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[G] The Starcraft Pyramid
Version 2.4
Version notes:
Thanks to all who participated on the next batch of arguments with constructive comments. Thanks to fulaghee for the pimped pyramid  Change log at the end.
Throughout my recent coaching sessions, I have come to realize that there is a very structured way in which players will improve rapidly. This has manifested itself in a hierarchical manner in which the failure to master the lower levels prevent the full effectiveness of the top levels.
So, without further ado, here it is.
Budha’s Starcraft Pyramid:
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/dEd66.png)
Thx to fulaghee!
Here is a video summary of the pyramid:
Part 1
Part 2
Please Note: The video was produced with the first version of the pyramid and may not reflect the newer revisions.
I will start by going through every level and describing in details what they include, then explain what the pyramid actually represents and how to use it effectively. This might seem very obvious (since a pyramid is fairly straightforward), but there still are some subtleties
Economy
+ Show Spoiler +At its base, Starcraft is a game of economy, as are most RTS games. If you don’t understand this, it is your first step into becoming a better Starcraft player. The very first fundamental concept behind the best players is economy. This implies constant worker production and taking bases in relation with your worker count (approx. 1 base per 25 workers). The sheer amount of money intake will be the foundation of the rest of your progression in Starcraft 2. This leaves us to the second ladder step in the pyramid.
Production
+ Show Spoiler +Production, production, production. The second brick in the Starcraft Pyramid is making as much “stuff” as you can. The sheer number of units popping out on the map will be enough to win against any player who has not mastered this step. At this step, the type of unit does not matter, as long as you fully utilize your economy with lots and lots of production. It can include army, defense and upgrades, just spend that money!
These two first concepts might seem obvious, but they are often the most neglected because they are overshadowed by the upper levels of the pyramid.
Knowledge
+ Show Spoiler +This step happens out of the game. Knowledge, as in game knowledge, as in knowing what units are, their names, the upgrades they can have, their strengths and weaknesses, etc. You do not need to explicitly use this knowledge in this step, it will come naturally. Simply KNOWING will enable you to move up in the pyramid, and allow you to make decisions.
Information
+ Show Spoiler +Information is what is displayed to you in-game. This starts out with what race your opponent is playing. Then, where he spawned on the map, what he decides to show you, and finally scouting. With proper scouting, you will gather all the information necessary to capitalize on your new-found knowledge of the game and enable you to actually start making on-the-fly decisions about your game specifically. The information gathered will of course enable you to make the correct in-game decisions and follow the right strategy to plow through the opponents that have not achieved this rank yet!
Army
+ Show Spoiler +As weird as it sounds, the army is usually the most under-emphasized aspect of Starcraft. This level of the pyramid includes not only the army composition, but also it’s positioning on the map. This is where you will, for the first time, make in-game, in-the-moment-decisions about what type of units to produce, and WHERE to place them. Put the emphasis on the second part. The positioning of your army is just as important as its composition. You need to defend your bases and engage in the rights spots, with an advantageous position. The spot where your army awaits its order to advance is also crucial here; imagine your army being in the back of your base when the opponent pushes? Once this is mastered, you will plow through any opponent that has not reached this level. Next, we bring structure to your game.
Build
+ Show Spoiler +After the most underrated aspects of the game, comes the one with the most hype. The Build, or build order, the order in which you place down buildings and units to reach a certain goal. Now you have finally reached a point where you understand the game enough to actually optimize what you do and how you do it. This one should be higher in the pyramid if it wasn’t for one of the most awesomest (yes, it’s a word!...) things about Starcraft: The Pros. Professional players have made builds their career goals. They spend hours, days, weeks, months perfecting them. STEAL THEM. Use them! Take advantage of this, and after you master your builds, you will rampage through the ladder. This level emphasizes smoothness and optimization early on, and it will launch you into the mid-game with a huge advantage.
Control
+ Show Spoiler +A relatively small step inside the massive pyramid to mastering Starcraft is Control. This includes and emphasizes Map Control. Obviously, only one player can have map control. But what this level dictates is having map control when you want it, and especially making the most of this positional advantage. Extending on map control is your army control, i.e. moving your army forward and back, left and right, when appropriate. This section will also includes SPELLCASTING during engagements, like storms, fungal and stimpacks, and where to place your spellcasters inside the army. Controlling the bulk of your army and the map is an essential part of your RTS gaming career.
