• Log InLog In
  • Register
Liquid`
Team Liquid Liquipedia
EDT 08:14
CEST 14:14
KST 21:14
  • Home
  • Forum
  • Calendar
  • Streams
  • Liquipedia
  • Features
  • Store
  • EPT
  • TL+
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Smash
  • Heroes
  • Counter-Strike
  • Overwatch
  • Liquibet
  • Fantasy StarCraft
  • TLPD
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Blogs
Forum Sidebar
Events/Features
News
Featured News
Serral wins HomeStory Cup 2915Serral wins Maestros of the Game 243ByuL, and the Limitations of Standard Play3Team Liquid Map Contest #22: Results and Winners7Code S Season 2 (2026): RO4 and Finals Preview12
Community News
Weekly Cups (Aug 3-9): Protoss get shut out1RSL goes to London! 2026 Offline Finals Nov 21-2212Weekly Cups (July 27-Aug 2): SHIN's big week0SC4ALL II: Brood War - $2500 - Dec 5-69SC4ALL II announced - $10,000 prize pool, Dec 5-64
StarCraft 2
General
Weekly Cups (Aug 3-9): Protoss get shut out SC4ALL: II Talent Announcement! Protoss AoE skill expression August World Ranking: Clem climbs to #2 Balance hotfix patch 5.0.16b (July 16)
Tourneys
Sparkling Tuna Cup - Weekly Open Tournament RSL goes to London! 2026 Offline Finals Nov 21-22 RSL Revival: Season 6 - Qualifiers and Main Event PIG STY FESTIVAL 8.0! (13 - 23 August) Tasteless Time Warp: SC Evo Showmatch (May 25)
Strategy
[G] Having the right mentality to improve
Custom Maps
Nexus Wars 2021 GUIDE [M] (2) Industrial Park
External Content
Mutation # 538 Media Blackout The PondCast: SC2 News & Results Mutation # 537 Hostile Territory Mutation # 536 Railroad Switch
Brood War
General
BGH Auto Balance -> http://bghmmr.eu/ ASL22 General Discussion Are you ready for ASL 22? NEW HYPE VIDEO How FlaSh Nearly Forfeited MSL Finals being late BW General Discussion
Tourneys
[Megathread] Daily Proleagues 2v2v2v2 Tournament KCM Race Survival 2026 Season 3 Escore Tournament - Season 3
Strategy
Fighting Spirit mining rates Odyssey Mineral Stack Saturation Any training maps people recommend? Simple Questions, Simple Answers
Other Games
General Games
Nintendo Switch Thread General RTS Discussion Thread EVE Corporation Stormgate/Frost Giant Megathread Diablo 2 thread
Dota 2
Looking for a Dota Mentor Official 'what is Dota anymore' discussion
League of Legends
[TL LoL EUW IHs] Teemo shall perish TSM pausing esports and CLG Dead
Heroes of the Storm
Heroes of the Storm 2.0
Hearthstone
Deck construction bug
TL Mafia
TL Mafia Power Rank TL Mafia Community Thread NeO.D_StephenKing vs This Guy From 1 Million Dance
Community
General
US Politics Mega-thread Russo-Ukrainian War Thread Iain M Banks Says He Has Cancer And Months To Live European Politico-economics QA Mega-thread The Games Industry And ATVI
Fan Clubs
MarineLorD Fan Club The ShoWTimE Fan Club The herO Fan Club!
Media & Entertainment
Movie Discussion! Anime Discussion Thread Series you have seen recently... [Req][Books] Good Fantasy/SciFi books
Sports
Football (Soccer) Thread NBA General Discussion TeamLiquid Health and Fitness Initiative For 2023 Formula 1 Discussion MLB/Baseball 2023
World Cup 2022
Tech Support
Computer Build, Upgrade & Buying Resource Thread Simple Questions Simple Answers FPS when play League Of Legend on laptop
TL Community
The Automated Ban List Northern Ireland Global Starcraft
Blogs
Are High-Level Gamers more A…
TrAiDoS
Cathedral Of CS And NY pizza a…
FuDDx
Please support my new stand…
Peanutsc
Hello guys!
LIN1s
ASL S22 English Commentary…
namkraft
Poker (part 2)
Nebuchad
Customize Sidebar...

Website Feedback

Closed Threads



Active: 4038 users

RPS in RTS

Blogs > AirbladeOrange
Post a Reply
AirbladeOrange
Profile Blog Joined June 2010
United States2574 Posts
March 11 2011 20:17 GMT
#1
This was a chance find while I was reading about Rock Paper Scissors strategy. It's funny how detailed it gets even though it was written for someone who knows nothing of Starcraft. It also seems appropriate because on the forums I hear many people complain about Rock Paper Scissors in Starcraft 2. However, this is about Brood War. I'm no Brood War expert, but this article clearly fails to take scouting into consideration. Regardless of its faults it still is worth checking out. Here it is.

