So season 3 is winding down. I once again languish in Bronze. I feel better about my play, in terms of building workers and maintaining supply, but I feel like I'm not getting as much as I could out of StarCraft 2. It's as if sticking with Terran is, in essence, limiting my growth. It might not be the primary factor, but I do feel that there's more to learn and improve upon if I branch out into the other races.

TL,DR: I'm thinking of going to random in Season 4.

I'm aware that Zerg will probably be my weakest race for a bit as I need to wrap my mind around larva injects and the slightly different setup inherent in hatcheries as opposed to dedicated unit-producing buildings. Has anybody else gone through this sort of transition? Would you recommend it? Or should I stay in my little Terran bubble?

TrueZerG

43 Posts

October 10 2011 03:49 GMT

Dont do it. Playing random is NOT the way to go until @ least platinum, I know its annoying, but Just stay to one race and get REALLY comfy with it. I would advise you stop Laddering for an ENTIRE week actually.
-Practice 1v1 with the very hard AI with it @ 70% until you can beat it, (or even lower) and work your way up to 100%. Do like a Zerg @ 70%, a toss @ 70% then a T @ 70%, or what ever from easiest to hardest for you personally (thats it for me). I know this is REALLY tedious, but its SOMETHING you must do to get good, just keep practicing those and once u can beat them at 100% ure silver league material at minimum. TBH im high diamond lvl and all I do is have a strong opening w/o supply block and i get supply blocked half the time in later macro game, just make sure you can survive early game REALLY well ie no supply blocks @ 18.
-Once you can do this, do THREE entire days of playing the comps on the 'Macro Or Die Maps' one day for each comp @ 100%.
:It doesnt really matter if u win all those games but it will help you in the long run, as i think the comp is better in macro/die maps.

-Finally spend one day doing all of the micro challenges provided, THEN You can start laddering with your ONE race.

Trust me, its a long process, but I gave it to my friend who had the same predicament, and now hes almost in platinum Gold 2, it REALLY helps. Once you have those mechanics down you can start developing Game Sense

TrueZerG

43 Posts

October 10 2011 03:51 GMT

http://i.imgur.com/mWGLy.jpg

And lets not forget Terran has Mauraders

BlueInkAlchemist

United States73 Posts

October 10 2011 03:56 GMT

On October 10 2011 12:49 TrueZerG wrote:
Dont do it. Playing random is NOT the way to go until @ least platinum, I know its annoying, but Just stay to one race and get REALLY comfy with it. I would advise you stop Laddering for an ENTIRE week actually.
-Practice 1v1 with the very hard AI with it @ 70% until you can beat it, (or even lower) and work your way up to 100%. Do like a Zerg @ 70%, a toss @ 70% then a T @ 70%, or what ever from easiest to hardest for you personally (thats it for me). I know this is REALLY tedious, but its SOMETHING you must do to get good, just keep practicing those and once u can beat them at 100% ure silver league material at minimum. TBH im high diamond lvl and all I do is have a strong opening w/o supply block and i get supply blocked half the time in later macro game, just make sure you can survive early game REALLY well ie no supply blocks @ 18.
-Once you can do this, do THREE entire days of playing the comps on the 'Macro Or Die Maps' one day for each comp @ 100%.
:It doesnt really matter if u win all those games but it will help you in the long run, as i think the comp is better in macro/die maps.

-Finally spend one day doing all of the micro challenges provided, THEN You can start laddering with your ONE race.

Trust me, its a long process, but I gave it to my friend who had the same predicament, and now hes almost in platinum Gold 2, it REALLY helps. Once you have those mechanics down you can start developing Game Sense

Seems like the "lockout week" is an ideal time to practice my macro & mental checklist against the AI. Thanks for the suggestion.

BlueInkAlchemist

United States73 Posts

October 10 2011 03:58 GMT

On October 10 2011 12:51 TrueZerG wrote:
http://i.imgur.com/mWGLy.jpg

And lets not forget Terran has Mauraders

Oh, believe me... my opening is a standard 3 Rax and I LOVE my Marauders. My goal is to have at least a half-dozen with plenty of Marines in support and at least 51 food by about the 6 minute mark, so I can poke up my opponent's ramp & expand.

TrueZerG

43 Posts

October 10 2011 04:05 GMT

Well no seriously you should just practice vs AI, once you have the mechanics down youll soar out of bronze, just wanted to give a way to practice 'macro better' haha. And once you have those mechanics down youll be able to try more innovative things like, 3 rax pressure marines into expand into MnM timing push @ 7, a minute later but already have an expansion, just fun things <3

-But all in all, stop laddering for a bit and practice the macro, and then youll start actually being able to compete

whatthefat

United States918 Posts

October 10 2011 13:39 GMT

I hear what you're saying, and you're right that playing the other races will expand your understanding of the game. Taking a new race on in 1v1 is a big challenge though. The way I handle this is to play other races in team games. For 1v1 and 2v2 I stick with my main race, Zerg. For 3v3 I play my next best race, Terran. And for 4v4, I play my worst race, Protoss.

BlueInkAlchemist

United States73 Posts

October 10 2011 13:53 GMT

On October 10 2011 22:39 whatthefat wrote:
I hear what you're saying, and you're right that playing the other races will expand your understanding of the game. Taking a new race on in 1v1 is a big challenge though. The way I handle this is to play other races in team games. For 1v1 and 2v2 I stick with my main race, Zerg. For 3v3 I play my next best race, Terran. And for 4v4, I play my worst race, Protoss.

This sounds like a great suggestion for when I begin laddering again once Season 4 kicks off. Do you join random games or run with an established team? For me it'd be Terran in 1v1 & 2v2, Protoss in 3v3 and Zerg for 4v4.

whatthefat

United States918 Posts

October 10 2011 15:48 GMT

On October 10 2011 22:53 BlueInkAlchemist wrote:

Show nested quote +

I usually just play random games. I realize team games aren't quite the same as 1v1, but I've certainly learned a lot about basic mechanics and builds of other races by playing that way. There's also a lot less pressure to perform in team games, and you can get away with experimenting a lot more.