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Calgary25980 Posts
I'm not sure if this should be in Strategy or Brood War. I put it in strategy since it is a response to the thousand of authors of "Why did I lose?" threads.
The Self-Guided Road to Improvement
This is intended for a player who is looking to move from an upper low-level, or low mid-level foreigner (D, D+) to an upper mid-level foreigner (C+, B-). Players below that level maybe still appreciate reading it, even if they cannot apply all the concepts. Players above that level will surely not get much out of it, but can possibly help by suggesting edits or adding overlooked concepts. Is this different than the “Tips” thread? Maybe not; it reads differently and I’ve been working on it for awhile, so I’m posting it anyways.
Special thanks to infinity21. I immediately started writing this after I got home from talking to you about how we each learned this game and how we both looked to different places for improvement.
Improving Your Strategy and Game Knowledge
Improving your mid-level game is less a result of countless repetitions as it is a mindset. The first step to improving is committing yourself to improving - switching from a “mindless playing” mindset to a “mindful learning” mindset.
Just as there are many different viable playing styles, there are many different learning styles in this game. Some look outward and draw inspiration from stronger players, before adapting that style to make it a more appropriate fit for themselves. Others keep the strategy the same while they look to improve their mechanics to be able to emulate stronger players. Others still look inward, analysing the game, their play, and the maps to develop a self-tailored game plan.
Eventually you will need to do all three, but depending or your personality you will focus on one area much more than the other two. I believe the best first step after a basic understanding of the game (Knowing what beats what, knowing how to micro, macro, etc.) is to look outward and sharpen your game analysis by watching replays and VODs.
Watching professional (or even amateur) games with a mindful mindset is much different than the mindless one. The mindless observer allows himself to be taken on a journey - a trip through a beautiful landscape. The mindless observer is awestruck by the beauty of his surroundings and shocked when a new piece of scenery presents itself. The mindful observer must ignore the surface and see beneath it. He is always looking to the future and past, and looking deeper than what is presented to him. He is asking why the scenery is laid out this way. What will it look like in the future? How would it look differently if a slight change in the past had occurred?
Let me step out of this metaphor. If you are watching a VOD just for fun, you will be amazed when you see great micro, strong macro, mind games, a brashly stubborn attack, an interesting feint, etc. Games are more fun when you watch them this way, and any game that you’re interested in the outcome, should always be watched this way.
When you’re in a learning mindset, however, you need to watch a VOD differently. You must always be asking what you would do next if you were playing. When the progamer does not do that, ask yourself why. Which is better, what you would have done or what he would have done? Is the play fundamentally better, or better because of his mechanics? Is it something you can emulate in the future? Is it something you should emulate in the future? If an attack fails, ask why it failed. Was it because of mechanics, or was the unit composition wrong? Was the timing wrong? Did he attack the wrong place? Had he not attacked would he have been better off, or was he in a deficit to begin with and attacking was his best option? Watching games like this is much less entertaining and is much more mentally tiring, but I guarantee it will improve your game.
As an aside, I find it’s easier to start this analysis with progamers before turning it on your own play. For whatever reason, it’s much easier to critique others’ play than your own. VODs can (and should!) be rewound to review key parts of the game, whereas replays have to be completely restarted. Finally, progamers generally have sound play – whatever strategy they play should have a fair chance of winning; you may analyse a game you play and not be able to find where you went wrong, when in fact the strategy you were using never had a chance to win to begin with.
The technique I use might not work for you, but I’ll mention it just in case it helps. I keep a running scoreboard in my head to help me identify the points of the game where one player took the advantage. This can also help you identify if the game was one in a huge battle, or if one player simply pressed his slight marginal advantage to victory. For example, in a Zerg versus Protoss mid game on Blue Storm, Zerg drops 24 Zerglings into a Protoss base (bottom left). Here are three possible situations:
- The Zerglings kill a few Gateways while Zerg expands (++Zerg)
- The Zerglings kill nothing but allow Zerg to set up an expansion and defend it (+Zerg)
- The Zerglings kill nothing but stop Protoss from expanding (Even)
- The Zerglings die to Cannons (+Protoss).
There are really only a few (<10) turning points like this in a game that you need to watch for, and they should help you realize the exact moments when the losing player went wrong.
What you should not do is follow the “I’m going to mass game 20 games every day for a month” methodology at this point. So many people fall into this trap, thinking they will somehow become strategically stronger by simply playing dozens of games without reflecting on them. If you’re not seeking to learn the game, playing a ton of games has a low improvement:effort ratio. Don’t worry, you’ll come back to mass gaming later.
From here, take the analysing skills you’ve learned from progamers and apply them to your own games. The pro games should have given you a sense of what beats what, but now it’s up to you to execute it. HydraLurker beats SK Terran, but you still lost. Why did that happen? Did you have inferior upgrades? Did you mismicro? Was your Hydralisk:Lurker ratio off? Did you expand too much? Too little? Did he kill too much economy at the start of the game and you couldn’t catch up?
This is why I feel there should never be a “Why did I lose” thread, because your own analysis should make it perfectly clear. (as shown in this thread). Using the “scoreboard” method, find the key points that defined the winner’s advantage, and understand if you reacted properly at these moments.
While you are in this “learning mode”, play to learn, not to win. This doesn’t mean trying to invent ridiculous strategies that are destined to fail. It does mean stepping off the common path and seeing the results. What happens in ZvT if you make 12 Mutalisks? 14? 16? 18? What if you delay carapace, how does that affect the late game? Should you get melee or ranged attack with your second Evolution Chamber? What if you get Hive off 2 bases? Go through the motions of playing a few non-standard games to understand why the optimal strategies are optimal, and how the game gets changed when you deviate from that path.