Force
+ Show Spoiler +Finally we get to Force! This is one of the less defined and explored steps of the pyramid. It includes, but does not limit itself to, harassment, pressure, drops, etc. Force does not only mean knowing when to force yourself through the main defense of your opponent, but also knowing when to move forward to FORCE units instead of harvesters (**cough** vs zerg **cough**). It includes making drops happen to FORCE your opponent to lose map control, to FORCE him not to push your base, to FORCE him to rebuild harvesters. This step makes your opponent do what he does not want to do.
Now that you have mastered the lower and mid-levels, you are already well beyond the average skill level. Now comes the refinement, where you will finally get promoted.
Management
+ Show Spoiler +This is the first higher step of the pyramid. This is when you will get harassed, you will lose bases, you will be overwhelmed by the amount of stuff going on. Management is keeping your cool - Of course, you should be keeping your cool and stay on top of all the other steps before this! - So let me rephrase that: It is performing actions you would not perform without pressure. It is rebuilding your base after you lose it. It is having – and keeping – the correct hotkeys during the action (don’t forget to use them!). It is keeping vision of what is happening to fine-tune your reactions, staying on top of the lower levels of the pyramid during heated moments. This goes beyond the information gathered, and focuses on smoothing things out after your build has evaporated. This is obvious, but hard to accomplish and often neglected or forgotten. This one will take practice and experience!
Micro-Management
+ Show Spoiler +Finally, we arrive at micro! Why is it so high up? Because it is the single-most overrated aspect of Starcraft 2. If you have not MASTERED the previous steps, don’t waste your time micro-ing units. Not to say it won’t help, but you can spend your efforts somewhere else. This one has a lot of hype because it is “What the Pros do” They show of their micro, and commentators and spectators love it. You probably all know what micro is: splitting marines, perfect kitting, magic-boxing Thors, blinking away at the perfect moment. The real specific stuff! Again, not to say your micro won’t help you before, but it will never reach its full potential if you do not absolutely master the lower levels of the pyramid.
Timings
+ Show Spoiler +Again, one of the more refined and overrated aspects of the game. I take it back, not overrated, but mostly misunderstood. Tastosis (Tasteless and Artosis) love this aspect in their GSL commentary – with good reason. But you must understand that “Timing Pushes” are incredibly small windows of opportunity that are PLANNED BEFORE THE GAME. They exploit a known weakness in your opponents’ normal build at a very precise time. Do not confuse them with a strong mid game push, or a build order win. Because of their nature, timing pushes usually occur in the early game and sometimes (in very advanced play) in the mid-game. This part of the pyramid also includes very precise timings within your build order (ex.: building your Queen and Roach warren precisely when your pool finishes and you have exactly 300 minerals at that moment). Another note about timings are the ones that will manifest themselves inside the game itself. For example, killing off many harvesters will leave you a open window where you can push because your opponent needs to rebuild his workers. Fine tune and master this top level of the pyramid and you are well on your way of becoming a professional StarCraft player.
Dusting
+ Show Spoiler +This Final step is called dusting because I did not know what else to call it. Imagine building a table. All the levels of the pyramid are a part – Economy is the legs, Timings are the polish. No matter what you do from here, the table will get dusty! At this point, the game will evolve, both the MetaGame (notice how I just NOW mention this!) and the patches (once again, notice how just NOW do I mention patchnotes and balance!), and it will be your job to stay with it and refine your play. Think up new small tiny changes to get your edge (A good example, I saw MMA vs Nestea (I think that was the game) yesterday from GSL August, MMA placed a supply depot to wall in his marine next to the Xel Naga watch tower!). No one will be able to think for you at this point, it’s all up to you! The dusting phase is limitless, and now is when you know you are a true Starcraft Master!
PLEASE READ THE DESCRIPTIONS OF EACH LEVEL BEFORE CONTINUING Just click on "show spoiler"
What about Mechanics?
