EPTOn December 16 2011 15:46 GoldenH wrote:
From my perspective, protoss micro is: controlling small groups of units to make sure the zealots are always close enough to my stalkers and colossus to take hits away while not allowing all his army to do damage to it at once, while staying close enough to his marine/marauder that they can act as a wall if they decide to charge forward. It's sending out sentries, one of the slowest, weakest units of the game, ahead of your entire army, and trying to get a forcefield off across the entire screen before a ball of stimmed marine marauder can move one inch and cut off enough so that I did more than just waste energy, but not too much so that I lose more than a sentry or two.
Protoss is about dancing colossus and stalkers exactly so that we don't waste our damage by accidentally cancelling the animation, watching the little turrets spin on our immortals frustratingly slowly, about having to play in widescreen when microing phoenix or else there just isn't a wide enough angle buy time trying to keep mutas from killing them en mass. It's about predicting where medivacs and banshees are going to be so that we have enough to save our base from being massacred and enough to hold our front. It's about knowing your units will lose in a straight up fight and your wall will fall instantly to any attack move (but your enemies' will be repaired forever if you don't have your AOE). It's about knowing that when you cast a spell you'll lose the spellcaster and have a diminished effect of the spell unless you sacrifice most of your army to bait your opponent's until standing still under the storms, or trying to keep alive a unit that you can only have one of but whose spell is the only chance you have against a number of lategame enemies.
It's about spamming spells on the minimap hoping that your units are close enough to cast the spell before your army is destroyed and that the AI keeps them spread out enough before the spell gets cast to make a difference, it's about knowing your mineral sink and static defenses are the least efficent in the game, and that you only have one economy spell and only one way to use it. About having to choose between having good micro and macro at any given moment, because you absolutely can't have both....
Terran micro is about alternating between clicking towards the opponent's army and away from the opponents army while pressing 's' every .459 seconds and t occasionally and getting to spam your AOE spell from safety from the back of your army while getting to queue up units in a major engagement and choosing to either have good scouting or only unseige 1/3 of your tanks at once.
From my perspective, protoss micro is: controlling small groups of units to make sure the zealots are always close enough to my stalkers and colossus to take hits away while not allowing all his army to do damage to it at once, while staying close enough to his marine/marauder that they can act as a wall if they decide to charge forward. It's sending out sentries, one of the slowest, weakest units of the game, ahead of your entire army, and trying to get a forcefield off across the entire screen before a ball of stimmed marine marauder can move one inch and cut off enough so that I did more than just waste energy, but not too much so that I lose more than a sentry or two.
Protoss is about dancing colossus and stalkers exactly so that we don't waste our damage by accidentally cancelling the animation, watching the little turrets spin on our immortals frustratingly slowly, about having to play in widescreen when microing phoenix or else there just isn't a wide enough angle buy time trying to keep mutas from killing them en mass. It's about predicting where medivacs and banshees are going to be so that we have enough to save our base from being massacred and enough to hold our front. It's about knowing your units will lose in a straight up fight and your wall will fall instantly to any attack move (but your enemies' will be repaired forever if you don't have your AOE). It's about knowing that when you cast a spell you'll lose the spellcaster and have a diminished effect of the spell unless you sacrifice most of your army to bait your opponent's until standing still under the storms, or trying to keep alive a unit that you can only have one of but whose spell is the only chance you have against a number of lategame enemies.
It's about spamming spells on the minimap hoping that your units are close enough to cast the spell before your army is destroyed and that the AI keeps them spread out enough before the spell gets cast to make a difference, it's about knowing your mineral sink and static defenses are the least efficent in the game, and that you only have one economy spell and only one way to use it. About having to choose between having good micro and macro at any given moment, because you absolutely can't have both....
Terran micro is about alternating between clicking towards the opponent's army and away from the opponents army while pressing 's' every .459 seconds and t occasionally and getting to spam your AOE spell from safety from the back of your army while getting to queue up units in a major engagement and choosing to either have good scouting or only unseige 1/3 of your tanks at once.
You don't stutter step by pressing 's' and clicking forward and away. If you do this, or use 'h', your units will stop and not all fire. You actually attack move into the opponents army then rapidly click away so more of your units move into an arc and shoot. It's not insanely hard and can be mastered with practice, but if you mess it up, your units don't shoot. Also, it does tend to consume a lot of apm.
Note to other terrans: if you're using 'h' or 's' you're doing it wrong, use attack move, you may suck at first but eventually you'll be stutter stepping like a boss.
edit: protoss micro is 3 paragraphs of really hard stuff (moving colossus back and forth...er..dancing them I mean ^^), terran micro 1 ez mode sentence at the bottom. Quoted poster obviously not biased ^_^