It’s important to mention you learn from not playing. Very few people fail an attack and then have an earth-shattering realization about why their play has been flawed for so long. During a game, you are trying to figure out how to win this game. Afterwards, you are trying to figure out how to win every game you’ve played and are going to play. This is why it’s so important to reflect on your games. You don’t need to invest a huge amount of time into this – simply watching a loss with a mindful eye should improve your game knowledge instantly.
Also keep in mind that you have too much going on in a game to consciously think about this. You aren’t going to remember that one game where a harassment drop worked well when you’re playing against a Zerg at 250 apm. What you want to do is understand the game at its fundamentals, so your strategy becomes subconscious and you can focus your entire mind on your mechanics during the game.
People often wonder why they are playing so much and not improving, while other people can spend months away from the game and are still just as strong when they return. The more your game relies on a strong set of fundamental strategy, the more consistent you will win, the more quickly you will improve, and the less susceptible to short term losses of skill you will be.
Once you have the skillset to analyze the game, it’s time to improve your mechanics.
Improving Your Mechanics
What are mechanics? Starcraft can be split into two areas: Mind and body. The mind portion was covered above, and is labelled strategy (although tactics should probably be grouped in mind as well). The remaining body portion is mechanics. In essence, how well you control your hands are mechanics.
Surprise, surprise, I believe improving your mechanics is a mindset. Once you’ve improved your game sense to the point you know what you should be doing, the first step to improvement is convincing yourself that you can do it. There are no real tricks here, and people who tell you to spam to raise your APM are beyond stupid. It takes a concerted effort, telling yourself “I can play faster”, to improve your speed. You will increase your speed in steps; making a conscious effort to play uncomfortably fast for awhile until that becomes routine, and you must again realize that you can play faster.
Mechanics must come after game sense, or you will be controlling your units very quickly and accurately, but giving them the wrong commands. For example, many people can control a few speed Zerglings very well against a Marine and SCVs, but it takes someone with a good understanding of the game to realize when they should charge the Marine, when they should target SCVs and when they should retreat and target buildings.
As I continuously reiterate, I truly believe having good mechanics is a mindset, believing you can micro extremely well and breaking actions down to their most basic fundamentals. Plenty of players have accurate, fast clicking, but many of them don’t rush in to target Templar, don’t control Vultures well against Workers, don’t use Reavers as well as they should. Break the actions you need to do in your head into their most basic form when you are learning: “I’m going to run slightly past this Templar with Zerglings and then a-click it and then run away”, “I’m going to right click this SCV with my Mutalisk and at the perfect time right click away”, “I’m going to continuously select Templar, hit ‘t’ and click the center of groups.” Often actions like these seem daunting during a hectic game, but if you break them down to their most basic actions it becomes manageable. Again, once you’ve mastered this it all becomes subconscious, but at the moment you are trying to improve, it must remain on your mind.
I suppose this is just an elaborate “You can do it” message, but it’s true! Mechanics in StarCraft, at their very fundamentals, are very simple. We can all play quickly and accurately, you may just sometimes need to be reminded that you can.
Sometimes newer players find mechanics difficult because they are “wasting” clicks on useless actions. Let the unit AI do its work. Newer players often fall into the trap of over-microing every battle, or even worse, watching all the battles. A quick way to become a better player is to realize that you only need to control a battle for a little while to use your main abilities, get a proper flank or positioning set up, or to target their key battle-changing units. Once that has been done, let the unit AI finish the battle while you return to macro. The losses you suffer while not watching your units as the battle trails off will be more than made up by the new units you are getting more often.
Mind and Body as One
Now it’s time to bring both together and play to win rather than learn. Experience is the third component of a champion. Every win will be an assurance of your play, while every loss a reminder and learning experience.
There isn’t much more to say. At this point I feel like there isn’t much people will get from this, but I’m going to post it anyways in hopes that a few people learn to learn. Plus I’ve had this document open for about two months adding to it bit by bit, so it’s time to get rid of it. StarCraft is a fairly simple game, both mechanically and strategically. Hopefully you will realize why you aren’t improving and how to change.
I want to end by saying that it’s alright not to want to improve. Sometimes you just want to play a few games at any level to have fun. If you’ve already committed to improvement, you might as well know how to get the most out of it.
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Great guide! Gonna start making a concious effort to raise my apm now..
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good read, great for newer/middle players!
Though in the mechanics section, it wouldnt hurt to go over a bit on style, how certain pros chose to do their mechanics. Hotkey selections, F2-F4 uses, etc. Why they do it that way, etc.
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A great read. Will come back to this when im going through a rough patch. Give yourself a ! on the title.
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Very amazing guide, thanks man!
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Nice guide [: Gives me new inspiration to try harder at self-improvement once more and not just wanting it to come to me.
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nice post chill, thanks for the time spent. Useful for me, will also pass it on to my friend I'm trying to get into BW. 
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Very nice, you couldn't have posted this at a better time, at least for me, as I have decided to finally buckle down and improve a few areas of my game that I have been avoiding improving.
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I have a long way to go, but this guide should help me a lot Thanks!
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I'm around the C range but this should help =]
Thank you Chill+infinity
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Nice. I find that often when people ask for help (be it on tl net, bnet, wherever) and they post a replay, the people trying to help them will say things that are really specific and may help him win that particular game, but in the overall picture, would not help the player get better. Comments like "You shoulda gotten gas at 16" "You built 6 mutas instead of 7" or something like that, sure it may have given the player a leg up in one match, but talking about specifics is avoiding the core reasons as to why the person lost the game.
The whole self-improvement thing, about thinking about every move and how that is beneficial, that is what I try to tell people. That if you go 11 hatch 10 pool, and someone else tells you 12 hatch 11 pool is better, I tell them "Well yeah, but let's think about some of the more fundamental reasons why you aren't winning first."
