EPTIn my first blog entry, I wrote about how StarCraft 2 changed my life. This time I've decided to take a look at the evolution of my gameplay into a macro player - through my massing of team games.
disclaimer:
+ Show Spoiler +
I do not think playing team games is the way to make you a better 1v1 ladder player. I also don't think the way I went about learning to macro is the best way to effectively learn the concept. However, I know a lot of players who suffer from ladder anxiety, and I'm hoping some of the concepts I'll talk about can help those people in particular, who have not learned (or don't feel comfortable learning) them the best way- by massing 1v1s
When I started playing the ladder in the beta, the game was a lot faster and more unforgiving. Speed reapers, super early 4gates, 2gate zealot rushes, steppes of war, faster stim, 1 supply roaches and the like made climbing the ladder very difficult. The better I got, the more likely it was I ran into players who understood the game and could trounce me and abuse my deficiencies.
After losing constantly, watching tons of GSL and reading every page I could of the strategy forum, I started to have an understanding that was greater than my abilities. I know for players in the lower leagues, this is a horrible feeling. Constantly getting in positions where you know you need to do something, but you haven't set yourself up to do it (getting my reactored starport for colossus in TvP stands out personally) is really frustrating and demoralizing.
I loved this game so much, but losing constantly in ladder games was getting pretty upsetting, so I decided to play team games.
Team games provided me with some help learning with some basic concepts, and it was a much more forgiving learning environment.
For example, if I missed a forcefield on my ramp, I had teammates who would eventually show up to help me clean up a mess. In a 1v1 PvZ, I would have just lost and typed GG. With the ability to survive after taking serious damage, I started to learn how to come back from difficult positions. I also was able to learn the importance of pulling my probes.
This is a concept most low level players I play against with in house 1v1s struggle with. They don't realize the power of pulling workers. I don't mean to encourage you to use them in fights, but when there are just a few units in your base, and you have minimal forces, you'll see how helpful that probe surround is. For me, random 3v3s saw a lot of 10 pools and other fast cheeses. As a protoss player, you can hold most cheeses with a standard opener if you execute properly with pulling probes (walling in, chronoboost, etc), and seeing these frequently gave me a lot of practice dealing with them. You're also going to see most of the various 8-minute 1 base all ins each race has to offer, and you'll get used to how many units you'll be facing.
Now this happens in 1v1, don't get me wrong. And it happens a lot. The difference is your game isn't automatically over if you handle it wrong. It'll be a slow unpleasant grind, but it isn't over. You haven't lost. This is the problem for lots of people; they don't like losing when they're trying to learn. This was my problem.
Once I was able to get my basic builds underway safely, I started getting to see what macro was like. I could get to two base pretty safely in team games, make my colossus, max out and push. It was awesome. Once I had my deathball going, I was able to engage and abuse the tactics vods and TL had given. It was not uncommon in 2v2s for me to kill both opponents max armies while only losing 10-20 supply in the process (I miss the amulet so much </3).
The sheer quantity of units engaged in each battle in a regular team game can get pretty ridiculous. As a Protoss, a concept I learned in my team games was zoning. I started to see armies that were larger than mine, and I knew I couldn't fight them all at once. But I did know my forcefields could cut the army in half, or create a pocket of their units perfect for my ally's units. At a certain point. This is a concept you will learn in 1v1s as well. I found, personally, that team games just drilled the concept more frequently, as every single engagement required this tactic simply due to the number of enemy units, and frequency of enemy harass/attacks. When I figured this out, we would get the lead, and often progress from there to win.
As my macro started getting better, I was realizing I was mining my main out much faster, and now my natural was already saturated before I moved my probes from my mined out main there. Shit, I thought. I need to expand. This was getting frustrating. My macro was getting better than these games allowed for me. When me and my teammates defended one of those 8 minute 4v4 all ins after my FE opening, I knew I could expand after it because my opponents had to expand for themselves. The problem was that in most team game maps, there are no safe thirds.
At a certain point, it occurred to me that only in 1v1 maps would I be able to find a relatively safe third. But in 1v1s, there was no ally to help my fight. Okay, I thought, there was also no ally to defend my opponent.
I decided I'd try 1v1 ladder out again. I found that most of the platinum league players I was playing were pretty bad. I was trading in my favour in every engagement, and I now knew that I could expand afterwards. I started winning a lot of games.
I knew how to FFE for the few maps that allowed for it in PvZ, and I knew 2gate robo for banshee prone PvT. And I had my 4gate build for PvP. My PvZ wasn't great, but if they ever went hatch first I could apply my understood 4gate build there too. Remember, at that point 4gate was the build you needed to use to defend it yourself. In any PPvXX team game you were guaranteed to see double 4gates. I got into diamond league on the back of this, and I was happy.
Then I hit a wall, and this is the reason you'll see a lot of people with diamond/masters team games and gold/platinum 1v1s. This is also the reason I believe you should always learn to macro and your mechanics in the 1v1 setting. I knew how to get beyond two base, but I didn't really know how to play it. I could get my third base up and running, have my colossus production and my upgrades going, but I'd still float lots of minerals. I'd never really learned how to increase my infrastructure with my economy. I also found that as players got better, they too could abuse the difference in maps. Suddenly zergs were taking super fast thirds against my FFE, and I didn't know to respond to that. I'd get stuck in my base to ling infestor, and lose every single PvZ trying to secure and defend three bases.
