I feel that we need some more content for really low ranked players to help them learn the basics of the game. There's only Day9 casts and CPL casts. That's pretty much all we have. Even for CPL there are many already developed players that only need some tweaking. I assume that's happeing because most of the players are pretty good already and there's not enough demand for those kinds of streams/tutorials.
Even watching Day9 daily he talks about pretty advanced stuff already. Watch anything else like STPL, BWCL, ASL/KSL and you can see those guys doing different strategies that work for them and you might think that a good build/strategy is pretty much all you need to succeed. You try lots of stuff, try to repeat things seen in pro or semi-pro replays and fail. You fail because you cannot spend you minerals to keep them low, you either overmicro or send your units to death on siege tanks, you cannot use control groups and hotkeys. Nobody (almost) talks about those things. People assume everybody know that and focus mostly on strategies and high level play. But those seemingly little details matter a lot!
So only focusing on keeping your minerals low and not getting supply block can get you out of F soon enough, but if you think and blame your creative strategies you can still be in F for a long time. Most of the time you don't even understand why you win or lose a particular game. You could not judge your own play. So I think there should be more low level streamers and VODs with game analisys. Maybe even something like Bronze League Heroes for Starcraft 2. I believe this could also bring more new players into the game.
I was thinking about this too. I wonder if it would be possible to make like UMS missions for new players to complete, but those missions would be like: 'build nothing but scvs nonstop until you have 200-200" then add a level, don't get suppy blocked while doing that", another level "build only scvs and marines, don't get supply blocked" etc.
When they get that down, include some micro challenges (esp. with early game scenarios like defend ramp with scvs+rines vs ling rush), or BO challenges (like get 4 marines and a tank before 4:20).
I know nothing about making UMSes though, so i could only contribute ideas.
Then of course comes marketing, as such missions as build 200scvs would get boring as fast. Or maybe would need to mix up macro practice with micro challenges.
I am not sure what kind of content would be useful in the "keep your money down" department. There is not much to explain about it and it is almost always addressed again when a beginner asks why he lost a particular game. This part of the game is simply not the fun or important part for the majority of newbies and therefore it is never worked on.
With regards to micro, I guess there really is missing something. I do not recall having ever seen a video along the lines of "How to FD push" or "How to defend an FD push" or anything similar.
the content is to play the game with people you know, at your level. hypothetically speaking, that's how you learn organically and can get the quality of game you look for.
if you are at the most basic level of starcraft one of the worst things you can do is to constantly overthink things. it gets in the way of simply playing the game.
it's just you, a friend, and trying to beat him and vice versa.
streamers for these kinds of things simply get nothing out of it. and the content we had before is either gone, non-applicable, or never actually recorded. game videos were rather rare back then when everyone was learning together.
regarding vids like "how to fake-double" light did a lot of these that ended up being translated by a nice gent. a lot of ex-progamers (read:koreans) have done guides. again though, those are not basics. how you get the basics down is just by finding people and playing.
yeah i dont know what to tell you here.. just do what everybody else does? watch what (safe) buildorders are used at pro level and work from there? you dont need to copy it 100% just basicly do the same opening go from there...
Yo check out this seasons CPL content, With a whole new lower tier of people below 1350, there will be a lot of content for F,E,D players as well as the competitive upper tiers. Additonally there are a few streamers out there in the 1400-1600 range that could be useful to watch. I am 1500ish Protoss and I will start to stream more with commentary so if you wana check some of my games out you could. + Show Spoiler +
Also the signups just closed for CPL, but you should absolutely consider joining it since it is a great opportunity to work these things out with veteran coaches and practice partners. Its set alot of people (myself included) on a upward trajectory.
On September 09 2018 20:39 HaN- wrote: Stuff that exist in SC2 and that could help: - Tutorials - Unranked ladder mode - Co-op
And for all it's worth I've compiled guides found on Youtube into this PLAYLIST.
Yes, this is the stuff I was mostly talking about: VODs, tutorials that explain the basics, playing some simple builds with low APM, noob vs noob replay analysis. Thanks for sharing the playlist, very useful!
Honest truth is that this forum is like this on purpose. There have been countless guides for noobs, include my very own mechanics series, but as you may have noticed in the strategy section there's not even a sticky thread to compile them all together. And that's not because there's no thread at all, it's just that the threads that could be used aren't stickied lmao. Here's an example: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/bw-strategy/436604-collection-of-strategy-threads
In fact, I keep seeing the same questions answered over and over again because people just can't find stuff. Meanwhile, there's a lot of recommendations for day9 daily, which as far as my experience goes, is too advanced and scattered all over the place. Although he does have more focused videos.
To add to that, with the exception of a few good players, most of what happens here is blind leading the blind.