If I see someone doing a weak build, I won't say "Don't 8 gate, go 10 gate." I'll ask them "Why did you cut probes? Why did you build the gate early. What is this move trying to accomplish? What advantage does your build offer?"
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On February 05 2008 03:12 Equinox_kr wrote:
Two thumbs up.
Make that four. Awesome read.
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Quality guide. Came in at just the perfect time for me.
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whats boxer's apm? like 400?
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this is just the article i needed : )
reading after my homework though -__- too long.
-saved space for comment later-
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Read it over because I skimmed it last time and had some shit on my mind and realized a lot of stuff got clearer to me after reading this.
Too bad I'm gonna fall into the mass-gaming without reviewing trap again haha
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Good article Chill. Well written and informative.
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On February 05 2008 06:50 gwho wrote:
whats boxer's apm? like 400?
It's a bit irrelevant to the thread topic, but I'm pretty sure Boxer is one of the lower APM pros.
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Mass appreciation Chill. Hopefully this will cause great improvement in many players' games
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I love you so much Chill
Had to say it again 
This is definitely a piece of work. Great job on it!
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Wow, thank you for this great write-up.
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On February 05 2008 08:32 ShaLLoW[baY] wrote:It's a bit irrelevant to the thread topic, but I'm pretty sure Boxer is one of the lower APM pros.
EDIT: There is a blog on this now.
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w00t i vote recommended!!!
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Agree with everything except this:
Mechanics must come after game sense, or you will be controlling your units very quickly and accurately, but giving them the wrong commands. For example, many people can control a few speed Zerglings very well against a Marine and SCVs, but it takes someone with a good understanding of the game to realize when they should charge the Marine, when they should target SCVs and when they should retreat and target buildings.
I prefer to focus on mechanics first and get them top notch before attempting to start thinking about the strategical aspect of the game. My reasoning is that in every game you play with poor macro and poor micro etc, you are drilling in bad habits which I found were REALLY hard to change once I realised what I was doing wrong. On the other hand, it isn't as destructive when you're not fully engaged strategically in every game (because you're concentrating on getting your mechanics better). I've found personally that after I built a fairly solid base of mechanics into my game play, it wasn't very difficult to tell myself "now I really need to start thinking about the game and what's going in and looking it at in a deeper level" because the mechanics aspect had become second nature, leaving me to concentrate on strategy easily while still maintaining my decent level of mechanics. When I tried to reverse my bad habits in respect to mechanics, I found it so difficult to force myself to look at the minimap for instance, because after playing so many games without paying that much attention to the minimap I was so used to not really looking at it.
I must admit this is also partly due to my favourtism towards mechanics (anti MBS ftw) but it really has worked for me.
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On February 05 2008 14:08 skyglow1 wrote:Agree with everything except this: Show nested quote +Mechanics must come after game sense, or you will be controlling your units very quickly and accurately, but giving them the wrong commands. For example, many people can control a few speed Zerglings very well against a Marine and SCVs, but it takes someone with a good understanding of the game to realize when they should charge the Marine, when they should target SCVs and when they should retreat and target buildings. I prefer to focus on mechanics first and get them top notch before attempting to start thinking about the strategical aspect of the game. My reasoning is that in every game you play with poor macro and poor micro etc, you are drilling in bad habits which I found were REALLY hard to change once I realised what I was doing wrong. On the other hand, it isn't as destructive when you're not fully engaged strategically in every game (because you're concentrating on getting your mechanics better). I've found personally that after I built a fairly solid base of mechanics into my game play, it wasn't very difficult to tell myself "now I really need to start thinking about the game and what's going in and looking it at in a deeper level" because the mechanics aspect had become second nature, leaving me to concentrate on strategy easily while still maintaining my decent level of mechanics. When I tried to reverse my bad habits in respect to mechanics, I found it so difficult to force myself to look at the minimap for instance, because after playing so many games without paying that much attention to the minimap I was so used to not really looking at it. I must admit this is also partly due to my favourtism towards mechanics (anti MBS ftw) but it really has worked for me.
I've also argued that point a few times on gg.net. Once your mechanics are good enough you can start learning the game by trial and error, but if your mechanics are sloppy that just won't work - as you're just as likely to lost due to inferior multitask.
I know a guy who've played the game for alittle less than half a year now, and he's already one of the best tvz players in Sweden. I like to think that it's becouse he's got really great multitasking. Had he focused on learning the exact timing for barracks and different approaches to midgame and stuff like that instead I have no doubt he'd still be struggeling in pubbie games.
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I play zerg and I have wondered how zerg pro-gamers mechanics work. How often do most Zerg progamers use the f2-4 keys. Do they hotkey all their hatches? Do they press 1sd, 2sd, 3sd, or do they just click 1 twice, and then manually click the hatcheries to build units? I've seen pro use the arrow key as well to move the screen around... do pro's still do this?
It's one thing to have a high APM but that doesn't mean you're always playing efficiently and quickly. How do pros approach their mechanics and what is the rational for the way they do things?
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Well, I loved this post, as I am myself coming from a very bad level to a decent playing theses days. There is just one point I don't really agree:
For what I have learnt, to play well, you have to play fast. And to play fast, you have to react almost instinctivly to what is happening to you. What BO you are using, what to do against muta harass, where to drop, which expension to attack, 99% of the game shouldn't even be thought, and done automatically.
It seems that pro gamer says taht they are playing with their intuition rather than hardcore thinking. A good player don't think, he reacts, and he is able to react quickly because he has been thinking before. While playing, it's a bit too late to think.
My 2 cents...
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Very good read and especially also entertaining!
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Indeed a very good read, hopefully i can finally learn something.
