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Do not be overwhelmed by the vocal minority. This guide was very well written. Not once did a sentence derail itself, forcing me to go back and start it over. If the so called "target audience" can't deal with long sentences and complex ideas filled with nuance, I'm not sure Zerg, with all its complex and nuanced mechanics, is the correct race for them. (Perhaps they should stick to terran, where they can go, "Whoops, 200 energy on my CCs. 8 MULEs on the the gold!"? ;P) As far as I'm concerned, content should NEVER be dumbed down for the lowest common denominator; specificity and exactness are always to be desired, no matter the writing style.
Let's take the oft quoted example:
"What this guide attempts to provide is a coherent and progressive system on developing an underlying cognitive structure at integrating each of the important elements of macro efficiency into a unified and communicating system of thought triggers and critical thinking." While this sentence could have better choice of prepositions, redundancy is not an issue. Your more antagonistic critic (Shucklak) erroneously implied that a system is inherently coherent. A system is just the relationship or dynamics between two or more things, be they physical or abstract- coherence is not a necessity. The word "system" also does not necessarily imply progression, though I will not expound on this point, as I've just spent a good deal of space on nitpicking.
Regardless of the validity of these people's arguments, it is my opinion that simplifying (or "condensing" as someone called it) content is an insult to the intelligence of beginners, as well as encouraging a trend which I believe is unhealthy. The argument that the way this guide is written is discouraging to beginners is by far the most demeaning thing in these unjustified, patronizing criticisms. Just because someone has not been doing something for as long as another person does not meant that they have the mental capacity of an eight year old. Furthermore, removing the nuance and complexity of this guide just encourages the mindset of mere mimicry in order to get some quick and easy wins, instead of attempting to arrive at true understanding, and in so doing distracts beginners from the things which actually make them better Zerg users and gamers in general.
In case it wasn't obvious, I love this guide. It was very well written, even before the original circumstances are taken into account, and opens the window into the depth of Zerg play to those who are struggling to establish a solid understanding of the fundamental mechanics. I would love to help out with the editing for the revised version. Shoot me a PM.
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On November 09 2010 11:14 Pax wrote:Do not be overwhelmed by the vocal minority. This guide was very well written. Not once did a sentence derail itself, forcing me to go back and start it over. If the so called "target audience" can't deal with long sentences and complex ideas filled with nuance, I'm not sure Zerg, with all its complex and nuanced mechanics, is the correct race for them. (Perhaps they should stick to terran, where they can go, "Whoops, 200 energy on my CCs. 8 MULEs on the the gold!"? ;P) As far as I'm concerned, content should NEVER be dumbed down for the lowest common denominator; specificity and exactness are always to be desired, no matter the writing style. Let's take the oft quoted example: Show nested quote +"What this guide attempts to provide is a coherent and progressive system on developing an underlying cognitive structure at integrating each of the important elements of macro efficiency into a unified and communicating system of thought triggers and critical thinking." While this sentence could have better choice of prepositions, redundancy is not an issue. Your more antagonistic critic (Shucklak) erroneously implied that a system is inherently coherent. A system is just the relationship or dynamics between two or more things, be they physical or abstract- coherence is not a necessity. The word "system" also does not necessarily imply progression, though I will not expound on this point, as I've just spent a good deal of space on nitpicking. Regardless of the validity of these people's arguments, it is my opinion that simplifying (or "condensing" as someone called it) content is an insult to the intelligence of beginners, as well as encouraging a trend which I believe is unhealthy. The argument that the way this guide is written is discouraging to beginners is by far the most demeaning thing in these unjustified, patronizing criticisms. Just because someone has not been doing something for as long as another person does not meant that they have the mental capacity of an eight year old. Furthermore, removing the nuance and complexity of this guide just encourages the mindset of mere mimicry in order to get some quick and easy wins, instead of attempting to arrive at true understanding, and in so doing distracts beginners from the things which actually make them better Zerg users and gamers in general. In case it wasn't obvious, I love this guide. It was very well written, even before the original circumstances are taken into account, and opens the window into the depth of Zerg play to those who are struggling to establish a solid understanding of the fundamental mechanics. I would love to help out with the editing for the revised version. Shoot me a PM.
You sir, have my genuine respect!
Your argument is extremely well written and you have made points that parallel my own feelings about the nature of how the guide is written.
I believe the majority of the guide is written in a way that taking any part of certain sentences away will detract from the clarity of the point being made.
