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I know by this point everyone's probably seen the blog of the guy that went Bronze to Diamond on "macro alone" with toss. Just punched out mass stalker and won won won all the way to Diamond. No tricks no gimmicks, no crazy micro.
I think I also heard of someone doing this with just MMM with Terran (maybe?).
I'm wondering, has anyone attempted something like this with Zerg? Is it even possible? Personally I don't think it is. With the lack of T1 anti-air, the huge dependence on 'counter' units and such, I don't think Zerg is able to just power through opponents on macro alone.
This isn't a gripe or complaint, just an observation.
Obviously, in terms of basic SC2 play, 'Macro' is the most important; So long as we're only breaking SC2 ins Macro and Micro. I've been somewhat iffy on the value of this as the only 2 metrics of play, lately, though.
I think Micro is a fine term, it describes a very specific set of skills that can REALLY be practiced by itself. You can just go "I need to micro better" and practice your micro directly. No problem.
Macro's too big of a label though. "Macro better" could mean so many things! Is your gas timing horrible? Are you not building enough workers? For Zerg: is your drone timing off? Are you building the WRONG things due to improper scouting or game sense? Is your econ management poor? Are you not expanding fast enough? Are you teching too slow? Too fast?
"Macro better" is such an empty, useless statement, but it's thrown out to newer players soooo much. I've taken art classes before that required you to write critiques of other people's work for a grade. I feel like "Macro Better" is a lot like just saying "Paint Better." It's correct advice, it's valid, in a way, but still completely devoid of thought or content. It's the kind of critique that would net a grade around an F or F-.
I know the whole dichotomy of Macro/Micro is pleasing because it makes things simple, describes, in a way, what people do when they play and is pleasing in an aesthetic way due to onomatopoeia, but I think it's really just useless as a descriptive tool.
Thoughts?
 
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Pretty sure the experiment has been done with all races and that hydra's would serve fine as an all purpose unit. I think Destiny even went mass queen till Diamond.
Macro is quite simple of a term, probes and pylons, spend your money., until you're masters league you won't have to worry about the gas timings on your 3rd.
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I was masters last season before I stopped playing and I don't know any proper build orders, I just wing it and do what I have learned from BW. Mainly just mass lings/mutas/infestors. So yeah, up to a point, maybe low masters, all you need to do is just expand and make units.
You are going way to deep into details for a lower level player. The things they need to learn is that you need to take orher bases, make a lot of workers, larvae inject, creep spread. Maybe it is not as straight forward as the other races, but definately not as hard as you make it out.
And macro is basicly making units, not floating a lot of money, taking bases, saturating bases. Gas timing is gas timing, if you take your gas on 18 for a 3 hatch muta (BW) build you macro is not bad, your timing is off.
EDIT: Ninja'd
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Back when I played (up till roaches got range buff) I had 0 plans 0 build orders and I was able to get in top diamond (when that was the top league) by massing and rolling the crap out of 4gate and MMM builds.
Back when I didn't have steppes thumbed down. That was so lame.
I'm pretty sure there are masters/GM players that can just build more stuff than diamond players and win almost regardless of army comp.
That's just my opinion though.
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@Saechiis I don't know, sure hydras are sort of all purpose, but there's a lot of things that can kill hydra as such ridiculous cost effectiveness (colossus, tanks, hellions, etc) that it seems unlikely just going mass hydra till Diamond would work. Not to mention you'd be mostly undefended from any early-game aggression you couldn't deal with with only lings. Maybe roach/hydra would be an acceptable 'easy' macro-only unit comp? I don't know.
@Mortician Not knowing proper build orders, and just doing mindless macro is 2 different things, I think. Not to mention that build orders are usually referred to as part of macro. Also, I think that you've got it backward when you say I'm going too into detail for a lower-league player. I think lower-league players would benefit from more detail, where higher-league players wouldn't.
If you tell a plat/diamond/master player "Your macro is off" they likely have an idea what you mean, and maybe even how to correct the problem. You tell a bronze player the same thing, and they might not have any idea what they need to fix. It's a lot faster and more helpful (for them) to say "Oh, you stopped building SCVs. Don't do that."
