EPT
other than that, awesome read: )
The Starcraft Pyramid - Page 8
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alyselol
100 Posts
other than that, awesome read: ) | ||
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Monkeyballs25
531 Posts
On September 12 2011 16:05 Salivanth wrote: I also love the idea of using this to analyse a replay. In fact, I feel this is where it is most suitable. You lost. Why? Did your opponent get an economy better than you? If he did, why bother looking further. Did he produce more stuff, relative to the amount of money he had? If he did, fix that first. Did you just not know what to do, despite having the mechanics? Learn what to do for next time. Did you fail to know what he was even doing in the first place? Work on scouting better, so you can see it coming next time. Could you have countered him by using your army better? Prepare your army that way next time. I use the pyramid for exactly the same thing. 90% of my losses still boil down to having less workers than my opponent or building up massive excess resources and not turning it into an army fast enough. Day9 covered it in one of his early newbie tuesdays too. He says don't worry too much about unit counters or micro when your opponent just plain had a bigger army and would have won anyway. Saves a lot of time. | ||
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xlava
United States676 Posts
If people read it of course. | ||
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skatbone
United States1005 Posts
On August 18 2011 06:00 Roblin wrote: is this a serious post? day[9] answered a very similar question on his daily, he said: if it looks like your opponent is doing X, but is actually sacrificing efficiency for the element of surprise in doing Y instead of X, then he just did a really shitty Y and you can in 90% of the cases just kill him because you have a better build/gameplan. Well, as a teacher irl, I find models like these to be helpful so long as they aren't taken to be an actual reflection of reality. Rather they are useful guides that have to be viewed as flexible to the extent that people learn and improve in different fashions and at divergent rates. Thanks to the OP for this tool. Regarding trickery and Roblin's comment: Day[9]'s answer on his daily doesn't account for those builds that don't sacrifice eco for the sake of trickery. A large portion of this game involves denial of information. Hence, the "information" portion of the pyramid designates a skill that is always relative to your opponents efforts to deny that skill. Playing toss at a lowly diamond level, I struggle with the similarity of many Terran openings. Distinguishing 1 tax FE from fine-SCV all in is difficult even when I am actively seeking information. Given that I am not masters yet, I think trickery can often be overcome, at this level, with better economy and macro. HOWEVER, one of the difficulties with the PvT MU is the that, as P, I have to make a lot of educated guesses in the early game. If I guess wrong (due to the Terran's trickery/denial of scouting), I run the risk of losing. Secondly, in regard to the OP, you write "Obviously, only one player can have map control." I don't see map control as static. To me, it is more obvious that map control is in flux. And often, one player has ground control while another has air. This happens when the T with more vikings sits over the starports of the T with the larger ground army. The latter T can hold the Xel Nagas with tanks, but his advance is retarded by the air superiority of the former. | ||
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Ingebrigtsen
Norway343 Posts
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KuRiCobbY
37 Posts
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Yaki
France4234 Posts
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NB
Netherlands12045 Posts
my old roomate got from bronze to #1 gold just by learning how to use hotkeys even though he has never play RTS/blizzard game before. Also the resolution is horrible. | ||
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Sporadic44
United States533 Posts
Furthermore, timings occur can occur throughout the mid-game and in the late game as well. But It's all semantics anyway. I get the idea you're trying to convey but it comes off as confusing at first. I think the second half of that section better defines the concept of a timing. Opportunities to perform a timing attack arise through the present situation in a game. For example if I scout a greedy protoss expansion after I drop my roach warren and natural expansion, I now have the choice of grabbing ling speed and busting a roach ling timing. A late game example would be having say, chitonist(sp?lol) plating, +3 melee/carapace, and adrenal glands all finishing as my ultras pop from their eggs and i'm at 200/200. That can still be considered a timing attack because i'm lining up factors within the game in time. The reason caster's dont say, "omg its the perfect ultra/upgrade timing attack!" is because there's already so much going on, itd be redundant to call that a timing attack. Nevertheless the all the rules of timing still apply regardless of early/mid/late game labels. Moving from the idea of timing attacks you can speak more generally about proper use of time within a game as a rhythm. In fact i'd consider rhythm to be a better word for the timing section of the pyramid. Because performing "timings" is essentially just syncing things up to your liking. It feels more smooth than erratically navigating the map trying to get things done. Instead of doing things on a whim there is a calculated beat to your play. You larva inject, and then you creep spread, make some more overlords, then more units, send in a scout. As your larva pops youre already back at the hatch injecting more, back to the tumors now, we'll need more overlords so we make more, then units. scout ling shows hes expanding to a third, so we begin massing roaches as we snag +2/2, roach speed, burrow, and a fourth base. We make a bunch of roaches till those upgrades finish and then push. All the while larva injects, creep spread, overlords, are incorporated to our cadence. TL:DR: You could expand upon the timings section, OP. And I feel the first part of the section is erroneous and not really applicable to the idea of timing. http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Timing_Attack | ||
