How I Reached Platinum

I found silver to Gold league to be much more frustrating than Gold to Plat. Overall, Gold players know what to do with their units, and which units to make. They grab upgrades, and are somewhat comfortable with making early pushes, and also with playing a macro game (although gold macro isn't very tight).

In PvP at a gold level, many players will try to 4 gate you, and give up way too easilly, or just have poor micro and you can usually stop their early pushes. I had a lot of success at this level with a 3 stalker rush into either 4 gate blink, or a 1 base colossus push. One mistake a lot of Protoss in PvP make is that they expand when they can't hold an expansion. I noticed very quickly that if I got Colossus out as quickly as possible, I could 1 base vs. most 2 bases.

A lot of Zergs at the Gold level do not know how to play a macro Zerg very well. Most overproduce units in the early game to prepare for a rush that may never be coming, and few produce enough drones. Some of the strategies that I have found very effective vs. Gold and Platinum level Zergs are 3 Gate DT Expo, 6 Gate pushes, and of course, a "normal" macro game.

At the Gold level, most Terran players are extremely predictable. One thing that's interesting is that in Gold, I saw a lot of banshee rushes, and in Platinum, I have seen much more standard early pushes. I've been using the 2 gate robo build in this match up and I have a fairly high win percentage vs. Terran. At this level (and this actually applies for both Gold and Platinum) Terrans make some very common mistakes that are easilly capitalized on. For one, a lot of Terrans will overproduce Marauders. I dealt with this by simply building more chargelots. Another key mistake that so many Terrans make is that they will make a push that destroys their whole army. With good forcefield usage, it became much easier to hold off early 2 rax pushes, and even gain an advantage from them. They will also drop an army in your base and eventually lose it, thus being left with a really small army of themselves. Most Gold Terrans cannot micro their drops. Another huge mistake that most Gold level Terrans make is that they will make a planetary fortress at their natural. That means they are losing so much income without the use of mules. Another thing I noticed is that DTs are extremely effective vs. Terran at this level, and they can really let you put the pressure back on them.

For one, I played A LOT. I've been playing around 15 games a day on average, sometimes I will play 20 games a day. Besides that, my mechanics have improved and I've gotten better at macro. I've also been experimenting with different strategies, and I think that has helped a lot. One final thing I did was I made sure I improved my scouting, and I kept the other players expansions in check. One major tip I can give is CHECK FOR HIDDEN EXPANSIONS. So many Gold players will hide expansions from you, and if you find them, you can easily pick them off.

I need to continue playing a lot and refining my builds. I also need to continue scouting during the mid game, and most importantly, I need to work on pressuring my opponents.