Mechanics are a key factor in your success as a Starcraft player. Although they are very important, they are not explicitly dealt with inside the structure of the pyramid. This has happened for two main reasons:
- Each step of the pyramid assumes that you have the mechanics to follow. To actually master economy, production, information, Force, etc. you need to have the mechanics to perform such tasks. This is the main reason why they are not there, it is implied in each step.
- Most players don't agree on what the best mechanics are. They are very subjective and vary widely from one player to the other, according to personal preferences.
How to use the Pyramid
The pyramid is primarily a Tool. Nothing more, nothing less than an approach to improve your game, as well as a utility to take advantage of. It is a structured way of learning Starcraft and improving. It’s your road to the top!
The point of the hierarchical structure of the pyramid is to illustrate the importance of the lower levels in comparison to the top levels. It is not to prove that the top levels are impossible to achieve without the lower levels, but that their effectiveness will be drastically reduced. For example: imagine you have great micro. In average, you can pick out 5 zerglings for each marine! If you have 4 marines and you micro perfectly, you will take out 20 lings, great! But unfortunately, your macro slipped and you now have 200 minerals. Instead, if you have those 4 additional marines, and position them correctly against a wall with your first 4, without micro, you will probably be able to take out 4 zerglings per marine – a total of 32! This is only one – hypothetical – of many examples out there!
The hierarchy implies that the top levels of the pyramids will be scaled down - their importance and effectiveness diminished – if you cannot keep up and master the levels below it.
Also note that no one is placed inside a level of the pyramid and is tagged as "being at the Force phase". A player will sample every step as he progresses, and keep getting better at the lower ones until he is ready to progress.
I think that the concept of the Starcraft Pyramid will be mostly used in coaching – since that is the latest trend! – and I encourage it! Most coaches – amateurs and pros alike – tend to focus on in-game details and lose the big picture.
When using the pyramid in parallel to a game or replay, you always need to look at the base of the pyramid first.
- If you lost an engagement because of bad position, ask yourself if your army could not have been bigger because of bad economy or production.
-If you miss-micro your blink stalkers, see if you used them enough to harass and force units. Is your build smoothed out?
You can find an infinite number of these examples in Starcraft.
Misconceptions about the Pyramid
Well this is because we have had a lot of people that pass right besides the goal of the Pyramid. 1.
I want to put the emphasis on this; THIS IS NOT A SET OF RULES. The pyramid is a guideline - not even a guideline - a path, a vision, an approach to the game.
It is a tool, to help low level players define a path to follow. It is a utility to help coaching and identifying the most fundamental flaw in a player's game. It is used to avoid beeing blinded by the details of the game of Starcraft, and find the base, the fundamental reason you lost a game. It is also structured to show the importance of some elements of the game on - and over - some other aspects or elements. I have spent time and effort reading every single comment and tweeking this so that people can USE it as a guide, not as an absolute truth.
2. The levels I mention in the discussions are just a personal observation and have no actual credit on the skill level of a player who has mastred a step.
3. The pyramid does not imply that you have to master a step to start the next one. That would be ridiculous! It simply shows that the higher steps will not be as effective if you neglect the lower steps. A player will have to sample everything in this post - even at bronze level.
4. The pyramid is a CONCEPT. I hesitate to say this, because people might interpret it in the wrong way and do their own thing, but here it is. If you do not agree with the order of these things, it does not prevent you from using it. Reorder it the whatever you feel is right and USE IT. It is meant to be a tool, nothing more. But keep in mind that I have tweeked it time and time again according to arguments made in this post so to best reflect the game (See conclusion).
Interesting Discussions (Q&A)
The Short Games
Many Comments are about the shorter games and how this approach deals (or does not deal) with them. This has been one of my concerns while making this pyramid, and I think I have managed to define every stage so that this also applies to short games (some changes with v.2.0)
Let me explain with an example that has come out a lot, the 4gate vs 4gate in PvP:
People have said that Micro will take an overwhelming importance in these games. That is TRUE, but there is a reason for that, and the pyramid can actually explain it. In these short games, the macro in general (economy, production, information, up until micro!) because very very very easy to manage. Ergo, players easily reach the micro phase very rapidly, and this will take up all the importance. To illustrate why the pyramid still applies, lets start a thought experiment:
What if, during a 4gate, one of the two players stops production? What if he stops reacting to his opponents pressure and restarts building probes? Whats if he screws up his build and his opponent gets there 10 seconds before him? The answer, in all these cases, is that he will lose. As you can see, all the lower steps still apply and have predominance on the upper steps, but the upper echelons are just a lot easier to access!