The two problems i know that i have are the following:
1) I have a habit of trying to do everything as fast as possible even though i don't want to and i KNOW that it's keeping me from playing properly, but it's damn near impossible to "slow" down now that i have been playing like this for so long. I get so caught up in microing my units that i completely forget about my base which results in me having zero units once the others die.
2) I'm braindead and can not for the life of me learn simple build orders, I've been watching replays and VODs since forever but trying to memorize a build seems useless for me, the second i start playing my mind goes blank and i automatically build some other shit that has NOTHING to do with the build order i was supposed to do.
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Calgary25980 Posts
On February 05 2008 14:08 skyglow1 wrote:Agree with everything except this: Show nested quote +Mechanics must come after game sense, or you will be controlling your units very quickly and accurately, but giving them the wrong commands. For example, many people can control a few speed Zerglings very well against a Marine and SCVs, but it takes someone with a good understanding of the game to realize when they should charge the Marine, when they should target SCVs and when they should retreat and target buildings. I prefer to focus on mechanics first and get them top notch before attempting to start thinking about the strategical aspect of the game. My reasoning is that in every game you play with poor macro and poor micro etc, you are drilling in bad habits which I found were REALLY hard to change once I realised what I was doing wrong. On the other hand, it isn't as destructive when you're not fully engaged strategically in every game (because you're concentrating on getting your mechanics better). I've found personally that after I built a fairly solid base of mechanics into my game play, it wasn't very difficult to tell myself "now I really need to start thinking about the game and what's going in and looking it at in a deeper level" because the mechanics aspect had become second nature, leaving me to concentrate on strategy easily while still maintaining my decent level of mechanics. When I tried to reverse my bad habits in respect to mechanics, I found it so difficult to force myself to look at the minimap for instance, because after playing so many games without paying that much attention to the minimap I was so used to not really looking at it. I must admit this is also partly due to my favourtism towards mechanics (anti MBS ftw) but it really has worked for me.
Hmm interesting point. I think I agree with you. My argument was written in the context of winning, but you will learn quicker with your method. I'll have to address this.
Thanks.
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On February 05 2008 18:20 Shado. wrote:
I've seen pro use the arrow key as well to move the screen around... do pro's still do this?
As far as I know the only pro that does this is Boxer. Although boxer is a great player, I think it is safe to say that, unless you feel really comfortable with it, there is really no reason to try to teach yourself this style of micro, as plenty of players have become great without it. As far as the rest of your post, I would assume it is difficult to choose an absolute truth for all progamers, or even just the top 10% or whatever, but imho, hotkeys are a good habit to get into. Having the ability to do such things as make units in your base while overseeing/microing a battle half the map away or vice verse becomes invaluable, especially as your APM and such things increase.
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many pros do that man, you can control 100% your units while u move the screen, for a lot of them is a must.
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On February 06 2008 05:36 4AiUR wrote:
many pros do that man, you can control 100% your units while u move the screen, for a lot of them is a must.
I just did a little searching, and the general TL consensus over several threads is that boxer is the only one that does this, and it is because he sets his mouse scroll speed to the lowest setting.
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On February 05 2008 14:08 skyglow1 wrote:Agree with everything except this: Show nested quote +Mechanics must come after game sense, or you will be controlling your units very quickly and accurately, but giving them the wrong commands. For example, many people can control a few speed Zerglings very well against a Marine and SCVs, but it takes someone with a good understanding of the game to realize when they should charge the Marine, when they should target SCVs and when they should retreat and target buildings. I prefer to focus on mechanics first and get them top notch before attempting to start thinking about the strategical aspect of the game. My reasoning is that in every game you play with poor macro and poor micro etc, you are drilling in bad habits which I found were REALLY hard to change once I realised what I was doing wrong. On the other hand, it isn't as destructive when you're not fully engaged strategically in every game (because you're concentrating on getting your mechanics better). I've found personally that after I built a fairly solid base of mechanics into my game play, it wasn't very difficult to tell myself "now I really need to start thinking about the game and what's going in and looking it at in a deeper level" because the mechanics aspect had become second nature, leaving me to concentrate on strategy easily while still maintaining my decent level of mechanics. When I tried to reverse my bad habits in respect to mechanics, I found it so difficult to force myself to look at the minimap for instance, because after playing so many games without paying that much attention to the minimap I was so used to not really looking at it. I must admit this is also partly due to my favourtism towards mechanics (anti MBS ftw) but it really has worked for me. yea i remember reading in an interview with the coach of pos(i think) why he choose july, he said because he was fast -meaning that he had good mechanics- and that although he wasnt a very good strategical player that he could learn that(strategy etc.) afterwards. hope that made sense
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Well, yeah I know to hotkey everything but I feel as if I don't know the finer points of things.
I used to just hotkey my hatches from 1-7 and important units like muta/lurker/scourges/defiliers 8-0. Now I'm experimenting with units 1-3, first 3 hatches 4-6, and then each additional main base, 7-9, with scourges usually at 0. I also set my F2-4 at the other person's base so I can move between battles and bases easier...
Also... does anyone use the spacebar? or does anyone use waypoints (using shift) for any reason other than scouting? and is it just me or does it seem impossible to use all your larve the second it comes out while microing a battle?
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I actually pay attention for a game and I realized I used space bar without realising it xD It was when I was too lazy to use the minimap to move my view to across a large distance. Waypoints are used in everything like repairing, loading dropships, getting scvs to mine after they're done building, etc etc.
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thanks im d and want to get to c and was wondering specific ways for me to improve faster
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On February 07 2008 17:00 Shado. wrote:
Also... does anyone use the spacebar?
I use it all the time.
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Good guide Chill, although I found the mechanics section a bit lacking. Maybe you could add a more practical approach on stuff like using F-keys, how good players/pros hotkey etc
Also if you by spamming mean spamming away the first minutes of the game I hardly think that's "beyond stupid". Every pro does it and it's obviously a way to warm up and get your speed going.
