|
Make sure you read the OP before asking a question. Asking a question already addressed in the OP will result in moderation action. |
On January 27 2013 08:09 probeater wrote:
what to do against a terran that stays on one base and only builds marines? i couldn't get up his ramp to see what other buildings he had but his rax had no add-on. once my obs came over i saw 5rax without addons, and he was coming with a thousand marines. i did a 3gate robo expand because he was definitely going to all-in me. i didnt have enough units to stop this, lost all my probes and had to GG. any general help forthis kind of play?
If its that many marines i wouldn't get zealots, but just stick with stalker sentry. And FF his army in like a quarter deal with that and rinse and repeat. I would say tech to collo but I doubt you will be able to while warping in sentries and stalkers to defend the push. If you can afford tech to collo or add more gates.
The key is to not let your sentries with energies get sniped or you will be in trouble. You Could also try to kite with some stalkers from his base to your base.
|
What's the best response when the zerg opens 3 hatch before pool? Cannon rushing is hard since the zerg will be especially paranoid about scouting around his hatches, and if u fail a cannon rush you might as well leave the game. Can't take a quick third since they will flood you will slow lings immediately after. What to do?
|
Best to send in a replay to show us what happened. I'm not sure why you can't go for a quick third? Slow lings are terrible. Especially against good cannon and sim city placement.
|
Well, I guess I should say in the game I went for a quick third after I failed a cannon rush and then got contained to 2 bases and basically lost already. So I guess just go quick third if they 3 hatch and dont bother cannon rushing?
|
Is there a good general rule about how many stalkers you should keep in a mineral line to fend off phoenix harass relative to the number of phoenixes a player has in PvP? I usually stick to 5 per mineral line, but against higher phoenix numbers it seems like they can get way too many guaranteed probe kills without the stalkers really being enough of a deterrant, even with target firing and blink.
|
Italy12246 Posts
If he's making just 4-5 phoenixes (as he should), that's a good number. Make more if for some reason he's making more phoenixes; that's very non standard (and pretty bad as his midgame tech will be heavily delayed) so there's no set number of stalkers to defend vs tons of phoenixes.
|
Hi all.
I'm in Diamond (toss) and are still having an extremely basic problem. Supply blocks and paying attention to the minimap.
I'm sure i've played about 3000 games of Starcraft over the last 2 years, and have never put effort in getting those into the "flow".
It feels so extremely hard to implement such things now, so i really need some good tips on how to do it.
Does anyone have some good "rule of thumbs" to make it easier for u to work towards such goals?
And also how is the best way to focus on it. I mean making yourself focusing on that first of all, and not strategy/scouting/engagements etc.
(dont know if this is the best place to post this to get response)
|
Hello.
I'm a Diamond Random player since recently, after maining Toss for a long time before deciding that random was more fun and I wanted to have more fun in the game. In this particular game on Cloud Kingdom, I went for a relatively fast three Stalker opening (probably not very refined, but I'll look up the actual build order sometime) and followed it up with Phoenixes. I know Phoenixes is not the best build on this map, but I knew my opponent likes Phoenix play, and I'm very confident in my Phoenix vs Phoenix. Also, as I scouted only one gateway, I expected some kind of fast tech play and hoped it would be Robo rather than Blink.
In any case, I follow up my Stargate with a quick blind Robo and almost have an Immortal out when the blink Stalkers are at my base, so I figure I'm in an okay position. I also manage to snipe an Observer and not lose too much, so I figure I'm fine. However, how do I play from here? Do I just ballsy take an expansion behind my Immortal, keep chronoiong Immortals and just try to defend as well as I can? Should I be making Sentries or not? I'm completely lost as to what to do, so I just decide to attack with a superior army composition but when I'm halfway across the map I realise he can just forcefield me out and I realise this too late and tap out.
Here's the replay. If one could help me with some timings I could have done in this particular game or what I should have been doing with my Phoenixes instead, I'd greatly appreciate it. Thank you.
http://drop.sc/299102
|
On January 27 2013 21:43 hersimp wrote:
Hi all.
I'm in Diamond (toss) and are still having an extremely basic problem. Supply blocks and paying attention to the minimap.
I'm sure i've played about 3000 games of Starcraft over the last 2 years, and have never put effort in getting those into the "flow".
It feels so extremely hard to implement such things now, so i really need some good tips on how to do it.
Does anyone have some good "rule of thumbs" to make it easier for u to work towards such goals?
And also how is the best way to focus on it. I mean making yourself focusing on that first of all, and not strategy/scouting/engagements etc.
