where rank 4, rank 5, and rank 8 platinum. (There was also a 30-something platinum but he sixpooled me so he doesn't deserve an analysis :p )
This means, not only were they a lot higher ranked than me (one and a half division, almost!) my computer also ranked ALL the games as being even. I'm seriously wondering if my computer has some sort of bug which registers all games as even, or if battle.net is trying to place me in top platinum. I guess we'll see.
Also worth mentioning, all of the guys I played had at least 1000 games played (I'm sitting on 240).
I thought I'd do some analysis on those games, I mean, after all, I am trying to reach platinum league. So if I could learn how to beat top platinum I'll be safe, right?
ZvZ on Scrap Station
Before I actually do any analysis I just want to say that this game is stupid. The ending is just.. stupid.
He went muta+ling and I went hydra+baneling. Then he got banelings to counter my hydras, and when I was looking in the wrong place he ambushed my hydras and they just died...
Anyways, lets do some analysis of the stuff BEFORE the crap ending!
I start by asking him his league, haha
The reason was he had the Ultralisk-avatar which requires 750 wins as zerg.. made me go O.o
Standard openings really, I get 14 pool 13 gas and he does 14 gas 14 pool.
There's a few other small things to notice, like my money going up really high. The reason was I normally throw down an expo and roach warren but wanted to scout first. I saw he was teching so I droned while teching to hydras. I mean come on. It's scrap station, what else would he be doing?
I was actually quite surprised looking at the replay. I was basically fucked even if he haden't gotten banelings.
Why was I so fucked? He got the damn gold and I didn't notice!!
He also killed a few drones so he was WAY ahead in drones AND had the gold... I noticed eventually but way too late.
I eventually caught up in drones, but then the stupid ending happened and it was GG.
So. What did you learn?
One small thing first, I had way too much gas early game. Apparently you don't need 2 gas right away to build hydras, not until 2 bases are saturated, anyway.
Now, the big thing!
Really, I think if I had scouted his banelings and scouted his gold expo sooner, I would've been fine. I would have made roaches to tank the banelings and I would have been fine. He was slightly ahead in economy, but not that much. Scouting, scouting, scouting!
Also worth noting: He had 4 bases. I knew that they were up, so right when they finished I decided to attack, unfortunately it didn't work.
Replay
ZvP on Blistering Sands
There won't be that much analysis on this one, because there isn't that much to talk about.
The toss did stargate (4 phoenixes) into expand, while I did a fast expand (15 hatch). He killed a few ovies and a queen, but I got some spore crawlers and my drones were safe.
I took my third (gold) and started getting a good roach hydra mix. He expanded to his gold so I attacked and managed to kill it off quite easily. By then it was already gg, but I got some corruptors to kill his colossi (name one protoss who doesn't go colossi in PvZ) and finished him off.
Since there's not that much to talk about strategy-wise, I looked at my mechanics and that sort of thing instead. The first (and most important!) thing I need to improve is my vomiting. No, not actual vomiting, queen larvae vomiting. My timings are off whenever I get distracted (like when scouting or something) and it kinda hurts my macro.
I also need my second gas earlier, I got it when I got my Lair, but I got to high money since I couldn't make as many roaches as I wanted to. So yeah, second gas earlier, preferably same time as I get my roach warren. It didn't make a huge difference, but against a 4 gate it could!
Replay
Now for the last game! With a sweet, sweet ending!
ZvP (No ZvT today, sorry
on MetalopolisThis game actually feels pro to me. Why does it feel pro? Because I got expansion blocked! ^__^
Normally, that's not a thing to be happy about, but in every single pro ZvP I watch, the zerg gets blocked from early expanding. I saw a probe in my natural, and went straight for a normal gas/pool opening.
I did get my expansion down together with my roach warren, around 20-24 food (or supp-la-hai, if you prefer that term). Then I saw it. The Feared, the Dreaded, the Hated, the I-WIN-BUTTON that is 4 fucking warp gate!
You guys are probably bored OUT OF YOUR MINDS with dealing with 4 gates, but I haven't done it that much. I don't really know the exact timings, how much stuff will come and all that sort of stuff, but I made a shitload of roaches and some spines, in an attempt to Not Die.
It worked fairly well.
When the push came, I had 5 roaches, 1 queen (I didn't wanna move the second one in case I needed more larvae) and 2 spines close to done (250/300 hp or so).
My 4gating little buddy had 5 stalkers, 4 zealots and 2 sentries with 3 forcefields combined.
It was actually a long fight. He killed a queen and a spine, then backed off and reinforced from his pylon (For the record, I Dont Like Reinforcement Pylons)
There was some back and forth action, until I finally was able to kill his pylon, the probe and got him to back off.
As you all most certainly know, I am now in the lead. Why? Because I defended my expo!
I'm now on two bases against one, so I KNOW that he will be expanding. When I see that he does, I take my third. I almost did a giddy little victory dance already, but decided to keep playing instead.
It was lucky I did that, because he did another push with Immortals added to the mix. I held that as well (it was kind of close though, not in a "wipe my face from all this adrenalin-induced sweat" kind of closed but more of a "sigh of relief" type of thing.
I started getting hydras as well as droning my third. He takes a secret (gasp!) third, which I fail to notice, yet again.. T.T
It doesn't matter though, I'm closed to maxed and just crush him. Colossi are supposed to "counter" hydras, but he still dies pretty convincingly.
Replay
Now I promised there was a sweet ending, right? Well there was.
![[image loading]](http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YYQEowIMqTY/TVXPLWreY_I/AAAAAAAAAAU/5-8xNe-2ork/s1600/Copy+of+sweetend.bmp)
Yummy, Yummy QQ ( << This is a link. You should click it)