I have no idea what people mean anymore when they talk about spamming to be honest.
I am 250-300 apm, with the highest in TvZ/TvP and lowest in TvT (obviously) and I think this is almost the perfect apm-zone to be in for Terran anyways.
Well 300 would be optimal I think since there is so much shit that Terran needs to do and 200 apm won't usually cut it at better levels.
Anywho, I liked your article and the discussion about mindsets.
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On February 06 2008 03:55 grobo wrote:
Indeed a very good read, hopefully i can finally learn something.
The two problems i know that i have are the following:
1) I have a habit of trying to do everything as fast as possible even though i don't want to and i KNOW that it's keeping me from playing properly, but it's damn near impossible to "slow" down now that i have been playing like this for so long. I get so caught up in microing my units that i completely forget about my base which results in me having zero units once the others die.
2) I'm braindead and can not for the life of me learn simple build orders, I've been watching replays and VODs since forever but trying to memorize a build seems useless for me, the second i start playing my mind goes blank and i automatically build some other shit that has NOTHING to do with the build order i was supposed to do.
1) is something people usualy do because they are afraid of loosing units and thus stare at the screen even tough they don't acctualy do something that benefits the outcome of the fight. There is usualy the pre-setup (tank formation, mines) and the correction (classic marine attack lurkers and a part of the team moves aside) and that's basicaly it. Like with every habit you want to break you have to accept the possibility of fucking up. What you might loose is a few units or games, but you'll understand the big picture, the "what happens over time".
2) I think here's where chill's improvement guide has some great information. Winning is a path of trial and error. There is no need to learn a buildorder if you don't know what's it for. When your mind goes blank and you realise you do something that you don't benefit from watch the replay and do some reverse psychology on yourself. There was a reason why you did something you did, just because it was wrong, doesn't mean you had no reason. And with the power of replays you can point out those flaws and next time you're about to do the same mistake, you're able to remind yourself that this isn't as efficient as you think. Starcraft is a fast game were you not only have to learn what's right, but more so what's wrong.
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Netherlands4511 Posts
This thread helped me reach rank B+ on Iccup. I owe this solely to you, Chill. Thank you.
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Calgary25980 Posts
No problem, maybe you won't afk for a year this time when you hit A.
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Netherlands4511 Posts
I feel so inspired I think I will stay and I believe I was afk for 2 years x.x
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On February 08 2008 02:15 ret wrote:I feel so inspired I think I will stay and I believe I was afk for 2 years x.x
Make sure your reps gets saved this time, we want a ret-pack!
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infinity21
Canada6683 Posts
So what DID we talk about? haha
I do remember the bit about mechanics and how it's a mindset and such but I feel like we talked about so many things that everything's blurry now.
Nevertheless, I agree with everything you say 
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Always wanted something like this can't wait to get it read (took a printout!)
Thanks Chill.
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Good guide, thanks for writing it Chill.
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I also divide learning in two phases: strategical (call it mind, analytical or whatever.. you get the point) and mechanical.
You seem to view it like first you increase your strategical skill, which creates a demand for mechanical skill ("I know what to do, now I need to learn how to do it!"). You don't really adress what happens when you've filled this demand.
The way I see it this is what is going to happen, wether you start with learning mechanics or strategy is imo irrelevant:
Let's just assume we start with strategical learning, first you will increase your strategic understanding, creating a demand for mechanical skill. Basicly, you are losing games, and you know why. You just need to learn how to do what you already know.
So you increase your mechanical skill (wether this is by mass gaming, conscious speed practise or micro UMS).
Eventually you will increase it so that you create a demand for strategic skill. You are now playing vs better opponents and you start losing again, but now you don't know why, you need to find that out.
So you increase your strategical skill (be it by self-analysing, a tutor or watching reps).
Once again you're new strategical knowledge will create a demand for mechanical skill.
You increase mechanical skill.
You find yourself with a demand for strategical skill.
and so it goes on.. Naturally it could as well have started with mechanical learning. It's a never ending cycle. And ofc it's not impossible to learn both at once either, but I find that rare. Almost always you practise one harder than the other, be it consciously or subconscously.
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Thanks Chill. I love your articles, and this one especially. I've been trying for years to figure out why I never seem to improve no matter how hard I try. I see that I have been focusing too much on mass gaming while not having any strategical understanding at all. It just seems that I have a bit of trouble understanding the "whys" of progamer replays and vods, so I never get much out of them.. But that might be because I never really watch them much. I get bored of just watching replays and I felt it was a waste of time when I could be gaming, but I am definitely going to try your method and really concentrate on the strategical aspect of zerg matchups.
Again, thanks a lot. <3
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wow, great article. sometimes i'd wonder why i'm so much worse at this game than i used to be in comparison to the top competition, but now i realize i have never really tried to get better - i just play. i'd say i have probably only watched about 1 of every hundred games i've ever played and only really watched replays/VODs if my /f list was watching them (aside from WCG finals). i guess getting good at bw was simply a side-effect of playing so much - one that wears off VERY rapidly after even a short break.
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Thanks. Very helpful article.
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Man good guide and read. Now you just need to break these categories down into smaller sections, and make guides on them too
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Chill; how do I love thee? Let me count the ways:
1) You rock
2) You own
3) You rox
4) You roxerz my boxerz *WARNING DONT TAKE LITERALLY*
5) You pwn
6) Uh..
10) This helped me alot!
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TvP nuking perfection strategy here I come.
Great guide.
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On February 07 2008 23:49 ret wrote:
This thread helped me reach rank B+ on Iccup. I owe this solely to you, Chill. Thank you.