Everyone's seen a noob post a replay and 90% of the posts are talking about making workers or macro in general, even though there's glaring strategical issues that are way more important to fix. This makes noobs not want to post, because even though they don't understand a certain match-up, or just don't know what to do in a given situation, which is what causes them to float in the first place, all they get is the same shit over and over again.
I for one resorted to doing my own research, and advise everyone to do the same. Go to zimps Replays thread, get a bunch of pro replays going and analyse them yourself. Use the Foreign BW Discord if you want newer replays.
Unfortunately, most people don't have the time or motivation to do it and end up ditching the game.
Once you learn a bit more, you'll be able to take get to know who to listen to, which is paramount if you want to get anything out of this forum.
That said, this is a timely thread for me, because I just posted three pro hotkey analysis videos yesterday, one for each race, which you can check out here:
I'm thinking about for a long time. I want to open an SC dedicated portal, with rankings, tutorials, tournaments, news etc. An SC heaven. Primary focus on video content from myself, willing to invite other players as long as quality will be good.
Anyone willing to help out a bit? I'm open to put money into it for hosting, some better graphics and structuring it nicely with filtering etc. I'm ready to roll.
Need help with:
- setting up a webpage, I don't care if it's wordpress or other template, as long as it's neat and has got functionalities around news / filtering / addons like rankings or some forum - graphics - video editing, or at least an intro for me
Personally i'm willing to make few videos a week, on everything from super basics into deep strategic analysis.
On September 10 2018 02:28 kogeT wrote: I'm thinking about for a long time. I want to open an SC dedicated portal, with rankings, tutorials, tournaments, news etc. An SC heaven. Primary focus on video content from myself, willing to invite other players as long as quality will be good.
Anyone willing to help out a bit? I'm open to put money into it for hosting, some better graphics and structuring it nicely with filtering etc. I'm ready to roll.
Need help with:
- setting up a webpage, I don't care if it's wordpress or other template, as long as it's neat and has got functionalities around news / filtering / addons like rankings or some forum - graphics - video editing, or at least an intro for me
Personally i'm willing to make few videos a week, on everything from super basics into deep strategic analysis.
Ping me on TL
dude i've been doing some begginers tutorials stuff in spanish, if you need other content maker i can do protoss and 2vs2 related stuff for newbies, would love to do something for the growth of bw.
On September 10 2018 02:21 rand0MPrecisi0n wrote: Honest truth is that this forum is like this on purpose. There have been countless guides for noobs, include my very own mechanics series, but as you may have noticed in the strategy section there's not even a sticky thread to compile them all together. And that's not because there's no thread at all, it's just that the threads that could be used aren't stickied lmao. Here's an example: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/bw-strategy/436604-collection-of-strategy-threads
In fact, I keep seeing the same questions answered over and over again because people just can't find stuff. Meanwhile, there's a lot of recommendations for day9 daily, which as far as my experience goes, is too advanced and scattered all over the place. Although he does have more focused videos.
To add to that, with the exception of a few good players, most of what happens here is blind leading the blind.
Everyone's seen a noob post a replay and 90% of the posts are talking about making workers or macro in general, even though there's glaring strategical issues that are way more important to fix. This makes noobs not want to post, because even though they don't understand a certain match-up, or just don't know what to do in a given situation, which is what causes them to float in the first place, all they get is the same shit over and over again.
I for one resorted to doing my own research, and advise everyone to do the same. Go to zimps Replays thread, get a bunch of pro replays going and analyse them yourself. Use the Foreign BW Discord if you want newer replays.
Unfortunately, most people don't have the time or motivation to do it and end up ditching the game.
Once you learn a bit more, you'll be able to take get to know who to listen to, which is paramount if you want to get anything out of this forum.
There is some constructive advice hidden in your rant, but your general condamnation of TL's dealing with noobs is just BS. "It's beginner-unfriendly on purpose", that's what you're saying?
I second that it would be nice if someone sat down and made the ultimate beginner-thread-sticky, with a short and welcoming introductory text and the perfect bundle of useful links. That'd be a lot of work though if it shouldn't derail into an incomprehensible wall of text and a ton of links to semi-good, halfway-useful existing guides. Organizing and presenting information is tough... The people who run TL do it for free, it's not their job...
Actually: You can find all the info you need to start fruitful personal practice (which no tutorial can replace), and there are tons of people willing and able to help out on noob questions, people who know that it's hard to find or arrange everything there is to know to even start off in BW.
TL did a lot over the recent years to become much more beginner friendly: Liquidpedia-Beginner-Portal? Forum Guidelines that point to these Recommended Threads? Threads like "General Discussions" or "Simple Q, Simple A" that work the other way around: ask and you shall receive? Where people do all their best to help you?
Newbs ask the same questions most of the time here not because they cannot find the answer but because they don't look for it themselves. They ask stuff that you can test in the game in 1 minute by yourself, they ask stuff that can be found on Liquidpedia in the unit-description-threads or in the basic matchup-guides. That'd take more time oftentimes than just asking. No problem. People still help them every time.