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Nutro
26 Posts
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CCitrus
Canada164 Posts
Something that a lot of players (myself included) do is focus entirely on one section of the pyramid. When I began SC2 I powered to diamond with cheesy 4-gate/2-gate play, focusing on micro. Once I realized the limitation of 4gates I began to do 2gate+robo timing pushes, again focusing on builds and timings. If my push failed, I invariably lost to good macro. Now, having abandoned cheesy pushes I've stagnated at high/mid plat play, and you're completely right, my army placement and control is losing me games. Your pyramid is valuable in identifying problem areas. | ||
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zdragon
United States150 Posts
Wouldn't it behoove you to get to that level first before passing judgment on what the mindset and priorities are at that level? | ||
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Monkeyballs25
531 Posts
On September 30 2011 01:30 NB wrote: that picture is so so wrong... my macro is horrible despite facing off vs GM time to time on NA sever. my old roomate got from bronze to #1 gold just by learning how to use hotkeys even though he has never play RTS/blizzard game before.. I think it was pointed out that you don't have to learn the things in sequence. Hell, I regularly see players with awesome stutter step micro and the like. But they only have half the units that a better macro player would have at that point. If you improve something at the top of the pyramid it'll help you win games, but it doesn't make the stuff under it more effective, for the most part. Whereas improving something at the bottom improves everything above it. Your micro is twice as effective if you have twice the units. If your micro gets twice as good, your production and economy will be unchanged. Unless you're microing workers away from harassment or something | ||
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xlava
United States676 Posts
On September 30 2011 01:30 NB wrote: that picture is so so wrong... my macro is horrible despite facing off vs GM time to time on NA sever. my old roomate got from bronze to #1 gold just by learning how to use hotkeys even though he has never play RTS/blizzard game before. Also the resolution is horrible. ... The pyramid references to standard play. I'm sure MKP's macro wasn't anywhere near the macro of other players when he first started in the GSL because his micro was that good. Don't bash this post just because you consider yourself and your friend outliers. Its a correct in depth analysis and very informative for new players. | ||
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adius
United States249 Posts
On September 30 2011 01:30 NB wrote: that picture is so so wrong... my macro is horrible despite facing off vs GM time to time on NA sever. my old roomate got from bronze to #1 gold just by learning how to use hotkeys even though he has never play RTS/blizzard game before. Also the resolution is horrible. Being #1 in your sub-masters division means that you spent your bonus pool without getting promoted, so you've probably reached a temporary plateau in your development. It doesn't actually reflect anything about being better than most players in that league. Anyway you guys just need to look at your replays. The number and magnitude of your screwups is the only worthwhile measure of your level of play, looking at any of the numbers or shiny badges that the battlenet ladder throws at you is just going to be misleading. | ||
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Johnny_Vegas
United States239 Posts
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Gheorgio
Canada6 Posts
Not sure if I'll end up agreeing with the heirarchy, but I don't think that is important to me. Great post! | ||
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noodlesinsoup
United States106 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/dEd66.png) EDIT: The OP has been updated :D | ||
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Sequence
7 Posts
Anyway. Huge help and a big TY from me! | ||
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Buddhist
United States658 Posts
Conversely, a low level player will benefit heavily from good micro. A player with perfect macro who loses all of his colossi to vikings every time, or all of his mutas to thors every time, due to bad micro, will not get to high master level. The same goes for every single aspect listed there. Also, something entirely neglected in this, is mechanics/game control, e.g. hotkeys, screen save positions, mouse control, etc. Those things are EXTREMELY fundamental. I found it irritating to read "It is having – and keeping – the correct hotkeys during the action (don’t forget to use them!)." in the master league section. If you are forgetting to use your hotkeys, you should be in bronze, because you lack basic control of the game itself. You can't paint a painting if you can't move your hand the way you want to do it. Edit: and I realize that you probably have considered these things yourself, but I think you underestimate the truth to it. A player below Diamond does not necessarily lack macro. Some very low level players seriously macro like grand masters. Their problems are other things, like micro, decision making, etc. Also, mechanics are just, incredibly important. I'm master league and still trying to get a hang of the game controls a little bit better. I use all 10 control groups every game, and 3 screen save positions, but I could do even better. I think this aspect is woefully neglected by basically everyone, especially pros. | ||
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