LOL shut up jos... you just wanted to tell everyone you're B+. I know your dirty windmill ways.
In any case, the coolest thing in the guide that I saw was about macroing instead of watching your battles; It's the one thing that I always forget to do after I quit and come back, and it's so fucking important.
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I still do that -_- thats why when i tvz my min soars 4k sometimes haha
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Great read and great advice.
Thanks Chill.
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Perfect Guide. I feel like playing StarCraft and it's finals week...
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how does this help at all if you dont know the fundamentals of the game? (like me)
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On February 05 2008 01:37 Chill wrote:
I suppose this is just an elaborate “You can do it” message, but it’s true! Mechanics in StarCraft, at their very fundamentals, are very simple. We can all play quickly and accurately, you may just sometimes need to be reminded that you can.
I have a new sticky note on my monitor. It says "I can use the shift key!"
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This thread was mentioned in another and I just read it for the first time but it helped me sooo much. I need to bump this (even though it says old post). There is too much to learn from this, to all the people asking about, "what should I do when they do this" Whats a good build for this...These are all questions about trying to improve, I believe this thread is awesome and should be re-read by many.(Lots of the people in this thread have over 1k posts, time to let the newer guys read it)
If you guys truly want to improve this is definatly the thread to start at!
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I'm a new member here and pretty new to competitive SC too. This thread still made me think 'why didn't I read this before?' Great job man.
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Something I would like to add that have helped me a bit, when u watch a replay, for example zvp. and ur a zerg player, try to vision only the Zerg player so that you see exactly what is going on. u dont have to watch both sides, just the one that interests you and that helps you see exactly what mistakes are made and how u could do something better.
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very nice chill
edit: I went up from D to C
ty ty chill
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Great article. I was looking for concrete advice on how to improve and stumbled upon this thread. I've had trouble lately with winning games on ICCUP and once I managed to correct the misstakes I've been doing and win some games in that matchup I lose 10 games to another matchup at a certain map. But slowly and surely I've upped my play in a few weeks by alot and seeing this thread mention some of the methods I've been using is a great reassurence.
To actually get a good players assurance of what you're doing is right (aswell as the results in games and the feeling of having gained insight) is worth so much in this game since you often times get despaired about how you can't cope with some situations in the game.
I much appreciated the fact that this thread was very specific and I hope to further improve by using some of the methods mentioned here. Analysing pro games with the right mindset is something I've been unsure of (seing as it takes alot of time away from playing) and have had trouble with. But with this thread and how it phrased the connection between analysing and executing I've gotten motivated to actually go watch vods.
I really like when good players give concrete advice on how to improve (in a matchup or in general) since then you know it's true and can focus on acheiving that goal. This thread along with Nonys explanation of "Hungry toss" play have helped me reach another level in my PvZ games. I can now safely get into the mid game and be in a commanding position which feel great compared to when I used to get contained/overrrun without understanding why and having the confidence to deal with it.
Again, kodus for making such an informative thread. You rock!
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This was a huge help.
Thanks Chill!
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each victory is but a lesson for the defeated...
winning does little to improve ones skills it merely serves to bolster confidence.
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This is a very good guide. Exceptionally motivational, and very deep as well. I find it very enlightening.
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Bump! I just have a few questions which would probably be more appropriate in this thread than a new one considering they're about improvement and this is a definitive guide for well.. that.
Would anyone recommend the same style of learning the deep strategy first, when learning Terran? I've seen a lot of people (skyglow in this thread) say people should focus on mechanics first, which I'd imagine would only benefit Terrans.
And a more random question but, is using the minimap regularly considered a 'mechanic'? Is it advantageous when improving your mechanics to try and play through the minimap, using pings along with spacebar to dictate what you do next?
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This will help quite a bit. Thanks for posting this.
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Great guide!
I'm a newbie terran myself, so the mechanics vs strategy first discussion is very relevant to me.
I've already improved from 50 to 90-100apm in TvP, and I can credit this improvement to my efforts in learning a certain BO. As soon as I knew in the back of the head what I had to do next my mechanics just naturally stepped up to it, suddenly my apm was way up.
If I play when I'm tired/not focused I can lose track of my BO since I'm still very new to it, and when I lose my track like this my apm goes down to 70ish again. You lose out on your speed when you're thinking "what the fuck do I do now????!??!!" instead of calmly knowing what to do next.
The biggest problem to me in improving in this game now is that I feel uncomfortable in the ICCUP ladder as it is today. I only host games myself with names like "1v1 Python NEWBS ONLY" or "1v1 d-" and still I lose 9/10 games to players with 150-200 apm. I've completely stopped playing players that are over 1100 rating in order to prevent these high apm players to roll over me again and again. It gets really boring when you get to the same stage in your BO before you die to superior play each time. Basically this has shattered my confidence and this is something that is holding me back.
One day those assholes are going to get what they deserve though, I am going to get better at this game!
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Hi this suggestion has been posted re: Terran newbies especially, namely - learn 1 BO per matchup and practice the basic BO until your timings are perfect/near-perfect.
E.g.:
TvZ 9 min pre-hivetech hanbang
TvP 5/6 fact push
TvT is abit more random, perhaps 1fact 1port or 1fact expo.
Its true that learning a BO even against a com can increase your APM (i got mine from 100 to 150apm or so after a few hours of doing that) and try to constantly macro+add macro buildings after every short while controlling your units.
To learn mechanics (as Leta put it) and control "concentrate very hard" from the 1st scouting scv onwards. In a real game i've done this with my 1st vult killing workers, the 1st marine killing the enemy scout/ovie etc. and then move on to targetting specific things e.g. irradiating defilers (which i'm working on) and doing specific combos such as flanking or Scan->EMP or Scan->Irradiate.
