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I know, it sounds absurd. Or at least it feels that way to me. At age 20, FPS has been a big part of my life for almost 10 years from Quake 3 onto CS 1.6, then CoD2/4. About 6 months ago I discovered the pro SC scene in korea, and have been gobbling up every PL/MSL/OSL matches since. Around this time I heard about the SC2 beta, and I saw it as a fresh start, a way of getting into the competitive RTS scene. During the 2 months I had the beta, I massed about 1500 games total and went from silver to diamond league, before the point system change I was around 1350. Didn't get to even place after that because of Bnet's weirdness.
I've been looking for a way to keep progressing skill-wise while the beta is away and thought BW would be a good way to challenge myself. Naturally I got demolished on ICCup. Even after practicing the 1 rax FE into 9 min push vs Zerg and Siege Expand vs Protoss over and over and over by myself for a few days to smooth it out in custom SP games.There are still leaks in my build that I'm working hard to overcome. There seems to be a lot of game sense to learn in order to allow the few build's I've practiced to be effective. Then I need to have the mechanics to respond properly. I know it's hard to just walk into BW and be successful. At the very least however, I can do my best and will. My biggest weakpoints seem to be the game sense I discussed previously which the amazing Liquipedia and my own analysis help strengthen and just being able to multitask. Since FPS doesn't really demand much multitasking it's something that remains grossly under-developed.
Because of MBS/Automine, SC2 seems to mostly just require decent APM as opposed to both good APM and multitasking. However, having good multitasking habits can't hurt, such as the 'Mental Checklist' Day9 talks about.
My conclusion about the nature of multitasking development is that it seems to arise from being mentally proactive while mass gaming. That is, forcing yourself to keep thinking about everything you need to do in order to reach your current set of goals while playing, allowing variables to happen and learning the responses to them from replays so that you always have a reasonable goal. Please correct or add to this conclusion if possible.
Now a few questions:
Are there goals I can set for myself in BW given my circumstances that will lead to growth that carries over to SC2?
Does anyone have some tips for efficiently approaching the development of my multitasking habits?
Such things can't happen overnight, but I have the resources and focus to put it into practice and attacking it with the benefit of other's experience can only help. Also I know my age is a big factor when it comes to learning quickly, so I don't expect my skill to skyrocket, just steadily improve with specific goals and determination.
Where can I find players that are also looking to improve, or even higher up players that are willing to teach?
Most of the time people on ICCup just tell me how bad I am, or that they're a korean pro and I'm a 'chobo'. This cutthroat atmosphere doesn't seem suited to friendly learning, though I yearn to compete in it.
Are there things I can do outside of playing that can aid in the growth of my skills?
Been watching KawaiiRice's FPVODs on youtube to get a good idea of what high level playing looks like so I know what to shoot for. I've also seen the thread for SC2 players getting into BW, I knew most of what it detailed already.
Lastly, thanks a lot for participating in this noob's journey, even if it's just reading. I'm super duper thankful with cherries on top for any advice!
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just play as much as u did sc2 :O? tho i dont really think it'll help that much. SC2 everyone can be good at xD
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As far as "transferable" skills (that's what you want, right?), I'd recommend working on worker split (unnecessary but still why the hell not) and macro orientation. Unit control and microing isn't going to transfer over to SC2 since micro is extremely different (and not nearly as necessary) over there. There's just so much more you have to do/compensate-for in SC:BW that you just plain don't have to do in SC2 so don't look to be refining too many of the same skills. If you get decent at BW though, you'll see what everyone is talking about when they reopen the beta.
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On June 14 2010 17:27 Diminotoor wrote:
As far as "transferable" skills (that's what you want, right?), I'd recommend working on worker split (unnecessary but still why the hell not) and macro orientation. Unit control and microing isn't going to transfer over to SC2 since micro is extremely different (and not nearly as necessary) over there. There's just so much more you have to do/compensate-for in SC:BW that you just plain don't have to do in SC2 so don't look to be refining too many of the same skills. If you get decent at BW though, you'll see what everyone is talking about when they reopen the beta.
I understand what you mean about it being hard to tailor my learning to transfer to SC2, which is why I came here asking. Also, pretty much all I did to get to diamond league was macro my ass off and make sure I'm using my spell casters well and have good positioning before/during battles. BW is definitely > than SC2.
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the best advice i could give you to get better is to practice a lot
if that doesn't work you should probably just quit and move to a different game.. like pick up stix or hop scotch
good luck!
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On June 14 2010 17:42 G5 wrote:
the best advice i could give you to get better is to practice a lot
if that doesn't work you should probably just quit and move to a different game.. like pick up stix or hop scotch
good luck!
Did I offend you or something? I'm trying to be active mentally about practicing, not just mass game mindlessly.