Also, macro isn't 'basically' anything. Macro is EVERYTHING. (except micro) and that's the problem. I'm sure, based on your comment, you break it up more and consider some non-micro things NOT macro...but most people don't make that distinction, that I've seen. Most people just consider anything that's not micro to be macro. Build orders, gas timing, drone timing, expo speed, etc. And that's just not helpful.
@WirelessWaffle Your comment is pretty much Mortician's comment, with less details.
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You can just start pumping out roaches/lings and try to go for a timing attack too. The macro part would be establishing a decent enough economy before the attack, to be able to support it with constant pressure. Then if you want, expand a couple times behind it :p
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Ubiquitous: having or seeming to have the ability to be everywhere at once; omnipresent
I'm not sure that's the right word in context.
Anyways, Zerg can also win with mindless macro. At worst, they have to think a TINY more about unit comp.
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No, I'm pretty sure that's the word I wanted.
Onnipresent and all-important. As in, macro before else in all things, to the exclusion of all others, for the win.
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I was replying to the first 4 paragraphs of your post.
Here's my reply to the semantics stuff
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=61389
Also, going into specifics with lower level players isn't very because they aren't at the level where lots of people use higher level tactics/strategies. Being able to mass --> a-move ---> win is evidence of that.
An example of this would be "Don't do X when you see Y building at Z time because this attack can kill you"
More than likely the other person just has a shitty build order and reading too much into their play is kind of pointless.
Macro is a blanket term but if a person is giving advice they won't say "macro better" and leave the post there, they'll get banned pretty fast. They'll probably say macro better your injects are terrible, or you float so much money just MAKE SOMETHING.
And for Bronze-Diamond this is extremely valid advice because they have not perfected anything so pointing them in the direction of what will help them most is basically:
Don't get supply blocked
Spend Money
Make Workers
Use your races macro mechanic
Expand
Going into nuances of gas timings with someone who's floating 1kminerals while having zero gas is pointless.
The proper advice is, get your gas earlier if you plan on making X unit. Over complicating things just isn't worth it until they can understand (Ez part, since most people have a decent grasp on strategy) and execute properly.
Anyways there's no real point in this argument because after your first 4 paragraphs your post can be summed into
"Two words do not amount to constructive criticism"
To which most would reply
"No shit"
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On August 14 2011 01:52 Reithan wrote:
I know by this point everyone's probably seen the blog of the guy that went Bronze to Diamond on "macro alone" with toss. Just punched out mass stalker and won won won all the way to Diamond. No tricks no gimmicks, no crazy micro.
Link?
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Not to stupidly argue semantics, but omnipresent is not all important. I think of ubiquitous as more, "Is Zerg macro seen as often as Other Races macro" and the answer to that would be an emphatic yes. At high levels, Zerg macro is certainly as pervasive as macro in other races. But Zerg macro cannot be used at lower levels to just auto-win over players with worse macro.
edit:
ex: "Cowboy hats are ubiquitous among the male singers"
It's not that cowboy hats are all important to the exclusion of everything else; they are merely seen everywhere.
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Yes, perhaps I was reading too much import into the word ubiquitous, would perhaps momentous, significant, pivotal or crucial be more to your liking?
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Yeah, all of those work. Like I said, I don't want to be obnoxious. I think the observation is pretty interesting. Regardless of whether the correct usage of "macro" was used, it's odd that zerg is the race that relies most on unit comp. But I'd like to point out that the MMM army was composed of more than just marines. Likewise, Zerg may need to just create a creative unit composition to win. So maybe roach, ling, hydra wins everything till masters.
edit: oh, and queens.
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You can't expect us to know that this was posted on reddit..
and the guy got a new account, started from bronze and macroed his way up. I'd say that's completely true. He wasn't a bronze level player, he just had a bronze level account. Basically, good macro is enough to get you up to diamond, maybe even masters. So yes, at low levels macro is all that's needed to rank up, but once you reach a certain point, you'll start needing more than just macro.
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IIRC that link's been posted a few times here on TL, and there's also Google. And yeah, that was kinda my point. My main point was that zerg needs more than just macro SOONER than the other races. Like, whereas macro alone will take you to plat or even diamond with Terran or Protoss, I don't think you'll get much past gold or maybe plat with Zerg on macro alone.