Perhaps after that it could be good to learn how to set traps and surrounds and sieges, and know when and when not to attack. Just today i had a mass (20+) of MnM outside my friends' base and i saw 2 lurkers burrowed in his nat and i went "oh hey lets spread and attack" which led to disaster on my end =.= so yea do the case by case analysis (read: TRIAL AND ERROR) once your basic mechanics are up. note that i'm probably way below the level to execute any of this properly...
one thing about the minimap i noticed is that you have to keep reminding yourself to glance at it. usually when i manually control small groups of units e.g. to kill a lightly defended expo i forget to micro them and they end up dying as all unmicro-ed terran units do. spacebar is dicey as sometimes the AI randomly sets spacebar points and it gets very annoying...
Oh and another thing is to figure out how the AI works. one of the most annoying things is to give your units an order only to have them sit there dumbly and do nothing in an opponents' base, or having them attack a random building instead of the key tech building or even tower etc. EAPM must be effective if the purest sense i.e. give you an effective advantage by killing the correct thing at the correct time etc.
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i get constant Destination ZvT rape because some dood named By.Stylish told them all of the buids.
game 1 : i get raped vulture drop.
game 2: raped vulture harras
game 3: 4 rax sunken brake
game 4: proxy rax into 2 stargate
...
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proxy rax into 2 stargate? impressive
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Must've been team melee :O
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Very nice guide, Chill. It made me actually use the replay button.
+ Show Spoiler +
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You need to be one with the zergling.
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On April 16 2009 09:03 Swarmy wrote:
You need to be one with the overmind.
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Looks like a great guide....
i just started today and got my ass kicked twice 
i just lose any substance in a "build" i end up improvising and sucking due to lack of scouting info
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just re-read this.. its really good. thanks chill
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On April 16 2009 09:16 Mykill wrote:Looks like a great guide.... i just started today and got my ass kicked twice i just lose any substance in a "build" i end up improvising and sucking due to lack of scouting info
I'm there as well, but I'm making improvements practicing builds quite fast. You should try to write down a specific pre-made good build and then follow it to the letter. If this is too hard on ICCUP do it against the computer (use cheats if you have to, the only thing relevant is that you learn how to do the BO you have on paper).
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I agree that this is a great guide and thank Chill a lot for posting it.
It has one fundamental error in it though that hasn't been pointed out until now:
The best way to actually get better at SC is watch Chills FPStream!
Get it back up, man!
Or at least put the old ones in the loop...
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i disagree with the mechanical section a bit.
I mean, mechanics isn't a mindset. Learning the mechanics might be.
^ _ ^
great read otherwise
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Before you can improve, you must first learn to let the Force guide you. Let it guiiiide you...
Also good post. I liked it a lot.
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Hey, bump, questions! Would've been nice if this was in the recommended threads.. lucky it got linked to.
Is the order that's in this obselete? The liquipedia article on the same subject mentions having strong mechanics is essential to learning, which obviously makes sense.
I'm terrible for not being able to keep a conscious idea of things like looking at the minimap, are there any tips for remembering this things in an intense ZvT? :p
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Calgary25980 Posts
It's up for debate. I've since changed to the mechanics-first approach, because you can win games with mechanics alone, whereas that is much, much more difficult with strategy alone. I think it's also a nicer position to be in where you lose and wonder why, than losing and knowing what you should have done but simply weren't able to do it.
Some people prefer the other way.
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When do you draw the line with mechanics anyway? It's not as if you can ever perfect them. I mean unless you mean just learning how you should be micro'ing, macro'ing but not perfecting the execution.
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On October 01 2009 07:42 Espers wrote:
When do you draw the line with mechanics anyway? It's not as if you can ever perfect them. I mean unless you mean just learning how you should be micro'ing, macro'ing but not perfecting the execution.
I don't understand: you said yourself you can never perfect them, why do you ever have to draw a line?
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Osaka27148 Posts
I think he is saying what is the point of diminishing returns. That is, where another 50 hours of training mechanics improves you only another 1%, whereas those 50 hours may have been more valuable elsewhere.
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I was gonna write something but Manifesto worded it well
I also believe if you focus on being a mechanic based player it's going to be very hard to keep your skill level up, and inactivity will really hurt you
Think he mentions this somewhere in the OP too
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Another question: when you're in this D+~ area, would it be better just to narrow your practice to just 1 matchup rather than spreading your time over all three?
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Calgary25980 Posts
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On October 01 2009 05:05 Chill wrote:
It's up for debate. I've since changed to the mechanics-first approach, because you can win games with mechanics alone, whereas that is much, much more difficult with strategy alone. I think it's also a nicer position to be in where you lose and wonder why, than losing and knowing what you should have done but simply weren't able to do it.
Some people prefer the other way.
Wouldn't this style of learning just make you horrible inconsistent? Especially on iCCup where they're so many styles and to get far knowing how to adapt is so important.
Like say it's ZvP and Protoss goes Stargate into a +1 rush or speed Zealot opening, a guy who's been focusing on mechanics constantly will usually just get steamrolled because he won't know how to scout an opening like this.
I guess it's a case of winning versus improving playing with a solid understand is way way way more consistent.
That's how I'm trying to learn the game anyway.
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On October 04 2009 06:26 sunama wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2009 05:05 Chill wrote:
It's up for debate. I've since changed to the mechanics-first approach, because you can win games with mechanics alone, whereas that is much, much more difficult with strategy alone. I think it's also a nicer position to be in where you lose and wonder why, than losing and knowing what you should have done but simply weren't able to do it.