EDIT: Sorry about getting huffy, your advice is legit, the pick up stix/hopscotch part just rubbed me the wrong way.
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The fastest way to improve is by playing against similar or a bit better skill level players; also focus on one thing to improve at a time, for example producing workers all game long from all your bases, producing units continuously, scouting, attacking in more than one part at once, controlling more than 4 groups of units properly, etc. No matter how many games you lose, just focus on that aspect that you feel needs improvement, untill you can do it right, than move on to another. At some point in time, when you get them right, you`ll be able to do all of these important aspects in the same game, thus you`ll be able to play as it`s supposed to. Also, don`t play when you`re tired and don`t neglect sleeping. BW is one of the hardest games and it requires a lot of brain power. If you also do some sport, like swimming, running, tennis or working out, that would further help.
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10387 Posts
On June 14 2010 18:36 Misanthrope wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 17:42 G5 wrote:
the best advice i could give you to get better is to practice a lot
if that doesn't work you should probably just quit and move to a different game.. like pick up stix or hop scotch
good luck! Did I offend you or something? I'm trying to be active mentally about practicing, not just mass game mindlessly.
He's not telling you to mass game "mindlessly" he's telling you if you really want to get better you better buckle down and play a lot of games. It's either you mass games (which you could easily be "mentally active" when doing that and do quick reviews of the reps afterwards) to improve a lot in a short period of time, or you play a couple games a day over a long, extended period of time and improve a lot that way.
Massing games is more effective for getting things like macroing properly become muscle memory to the point where you can focus your thinking on other things and raising your APM. Playing for a long time of course increases your understanding and general game sense.
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The replies oozes of SC2 hate. Give the guy a chance.
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You put nice effort into this thread so I'm going to respond.
First off I like that you're sticking to 1 build order vs any given race. Don't make it anymore complicated than that. Learn 1 standard BO and adapt from there. The variations will come naturally to you as you play more and become more experienced.
About skills that transfer over to SC2: I'd like to point out HOTKEY USAGE. In BW you need to be twice as proactive in using hotkeys as you are in SC2. Your left hand needs to be just as quick as your right.
The mental checklist is so much more prominent in BW, as every 20seconds you need to make a new SCV and send it to mine. Every X seconds you need to cycle through your hotkeys or return to your base to produce units. There are tons of other stuff, like being able to harass while still producing. Being able to defend harass while still producing.
In BW keeping your minerals low is actually a challenge, as opposed to SC2. I'd say just playing BW will improve your SC2 game, don't need to focus about anything specific.
For a player in your situation, the easy way is learning a couple of cheese strats/rushes and picking up some easy wins here and there. But if you actually want to learn something and improve your multitasking, I'd suggest you stick to your macro build orders and just WORK on your mental checklist until you don't have to remind yourself to build scvs or return to your production facilities anymore.
Learning BW takes time. Covering the basics alone will keep you occupied for at least 1 year. There's no reaching diamond in 2 months in this game 
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On June 14 2010 20:34 ArvickHero wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 18:36 Misanthrope wrote:On June 14 2010 17:42 G5 wrote:
the best advice i could give you to get better is to practice a lot
if that doesn't work you should probably just quit and move to a different game.. like pick up stix or hop scotch
good luck! Did I offend you or something? I'm trying to be active mentally about practicing, not just mass game mindlessly. He's not telling you to mass game "mindlessly" he's telling you if you really want to get better you better buckle down and play a lot of games. It's either you mass games (which you could easily be "mentally active" when doing that and do quick reviews of the reps afterwards) to improve a lot in a short period of time, or you play a couple games a day over a long, extended period of time and improve a lot that way. Massing games is more effective for getting things like macroing properly become muscle memory to the point where you can focus your thinking on other things and raising your APM. Playing for a long time of course increases your understanding and general game sense.
My bad, thanks for clarifying, I edited my original post.
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+ Show Spoiler +On June 14 2010 20:40 LaLuSh wrote:You put nice effort into this thread so I'm going to respond. First off I like that you're sticking to 1 build order vs any given race. Don't make it anymore complicated than that. Learn 1 standard BO and adapt from there. The variations will come naturally to you as you play more and become more experienced. About skills that transfer over to SC2: I'd like to point out HOTKEY USAGE. In BW you need to be twice as proactive in using hotkeys as you are in SC2. Your left hand needs to be just as quick as your right. The mental checklist is so much more prominent in BW, as every 20seconds you need to make a new SCV and send it to mine. Every X seconds you need to cycle through your hotkeys or return to your base to produce units. There are tons of other stuff, like being able to harass while still producing. Being able to defend harass while still producing. In BW keeping your minerals low is actually a challenge, as opposed to SC2. I'd say just playing BW will improve your SC2 game, don't need to focus about anything specific. For a player in your situation, the easy way is learning a couple of cheese strats/rushes and picking up some easy wins here and there. But if you actually want to learn something and improve your multitasking, I'd suggest you stick to your macro build orders and just WORK on your mental checklist until you don't have to remind yourself to build scvs or return to your production facilities anymore. Learning BW takes time. Covering the basics alone will keep you occupied for at least 1 year. There's no reaching diamond in 2 months in this game
I agree very much so about keeping your money low in SC1. It's easy in the very beginning, but seems to get exponentially more difficult as the game progresses. I find even with 100% attention on my macro it just isn't enough. Thats a big reason why I came asking for multitasking advice. Your comment about muscle memory made me realize just how hard you have to work to overcome UI limitations, and just how special BW really is.