Be that as it may, the overall structure of the guide follows more often than not a 'wall of text' nature with certain very important points camouflaged in amongst more remedial prose. My central aim in the revision is not to re-write the entire thing (i began to try and gave up before i had got very far at all due to simple not being able to think of a better way to say the things i had without detracting from the clarity already inherent in the prose... ironic huh) but to restructure the guide somewhat and create more sections/sub-sections. Also going into more detail with certain things, larva economy for example, as requested by a reply; and really putting allot of effort into clarifying the important 'instructional' elements in the guide by separating and organizing them in various ways through the duration of the guide.
I'm about to give it another big haul in a little while, need to help my girl cook some food first (rolls eyes...lol) but yes, been thinking about bits im about to add today.
so Pax, i am interested in you helping out, we could meet minds and try set out a definite structure if you like, or if you are more interested in the prose end of things tell me what you would like to take a look at and revise. In fact I'll PM you.
Peace!
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You're welcome to use any or all of the larva econ section from my reply earlier. I'm now trying to get my head around combining larva economy with tech investments. Basically, if you're getting close to larva-capped, you can dump excess resources into tech (upgrades, tech structures) if you don't want to over-invest in larva production. For example: baneling nest and evo chamber instead of an extra hatchery for zergling production. Later on, the tech investments should let you make more efficient use of the larva, easing the earlier limits it placed on production.
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Nanoscorp. Since your post I have thought quite a bit into larva economy and its definitely an area of zerg macro i've not thought into as much as i should have previously. I've noticed just how sensitive larva economy can be to different strategies, for instance it should have an effect onwether you are going to 1 base 2 hatch/2 base 3 hatch/FE/quick 3rd e.t.c. and also how many queens you get to cover your unit comp Vs income from said bases.
I've also thought about how this is related to the 'flow' of growth up until mid/late game where you're maxed food. In so much that as your expansions increase, therefor queens increase, therefor larva production increases exponentially your need for pre-emptive Overlord production needs to step up progressively to keep your self from getting supply capped as your 'en-mass' unit producing capabilities double/triple at certain points. This relationship seems quite obvious but what i'm talking about is the specific mathematical relationship between how 'much' this overlord production needs to increase per rota Vs which specific expansion strategy you're going for this game (2 base 1 queen/1 base 2 hatch 1 queen/1 base 2 hatch 2 queen/... e.t.c.)
Obviously this also needs to be related to the resource cost of the build (units) you're going for which follows through into developing your econ to support this, which inturn! lol, is related back to larva production, how much you are making per rota, and how much of that should go to develop 'enough' of an econ to support your build, while leaving enough for OVs to keep ur supply up, while leaving enough for units to defend/attack.
I can see that it's obviously a VERY important aspect of a much more advanced level of zerg macro, where if one wished they could break down the math and figure out the optimum situational ratio for bases/queens[larva]/Ov/drones in regards to their army comp/build.
I'm only really just dawning on the intricacies of this whole complex aspect. I would really appreciate it if we could go through this aspect a bit together and get down some form of robust bit to add into the guide.
In regards to that actually, i big plan of mine is to extend the original guide with 'advanced' sections within each category that goes into much more depth and advanced techniques. Larva economy would obviously fit perfectly in the 'larva' category at the top.
Xios.
edit: Pax! i know i haven't PMed you yet, got pulled away by RL issues. Bout to send you one in a minute.
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Great guide. However, it was very hard for me to read it because your english is overcomplicated. Quick example:
"A note on expanding: It is very important when deciding to expand to ensure you are able to geographically cater for the possible protection of your expansion."
this means: dont expo if you cant defend it.
Since sc2 is a global community, some people dont have english as their first language, and even those that do its just unnecessary to overcomplicate the grammar.
KISS principle (keep it simple stupid) 
Other than that, some of this stuff has helped me out so thanks!
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On November 11 2010 09:50 FortuneSyn wrote:Great guide. However, it was very hard for me to read it because your english is overcomplicated. Quick example: "A note on expanding: It is very important when deciding to expand to ensure you are able to geographically cater for the possible protection of your expansion." this means: dont expo if you cant defend it. Since sc2 is a global community, some people dont have english as their first language, and even those that do its just unnecessary to overcomplicate the grammar. KISS principle (keep it simple stupid) Other than that, some of this stuff has helped me out so thanks!
