EPTBefore this, I had never taken interest into Starcraft 1 (never played it at all, never watched a game from it, never knew anyone who played it) nor did I play any other RTS games (i'm only 17 and the natural order of gaming in my generation went vanilla xbox/ps2 etc > xbox 360 > WoW > other computer games. The lesser nerds seem to have stuck with xbox 360 / MWF 3 though..
With no RTS experience before SC2, it obviously took me a while to start playing the game seriously. I did watch a lot of husky/hd around release and eventually GSL, and that got me started on trying to actually "improve" instead of just making 60 mutalisks or 20 carriers in bronze league. I was competitive in previous games though, and it carried over as by the time Masters league was out and they created GM league, I had hit masters soon after. As a nostalgic moment, here's a hilarious (hilariously bad) video I made on an old youtube account during the Beta where I sat on 2 base for 40 minutes and massed void rays, then recalled them into my bronze (Actually I think it was Copper League) opponent's base:
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(I stress I was a complete newbie at SC2 when I made this video! don't make fun of me)
For a while I played on and off, kind of sticking in mid/low masters because I was mainly relying on certain timing builds to get me most of my wins. Then I started really practicing more and only practicing builds that involved scouting / reactionary macro play. This is the biggest step IMO to improving quickly (ie, don't 2 base blink stalker all in when you could practice a quick 3rd into 4th base and get experience in end game PvZ that you can take with you after the game).
However if you are in a low league, I would suggest cheesing to a higher league and then improve your macro from there (that's what Scarlett did as well).
Once I started only playing this "quality improvement" style, my rank went up dramatically. I've learned high master players do not die to most all ins unless you really meta game / trick them. Because of this my mmr / rank went up (top 8) and that's what brang me to sir SlayerSMin
Before this game I had never really played a pro. I expected to get owned, so I just played my best / safest macro build and hoped to see how he would defeat it. He played very passively as well though, turtling on his 4th base/ mass spine until he had about 17 brood lords and 14 infestors. I took my 4th as well and got a mothership archon death ball, as well as harassing his bases with speed warp prisms + dts (managed to get his greater spire). Unfortunately, he let his broods get vortex'd and my archons demolished them. He left without a GG (understandably, mothership archon is pretty broken but it's the only feasable way a Protoss can deal with 18 brood lords / corrupters / infestors / mass spine!)
rep: http://drop.sc/175339
I'm in no way saying i'm a better player than him, but I'm just very happy that my MMR is getting high enough to face pro level players (in this case Min was on a losing streak and I was on a winning streak so our MMRs matched up). Hopefully I can continue improving and get to a level where I can consistently go toe to toe with any pro!
So if you were not a SC BW player with years of RTS experience and you want to get good at Starcraft 2/ take is seriously, I hope you can read this blog and know that it is entirely possible for you to achieve that goal. SC2 should not be compared to a game like Basketball where your parents/friends might say "you will never go pro, it's like a highschooler wanting to get into the NBA".. no sorry, it's not! Put in some mental effort, study the game, and practice enough and anyone can become Pro I would say.. that's what makes Starcraft so awesome.