Thanks LaLuSh! Your reply was exactly what I was looking for.
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You cannot really teach 'game sense.' That comes naturally with experience and hard work. BW has a pretty steep learning curve and skill ceiling when you compare it to SC2. Very few players have the raw talent to excel at BW right away. The key is patience and learning from your mistakes as well as processing every scenario.
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On June 14 2010 22:11 StarStruck wrote:
You cannot really teach 'game sense.' That comes naturally with experience and hard work. BW has a pretty steep learning curve and skill ceiling when you compare it to SC2. Very few players have the raw talent to excel at BW right away. The key is patience and learning from your mistakes as well as processing every scenario.
I got into the habit of being hyper critical of my replays when I was playing SC2, and have been doing so thusfar in BW. My questions were more about building good habits in my mechanics, but I appreciate your words nonetheless. ^_^
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Pretty much what G5 said, mass games, look at the replays and see where to improve, etc. Practice often with a good mindset, don't be like "FFS, i'm not playing for like evar now that ive lost 4 games in a row, i want a good win lose ration because win lose is e-peen size" Check how you lost and how to improve, no matter how many games you lost, don't let it kill you, keep thinking you are the best player in the world ^_^
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Get bwchart, check your latest replay, check what is your apm in comparison to your enemy.
There are 4 options:
1 you win your apm > enemy apm
2 you win your apm < enemy apm
3 you lost your apm > enemy apm
4 you lost your apm < enemy apm
kk
I only wanna talk about when you loose. K because if you did option 3, means you did something fundamentaly wrong, means this is a game where you can proberbly learn a lot from.
If you did option 4, means you were "supposed" to loose anyway. Sometimes when you loose a lot, you get in a very bad mood. But if you check the apms and see that you were supposed to loose anyway, that can be a good way to get back into the right mood again. Being in bad mood can destroy your game and will delay how fast you are learning.
You should come to iccup trainning channel/ (or the other channel i dont remember right now) if you find yourself to be in a position where you want advice. People there in general are firendly and at
D-/D/D+.
edit:
Btw just because ones apm is 10 apm higher than someone else doesnt mean its higher. Its like if the difference is 50 apm or something, then you can say its higher, so take the above vaguely and not strictly.
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Hmm i like where you are going- but there is no quick way to learn starcraft. like G5 said- you need practice, practice and more practice. By playing games, you are learning about relative timings, and game play. Also- during these mass games muscle memory will develop where macro cycles, and hot keys will becomes muscle memory. Once this 'second nature' sets in SC will become easier and easier.
But really- you just need to play more games, and look at strategically what you are doing wrong. Mechanics will come with muscle memory, but more importantly time! So many new players think that APM is what is holding them back- when in reality it's not APM at all, its lack of strategic insight
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1 strategy, 1 map, endless hours practice.
Simple tips:Don't queue, never stop making workers, never miss a supply.
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Thanks to NuKedUFirst for the advice.
Thanks to krndandaman for the ideas on concepts transferable to SC2.
Thanks to exeexe for the unique insight into the learning process, this should help a lot!
Special thanks to TeamLiquid and the community for allowing this thread to exist, there is no better place on the internet to learn the ways of ownage!
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Also FPS should make your clicking precision allot better, so that is at least one transferable skill, heheh...
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On June 14 2010 23:16 krndandaman wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 22:46 exeexe wrote:
Get bwchart, check your latest replay, check what is your apm in comparison to your enemy.
There are 4 options:
1 you win your apm > enemy apm
2 you win your apm < enemy apm
3 you lost your apm > enemy apm
4 you lost your apm < enemy apm
kk
I only wanna talk about when you loose. K because if you did option 3, means you did something fundamentaly wrong, means this is a game where you can proberbly learn a lot from.
If you did option 4, means you were "supposed" to loose anyway. Sometimes when you loose a lot, you get in a very bad mood. But if you check the apms and see that you were supposed to loose anyway, that can be a good way to get back into the right mood again. Being in bad mood can destroy your game and will delay how fast you are learning.