The Waterfall
Some of you have commented that Starcraft players always fall back into a cycle which is not illustrated in this pyramid. This is true in most parts, but a player that follows a cyclic process will have to go through these steps once again. I thought of adding arrows that shoot from each level and end up at the base, but it doesn't truly represent the game. So here is a metaphor to illustrate the cyclic approach to the game that almost all players (pros stay at the top!) go through:
Imagine standing at the bottom of the pyramid and having to walk up it's wall to reach the top (literally!). As you walk up, the Gods of Starcraft open a faucet on top of the pyramid, transforming it in a huge waterfall. As you go up, you will have to work hard to advance. If you let go, the water will drag you back to a lower level.
This is how I see the cyclic approach to Starcraft. Most players will eventually let go of one of the concepts and fall back down. It is easier to get yourself back up, because you know the way!
Player levels and Skill Measurement
This is by no means a skill measurement technique. This is not intended to be a way to put yourself against your friends and opponents and gauge them or tag them.
I HAVE TAKEN THIS PART OUT OF THE POST.
People misinterpreted this way to much. Sorry.
Fun examples
Morghaine brings us:
"The best example that your lower steps are right is Phoenix. Watching him play always makes my jaw drop. He can get away most games with pure ling and sometimes blings (or he used to, on KR GM ladder). He nowadays actually discovered a ressource called "gas" and has implemented it in his play (playing Muta Bling Sling most of the time).
But he used to produce pure lings and has crushed HT / Zealot / Archon comps with Lings just because his production and economy is so superior to everyone else "
I say : This wont work anymore because the game has matured a lot, but it was viable when people didn't master the lower levels, and the same concept applies directly to anyone who is not an epic starcraft player as are these pros
Conclusion
Thanks to all the comments and very interesting discussions posted here, I have tweeked time and time again this article to best reflect the game of Starcraft. Arguments have been made for and against what I have originally posted, and changes were made to entire sections and ideas when I was convinced that I did not have the best answer. There still my be some advancement to be done, but I think it has reached an undeniable level of maturity Thanks to everyone who made a constructive comment and argument
Please read all comments and discussions before posting "You're wrong", and elaborate on your position, as well as posting proof and examples. I have rarely been convinced to change the article based on 2 line comments.
I hope this has helped you understand the game better! Post comments, suggestions, and discuss on the actual order of the levels! PLEASE IF YOU ARE GOING TO DISAGREE WITH THE PYRAMID – I am open to it, just bring some facts, examples and solid arguments. I will gladly change it if you can convince me (I am not that hard-headed!)
Budha
PS.: If anyone feels like pimping out the pyramid and make it look better, email me budhazerg@gmail.com
Change Log:
There was some talk about the Build being replaced. After some thought, I found it inappropriate. I think that the Build should stay here because that is what this step will focus on. I was hesitant on replacing it with something like "Solidness" or "Smoothness" but those two concepts are cover by other levels, as well as reaction after your build is complete. The "Build" step emphasizes on the early game and how important it is to launch you in the mid-game.
Edited the timings section to add some that manifest themselves in-game. This could be argued that it should be included in the "Information" section, but it is by no means at the bottom of the pyramid, so it has been included here. Plus, they actually fit quite nicely with the idea of a timing being a very small window of opportunity!
I tried being a bit more precise on what I meant by management, adding that it goes beyond reaction and applies when the build is far gone.
What about mechanics section
Changed guideline to approach
Interesting Discussions (Q&A) section added.
Suggestion to put video after picture was accepted
I kept all the original names because names are that important. Keep suggestion name changes, I will change them when I feel it is appropriate! :D
New picture
Edited information section a bit
Update on management section
Misconceptions section added
Added to conclusion
Removed skill level association
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I think this picture is kinda wrong...