Some people prefer the other way. Wouldn't this style of learning just make you horrible inconsistent? Especially on iCCup where they're so many styles and to get far knowing how to adapt is so important. Like say it's ZvP and Protoss goes Stargate into a +1 rush or speed Zealot opening, a guy who's been focusing on mechanics constantly will usually just get steamrolled because he won't know how to scout an opening like this. I guess it's a case of winning versus improving playing with a solid understand is way way way more consistent. That's how I'm trying to learn the game anyway.
Winning with just strategy is only consistent up to a point too. As you play against better and better players whose mechanics are naturally better, you'll realize that even as you scout him and know what you're supposed to do, you can't do it because of your horrible mechanics. You simply end up watching yourself lose. If you emphasize mechanics first, you'll be able to scout him correctly while macroing, and transition smoothly into a counter. Better to learn strategy so you can apply it, instead of learning it but bring unable to do anything with it.
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The OP is the single most helpful document to my improvement so far. My opinion on the discussion thats going around on mechanics vs strategy would definitely be mechanics first, the reason being that controlling your race without comfortable mouse and keyboard mechanics, simply eats up too much of your thought-thought that could be used for strategy.
Practicing a BO that you don't completely understand the theory of is fine in my opinion because it eliminates hesitation/thought for the next action you will input thus allowing you to execute these actions more cleanly. theres seriously nothing worse than having someone own you and then talk your ear off about what you should have done, when you know exactly what you could have done/would have done if you had the actions.
Even though i'm no NoNy (im a d player in the midst of a my first sc growth spurt) i would say if you have 6 hours to improve your playing, I think 2 of them would be well spent watching VODs in the mindset chill explained, to accumulate "scenarios" of how pros have played things out so you will eventually have a pretty good idea of how to deal with a variety of things as tey come at you.
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On October 01 2009 05:05 Chill wrote:
It's up for debate. I've since changed to the mechanics-first approach, because you can win games with mechanics alone, whereas that is much, much more difficult with strategy alone. I think it's also a nicer position to be in where you lose and wonder why, than losing and knowing what you should have done but simply weren't able to do it.
Some people prefer the other way.
I think it needs to be clarified who the target audience is. For a total newcomer to sc or a D skilled player they probably need to learn strategy first becase at that level they still need to learn the basics of what they should be doing at various points in the game. Maybe once you have a solid grasp of basic strategy and mechanics you can start focusing more on execution and less on your strategy, but I think without a solid groundwork of strategy it's impossible to have good mechanics becase you won't know what you should be doing.
I think it's better to learn strategy and then work on execution because you generally learn execution through raw repetitive practice and being disciplined. Strategy however is a more delicate, thoughtful process so if you get that done first, you can grind your execution as much as you want being assured your efforts are being done for the right reasons (becuase you know the strategy and the thought process behind them.)
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I don't understand this argument. Aren't these easier to learn together(mechanics and strategy)? I'm not sure what exactly is being argued here :S
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On October 01 2009 05:05 Chill wrote:
It's up for debate. I've since changed to the mechanics-first approach, because you can win games with mechanics alone, whereas that is much, much more difficult with strategy alone. I think it's also a nicer position to be in where you lose and wonder why, than losing and knowing what you should have done but simply weren't able to do it.
Some people prefer the other way.
That doesnt make a lot of sense to me. Its better to not know why did you lose than the opposite?
Obviously you lost in both cases because of something you werent able to do, but in the latter case, you already know what to focus your practice on
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That doesnt make a lot of sense to me. Its better to not know why did you lose than the opposite?
Obviously you lost in both cases because of something you werent able to do, but in the latter case, you already know what to focus your practice on
Even though this probably isn't the most important debate on the forum, because like chill said everyone has their own approach. But i think what he means is its more fun to spot small strategical errors that you can easily correct next game than to know exactly what you should be doing but not have the ability.
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Calgary25980 Posts
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I still think mechanics should be focussed on first:
On February 05 2008 14:08 skyglow1 wrote:Agree with everything except this: Show nested quote +Mechanics must come after game sense, or you will be controlling your units very quickly and accurately, but giving them the wrong commands. For example, many people can control a few speed Zerglings very well against a Marine and SCVs, but it takes someone with a good understanding of the game to realize when they should charge the Marine, when they should target SCVs and when they should retreat and target buildings. I prefer to focus on mechanics first and get them top notch before attempting to start thinking about the strategical aspect of the game. My reasoning is that in every game you play with poor macro and poor micro etc, you are drilling in bad habits which I found were REALLY hard to change once I realised what I was doing wrong. On the other hand, it isn't as destructive when you're not fully engaged strategically in every game (because you're concentrating on getting your mechanics better). I've found personally that after I built a fairly solid base of mechanics into my game play, it wasn't very difficult to tell myself "now I really need to start thinking about the game and what's going in and looking it at in a deeper level" because the mechanics aspect had become second nature, leaving me to concentrate on strategy easily while still maintaining my decent level of mechanics. When I tried to reverse my bad habits in respect to mechanics, I found it so difficult to force myself to look at the minimap for instance, because after playing so many games without paying that much attention to the minimap I was so used to not really looking at it. I must admit this is also partly due to my favourtism towards mechanics (anti MBS ftw) but it really has worked for me.
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Mentioning the minimap.. did you force yourself to try and hit spacebar everytime it pings?
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On October 10 2009 07:22 sunama wrote:
Mentioning the minimap.. did you force yourself to try and hit spacebar everytime it pings?
Spacebar isn't very reliable. If you hit it to jump to a battle after hearing the you are under attack, If a unit finishes immediately after you'll only jump to your barracks and waste time, when you could have just hotkey your units and double tap that key. You should try and keep track of when/where you send units and subconsciously know what group or groups is getting attack and then tab that key quickly. If your base gets attacked I'm not really sure but it might be fast enough to just click the minimap.
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Yeah pings can get in the way of each other, so I just used alot of left clicking on the minimap.
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EPT
