EPTI decided in the last week to make the full switch to LOTV so from now on my blogs will be focused on this game rather than HOTS. Since I was on holiday it just made sense to start fresh with the new game as it will be fully out within the next 3-4 months probably.
I'm not too sure how to check out my stats per match up so I won't be including win rates this week. At the moment, I'm sitting at like 20-10 on LOTV ladder.
My Practice: I'm definitely not playing at my best, my mechanics are still a bit rusty and it's hard to transition to the new strategies and metas. I feel that this game has a much higher focus on strategy and unit control rather than mechanics which is interesting. Overall I am enjoying it so far and I prefer it to HOTS.
•ZvT: ZvT has changed a lot in Legacy, it has more of a ZvP feel about it. In HOTS it was pretty much if you have good fundamentals and mechanics you win ZvT 9/10 times. There wasn't a big deal about scouting a lot other than in the first few minutes for cheese and in the midgame for mech or bio.
Now, Terran have a ton of options. A standard build that I am seeing is the liberator hellbat push which is really strong. As well, proxy 2 rax reaper is super strong. I have been opening up with 5 queens and going 2 base muta most games. If they go bio I make ling bane corruptor with a few roaches for some buffer and my end game goal is mass ultralisk, ultras are verrrrrry strong in legacy. Against Mech I generally go infestor roach vs mass cyclone and aim for just a big economy and lot's of tech switches.
Mutalisks are very weak in Legacy and get hard countered by liberators. I learned that the hard way >.<
I would consider ZvT my second best match up at the moment.
•ZvP: In ZvP I am opening with double evo upgraded lings most games which makes my ultralisk play later on much stronger. Adept all ins and pushes are pretty common at the moment and they shred zerglings so spines or roaches are needed to defend against those type of pushes. Air toss is also quite common as a mid to late game composition.
After opening up with the double evo lings, I generally play defensive and get a strong econ going behind static defence and lurkers while teching towards ultralisks and viper corruptor if they go for air toss. The new viper ability is just so great against air based compositions. I think Infestors can work well also to work with the viper AA ability.
I would say ZvP is my worst matchup at the moment as I haven't really had enough time to experiment yet.
•ZvZ: I find ZvZ to be the easiest for me at the moment. I have been going muta ling as a mid game choice into lurkers and then into ultra ling as a late game and it's working really well. If I don't feel like going for a macro game, I do the 14/14 that Fenner did a video on and it works really well. ZvZ is definitely my best in terms of statistics at the moment.
All in all, I am really enjoying the new changes. As of the macro mechanics proposal, I am not a fan of it. Honestly, it depends on WHY Blizzard want to change them. It seems like they want to change it to make it easier for new comers to play the game which I think is not the correct response to not having a large player base.
If they're upset with the player count, make the game F2P and stop making Starcraft a less unique, complex and beautiful game that it is and that we all love at the moment.
My Stream: I am looking to get back to a consistent, regular stream again over the next few days. I am also looking for a graphic designer for some help doing overlays, sub badges and things like that.
Poker: Since my last blog post, I started playing online poker at pokerstars at the smallest stakes (1c2c blindsNL) and I am really enjoying it. I have always been into poker, but once I started reading a few books in the last 2 weeks and learning more about the complexity of the game, I got really interested. The depth involved to playing high stakes poker profitably is mind blowing. There's so much more to just the cards.
It really reminds me of Starcraft as a lot of the concepts such as map control and builds that we know can be directly correlated to Poker terms such as pot control and the lines that players take with certain lines.
I started with 40 dollars in my account (add 20 dollars and get another 20 free) and I am down to 10 dollars in the last two weeks >.< I lost 90% of that money in the first week pretty much when I didn't really know what I was doing, but now I am starting to play a profitable game more and more.
Generally I will have two tables open at the same time on one side of the screen and then have a Starcraft stream open on the other half. Having something else to do or to watch really helps because you don't get bored and play mid tier hands rather than just folding them like you should do most of the time.
If any of you guys are into poker and want to discuss it with me feel free to comment under here or tweet at me because I'd love to discuss poker with ye!
My Goals:
This Week:
• Understand the common builds ZvX in LOTV and their counters.
Short Term (3 Months):
• Grandmaster in LOTV.
• Consistently 50 viewers on stream.
• Join a Semi Pro team.
Long Term:
• Top 100 GM
• GM EU
• Start to make a name for myself in the semi pro scene.
• Online tournament results
So from my last blog post if you read it, I was on the GM grind in the first week of the season opening. I was around top 200 on the server all week, so I was really optimistic about hitting it. I think I played around 160ish games that week and played for 13ish hours on the opening day, amounting to roughly 40-50ish games. I was absolutely gutted to say the least when I didn't get the promotion.
However, it's only a small stepping stone on the road to where I want to go. Getting the promotion or not wouldn't have done anything to help me achieve any of my goals except actually having GM as well as making it easier to join semi pro teams. That's not something that will stick out if you look at my "career" as an overall when I come to the end of it, so honestly I'm not too worried.
It's so important to just zoom out and look at the grand scale of things and compare it to the timeline. It makes getting over tilts, variance and losses so much easier because they just don't matter in the long run.
It's a lot of small steps added together that achieve greatness. It's all about the grind. Love and appreciate the grind and you will go far.
If you want to keep up to date with what I am doing, catch me at any of the following!
Twitter - https://twitter.com/LucodaSC2
Stream - http://www.twitch.tv/lucoda/
Email - lucodasc2@gmail.com
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/pages/Peter-Lucoda-Healy/303284209796416
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) I would really, really recommend against trying to make nolimit holdem cash game a reliable source of income. skill has increased so much that beating the rake is really difficult, and even if you have great talent for the game and a great strategy for learning to play it, you'll be looking at months of losing/breaking even before you can hope to win anything that matches a minimum wage job.
