EPT
Video above to keep along with my comments down below here. So yesterday on the ladder I faced a previous B- player, and as a guy who's only ever peaked at D+, the game was surprising once I saw his rank. Definitely makes me feel better about my skill level and hopefully I can reach that glorious yellow border this season with enough practice.
TvP on Fighting Spirit, I spawned 7, he spawned 5 so slight spawn advantage for me.
I opened FD and he opted for a weirdly late nexus, so I was already ahead in the early game. I used my two initial vultures to try to poke at his potential third but he had goons waiting already at the ramps.
After regrouping some more vultures, I managed to sneak 5 into his 3rd where I sniped his probe before he built his nexus (his goon was mispositioned on the ramp) and was able to lay mines over the entire base. This would stall his 3rd even more while I would grab a third for myself. So once again, I had a sizable economic advantage.
Moving further into the game, my macro was... eh, decent? I'd give myself like a 7/10 so far and with my vulture harass, I was keeping him from taking map control. Scans revealed he wanted to take a 4th, so I moved a control group of vultures over. Though to be quite honest, I should have had a vulture up there already so there's that for next time's game.
The vultures managed to break through the pylon but ultimately died for nothing really. But I sent another group to the top right where I somehow sniped his nexus. Meanwhile, with his entire army distracted, I pushed with my almost 2/1 army at his natural. He had a great stasis but I was able to win the fight and push across the bridge into his natural. At the same time, I was taking the top left bases for my 4th, 5th, and 6th. This will come up later.
Here's where I messed up really hard. I should've taken my reinforcements and sent them to the natural to regroup and re-consolidate my army. Mech armies aren't good separated and in smaller numbers. Instead, I rallied some to his 4th to try to attack multiple places at once. He cleaned up my army at his natural and cleaned up my reinforcements at the 4th. I didn't manage to kill a single nexus this entire time, but I caught him transfering probes to his 4th, so I was up in workers like 73-53 at some point.
But with my army spread so thin, he countered at my 4th and 5th, and from then on out, because I didn't kill any of his bases, he rolled me over and outmacroed me, constant pressure at the bases in the top left, and 2 good recalls would seal him the game.
Post game thoughts: First, being able to nearly beat a B- player is definitely a huge confidence boost for me. I thought he was just a C player but after checking his stats he was B- for the past 3 seasons.
Things to work on: While my macro was pretty good this game, I need to focus on my army more to make sure my positioning is up to par. Also, I need more missile turrets around my base in case of reavers. The late nexus should've told me he might have gone reavers so I need them up. Also, I need to add on more than just 6 factories, as I was continuously overstacking units in them to lower my money. I should be around 10 factories by the push timing. And I need to be able to defend my extra bases, which I failed to do. More spider mines with my vultures is important to buffer the bases while I rally reinforcements to the top.