Ofcourse in long macrogames it is right, but what happends if one or both of the players go 1-base or timing attack or smt. like that? Then the pyramid turns completely.
I think this picture should look like a hourglass.
But nice thread anyway.
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@Crytch
Obviously you will need to adjust play for very short games, but the concept remains. The pyramid should just be scaled down! Even in short games, say a 4gate vs 4gate, if you manage to outproduce your opponent, you will win, except that with that little income and production, it is easy to master so you automatically walk up the ranks.
The hourglass shape is pretty cool too, especially when you take into account that every game (or almost) has a stable "mid-game" point! But it's not the same topic!
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Great thread, absolutely right for the most part... but Crytch is right - certain games rely more heavily on one element than another. An extreme example - 6 pool is almsot exclusively about micro.
For most standard games, the pyramid is spot on.
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I agree with you for the most part. But as Day9 grinds into our skulls, "Timing is at the heart of great strategy." Timing sort of works hand-in-hand with knowledge, since timing is something you bring into a particular game.
I also diagree with those who claim this does not apply for short games. Like Budha said, if in a 4 gate vs 4 gate one manages to squeeze out a couple of extra units due to superior production, unless their micro is horrible they will probably win or get an advantage. Similarly, if they manage to hold off a 4 gate with one less zealot and two extra probes, their economy will push them in the lead.
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Looks pretty sweet and definitely lots of flash for a new player. There's a bit of overlap between control and force in my mind but it's your pyramid. Cheers, looks nice;.
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Great read. I believe everyone above is right, this applies more to normal games then to micro-oriented ones.
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Great thread. Love this idea.
However, I think the concept of "forcing" should be higher on the pyramid. It's a rather abstract concept, and Multi-tasking, in my experience, is more important than more and more advanced strategies.
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On August 11 2011 03:31 Budha wrote:
@Crytch
Obviously you will need to adjust play for very short games, but the concept remains. The pyramid should just be scaled down! Even in short games, say a 4gate vs 4gate, if you manage to outproduce your opponent, you will win, except that with that little income and production, it is easy to master so you automatically walk up the ranks.
The hourglass shape is pretty cool too, especially when you take into account that every game (or almost) has a stable "mid-game" point! But it's not the same topic!
Not rly, in short games production is a shit compared with micro and timings. If you have 4 racks pumping out marines and marauders, but your enemy hit a timing to roflstomp you, or just have much better micro you will loose, if you have a good production line or not.
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This is an interesting concept, but I don't know if it can apply to all players/races/situations. A more generalized, but accurate, pyramid would look like mechanics->scouting/game knowledge/timings/force.
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@Velra_G
You make a good point here, but I still think that it should remain there, because it's exactly that, Timing is at the heart of every GREAT play. I believe there is a lot more to consider in the lower levels than timing (it should come up in late diamond to masters lvl)
@Spacebob42
You can actually drop and harass quite easily with low APM, as long as you shift-queue. Especially for drops (although it's harder to save them). I had trouble with planting mechanics in there though. Any thoughts?
@KinJongChill
Mechanics are actually surprisingly up there. You can easily get to diamond with APM lower than 100
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I think it's cool and people will be over critical. Nice job.
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I disagree that the pyramid should be changed for 4-gates and 6pools; the pyramid is more of an overarching roadmap for learning the game, not specific actions for specific games. Obviously micro will help you more than economy if you get 6pooled. But big picture, it would be better to be good at economy than holding off 6pools. After you can inject without thinking or naturally hit 4s or whatever, then you can think about how to stutter step those marines or forcefield exactly the right amount of their army to kill.
The pyramid actually reflects how I was taught and progressed through the game quite accurately, actually, and gives a good guide for teaching someone else to do the same. Thanks for all the work you did!
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I think what you should do is color code the levels to link the ones that go hand-in-hand with one another. Just cause now it seems like there are too many things for a newer player to get the hang of and showing the links would make it easier for them. Other than that, I think it is quite good and will use it to help my friend who bought the game. Nice work
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Im not talking to change it for 6 pool or 4 gates. The 4 gate example came from budha first, not me. There are much more builds and strategys (which are NO allins or cheese) which are designed for earlygame harras, timingpushs and attacks then allins like fu*kn 6 pool or 4gate...