Ok, maybe THAT sentence had a little too much fluff.
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I'm with FortuneSyn. Simplifying the guide is definitely not an insult to the intelligence of beginners, it's rather a way of showing tolerance to the non-native speakers of English in this community. The vast majority of people here will read the guide hoping for advice and direction when playing the Zerg race, they are not looking for an academic document.
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On October 28 2010 02:10 shuurajou wrote:
Minor suggestion to include in the guide around rallying new units to your army (not for everyone it's quite fiddly). Let's say I have a group of lings in group 1, already in the field. If I click my hatch hot key, and build some more lings (s, zzz) (let's say leaving 3 unused larva) I will CTRL+click the now morphing egg wireframes, then shift-1 it, so the 'in production' lings are now already in the correct control group before they have hatched. Advantage to this is as I move my lings around the map, the morphing eggs are following the same move instructions so will go to their 'brothers' in the field when they hatch. This avoids the issue of random secondary rally points which you've already rightly highlighted.
I do this all the time and it helps me immensely. I can get away with doing so much more with (relatively) low apm when I don't have to constantly update my control groups. The only units I build that I don't hokey this way are drones and overlords.
Makes playing off-race really difficult though.
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On November 11 2010 19:20 Tobberoth wrote:
I'm with FortuneSyn. Simplifying the guide is definitely not an insult to the intelligence of beginners, it's rather a way of showing tolerance to the non-native speakers of English in this community. The vast majority of people here will read the guide hoping for advice and direction when playing the Zerg race, they are not looking for an academic document.
My point really is that we shouldn't OMIT anything. When I said that "simplification is an insult to the intelligence of the beginner", I meant the sorts of simplifications that detract from the overall meaning. We can all agree that the editing process is a good thing. However, over-editing and over-simplification that removes important information is just as bad as unnecessary complexity. As such, a balance needs to be struck, which I try to do whenever I'm editing anything.
On that note, the guide is now available as a wiki at http://zerg-101.wikia.com/. If anyone sees anything that they feel needs help, just go ahead and post it in its respective discussion page, here in this thread, or PM me or -Xios. I'll have -Xios put the url in the OP.
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Russian Federation4295 Posts
Use it and you can multi-inject very fast
![[image loading]](http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/3868/69800717.th.jpg)
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Is there any reason why posts like these are not stickied in some sort of 'reccomended threads' post at the top of the forum?
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Another option if you don't want to tie up separate hotkeys for each hatch/queen but still want to 'see' each base as you inject (to evaluate saturation etc) is the little-used camera hotkeys. You can use CTRL-F5-F8 to hotkey camera locations to your bases, then inject with your queens still all on one hotkey. ie: if queens are on 4, F5,4,v,click,F6,4,v,click, etc. Saves up unit hotkeys to be used for tech buildings, extra queens, scouts, creep tumors, etc.
Only thing with the above method is the default F5-F8 camera keys are pretty far from your hand's normal position. So I'd be inclined to decouple it a bit. Say, always use the minimap to inject, but after each inject, do a quick F5,F6,F7 to check the status of your bases. Should be really fast and you can still use the when->then to remind you. (But if you're in the middle of a pitched battle you don't have to go look at your bases.
On a tangent, was there ever consensus on whether changing the default shortcut keys is verbotten? It would be nice to remap those camera keys to F2-F5.
Edit: Backspace works too, but is further away, and I like the ability to have a key associated with each base. I do like the suggestion of binding spawn larva, cycle bases, etc, to mouse buttons though.
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just rebind your ~ (voice chat) key to town camera, and you can easily manage all larva injections with 1 hotkey for everything (or 2 if you prefer to keep queens and hatches separate).
It seems funny to me that people come up with these elaborate hand mechanics to use backspace efficiently when it's far across the keyboard from everything else.
Just move it next to everything else you click and don't worry about it.
Also, if you put all your queens together, they'll self-optimize when you spew a list of commands, and so binding each queen and hatch together is a terribly inefficient way to use your queens and hotkeys (and hatches, since you can't produce out of all hatches at once.
for me, 3 queens, 4 hatches (i use grid, so V if you're standard)
3 --> [~x(click)] repeat ad nauseum.... and you'll inject all hatches in like .25 sec.
I challenge you to find a more efficient way.
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Sorry to be a party pooper, but there was way too much fluff and not enough substance.
