EPTUntil very recently it's been a frustrating and discouraging few weeks for me playing Starcraft 2. I dropped out of gold league a while back after 300 games or so, and now, after over 700 games, I'm still stuck in silver.
I have also been going through noticable streaks of winning and losing as I bounce back and forth across the 50% win/loss ratio. If I crept above 50%, I would promptly lose as many as nine games in a row. If I dropped far below 50%, I would win around the same number. I rarely felt like I had won or lost a close match, either: the matchmaking system seemed to be alternately crushing and coddling me. Worst of all, it felt like it was something different that got me killed every time, as though there were a million things I had to improve upon before I could take a single step forward.
To try and shake myself out of the funk I was in, I decided to take the time to make proper notes about how I was losing and - just as importantly - how I was managing to win, in the hope of identifying patterns so that I could concentrate on improving the right aspect of my play. The results were interesting to say the least!
In one sense it was something different that got me killed in every game. Sometimes I'd forget to scout, or scout early but neglect to keep tabs on my opponent as the game went on. Sometimes I'd forget a vital tech building, or upgrades, or an expansion, or gas, or a macro hatch. Sometimes I'd lose quickly to aggressive play, sometimes I'd mass too many units, dither around being too passive, and lose to economic play. Sometimes I'd do really well early on, get into a commanding lead, and then fall apart.
But in another sense it was always exactly the same thing that got me killed: tunnel vision. If I went into a game distracted by some quirk of the map or the matchup, I'd forget something and lose. If I got distracted by what my opponent was doing, I'd forget something and lose. If I crushed his attack and took half the map, I'd often be so distracted by my success that I'd forget upgrades, forget tech, forget that if I give him long enough he can max out on two bases - and lose. It wouldn't always be the same thing, but it would always be something critical.
In the end, then, the issue wasn't that I needed to focus on improving some aspect of my play - although without doubt it all needs a lot of work. On the contrary: I needed to stop myself focusing.
This manifests on a number of levels, too. For instance, I started to catch myself watching the last quarter of the Spawn Larvae progress bar, spamming V so that I could nail the re-inject, while larvae from the last round sat there unspent, my evo chambers were idle, my gas crept up waiting for me to start a baneling nest or a spire, and my lings sat in my base instead of at the watchtowers. And if something happened while I was waiting, that narrow focus would shift and I'd usually forget the injection as well. But mechanical myopia was only part of it.
I was also forever losing sight of my overall goal, often in the time it took me to make my first overlord. On the loading screen I'd be thinking, "Ok, ZvZ on Steppes. I'm gonna do that Day9 roach/fast lair build. Get some roaches, block my ramp, transition into... oh, the game's started. Shall I make my overlord on nine, or ten? Nine gets it to the ramp quicker, but I can scout an early pool better if I send my tenth drone and use an extractor trick..." and the whole game plan would be forgotten. I'd execute the opening build order, more or less, but when it came to the branching point I'd suddenly realise that I had no idea where to go with it because I had no idea what he was doing.
In light of this realisation, my losing and winning streaks started to make sense too. When I was winning I was more relaxed, sitting back (figuratively and literally) to take in the whole game, and consequently staying on top of things better. But as soon as I started to lose, I'd tense up. I'd blame my laid-back attitude for the loss and become determined to focus better. As a result I'd start to forget things again, so instead of everything being a little bit sloppy, a little bit slow, but at least all there, one or two aspects of my play would tighten up at the expense of one or more truly catastrophic oversights. Then in the next game I'd overcompensate and forget something else, and end up on tilt. Eventually I'd manage a win, calm down, and the cycle would begin anew.
The lesson is: I'm not quick enough to do everything that needs doing, quickly. And it's more important that everything gets done than that it happens at exactly the right time. To put it another way, I am not yet at the stage where I can afford to focus on improving individual aspects of my play.
For me, the next step is to make sure I'm doing everything - injecting, spreading creep, spawning larvae, getting upgrades, scouting, making overlords, keeping an eye on his tech and his army, thinking about my plan and what I need to be doing next, expanding, taking advantage of opportunities to be aggressive - and mainly letting speed come through habit, as opposed to actively trying to 'get quicker' by concentrating harder on individual tasks.
I shall pursue this 'meta strategy' (I treat myself to that word occasionally) for a while and let you know how it pans out.
Thanks for reading.