You should come to iccup trainning channel/ (or the other channel i dont remember right now) if you find yourself to be in a position where you want advice. People there in general are firendly and at
D-/D/D+.
edit:
Btw just because ones apm is 10 apm higher than someone else doesnt mean its higher. Its like if the difference is 50 apm or something, then you can say its higher, so take the above vaguely and not strictly. I don't think the mentality of "oh I'm supposed to lose since i'm lower apm" should be taken, even if its to encourage yourself. APM really does not define a player
Higher EAPM is always better, spam is supposed to just keep you busy constantly, there is never a time in game when you should not be doing something.
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On June 14 2010 23:16 krndandaman wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 22:46 exeexe wrote:
Get bwchart, check your latest replay, check what is your apm in comparison to your enemy.
There are 4 options:
1 you win your apm > enemy apm
2 you win your apm < enemy apm
3 you lost your apm > enemy apm
4 you lost your apm < enemy apm
kk
I only wanna talk about when you loose. K because if you did option 3, means you did something fundamentaly wrong, means this is a game where you can proberbly learn a lot from.
If you did option 4, means you were "supposed" to loose anyway. Sometimes when you loose a lot, you get in a very bad mood. But if you check the apms and see that you were supposed to loose anyway, that can be a good way to get back into the right mood again. Being in bad mood can destroy your game and will delay how fast you are learning.
You should come to iccup trainning channel/ (or the other channel i dont remember right now) if you find yourself to be in a position where you want advice. People there in general are firendly and at
D-/D/D+.
edit:
Btw just because ones apm is 10 apm higher than someone else doesnt mean its higher. Its like if the difference is 50 apm or something, then you can say its higher, so take the above vaguely and not strictly. I don't think the mentality of "oh I'm supposed to lose since i'm lower apm" should be taken, even if its to encourage yourself. APM really does not define a player
I see your point about how the correlation works, but I review every replay whether I win or lose, and I'm always hyper critical of both myself and my opponent concerning micro/macromanagement as well as strategically and tactically. However, he makes good points about where the find the clues most pertinent to my evolution as a player.
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don't play sc1 after sc2.
i have played sc1 for 8 years, then stopped for 2 and played 1800 games of sc2 got to 2000 platinum and then tried to play some BW just for fun... needless to say i couldn't do it.
BW is simply to difficult and though i have the APM there's no point in trying to get good at SC1 just for 3~4 weeks.
If you want to keep ur skill during the beta downtime forget what all these noobs are saying .
Just watch as many replays as you can and test your builds. see how fast you can make your builds up to 50 or 60 population.
Playing BW will not help.
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On June 14 2010 23:36 decemvrie wrote:
Playing BW will not help.
That is, unless you enjoy playing it. I fundamentally disagree saying that playing BW will not help. Sure, the mechanics are very different, but learning how to enact a strategy in a different environment can be invaluable to improving at SC2. The way you have to plan out your game in BW - creating goals and accomplishing them in the most efficient way, is exactly what you do in SC2.
OP - Generally, if you ask someone in-game what you could have done different, chances are you won't get very good results. I'd recommend the iccup training program and starcraft training community (you don't necessarily have to join, just hang out in the channels). It's very clear in these places that you're practicing. About half the time you can get observers to watch and constructively criticize your play.
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On June 14 2010 23:46 Servius_Fulvius wrote:That is, unless you enjoy playing it. I fundamentally disagree saying that playing BW will not help. Sure, the mechanics are very different, but learning how to enact a strategy in a different environment can be invaluable to improving at SC2. The way you have to plan out your game in BW - creating goals and accomplishing them in the most efficient way, is exactly what you do in SC2. OP - Generally, if you ask someone in-game what you could have done different, chances are you won't get very good results. I'd recommend the iccup training program and starcraft training community (you don't necessarily have to join, just hang out in the channels). It's very clear in these places that you're practicing. About half the time you can get observers to watch and constructively criticize your play.
Thanks a lot for pointing me in the right direction, I didn't know they existed and should be instrumental in my continued growth =D
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I played on ICCUP for about 8 months or so before the beta hit and clawed my way up to D+ terran. There's a few things that are similar between the two crafts and some that are surprisingly different. The biggest difference (and the reason I enjoyed sc2 more) was that, especially as terran in sc1, you can't do everything you need to. Just building your base and producing workers without hickups takes 100+ APM, which means you're not scouting, you're not controlling your units, and worst of all, you have no time to think during your game.