(dont know if this is the best place to post this to get response)
Supply blocks are a very big issue to have in diamond, minimap awareness not as much. Both are fixed by the same mechanic of utilizing peripheral vision. edit: Jeez, wall of text. I covered your entire question though, zzz.
Minimap awareness is pretty easy to work on: Begin by forcing yourself to concentrate on the minimap at any given moment you don't need to be directly looking at what you're doing. It'll be weird at first but you have to get comfortable with peripheral vision. It should become a habit that whenever nothing is going on your focus turns to the mini-map. It should eventually develop into an active awareness in your mind that even when you aren't checking the minimap, something could be coming and you should be anticipating it on the minimap.
Supply blocks are more important to deal with first, but I listed the procedure for minimap awareness because it's pretty much the same way to begin dealing with supply blocks, though a little more complex. Focus on the physical supply count whenever you can spare the attention. Like the minimap, you should have an active awareness in your mind that when you aren't watching the supply count you're most vulnerable to supply blocking yourself by tunnel visioning.
Continuing on supply blocks, you also REALLY need to know both the mechanics of Protoss and your build very well. There are many ways to develop habits of keeping ontop of supply, but they all must facilitate the anticipation of supply blocks. One easy way is to realize as a Protoss you warp/produce in waves. Between each major warp-in, you should be actively aware just as much as you are of the physical supply count as you should be of the fact that you need to drop x pylons to keep up supply for the next warp-in. Same with producing out of multiple robos, same with stargates. Though not directly related to the macro mechanic of keeping up supply, you also want to develop an intimacy with a build that should reach max 200/200 supply consistently. It won't solve supply blocks but when coupled with the first two tips of watching your supply count and anticipating each warp-in, it will help tremendously.
The goal in this regard is to develop a mechanical check list so that checking supply/the minimap is on your mind at all times you aren't physically looking at it. Don't try to work on both at the same time -- start with supply. When it's a mechanical habit that is constantly on your mind, and you have virtually no supply blocks (discluding the major engagement of each game) should you even consider starting on minimap awareness next. Day9 covers the physical process of watching both your supply and minimap as a literal dance across the screen, moving your eyes back and forth from the top right to the bottom left. You aren't going as fast as you can, you're just doing it at a speed you can comfortably read the supply and see the minimap. You aren't looking directly at supply or the minimap, you're focusing between the center and corner so that you're able to distinguish the supply count or the minimap as clearly as possible through peripheral vision without directly looking at it.
And as for how to prioritize watching/managing supply and watching the minimap over scouting/engagements, at first you kind of have to sacrifice for the sake of learning the mechanical process of focusing on either. Eventually, you learn to focus on minimap where you anticipate a drop/ling runby during times you're most vulnerable to it for example, and you won't really need to watch the supply count as much as casually check up on it because you know your build well enough and anticipate your production to build the appropriate supply. But until you reach that point which takes tons of practice and experience, you have to prioritize what's most important until you reach that level of comfort. I wouldn't look away from every major fight, but slowly work it in, starting with an active thought. Another tip Day9 offered in a daily a while ago is that whenever you're looking directly at and focusing on something ingame, like, a battle, you should try to devote your thoughts to anticipating the next mechanical process. ex: you're micro'ing a battle, but you're not thinking about the battle as much as telling yourself in your mind that at some point you need to look away for 3 seconds to drop pylons because you will be supply blocked with the next warp-in. If you can achieve that level of game awareness, it simply becomes a matter of speed.
feel free to PM me on anything specific. explanation got kinda convoluted trying to address multiple questions.
|
On January 27 2013 21:43 hersimp wrote:
Hi all.
I'm in Diamond (toss) and are still having an extremely basic problem. Supply blocks and paying attention to the minimap.
I'm sure i've played about 3000 games of Starcraft over the last 2 years, and have never put effort in getting those into the "flow".
It feels so extremely hard to implement such things now, so i really need some good tips on how to do it.
Does anyone have some good "rule of thumbs" to make it easier for u to work towards such goals?
And also how is the best way to focus on it. I mean making yourself focusing on that first of all, and not strategy/scouting/engagements etc.