PvP got patched, and suddenly I had to use different builds. I knew how to do all the variant 1/2/3gate robos, and the various stargate or twilight builds, but I didn't know how to play them. When I went DTs and didn't win me the game, people were countering and killing me. I didn't know when to time my blink stalker pushes, and I'd constantly go from in the lead with map control to somehow being overrun by some ranged colossi. What the fuck man! Now I had two of three matchups I could not win.
This takes me to where I'm at now. I have pretty decent mechanics at this point. When I'm not microing intensely, I usually keep my minerals and gas down below 400. I have started to get a better understanding of how to play all the matchups and the various timings. I still am looking for that four base macro game, but I've learned when I need to be attacking, and that not every game needs to be spent sitting back at home defending. I'm still having a hard time climbing the ladder, as I'm currently sporting a near 80% win rate in PvT with most likely a sub .250 record in both PvP and PvZ. I attribute this directly to my lack of understanding in those two matchups, which as I've tried to explain is a fall out from only playing team games for most of my first 500 or so games played and not truly learning the flow of 1v1s. My PvT luckily benefited from my beta time playing terran. Oh, and observers are pretty good.
I've come to understand that I need to play more games so that I can learn these matchups better, and to perfect my mechanics. This has been a difficult process, as it's been disheartening losing in 2/3 of my matchups, but this leads to my point of this blog post:
When I ladder now, I realize that every game I'm seeing something I haven't seen before, and I realize that this is a nuance in the matchup that I have to experience in order to be a better player. Every build I'm playing, even if I've done it hundreds of times in team games, has a different timing in the 1v1 environment. There are subtleties (like where scouting overlords are sent, positions for proxy gateway/cannon rushes, drop timings) that sure, will irritate me when I lose to them, but I'm learning when to expect them, and how to handle them the next time that I do. This was the mentality I want to stress. Every time you lose, you're actually gaining something. It's a warped concept, but it's one that people like Day9 try to stress often.
The reason you're not laddering is that winning feels great and losing sucks, and you're afraid you're going to lose. But you must remember, you aren't really learning anything from a win and that it's not what is going to make you a better player.
Your victory can be attributed to their mistakes just as much as it can be to what you've done. But when you lose, it's always because you've done something wrong to learn from. There may be several mistakes in your gameplay, but you'll realize at least one (likely the one that lost you the game), and you'll try to not make it again. It could be something micro intensive like forcefielding, macro based like creep spread, or timing based like saving/using scans, but it's something you'll remember to work on or work into your gameplay. Now that it's stuck out in your mind, you may pay more attention to it or remember to do it, because you're reminded of that mistake by the times you've lost to it. Each game you'll remember this skill/tactic, and it will become part of your natural gameplay instincts. This is what will make you a better player, which I something I believe most players are striving to become.
Personal addendum + Show Spoiler +
Every time you lose to a cheese rush, you have learned what doesn't work. Whether it be a misclick, not pulling probes, not chronoboosting, etc, you'll realize what you need to do to avoid it next time. (example: Every protoss knows that once you've had the metalopolis natural PvP cannon rush done on you to in turn scout there every time in PvP) Now when I face early pool nonsense I know it's beatable, and I know that I've inherited a free win if I play the way I know how to. I've faced enough early cheeses that I have learned how to beat it. This is another thing you gain every time you lose to a cheese: More experience on how to beat it
I'm a pretty big believer that rage against cheese is just a sign of a whiny, lazy person. There are obviously some instances (like 8 pool on Tal Darim ZvP last scout) that you can't do anything about, but if you have a hard time with cheese, go to the practice partner thread and find someone to play it out with you. Practicing holding cheese is about 5-6 minutes each game, and is a really easy process. If you're mad about how hard it is to hold, stop posting whining about it, and go practice with someone until you can. There's a reason the pros hold it off.
I'm a pretty big believer that rage against cheese is just a sign of a whiny, lazy person. There are obviously some instances (like 8 pool on Tal Darim ZvP last scout) that you can't do anything about, but if you have a hard time with cheese, go to the practice partner thread and find someone to play it out with you. Practicing holding cheese is about 5-6 minutes each game, and is a really easy process. If you're mad about how hard it is to hold, stop posting whining about it, and go practice with someone until you can. There's a reason the pros hold it off.
Ladder fear exists because you don't like losing. It took me a whole load of team games, and a StarCraft gameplay epiphany to change my mindset and overcome it, and I stress it's important to understand that losing can be a good thing! Losing is something that will teach you for next time, and will eventually make you a better player. This is a good lesson for life as well. You can make mistakes, but they are things you will learn from, and you can come out of them a better person.
...unless you're in bronze league. Then you should probably just kill yourself.
found lots of thread in teamliquid but this one kinda make sense to me. thanks