At least for me personally, there was little "strategy" in sc1 as an RTS, because in TvP it was all "omg I got to make tanks and siege them and lay mines and fight off this reaver and this DT and lay more mines and does he have an expansion I should get an expansion!". In TvZ it was all "ok I have this buildorder that goes all the way to freaking science facility and I have to run around like a maniac to defend against muta while building marines and now there's lurkers and I have to defend those and push out wait is that dark swarm oh crap". Well you get the point^^
The things you can learn from SC1 are "keep your money low, move your hands as fast as you can, and scout". Those things have been useful to me in SC2, and I think if you gain some level of comfort in just building a ton of crap in sc1 you'll feel very comfortable in sc2. Once your brain doesn't need to think about all those things you can start to actually play the strategic part of the game. In SC2 this happens at a much lower skill than in SC1 and as a consequence it feels alot more important to "think" about your game, which you won't learn at D/D+ in sc1.
As for suggestions: I went back to sc1 when the beta went down too, but I'm trying to play it more with the SC2 mindset. Forget build orders (especially ones like the 9 minute push that tell you what to do for 9 minutes of the game). In fact, I recommend you forget playing terran. Building units, sieging tanks, building a base and laying mines, all those things are horribly difficult to do well in sc1, and much much simpler or non-existant in sc2. You won't need those skills for sc2. Chose an easier race that has early map control. That way you can concentrate on getting scouting information/expanding/making units without spending 80% of your time frantically trying to build a base and defend it from dragoons or mutalisks.
EDIT - The reason I'd say to forget about build orders isn't because they're bad (in fact, they're very good!) but because you'll follow them blindly without understanding why you build turrets and when. Especially the 1rax FE into 9 min push. It takes alot of practice to not die to a ling all-in or to 2hatch lurker with that build, because it's designed to be as economic as possible while building juuuust the minimum amount of units to hold stuff off. Try 2 rax 3 rax 4 rax who cares, just try things and judge for yourself what's most effective. That way you find your own buildorder, and it's what you'll be doing in sc2. You'll never learn gamesense until you lose to every possible strat, with every possible strat IMO.
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Just getting a training schedule and sticking to it will be a good training for when you have to practice SC2 for hours.
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so many posters here are so wrong... APM means nothing, it just shows your effort.
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On June 15 2010 00:07 Misrah wrote:
so many posters here are so wrong... APM means nothing, it just shows your effort.
Ok, so effort, being correlated with APM according to you, means nothing as well then! Regardless of APM discussions, there's a certain number of actions per minute that you need to do in broodwar in order to be successful at D level. If you can't pull them off you lose.
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one thing that rings true for both bw and sc2 is
learn to macro first.
micro is far more demanding (time spent doing it) for less rewarding
oh wait your terran, you HAVE to micro.
Just try to only control your army to the extent of 1a2a3a, and hitting stim or seige mode 1 time.
This is guessing that you're like <120 apm, because below that you should avoid micro except when painfully obvious you need to do something.
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On June 14 2010 23:16 krndandaman wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 22:46 exeexe wrote:
Get bwchart, check your latest replay, check what is your apm in comparison to your enemy.
There are 4 options:
1 you win your apm > enemy apm
2 you win your apm < enemy apm
3 you lost your apm > enemy apm
4 you lost your apm < enemy apm
kk
I only wanna talk about when you loose. K because if you did option 3, means you did something fundamentaly wrong, means this is a game where you can proberbly learn a lot from.
If you did option 4, means you were "supposed" to loose anyway. Sometimes when you loose a lot, you get in a very bad mood. But if you check the apms and see that you were supposed to loose anyway, that can be a good way to get back into the right mood again. Being in bad mood can destroy your game and will delay how fast you are learning.
You should come to iccup trainning channel/ (or the other channel i dont remember right now) if you find yourself to be in a position where you want advice. People there in general are firendly and at
D-/D/D+.
edit:
Btw just because ones apm is 10 apm higher than someone else doesnt mean its higher. Its like if the difference is 50 apm or something, then you can say its higher, so take the above vaguely and not strictly. I don't think the mentality of "oh I'm supposed to lose since i'm lower apm" should be taken, even if its to encourage yourself. APM really does not define a player
As mentioned in his post if it's like 50 higher, you really should lose. Unless their spamming rediculously or something.
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all the people who aren't cut throat left ICCUP for sc2 beta.
its a tough atmosphere, but there are still a few ppl here and there still playing.
in my opinion, most of the doucebags on ICCUp have been not korean players, but white / english speaking dipshits who can't keep their comments to themselves.
you join a D game and they insult you on how bad you are? lol. its pretty pathetic.
but for game sense... its just practice. you really need to use your scouting information and determine what they are likely going toward. knowing the timing of what hsould be happening, or counting workers/pylons to determine information..
just practice yo.
i wish you luck, if you want to play on iccup with me, my ID is kyungrim
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there are people with 150 apm at B level , Apm has not much to do with skill.At least not in our skill level. Just focus on getting faster but don't think uuuh i have to spam get my apm up.
