I won't spoil the game for those who haven't watched it but here's the video if you want to see it
Anyway, Best starts out with a 14 nexus and then loses it rather quickly to a semi-cheese attack, with about 5 marines and 5 scvs. However, the commentators said that it's not a big deal losing the nexus and I was wondering why it isn't. The game that every mineral and every second is precious (at least in top gaming form), I was wondering why not. I also believe that sometimes, every second and every mineral (especially in the early game) is overrated; Best in this game used a probe that hasn't returned its minerals to build a pylon. Only 8 minerals, but then again, isn't every second and mineral important?
Also, if you watch the video around 12:36, one of the commentators make the weirdest sound. If you keep rewinding and listening, it sounds pretty funny.
Maybe they meant that it wasn't a big deal to lose the nexus because he wasn't going to be able to use it for a while anyway due to the rush / he had already lost before it went down or something. Meaning, maybe they were exaggerating / joking?
It's because if Best pulled all his probes right away, losing the nexus is not a big impact since the Terran is unable to do game-ending damage at that time and has to waste resources by taking SCVs off minerals, producing extra marines, etc. This was touched on in the first Nal_Ra's hallucination for Bisu vs Light.
On May 11 2009 12:33 Pyrrhuloxia wrote: Maybe they meant that it wasn't a big deal to lose the nexus because he wasn't going to be able to use it for a while anyway due to the rush / he had already lost before it went down or something. Meaning, maybe they were exaggerating / joking?
I have no clue what this means, he didn't lose anything prior to the rush. And no, the commentators weren't exaggerating; Nal_ra even backed it up with some stuff and talked about another previous game like that where a player lost his nexus early
at that point the P isn't saturated in the main yet, so its just a 400 mineral loss if you don't lose any probes and just sac the nexus. if the T has to build 5 marines and bring 5 scvs and build a bunker (not sure if this happened exactly) then the T also loses mining time, so the effect of losing the nex is mitigated
On May 11 2009 12:35 Hot_Bid wrote: at that point the P isn't saturated in the main yet, so its just a 400 mineral loss if you don't lose any probes and just sac the nexus. if the T has to build 5 marines and bring 5 scvs and build a bunker (not sure if this happened exactly) then the T also loses mining time, so the effect of losing the nex is mitigated
Oh, okay, thanks. I'm still confused on that whole thing about Starcraft's preciseness and then the other things that aren't so precise.
Gas for terran is late, so the timing for factory and expo are late for terran, making the big push that much later. 5 marines don't do shit later on and the lost mining time for the scvs is large because scvs mine slower than probes and have a longer way to get back home to get to the mineral patches. Also, protoss might be able to get a couple probes out from the expo depending on the timing.
Seriously, 8 minerals isn't much and waiting for the probe to go put the mineral back at the nexus might delay your food count, making probes and goons paused for the extra seconds it might take for the pylon to warp in. It can add up and the 8 minerals is not much in comparison. Either way, it won't make a huge impact on the game.
Anyway, it's because 1) the Protoss still mines quite a fair amount from the nat before the nexus dies, so the cost of nexus is somewhat made up for and 2) Terran player himself has to sacrifice a lot of mining time (the number of SCVs pulled and not working = incredible amount of resources not mined) and resources (Bunker, more marines than usual, repairing bunker/SCVs).
If you go according to that, as the Protoss has not lost any probes, the Protoss is far off better economically.
The point that someone else made that the Terran timing will be late is kind of moot, since Protoss timing will also be late because of the early Nexus.
That being said, I agree with all the other points. Terran didn't put himself decisively ahead.
Konadora sums it up well, as long as the P don`t lose probes, and especially if he can keep on mining until the nexus goes down the game is pretty even. Of course this is better for the Terran than playing behind by letting the nexus stay alive, and its the reason they do it.
Also there should be noted that on the map in this specific game Best had more expos in the back of his base he could take, so he did not even have to wait for the range upgrade to finish and kill the bunker before restarting his nexus.
In my personal experience I usually win the games when I lose my nexus against bunker rushes, this is mainly because most Terrans brings too many scvs totally fucking their own eco, just to shut down my nexus.
That makes a great deal of sense, those who responded. I've actually wondered about this a lot (not being a terran player). The primary purpose of the bunker seems to be timing disruption, rather than economic gain, but it sets the terran player back so far it always seems a bit strange that it ever works out.
On May 11 2009 12:35 Hot_Bid wrote: at that point the P isn't saturated in the main yet, so its just a 400 mineral loss if you don't lose any probes and just sac the nexus. if the T has to build 5 marines and bring 5 scvs and build a bunker (not sure if this happened exactly) then the T also loses mining time, so the effect of losing the nex is mitigated
I was gonna post myself but this is post pretty much says it all.
In fact, it's very possible that BeSt didn't lose out on any minerals; he may have very well broke even. He spent the most possible time mining from the nat minerals as he possibly could, thus getting the most out of his short-lived expo.
I just watched this game. It was fun! Notice made a huge mistake by deciding to double expand and play the macro game - this let BeSt get his arbiters up and do what he does best, mass units.
BeSt deserves a lot of credit for straying from his typical strict macro play here - he basically kept Notice down a base with persistent shuttle play. A nice game from him. Once the game got to its later stages, Notice just couldn't keep up with his multitask whatsoever.
When I was watching the game, I thought that Notice took a bit too many scv's along on his rush and didn't kill any of Best's probes. IMO, it hurt him a lot more than it hurt Best with all that mining time lost + Bunker cost.
one of the notorious 'protoss cheeses' if terran scouts you early, reacts in the best way possible, and gets a little lucky, they end up only a little bit behind
On May 11 2009 15:56 IdrA wrote: one of the notorious 'protoss cheeses' if terran scouts you early, reacts in the best way possible, and gets a little lucky, they end up only a little bit behind