(dont know if this is the best place to post this to get response)
rd really did a good job answering your questions. I just want to add something about supply blocks:
You should be checking your resources often, but another tool that really helps me is to do a little math with each production cycle. So, let's say I'm using 8 gateaways, double robo pumping colossi, and I'm done with probes. Each warp-in round is 8 units, which is (no matter what I warp in) 16 supply. So with each warp-in round, I want 2 more pylons. Then, for the robos, each colossus is 6 food, so 2 colossi are 12 food. That means I want to alternate between 2 pylons and 1 pylon each colossus production cycle--so 2 for the first colossi, 1 for the second, 2 for the third, etc. until I'm maxed out. And, in all cases, it's generally safer to err on the side of caution and build a little extra supply space--especially if you're like me and you drop pylons around the map for flanks, harassment, and reinforcement--because those can be sniped and put you in the hole.
Obviously, if you're still building probes, it can be more complicated because you're sometimes going to boost your nexi and throw a lot of math down the toilet. But I think it's still really helpful to know how many pylons to build with each production cycle, so you keep up without having to sit there and guess over and over during a game. Still, even with building probes, you know that every 8 probes you need a pylon (aside from when a nexus finishes), so with 2 nexi you want to build a pylon each 4 probe cycles, and with 3 you want to build a pylon between 2-3 probe cycles.
I'm not saying you should stop checking your supply count throughout the game, but if the "check your supply all the time" method isn't improving your supply block issues, maybe my method can help. I still check my supply often, but I have a better feel for when I need to build pylons because I mentally attach a specific pylon cost to building units. Being able to play by feel is especially important to me because I'm the type of player who likes to use a lot of pressure, harassment, and multi-pronged aggression in my play, so I can't always afford to keep an eye on my supply count with everything that's constantly happening.
-----
The other thing I want to point out is that you should always replace a destroyed pylon. If you build pylons out on the map, you should try to pay attention to them on your minimap because they give you vision of incoming units or potential expansion. So when one goes missing, be sure to replace it. Or if you don't remember whether you put a pylon somewhere, or how many you put in one general area, double check your supply count and catch up.
|
On January 27 2013 21:43 hersimp wrote:
Hi all.
I'm in Diamond (toss) and are still having an extremely basic problem. Supply blocks and paying attention to the minimap.
I'm sure i've played about 3000 games of Starcraft over the last 2 years, and have never put effort in getting those into the "flow".
It feels so extremely hard to implement such things now, so i really need some good tips on how to do it.
Does anyone have some good "rule of thumbs" to make it easier for u to work towards such goals?
And also how is the best way to focus on it. I mean making yourself focusing on that first of all, and not strategy/scouting/engagements etc.
(dont know if this is the best place to post this to get response)
IRL i just occasionally glance to the lower left to simulate me looking at the mini map.
|
Argh, I am so frustrated guys. I still have problems against Terran. It seems like this match up is so much in the terrans favor. I just got terran all in rushed with mauraders and marines and I literally don't know what to do. I use the standard 1 gate FE and I still get rocked. Isn't this build supposed to be safe? I'm thinking of just switching over to Zerg at this point. It's so frustrating as this is the only race that I have trouble with. Please help!
These are my replays
pvt2
pvT 1
|
How do you deal with a high ground CC in PvT? After scouting a bunker and no expansion I'm forced to prepare for a 1/1/1, or hellion drop or another of the infinite possibilities of one base nonsense terran can do, meanwhile I haven't taken my 3rd and 4th gasses and I've delayed my tech and upgrades by getting 2 observers and possibly an immortal before any tech. When my obs gets to terran's base around 8:00 and I see he's playing totally standard my gas income sucks, I have only one sentry with decent energy, and my unit count, while okay, is still insufficient to defend the medivac timing, especially when drops are involved. It seems like I'm almost always behind in that instance, and am liable to get hit really hard by the medivac timing if I suddenly try to play catch up with tech and upgrades. Really frustrating how ridiculous it seems to scout in this match up.
Replay: http://drop.sc/299463 (sorry for the BM, as you can tell I'm frustrated with this match up)
|
On January 28 2013 21:24 Chandra wrote:How do you deal with a high ground CC in PvT? After scouting a bunker and no expansion I'm forced to prepare for a 1/1/1, or hellion drop or another of the infinite possibilities of one base nonsense terran can do, meanwhile I haven't taken my 3rd and 4th gasses and I've delayed my tech and upgrades by getting 2 observers and possibly an immortal before any tech. When my obs gets to terran's base around 8:00 and I see he's playing totally standard my gas income sucks, I have only one sentry with decent energy, and my unit count, while okay, is still insufficient to defend the medivac timing, especially when drops are involved. It seems like I'm almost always behind in that instance, and am liable to get hit really hard by the medivac timing if I suddenly try to play catch up with tech and upgrades. Really frustrating how ridiculous it seems to scout in this match up. Replay: http://drop.sc/299463 (sorry for the BM, as you can tell I'm frustrated with this match up)
Just do a standard 1Gate expand and add 2Gates before Robo to get the standard 3Gate Robo infrastructure. Once you get a Zealot and a Stalker you can simply walk over to the Terran base and check if there's an expansion. If there is, he's not 1-1-1ing; if there isn't, he's either doing some sort of 1base all-in or he's wasting his second orbital. Either way, your 3gate Robo infrastructure puts you in a great position. It's fine to sacrifice the Zealot diving past the bunker in order to scout for the expansion.