As mentioned in his post if it's like 50 higher, you really should lose. Unless their spamming rediculously or something.
Apm really has nothing to do, i beat countless of players with 200+ apm. I remember one replay of fantasy with about 150ish apm too. Savior also played with often less than 200
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On June 15 2010 00:25 slowmanrunning wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 23:16 krndandaman wrote:On June 14 2010 22:46 exeexe wrote:
Get bwchart, check your latest replay, check what is your apm in comparison to your enemy.
There are 4 options:
1 you win your apm > enemy apm
2 you win your apm < enemy apm
3 you lost your apm > enemy apm
4 you lost your apm < enemy apm
kk
I only wanna talk about when you loose. K because if you did option 3, means you did something fundamentaly wrong, means this is a game where you can proberbly learn a lot from.
If you did option 4, means you were "supposed" to loose anyway. Sometimes when you loose a lot, you get in a very bad mood. But if you check the apms and see that you were supposed to loose anyway, that can be a good way to get back into the right mood again. Being in bad mood can destroy your game and will delay how fast you are learning.
You should come to iccup trainning channel/ (or the other channel i dont remember right now) if you find yourself to be in a position where you want advice. People there in general are firendly and at
D-/D/D+.
edit:
Btw just because ones apm is 10 apm higher than someone else doesnt mean its higher. Its like if the difference is 50 apm or something, then you can say its higher, so take the above vaguely and not strictly. I don't think the mentality of "oh I'm supposed to lose since i'm lower apm" should be taken, even if its to encourage yourself. APM really does not define a player As mentioned in his post if it's like 50 higher, you really should lose. Unless their spamming rediculously or something.
Jaedong has much higher APM than Stork and yet Stork is the only Protoss he's lost to in the past year. APM really doesn't mean much, as long as it's not 100 vs 50 or something. Once it's past a certain threshold (though it's impossible to really say what that is, and it's race dependent) there's not much of a difference. Obviously for an individual he'd be better with higher APM 99% of the time, but you can't compare two different people based on APM alone.
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so, what's your iccup rank?
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Really enjoying the discussion I seemed to have caused ^_^ all very helpful. For clarification so far I'm D-, my score is 0-13. I'm not discouraged though, I knew to expect this and welcome it.
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On June 15 2010 00:58 Misanthrope wrote:
Really enjoying the discussion I seemed to have caused ^_^ all very helpful. For clarification so far I'm D-, my score is 0-13. I'm not discouraged though, I knew to expect this and welcome it.
Haha... I read this thread because I feel the same way about BW...
In SC2, I was mid-diamond with ~80% winrate when Bnet 2.0 wasn't failing on me and now decided to go to BW after about five years of not playing it (and never playing it competitively). I'm D- as well and 0-7. I think I'm just going to macro the whole game and focus on not forgetting to do something, i.e. not putting workers on minerals since that happens a lot for me. Often by the end of the game I notice I have about 10 probes scattered around my base in random locations because I told them to build something and I forgot to put them back to mining. =\ Idk, I'm just going to stick with the game more and I need to use an APM program to look at how I'm playing more in depth.
I don't think this has been mentioned yet, but it seems that the need to expand in BW>SC2. I often play games on SC2 with two bases and feel secure with them and do not need any more minerals/gas. In BW, it just feels I need to expand more and more rapidly (aside from the fact Zerg cannot use spawn larvae in BW.) Just what it feels like to me... I know there will be tons of people that disagree.
I only am playing this game to keep me focused on creating a mental checklist and for the fun of competition. I don't really expect this will make me ready for SC2, but it will be better than playing CSS, TF2 or some other FPS that I own.
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On June 14 2010 23:36 decemvrie wrote:don't play sc1 after sc2. i have played sc1 for 8 years, then stopped for 2 and played 1800 games of sc2 got to 2000 platinum and then tried to play some BW just for fun... needless to say i couldn't do it. BW is simply to difficult and though i have the APM there's no point in trying to get good at SC1 just for 3~4 weeks. If you want to keep ur skill during the beta downtime forget what all these noobs are saying . Just watch as many replays as you can and test your builds. see how fast you can make your builds up to 50 or 60 population. Playing BW will not help.
That isn't the case for everyone. I came back to BW and I'm playing some of my best games of my life. 3-4 weeks is certainly not enough time to get that good, but it's still productive. Brood War is the Bible for RTS gaming. You can learn a ton from playing it.
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Often by the end of the game I notice I have about 10 probes scattered around my base in random locations because I told them to build something and I forgot to put them back to mining. =
you can shift right click the worker back to gather minerals in Bw too. Just have to quick enough before worker starts building
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On June 15 2010 00:17 Feefee wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2010 00:07 Misrah wrote:
so many posters here are so wrong... APM means nothing, it just shows your effort. Ok, so effort, being correlated with APM according to you, means nothing as well then! Regardless of APM discussions, there's a certain number of actions per minute that you need to do in broodwar in order to be successful at D level. If you can't pull them off you lose.