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Due to the fact that zerg has larva instead of buildings, as long as a zerg has an idea of when to build units of drones, then the zerg can also win purely off macro alone, and it's even easier to win off macro as zerg if they can survive all the various timing attacks against them since larva stacks, a mistake won't be as bad for zerg as the other races.
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On August 14 2011 03:02 Reithan wrote:
No, I'm pretty sure that's the word I wanted.
Onnipresent and all-important. As in, macro before else in all things, to the exclusion of all others, for the win.
Ubiquitous does not mean "all-important." It doesn't even connote that.
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Ubiquitous does not mean "all-important." It doesn't even connote that.
This has already been discussed. Please read before posting.
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I think Micro is a fine term, it describes a very specific set of skills that can REALLY be practiced by itself. You can just go "I need to micro better" and practice your micro directly. No problem.
Macro's too big of a label though. "Macro better" could mean so many things! Is your gas timing horrible? Are you not building enough workers? For Zerg: is your drone timing off? Are you building the WRONG things due to improper scouting or game sense? Is your econ management poor? Are you not expanding fast enough? Are you teching too slow? Too fast?
That's one of the thing I use to argue against people telling me to "practice macro" without telling me which part do I miss.
I understand that gas timing is not exactly the same as macro, but with gas timing comes gas income and expense, and having it too early ruins your early macro, having it too late ruins your midgame macro, as you have an imbalance in ressources and most probably can't spend all your money into the right spot, or it may force you into bad unit compositions..
Macro covers such large fields (production, supply timing, expand timing, worker production and income, "macro mechanics" aka larvae inject and creep tumors for zergs) that there is no way you can focus on all these things together just to train them.
You have to take them seperatly and train them that way. Ofc, there are some that are linked: having good injects modifies the overlord production, as does the mule change the income for terran thus his production capacity, as the chronoboost on unit producing structures changes. But creep spread is not something you'd practice at the same time as larvae inject, because it's just so much different. It can be practiced with the "watching the minimap" skill (which is not directly linked with micro), but trying to learn both larvae inject and creap spread at the same time when you have none of these skills will just lead you to be mediocre in both, and noone wants to train hard and to achieve nothing.
The comparision between creep spread and larvae inject is an example that could have been used with different skills, and while there might be only 2 different fields of "macro"(at least for zerg), they are still clearly seperated.
And although I understand that "practice macro" means having a better overall spending of your ressources and ressources management, and is a very good advice, it's still too general to be understood by a good player. After all, how many players thought they had good macro because they spent all their money but had only 25 drones 15 minutes into the game? (and don't tell me it doesn't happen in the lower leagues, because it does. I have been an example of this when I was still in gold, and having good drone saturation in the late-midgame is still a goal of mine).
However, I think it should be easy with good macro to go up to diamond and maybe even above with zerg. This does not mean winning all your games, but most of them and enough to increase your mmr up to diamond.
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On August 14 2011 01:52 Reithan wrote:
Macro's too big of a label though. "Macro better" could mean so many things! Is your gas timing horrible? Are you not building enough workers? For Zerg: is your drone timing off? Are you building the WRONG things due to improper scouting or game sense? Is your econ management poor? Are you not expanding fast enough? Are you teching too slow? Too fast?
Gas timing is not macro; it's part of build order; same goes for teching. As for econ management, that would be macro, yes. I think the term has been thrown around so much that it has lost solid meaning. I like to believe that it's getting many workers, expanding often, never getting supply blocked, and massing up an army quickly. Even in diamond and maybe low masters you have to continue working on macro as you develop multitasking/micro and minimap watching and other skills, because macro is the core to your play. Actually, some pros have a problem with macro because they micro so hard that macro slips.
I can understand why zergs might not be able to follow the "macro mantra" at lower levels as easily as their terran protoss brothers because of allins, scouting, and more game sense needed. However, I know a GM level protoss whose friend lent him his account. He did the 5 placement matches and then 10 more games and entered masters easily, despite it being his offrace. I think all he really did was perfect macro and using common sense when playing. You don't need to worry so hard about how quickly you tech, or balancing gas/mineral income. That's something you worry about when you're good enough at spending those resources that you start worrying about when you get them.
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EPT