I'll summarize the majority of your guide for you:
1. Try to get your injections exact and on time
2. Right after you inject larvae, start building units
3. Make sure you build the correct units given the situation (refer to Liquipedia)
4. While you build units, make sure to mix in overlords and drones
5. Take gas quickly
6. Expand once you start to get saturated
7. Try to take easily defendable expansions
8. Control groups section
Notice how vague everything is. Some things are flat-out suboptimal (namely 4 and 5). When do you take your gas? When do you stop droning and start building units? What are expo timings for certain builds? Do you have any tips for getting injections exact besides just plain repetition? (For example, if you start building your 2nd queen while your first inject is almost done, your 2nd queen will finish with your 2nd inject, meaning you can start injecting synchronously with your 2 queens). What about extra hatcheries for certain unit compositions? You say this is a game of exact timings, yet you don't give any. Zerg macro is more complex than just getting things down mechanically. It's more complicated than knowing when to build drones and build units. It's more complicated than not getting supply blocked and not over-building overlords. It's more complicated than timing your tech structures, knowing defensive tech timings, opponent attack timings, expansion timings, gas timings, etc. Everything you've written (that's correct) will of course be helpful to your target audience (bronze/silver/gold). But if you really want to tackle Zerg macro, you're going to have to be more specific and more comprehensive. This "comprehensive" guide doesn't even scratch the surface.
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I'm sorry you feel this way Saracen, I believe you are a high plat/diamond level player. This guide was not intended for you. Neither was it written by someone that is comfortable with the much more complex, deeper mechanics of zerg macro, as i am myself fairly new to Starcraft, I tried my best to put together the fundemental mechanics of good zerg macro, not zerg macro strategy, which i believe is what you are refering to.
As stated at the begining of the guide, the way it is written, 'fluffed' as you put it, is written in what someone like you may deem as 'un-necessary' because what the guide is more focused on helping the reader develop 'are' those basic underlying mechanics that is in my humble opinion the most fundamental issue stopping lower leveled players.
Amongst other reasons, why i had not gone into the deeper aspects of zerg macro is that the people who this guide is intended for should not be learning about that until they can actually efficiently do the basics stated, which is the aim of the guide.
The list you placed is essentially a VERY condensed version of the guide, but all you did was say 'this is what you do'. The big difference here, and the reason for the length of the guide is that in that little list there is absolutely no explanation of how to 'think', what steps to take, or what to physically press or where to look at things when. This is what the guide is for. A process people will benefit from that need help developing a system through which they can take steps to integrate all the points raised your fantastically short and to the point list (actually offering little to no help on how to get there practically) into their game awareness and reflex response while playing.
Obviously i needed to be a little more clear at the beginning of the guide, aside from writing who this guide was for, and explaining that it is a guide about the 'fundamental mechanics', so people do not get upset that it was not written to a degree of detail some people may be expecting.
I'm sorry i wasted your time by unintentionally pulling you into reading the length of such a long guide by possibly falsely advertising to you that there may have been something of use to higher level players. In the revision of the guide, i will have to make that point clearer.
In my defense i don't work for blizzard, nor am i a l33t gamer or any of that fishy jazz. I did what i could, and it seems to have helped enough people so far for me to be happy with. I will be trying my best to add more complicated aspects to a later version, but i am learning as well, so don't expect anything mind blowing.
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I've updated the first post with, well, an update of the progress of the guide.
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As a new Starcraft 2 player with under 10 melee games played in Broodwar way back when I din't even have internet (lol) I can't thank you enough for this really really REALLY usefull information on how my favorite race, the zerg, works. I want to learn the game and be the best I can be and this guide was just what i nedeed to get right into learning the mechanics of zerg. You helped my learning experiente by a lot and i am really happy to so that you have great great plans to future expand this.
Again, big thanks for what you are doing, it is the best thing i found on zerg and I am the type of guy who likes to read on how to play the game I play. Your plans just blew my mind and I am looking forword to your website.
Keep the good work going and thank you for teaching me the mechanics of zerg macro.
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Mind = Blown. Best guide I have read on learning and applying Zerg Mechanics. Wonderful job OP. I hope to see this info in the liquidpedia section please!!
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Added the following to my nerdbook:
"WHEN larva drops, THEN inject.
WHEN you inject, THEN build units (preemptive overlords > drones > units)."
brought me from mid gold to platinum, so thanks! :-)
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EPT![[image loading]](http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/3868/69800717.jpg)