Trust me- APM is not the thing that is holding you back from going up ranks.
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On June 15 2010 00:58 Misanthrope wrote:
Really enjoying the discussion I seemed to have caused ^_^ all very helpful. For clarification so far I'm D-, my score is 0-13. I'm not discouraged though, I knew to expect this and welcome it.
Good, something that really helped me progress was the fact that I heard people saying a loss makes you learn more than a win, therefore I was just welcoming losses and enjoyed playing even with 10% win ratio stats or less.
Just keep playing, learn from your mistakes, and never get discouraged by losses, just enjoy the learning they bring you. If you do that, you will leave the D- rank before you know it.
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On June 14 2010 23:16 Spyfire242 wrote:
1 strategy, 1 map, endless hours practice.
Simple tips:Don't queue, never stop making workers, never miss a supply.
This is all you should be busy while practicing BW for SC2. BO's, micro and general game sense, wont be useful for you AT ALL, just because BW is a totally different game than SC2.
In other words, the only thing that BW can do for your SC2 game, is to train you to be effective while using your resources/time, the faster you are the more time you have to do extra stuff, like harrass and other things.
1 advice tho... since you are doing it for SC2... dont worrie at the start to make perfect macro, even ppl in the lower C's sometime slip and raise around 1k-2k minerals at some point in the games. So you better focus on getting things done GOOD, then with more games you play you start being more faster and youll find that u have more time to do other extra stuff you couldnt do b4.
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Wow this has turned into a plethora of great insight and discussion, thanks a bunch to everyone!
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As with everybody else, mechanics is everything. With Terran you tend to have an easier time than Zerg players cause we have to use our hatcheries that all over the map to build units while if your MnM or Mech is almost always within your first base in straight, pretty lines that build nicely (Sorry if I'm sounding like i'm mad at Terran, I'm not). Get used to seeing that your minerals are not being spent effectively cause it's easy to que units up, but it's better if you have the factory/barracks count to match the production of minerals/gas that you have.
The thing that might make you best at SC2 is having to check your workers. Periodically checking your workers is necessary in BW cause guess what, DT's (though your terran so you'll get a warning unlike us Zerg) will rip you to shreds when your not looking, or, some mutas came in and you didn't see it, but they managed to kill one of your gas SCVs. Guess what happens, your gas count goes to shit. Or what if you sent off a SCV to build a Tech building in the corner of your base where they might not scout it, you need to remember to bring that SCV back to mine or your economy hurts (Every unit is important). Finally, getting used to having multiple hotkeys for your army in general is better cause moving everything in a gigantic blob is not nearly as skilled as 4 or 5 groups of units that move "together," that can surround effectively, and be overall, better.
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On June 15 2010 01:52 Misanthrope wrote:
Wow this has turned into a plethora of great insight and discussion, thanks a bunch to everyone!
I really like your attitude, I have this stereotype for sc2 fanboys, but you are very opened to bw, even saying the bold statement bw > sc2. It's great to see that attitude from an sc2 player. I agree sc2 is a great game and I liked playing it, but saying it's better than bw is just being blind imo.
Anyway this isn't about SC2 vs BW but you getting better so gl. If you want, maybe I can watch a replay of yours and give you some relevant advices?
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the only way is to practice a shitload and even then it takes a ton of time to get all that game sense and multi tasking. There is no way you will be even close to decent by the time sc2 comes out. There is no quick way to get good at BW unless you're Kolll
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On June 15 2010 02:40 Sharkified wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2010 01:52 Misanthrope wrote:
Wow this has turned into a plethora of great insight and discussion, thanks a bunch to everyone! I really like your attitude, I have this stereotype for sc2 fanboys, but you are very opened to bw, even saying the bold statement bw > sc2. It's great to see that attitude from an sc2 player. I agree sc2 is a great game and I liked playing it, but saying it's better than bw is just being blind imo. Anyway this isn't about SC2 vs BW but you getting better so gl. If you want, maybe I can watch a replay of yours and give you some relevant advices?
I think it remains to be seen if SC2 can eclipse BW as an e-sport, but in my mind it's obvious that BW is the new chess. I think humanity is certainly experiencing an exciting time with our culture becoming computerized, and all I know is I want to be a part of it.
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This has sort of already been mentioned but.... Hotkey Usage!
In BW the 12 unit selection limit made it necessary to hotkey your army with multiple hotkeys.