PS It also has a section talking about fighting games, specifically Virtua FIghter.

RPS in RTS

Real-time strategy games such as StarCraft also use the RPS system. Like fighting games there's the concept of RPS on large scale and a small scale. On the small scale, particular units are designed to counter each other in a RPS way. A marine dies to a guardian. A guardian dies to a corsair. A corsair dies to a marine. Abstractly, there are 6 categories of unit. Ground units can either attack 1) other ground units, 2) air units, or 3) both. Air units can attack 4) other air units, 5) ground units, or 6) both. Pure ground-to-ground units usually beat both other types of ground units, yet lose to both types of air units that can attack ground. Similarly, pure air-to-air units usually beat both other types of air units, but loose to both types of ground units than can attack air.

RPS is not limited purely to units countering each other though. Real-time strategy games also have the concept of trading off powerful units now for a strong economy now, which leads to even more powerful units later. So on one extreme, a Zerg player in StarCraft might sacrifice his entire economy to get a quick attack force ("6 pool" is the term). This will likely beat a player who chose the other extreme of playing for pure economy and no immediate attack force (by building double oven triple hatcheries). A moderate build (pool on 9th peon, one sunken colony) will likely defend against the early attacker's rush, though. Surviving the rush, the moderate build will have a much superior economy and win in the end. However, this moderate build will produce an inferior economy to the player who built 2 or 3 hatcheries and went for pure economy.

In Starcraft, the early rush is a very, very risky strategy. It's all or nothing. You'll either win right away off it, or your rush will fail and you'll almost surely lose. Because of this, the early rush isn't all that common (depending on the map), but the very threat that the opponent might play the early rush is enough to stop you from playing for pure economy every time.

Finally, notice how hard it is to determine the actual payoffs in StarCraft. If your correct guess results in a battle between a few enemy Zealots and several of your Marines, what is the payoff? How many Marines will you lose? It depends on the micromanagement skill of both players, the terrain, and whether each player even focuses on the battle at all (maybe there's a more pressing battle somewhere else on the map). A lot of the goodness of StarCraft's design is that it's full of RPS with unequal and unclear payoffs.

http://www.sirlin.net/articles/rock-paper-scissors-in-strategy-games.html

*
mikeymoo
Profile Blog Joined October 2006
Canada7170 Posts
March 11 2011 20:39 GMT
#2
Oh Sirlin... I knew this looked familiar.
o_x | Ow. | 1003 ESPORTS dollars | If you have any questions about bans please PM Kennigit
MiniRoman
Profile Blog Joined September 2003
Canada3953 Posts
March 11 2011 20:54 GMT
#3
T.T fighting gamers may want their genre to be as deep as RTS.. but it isn't. Sirlin with flawed logic does not make it so
Nak Allstar.
Boblion
Profile Blog Joined May 2007
France8043 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-03-11 20:57:41
March 11 2011 20:56 GMT
#4
I think we have already said it before, Sirlin shouldn't be allowed to talk about RTS, especially broodwar.
A D- player is more knowledgeable than him.
fuck all those elitists brb watching streams of elite players.
puppykiller
Profile Blog Joined August 2009
United States3137 Posts
March 11 2011 21:13 GMT
#5
huh... this is pretty obvious stuff except super dumbed down
Why would I play sctoo when I can play BW?
Chill
Profile Blog Joined January 2005
Calgary26003 Posts
March 11 2011 21:18 GMT
#6
Have you seen Sirlin's later posts on RTS? He has no autority on talking about the genre. He can talk about the mind of gaming, but as soon as he crosses into RTS specifics he loses all credibility for me.
Moderator
intotheheart
Profile Blog Joined January 2011
Canada33091 Posts
March 11 2011 21:39 GMT
#7
Except it doesn't exactly work that way, since maxed 200/200 armies attacking each other can typically vary in terms of "effectiveness," as the skill level of the players differ. RPS is luck and mind-games.
kiss kiss fall in love
Chef
Profile Blog Joined August 2005
10810 Posts
March 11 2011 21:57 GMT
#8
Haha, this is such tunnel vision. Maybe some units are better at killing certain units than others, but that doesn't make it rock paper sissors, especially when in StarCraft you are not forced to engage enemy armies if you don't want to. Carriers counter lurkers? Sure, but that doesn't help when your carriers are on one side of the map and the lurkers are in the Protoss' mineral line. There are no real counters in SC because every unit has a number of uses that goes beyond just attacking into the enemy. It really takes someone with no RTS experience to think of StarCraft only in terms of whether the units win in a confrontation vs one another.
LEGEND!! LEGEND!!
TheNessman
Profile Blog Joined May 2009
United States4158 Posts
March 11 2011 22:17 GMT
#9
hahaha, the OP seemed pretty legit and logical, nothing new, but a simple way of explaining some of the basic ideas in SC,

