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BW Quick Reference Guide

Forum Index > BW General
Post a Reply
razorsuKe
Profile Blog Joined July 2008
Canada2036 Posts
Last Edited: 2020-03-30 17:10:40
March 29 2020 21:47 GMT
#1
LATENCY

Brood War is Peer-to-Peer (P2P) meaning you connect to your opponents, not to a central server when in a game.

*Unless none of the players in a game can NAT properly in which case a Blizzard server is in fact used, and losing connection to it drops you from the game. (Does not apply to 1.16)

You will notice this icon and message:
+ Show Spoiler +

[image loading]


[image loading]


Turn Rate (TR)

Higher TR = Fast unit response ie: the time it takes to respond when you issue a click/command to the unit actually moving/responding, with higher chance of lag if connection between you and opponent(s) is not good

Lower TR = Slower unit response, better lag

Chart posted by SC Developer Grant Davies outlining response times and their corresponding TR with respect to low/high/extra:

https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/starcraft/t/turn-rates-matchmaking-and-you/519


TR Low High Extra
24 125 167 208
20 150 200 250
16 188 250 313
14 214 286 357
12 250 333 417
10 300 400 500
8 375 500 625


So these are pretty much equivalent:
TR 24 high = TR 20 low
TR 20 high = TR 16 low
TR 24 Extra = TR 16 low

UNIT SIZE / DAMAGE TYPE

Understanding unit size/damage type will help you realize why some units do good against others.

Reference:
http://classic.battle.net/scc/GS/damage.shtml

: Normal weapons are equally effective against all types of units.
: Concussion/Plasma weapons do 50% damage against Medium units and 25% against Large units.
: Explosive weapons do 50% damage against Small units and 75% against Medium units.

[image loading]

* Spider Mines: Small Unit / Explosive Damage with Spash

"Does this mean Mutas only take 50% damage to Goliaths?"
Yes it does.
"Then why does it feel like Goliaths counter Mutas?"
Cause goliaths are cheaper, less gas dependent and thus more economical to produce.

- Buildings are essentially Large Units
- Some buildings have armor, Sunken Colony has 2 armor.

HIGH GROUND / COVER

Reference:
http://classic.battle.net/scc/GS/hc.shtml

^ That was printed in the original sc booklet that came with the game. That information is flat out WRONG. You can test it yourself, high ground hit percentage is actually just 50%

Some doodads don't actually provide cover and some high ground is not true high ground (like the 3rd base on sylphid)


OTHER TIDBITS

- 9h is essentially an obsolete and useless build, it is completely dominated by 10h since you get an extra drone and the timing for the completion of pool/hatch is pretty much identical

- Ghost sight range upgrade is just that - it is for sight/vision ONLY. It does not increase attack range. (I see people upgrading this in UMS like bunker defense, don't do it, it's completely useless when you have full map vision already)

- Eggs are strong, high armor, Cocoons are NOT. So while you can morph a hydra into a lurker egg to give it a boost, morphing a muta into a guard/devourer doesn't do shit, in fact it's worse since cocoon is a large unit.

- Sunken colonies LOSE HP when completed. A regular colony is 400 hp, a sunken colony is 300 hp. When you are attacking a morphing colony, often times you will see pros stop hitting the colony when it is at 100hp, this is because any additional hits would be better spent hitting zerglings/whatever else is attacking you. Once that colony is done, that 100hp turns into 1hp and you can finish it off with 1 hit.

- Unit Limits, extended or original? This only comes into affect when the game is maxed out, units like the valkyrie won't fire properly and sometimes freeze up. Very important to have this on extended for most UMS games (EUD maps will have it on original by default to enable special properties) But for something like Desert Strike, if you have it on extended, valks will actually fire.
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Highgamer
Profile Joined October 2015
1470 Posts
Last Edited: 2020-03-30 11:29:18
March 30 2020 11:27 GMT
#2
Nice effort, (re-)read some useful things here, but it feels a bit random/arbitrary as to what you chose to cover and what not. There are about a million other BW-things people refer to that noobs wouldn't understand, namely builds/openings, tactics, map-abbreviations etc..