If someone posts a replay here, they get the "macro better"-advice most of the time because it is one of the most important advices and because half of the noobs don't even seem to understand that bad macro is an issue. It's actually directly linked to the usefulness of advice on strategy: if s.o. has bad macro, giving him strategy-advice is a dice-roll. Next time he/she'll come "the strategy didn't work", guess what, you need macro for it to work. And yet: right behind the "macro-better"-advice, most of the answers will include strategy-help anyway, formulated on beginner-level-comprehensibility ("In TvP it's OK to be one base down" or something like that).
Giving someone who's new the advice that he/she needs is not so easy as you might think, not in a game as complex as BW with 20 years of development where so much "basic"-stuff is 100% counter-intuitive. Could you sum up just all the basic stuff that there is to say about matchups, strategy, mechanics, mindset in a readable text that doesn't turn into half a book? (again: I think it would be nice if there was one thread to teach them all, even if it turned into the equivalent of a 1000p book. But that's just a shit-ton of work...)
I watched your "Pro Hotkey Analysis"-"Tutorial" and I have to say: I wouldn't rant so self-righteously if that'd be all I could do... You "analyse" hardly anything. Once every 1-2 minutes or so you say "and here Zero puts stuff on hotkey X". Yes, in the first half you drop a sencence here and there about why Zero does this, but the rest of the time people can watch the game with you silently or listen to you stating the obvious about what's happening. Good for newbies I guess, if they wanna stay that way. I don't think I did you wrong with that description. But as hinted above: I applaud anyone's effort, according to his/her skills, to make TL even more beginner friendly. More tutorial vids of any kind are a great way for sure.
While I'm still a scrub, heres the stuff that was really valuable to me way back when. If I can remember anything else thats still somewhat relevant I'll be sure to post. Otherwise, its just a matter of learning and practice.
Day9 used to podcast back in the day before the daily existed, and while any openings he talks about will obviously be dated, he did make a lot of great points of how to think about the game, how to come up with strategies, and how to get your mechanics going smooth in terms of what you see, where you are at, and how to react. Remember while you can get away with just copying in starcraft without really understanding the game, I'd say its way more fun if you get a sense of how the game works. Day9 definitely gets the whole science of broodwar aspect, so give these old ones a listen! Day(9) Podcasts
And for those of you tryna bust out sair DT, I'd say this old gem is worth a watch:
Focus on the fundamentals. You already know that units generally are better than static defense, you need to hot key your bases, non stop build workers in most situations, etc... but in practice are you doing all these things? Playing “right” will get you to D level most likely. When you can get to D level, I think then it’s time to start thinking strategy, then specific build orders.
Also didn’t Artosis also get placed in F league? Lol.
People who are higher up spent lots of time building up fundamentals. Like- years fine tuning mechanics and game understanding.
I have been playing Starcraft so much. Last season, I played more than 2000 games. My max mmr was 1650.
I often get F, D, C rank. I don't know difference between F rank and C rank. They have high apm, most people who play with me, have than 200 apm.
F, D, C rank are the same: apm, strategy, micro, marco, cheese, knowledge about Starcraft.
I also don't know why I won, I lost a lot of games. Yesterday, it was my first time, I reached B rank and immediately I lost 5 games stretch.
Finally, I think ladder games, it isn't for people who play Starcraft less than 6 months seriously. Blizzard should open option to players who choose their level. They can't play a game, when they lose very easily in 10 games stretch. Actually, I have 1500 mmr, it's a success.
I have played Starcraft for 15 years. My level likes a newbie.
Have anyone thought about fully fledged BW video courses? Like we have on coursera or eDX. Nice startup idea, can sell them for $49.99 in no time. The game is clearly complex enough.
Unfortunately the number of skilled players in Brood War far outweigh the number of uber-noobs. Reading a strategy or two is fun when you use it to beat your friends at your level, I'm not so sure it's that fun to feel like you are always playing catch-up. We kind of lost the source of uber-noobs when the diablo II - WCIII - SC:BW bnet 1 ecosystem fell apart. So the audience for such guides you're suggesting does not really have a large player base to make use of those guides for.
But anyway, all the pre-2005 guides can basically be summed up as this:
Never stop building workers. Don't get supply blocked. Build more unit-producing structures when your money gets high. Expand when you think your expansion won't be killed. Zerg want one more base than Terran or Protoss. Protoss want one more base than Terran. When you have 3 or 4 gas you can basically do whatever you want.
And then maybe some stuff like Firebats counter lings Dragoons counter Lurkers psi storm is needed vs Zerg ghosts are a bad unit.
Like when we're talking really basic and simple and easy to remember, those are kind of the main points that help people before they turn into try-hards that memorize build orders, but they're still good enough that the idea of an RTS isn't baffling to them.
EPT
Day(9) Podcasts