What makes him so discredited? Link?
~~! youtube.com/xmungam1 !~~
Boblion
Profile Blog Joined May 2007
France8043 Posts
March 11 2011 23:16 GMT
#10
The "why TL think that Sirlin is a joke" thread:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=108326
fuck all those elitists brb watching streams of elite players.
Please log in or register to reply.
Live Events Refresh
PiG Sty Festival
12:00
Qualifier #2
PiGStarcraft379
IndyStarCraft 29
Liquipedia
Sparkling Tuna Cup
10:00
Weekly #141
Nicoract vs IbaLIVE!
Shameless vs TBD
CranKy Ducklings132
LiquipediaDiscussion
[ Submit Event ]
Live Streams
Refresh
StarCraft 2
SHIN 616
Lowko472
PiGStarcraft379
Classic 142
ByuN (SOOP) 111
Maru 97
herO (SOOP) 75
Rogue 55
Cure 41
Trap 39
IndyStarCraft 29
StarCraft: Brood War
Shuttle 4932
Bisu 2015
Jaedong 944
firebathero 823
Hyuk 607
Mini 483
Soulkey 328
EffOrt 323
Stork 314
Light 237
[ Show more ]
Snow 158
Pusan 132
Barracks 119
Killer 110
hero 94
Rush 69
Sea.KH 68
Sharp 54
soO 54
Free 47
sorry 19
Sexy 18
zelot 11
IntoTheRainbow 10
Terrorterran 9
yabsab 8
Icarus 7
Dota 2
Dendi2234
XBOCT1498
Counter-Strike
olofmeister2130
x6flipin1263
byalli785
Super Smash Bros
Mew2King69
Heroes of the Storm
Khaldor29
Other Games
singsing2447
B2W.Neo654
crisheroes279
Sick184
Liquid`LucifroN122
hiko87
Livibee87
QueenE48
KnowMe43
Organizations
StarCraft: Brood War
lovetv 11
[ Show 11 non-featured ]
StarCraft 2
• CranKy Ducklings SOOP8
• AfreecaTV YouTube
• intothetv
• Kozan
• IndyKCrew
• Migwel
StarCraft: Brood War
• BSLYoutube
• STPLYoutube
• ZZZeroYoutube
Dota 2
• lizZardDota2284
Other Games
• WagamamaTV230
Upcoming Events
PiGosaur Cup
11h 47m
Replay Cast
20h 47m
Kung Fu Cup
22h 47m
Replay Cast
1d 11h
The PondCast
1d 21h
Replay Cast
2 days
Escore
2 days
CranKy Ducklings
3 days
Sparkling Tuna Cup
4 days
Afreeca Starleague
5 days
Rush vs Hm
Bisu vs Shuttle
[ Show More ]
WardiTV Weekly
5 days
The Patches Monday
6 days
Afreeca Starleague
6 days
Sharp vs Shinee
Action vs Shine
Liquipedia Results

Completed

Proleague 2026-08-10
CranK Gathers Season 4: BW vs SC2 Team League
Eternal Conflict S2 Finale

Ongoing

KCM Race Survival 2026 Season 3
K-JUNGMAN
Acropolis #5
RSL Revival: Season 6
Esports World Cup 2026: LCQ
BLAST Bounty Summer 2026
BLAST Bounty Summer Qual
Stake Ranked Episode 3
XSE Pro League 2026
IEM Cologne Major 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 2

Upcoming

Escore Tournament S3: W7
CSLAN 4
ASL Season 22
Escore Tournament S3: W8
Acropolis #5 - TRS
Blizzard Classic Cup 2026
Acropolis #5 - GSA
HSC XXX
SC4ALL II: StarCraft II
Kung Fu Cup 2026 Grand Finals
RSL Offline Finals
PiG Sty Festival 8.0
Big Dog Cup 2026 Div 1
META DYMY #4
PGL Masters Bucharest 2026
Thunderpick World Champ.
ESL Pro League Season 24
Stake Ranked Episode 4
Logitech G Connect 2026
SL StarSeries Fall 2026
FISSURE Playground #5
BLAST Open Fall 2026
Esports World Cup 2026
TLPD

1. ByuN
2. TY
3. Dark
4. Solar
5. Stats
6. Nerchio
7. sOs
8. soO
9. INnoVation
10. Elazer
1. Rain
2. Flash
3. EffOrt
4. Last
5. Bisu
6. Soulkey
7. Mini
8. Sharp
Sidebar Settings...

Advertising | Privacy Policy | Terms Of Use | Contact Us

Original banner artwork: Jim Warren
The contents of this webpage are copyright © 2026 TLnet. All Rights Reserved.