1 for vultures, 2 for tanks, 3 for science vessels, etc etc... In SC2 the fact you have no limit on this means that a lot of mid-low level players will group their entire army as one hotkey resulting in what Day9 calls one hotkey army syndrome where (for example) you a-move your army of tanks and vikings to the enemies base only to have all of your vikings destroyed cause they get there first and are blown away before the tanks even arrive.
If your looking for transferable skills than the skill of hotkey usage in general but more specifically not relying on just one (or maybe 2) hotkeys for your army would be a big help to you in SC2 where most people fall into the one control group trap.
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On June 14 2010 16:26 Misanthrope wrote:
Because of MBS/Automine, SC2 seems to mostly just require decent APM as opposed to both good APM and multitasking. However, having good multitasking habits can't hurt.
Um are you joking?
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You have inspired me to reinstall SC:BW and ICCUP so I can get my ass demolished again.
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On June 15 2010 04:37 XKiller wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 16:26 Misanthrope wrote:
Because of MBS/Automine, SC2 seems to mostly just require decent APM as opposed to both good APM and multitasking. However, having good multitasking habits can't hurt. Um are you joking?
The subject states pretty obviously that he is a newb. So I'm guessing he wasn't joking. Troll elsewhere.
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On June 15 2010 04:37 XKiller wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 16:26 Misanthrope wrote:
Because of MBS/Automine, SC2 seems to mostly just require decent APM as opposed to both good APM and multitasking. However, having good multitasking habits can't hurt. Um are you joking?
I'm not totally sure what you mean, but SC2 feels like 1a2a3a4s5s6s7ddddTabaaaaTabss, check pop F5 <60 food 1 scv for supply, >60 food 2 scv for supply, b+s shift click click click into GG.
SC1 seems like 1t2t3t1a2a3a4a5a6a7i8i5o6o F2 click M click M click M click M click C click C click T click V click V F3 box-a click box-a click box-a click box-a click, oh no, i'm capped! 1-1 where's my army? Swarm in my nat??? I forgot to micro!!! FFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!! ..........gg
Additionally: Great to see I've inspired you Grend!
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This topic has been a fun read. I had been considering picking up BW with no intentions of being a serious player, just to have some fun with it since I'd been enjoying the SC2 beta and got up to platinum.
However, I have yet to do so for reasons other people have stated previously (The game's been out for 12 years or so, obviously the average skill level is pretty high.) Thanks for posting your experience.
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notice from Flash, practice others races during ur free times.
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All I can say is don't get discouraged Fuel. Excellence is a habit, and what a game to be a perfectionist about! The practice alone will help make you a better gamer, even if you can't get far into the scene. It's all about giving it %110 and seeing where that takes you.
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just dl some map hacks and you will always win all the good tournaments
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Ive been getting back into bw again too, very average low D zerg. If you ever wanna play add me as b00merkuwanger on Iccup or pm me here.
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If you can master multitaskin of BW sc2 is a breeze. The best way to get better at BW is through muscle memory so your mind doesnt have to think about certain things throughout the game allowing you to think more tactfully. That of course comes with mass gaming, sadly this game cannot be mastered through merely theory and some nifty tricks, its a game of making no mistakes and capitalizing on your opponents mistakes.
If you can manage to get decent at bw before SC2 comes out, you'll be way ahead of the pack as far as skill goes, so if you have the time keep on doin what you're doin and you shall find success down the road.
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bw is fun to learn too.
as terran, theres lots of fun vZ and vP builds you could do, especially all-in timing pushes.
playing bw continuously will absolutely ruin your expansion timings in sc2 (i know when i first went into sc2 i kept losing due to expanding too early), but in turn this presents more opportunities to improve your macro and multitasking. playing terran also highly encourages you to babysit your units, which is definitely a transferable skill.
look at my profile if you want to add me, i'm decent at all mus except TvT and TvZ. 
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Thanks to the guys that have offered to help me out with practice, I'll be contacting you all soon.
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@Fuel
Not trying to discourage you, but if you're looking for fun by picking up bw for the first time, playing on iccup or playing any "competitive" 1v1 games probably aren't the best ideas. Even if you've played casually before like 3v3 bgh on bnet or something and know all of the hotkeys, it's still really frustrating to try to get into the competitive 1v1s. But starting off from scratch with no knowledge of the hotkeys or basic mechanics and jumping straight into iccup is a guaranteed failure. I think Day9 said it best when he mentioned that completely new players are better off playing 3v3 games with a couple friends and just get used to moving units around and learning the hotkeys.
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Iccup STILL isn't a newb friendly area. Just because SC2 beta is here doesn't mean EVERYONE left. The competition on Iccup in the D - D+ range is still tough. Getting to D+ and maintaining it is still nothing you can breeze through.
Just play a lot of games and build up your APM, Macro, game sense.
Brood War is so taxing on the brain... I love it
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EPT