Maybe it would be better to use these informations to bolster up Liquidpedia with missing details (if there are any)?

edit: Definitelly would add spider-mines to the unit dmg/size-chart.
blabber
Profile Blog Joined June 2007
United States4448 Posts
March 30 2020 13:11 GMT
#3
Does the ghost sight upgrade let you nuke from further away (without the use of scan or other vision)? I feel like I remember this being the case
blabberrrrr
Highgamer
Profile Joined October 2015
1470 Posts
March 30 2020 13:57 GMT
#4
From Liquidpedia:

Ocular Implants: Increases Ghost sight by 2 (from 9 to 11), and Nuke range also by 2 (from 8 to 10).
mutmut
Profile Joined March 2020
4 Posts
March 30 2020 14:17 GMT
#5
Brood War is Peer-to-Peer (P2P) meaning you connect to your opponents, not to a central server when in a game.

Unless none of the players in a game can NAT properly in which case a Blizzard server is in fact used, and losing connection to it drops you from the game. (Does not apply to 1.16)
razorsuKe
Profile Blog Joined July 2008
Canada2036 Posts
March 30 2020 17:00 GMT
#6
On March 30 2020 20:27 Highgamer wrote:
Nice effort, (re-)read some useful things here, but it feels a bit random/arbitrary as to what you chose to cover and what not. There are about a million other BW-things people refer to that noobs wouldn't understand, namely builds/openings, tactics, map-abbreviations etc..

Maybe it would be better to use these informations to bolster up Liquidpedia with missing details (if there are any)?

edit: Definitelly would add spider-mines to the unit dmg/size-chart.


I would be glad to add stuff, but the goal is just a quick reference. Build orders and tactics are in-depth and evolving, not really something you want to quickly look up and glance at.
Abbreviations could probably be added but that's gonna be one hell of a list O_O

The first two things aren't really posted anywhere convenient, if I were to specifically search for it, it would take more than 3 clicks to find.

Good point on spider mines, I'll add that.
EntusGalleries.com - CJ Uniform Sale
razorsuKe
Profile Blog Joined July 2008
Canada2036 Posts
March 30 2020 17:00 GMT
#7
On March 30 2020 23:17 mutmut wrote:
Show nested quote +
Brood War is Peer-to-Peer (P2P) meaning you connect to your opponents, not to a central server when in a game.

Unless none of the players in a game can NAT properly in which case a Blizzard server is in fact used, and losing connection to it drops you from the game. (Does not apply to 1.16)


Yes thank you, I'll add that (and grab a screen shot of that icon when it appears)
EntusGalleries.com - CJ Uniform Sale
pebble444
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
Italy2503 Posts
March 30 2020 17:03 GMT
#8
I think this thread is great, and has an even greater potential if the OP keeps it up to date with information proven and feeded by the community. you could even find someone to make little videos with graphics to explain some of these things more thoroughly
"Awaken my Child, and embrace the Glory that is your Birthright"
razorsuKe
Profile Blog Joined July 2008
Canada2036 Posts
March 30 2020 17:15 GMT
#9
On March 31 2020 02:03 pebble444 wrote:
I think this thread is great, and has an even greater potential if the OP keeps it up to date with information proven and feeded by the community. you could even find someone to make little videos with graphics to explain some of these things more thoroughly


I'll update it as need be, but like you said, this is for facts only, nothing that's up for interpretation or changing/evolving with game play.

What needs to be explained more thoroughly with a video though? Aren't these things self evident?

Although there was a video where a guy on TL proved that high ground hit percentage was indeed 50%. He used a siege tank and an ultra on high ground and put a chart of hit/miss. He did this 100 times and in the end it was actually 50 hits and 50 misses. I've been looking forever for that video but it seems to have disappeared.
EntusGalleries.com - CJ Uniform Sale
shakigami
Profile Joined November 2013
220 Posts
March 31 2020 02:32 GMT
#10
On March 30 2020 22:11 blabber wrote:
Does the ghost sight upgrade let you nuke from further away (without the use of scan or other vision)? I feel like I remember this being the case

Nuke Range is one matrix less than current Ghost sight range (i.e. 8 or 10)
MasterReY
Profile Blog Joined August 2007
Germany2708 Posts
March 31 2020 11:22 GMT
#11
the miss chance is actually 53.125%
source: (Wiki)Damage
https://www.twitch.tv/MasterReY/ ~ Biggest Reach fan on TL.net (Don't even dare to mention LR now) ~ R.I.P Violet ~ Developer of SCRChart
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