EPTNearly two years ago now I was introduced to an amazing game called Starcraft 2. At the time I was really excited to play the sequel to Brood War, but I must admit I hadn't really played much brood war and had only the faintest notion that it was "kind of big" in Korea. So a bunch of my friends and my brother all bought the game on release day and proceeded to play the hell out of the campaign. We all sat in the same room playing the campaign and talking about how awesome it was for a few days. At some point, someone suggested that we "play online" against other people. I remember being kind of hesitant about the idea, and only agreeing to it "as long as we don't get all crazy about it like those guys in Korea". Two others also agreed, ad we decided to try and learn to play 3v3. All of us had done some WoW arena together in the past and so we expected to get our butts kicked, but we also expected to be able to pull some wins off eventually. We started off easy, playing 3v3 against medium AI until we could tackle that. We decided that each of us would play a different race, so that way we always had every potential tool on hand. After about 5-6 45 minute games against the computer we judged ourselves ready, formed a party and hit "find match".
My god were we ever wrong. We lost our first four placement matches and gave up in disgust. That night we saw all the main cheeses, cannon rushing, 6 pooling, and triple reaper rushing. Our practice against the entirely predictable and slow moving AI had not prepared us at all. It was embarrassing to lose over and over before we even expected to see a single enemy unit. At the time none of us new what a walloff was or how the macro mechanics of our races were even supposed to work. By the end we were all demoralized and kind of pissed, wondering how anyone could ever play this stupid imbalanced game. As we debated whether or not to continue trying I quipped "Never give up, Never surrender".
The next day we were right back at it. We had all spent time watching YouTube videos about the strategies our races could perform. Our Protoss player had learned what a 4-gate was, I (Terran) had learned how to rush for banshee's and how to wall off, and our Zerg player had learned about larvae injecting. Armed with our new knowledge we set off, and promptly won our final placement match, putting us into Silver league. From that point on we spent the next two weeks playing 3-4 games every night. We had many ups and downs, but started to settle into a regular rhythm and learn how to plan for what our opponents were going to throw at us. We still lost to stupid cheese alot, but we also started to win any match where we could get our economy going. We even occasionally held off and punished cheese.
At some point along the way I stumbled upon a discussion about Day[9] and how great he was at teaching you the game. Included was a link to his casts of the "King of Beta" tournament. Intrigued I clicked on a random game and was instantly spellbound. Seeing real progamers in action ignited a fire in me. I watched game after game, covering nearly half the tournament in a single go. I was entranced. In one sitting I went from completely apathetic towards really learning the game to "I really want to play like those guys". The give and take and reaction/counter-reaction of a pro level game was the most amazing thing I had ever seen. I started to devour entire blocks of the Day9 dailies and really study build orders and strategies. In between playing with my friends I started to venture into the terrifying world of 1v1.
My first time in placement matches in 1v1 I was so terrified. My hands shook as I hit the "Find Match" button. I was matched against a Protoss. I executed my only practiced build, a banshee rush, and won easily. My opponent hurled some epithets my way and left without a GG. I was thrilled, I instantly hit the "Find Match" button again. I lost the next two matches, but went on to win my final one. I was placed into Silver and I felt a sense of satisfaction, as even though Silver was still a really low rank I still felt like just avoiding Bronze was an achievement. I lsot my next three games in a row and for a moment almsot gave up, but then I thought again "Never give up, Never surrender". I won my next three games in convincing manner. I played over 30 games on the ladder that first day, losing many, but winning a few.From there on out I was hooked. Deep inside my soul, I knew that I wanted to someday be a great gamer.
Continued in part 2