|
On January 29 2013 01:58 Shiori wrote:Show nested quote +On January 28 2013 21:24 Chandra wrote:How do you deal with a high ground CC in PvT? After scouting a bunker and no expansion I'm forced to prepare for a 1/1/1, or hellion drop or another of the infinite possibilities of one base nonsense terran can do, meanwhile I haven't taken my 3rd and 4th gasses and I've delayed my tech and upgrades by getting 2 observers and possibly an immortal before any tech. When my obs gets to terran's base around 8:00 and I see he's playing totally standard my gas income sucks, I have only one sentry with decent energy, and my unit count, while okay, is still insufficient to defend the medivac timing, especially when drops are involved. It seems like I'm almost always behind in that instance, and am liable to get hit really hard by the medivac timing if I suddenly try to play catch up with tech and upgrades. Really frustrating how ridiculous it seems to scout in this match up. Replay: http://drop.sc/299463 (sorry for the BM, as you can tell I'm frustrated with this match up) Just do a standard 1Gate expand and add 2Gates before Robo to get the standard 3Gate Robo infrastructure. Once you get a Zealot and a Stalker you can simply walk over to the Terran base and check if there's an expansion. If there is, he's not 1-1-1ing; if there isn't, he's either doing some sort of 1base all-in or he's wasting his second orbital. Either way, your 3gate Robo infrastructure puts you in a great position. It's fine to sacrifice the Zealot diving past the bunker in order to scout for the expansion. When I say "scouting a bunker and no expansion" I'm referring to information I gather from my zealot stalker poke. In the replay I posted I do exactly that and run past the bunker with my zealot and see no CC on the low ground. It doesn't really seem like he's wasting his orbital that much when it literally takes less than five seconds to float it over to its normal position, then play standard as usual. He maybe loses a little bit of economy, whereas I have to drastically change my normal build and delay my tech and upgrades to account for different possibilities.
|
Italy12246 Posts
If he floats his CC to his nat that late, you are still fine. It fucking sucks when they go 3cc behind it and you were thinking 111 though, then you just have to go allin with an immortal bust and pray it works.
What you could do if you want to play a bit riskier vs 111 is take your nat gas and start teching up a bit; if you see a really fast all-in coming your way with your obs just cancel your tech (go easy on it, add just the support bay if you aren't 100% sure what the T is doing) if a very fast 111 is coming your way. Sometimes it's actually possible to have colossus in time, if the Terran decides to delay his push.
Additionally, if you are very confident in your micro vs hellion drops you can go 1gate fe into robo when you see a bunker (ie, no bio aggression coming, he's either expanding or teching), which allows you to scout him faster.
|
I can never seem to survive 2raxes....like, every 2rax in the book kills me every time. At least on entombed valley.
Here's a game against a low masters Terran where I scouted the 2rax early enough, went for 30 nexus 30 gateway x2 and didn't even get a robo (my mistake), and still got brutally slaughtered by the 2rax. Like, demolished and it wasn't even close.
http://drop.sc/299510
I'm still at a loss for what I'm meant to do against this play...I must be missing something lol
|
As a Protoss newb, I keep getting tripped up on how much production I can have. Even when I'm not supply blocking myself (happens too often for me to admit), I feel like I either have too many minerals, or Warpgate cooldowns that I don't have the resources to use. How many gates + Stargates/Robo can I support off 1, 2, or 3 bases?
|
Italy12246 Posts
Roughly 3gates and one tech building on one base, and 6gates, one tech building (a robo the vast majority of the time) and 1/2 forges upgrading (plus a twilight council) on 2.
A decent rule of thumb is 3gates + 1tech (robo/stargate/twilight council and forge) per base.
|
If you're not planning on going Robo tech (planning Templar late game, generally), is it still worth it to build a Robo early on to get Observers? Or should you rely more on Hallucinated Phoenixes?
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