I just said imo the picture should look like a hourglass. For macro games the pic is perfect, but everything else its just wrong, whatever you say.
You will never be able to outproduce someone in early, if he has 100 times better timings and micro, so you will never win that game.
/edit: Im not trying to flame your thread or picture, i just try to give my feedback about what you could do better. If all ppl in this thread think i just try to troll, harras, flame or whatever should stop overreact like little kids. :p
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@Crytch
I plainly meant in a hypothetical case where you COULD produce more in a 4gate. Of course you can't, but if you forget to, it will be completely devastating.
I really think that saying "everything else is just wrong, whatever you say" might be too much of a closed statement. BTW I would love to elaborate on the hourglass design, but I see it applying more to the options that present themselves to you (in a reverse fashion, the hourglass would then zone in on your strategy).
I also still believe that it applies quite nicely to short games. You have very little occasion to actually screw up the lower sections in a short game, so you concentrate your efforts on the upper sections. As long as the bottom stay solid!
@Zestage
Thanks, the more this discussion goes on, I really think that this will be more of a teaching approach than anything else. I'd like to rephrase when I said it's a "guideline" and replace that with an "approach" to the game. I'll revise it tomorrow with the comments I get!
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Very nice guide Budha. And i think you have summed up everything about the game in about the correct order.
I have never really thought about the game in this sense. Putting everything in just 12 catagorys is very interesting. Really simplifies the game and shows new people what is important. I am a diamond player and id say im about at the 'build tier".
I have a few friends starting the game and i will definatly point them here.
Just one point did you mention anything on scouting. Maybe i missed it.
And i think someone tried to make the point of micro should be lower on the table or in the shape of a hourglass.
I would like too make the point that micro is not needed to make a good player. First you need the units to be able to micro. eg if you supplied blocked your self a few times and your opponent did not then he/she will have more.
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A great tool that highlights the important steps towards improving your game. I think one small change that could be made that might make it more clear for lower level players to use is to color code the pyramid. You mention three different levels, perhaps if you color coded those levels it would be a better visual tool for new players.
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"everything else is just wrong, whatever you say" might be too much of a closed statement.
Yeah, maybe. But honestly, for everything else then macro vs macro opening its right. May look harsh, but the all these macroparts which take a big part of your pic (like economy, production, knowledge, information) will be exchanged by micro, timings and management.
There are aggressive 2 racksopener where you "macro up" first 2 - 2.5 minutes and then the microfight allrdy begins. So im not sure if...
I also still believe that it applies quite nicely to short games. You have very little occasion to actually screw up the lower sections in a short game, so you concentrate your efforts on the upper sections.
...fits perfect.
As i wrote several times before, thats just my opinion. If you wanna design your pic and thread like a pyramid its your opinion. I just gave my shit. :p
And again, for macrogames your pic is done very well. 
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@Crytch
I think we understand each other :D
@scigrex &Darclite
Color coding is a good idea. I think I would separate the 3 first levels and the Management & above into two different categories. I think that there is a major break maybe not in concept, but in winning ratio that will occur at these places as you go up.
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This is similar to an acronym I came up with a long time ago, which is much simpler, but less thorough. E.M.I.T. Economy comes first, followed by Military (building units), followed by Intelligence (information gathering) and Technology. I think you'll find it fits nicely with your pyramid, and can be used in game to make sure you are not forgetting some aspect of strategy that could help you improve.
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I just said imo the picture should look like a hourglass. For macro games the pic is perfect, but everything else its just wrong, whatever you say.
I think the contention is that you see this as "what is most important to the success of a match" instead of "what is most important to the improvement of the player." I agree in a match an hourglass shape would make more sense.
This is about learning the game not playing a match though. Basically it means, for every hour you spend practicing, you'll get more wins by mastering the lower levels first before focusing on the higher level things.
At least that's the way I see it 
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Well, to have success matches is the way to improve players skill, or not?!
Ofc you also get better due to loose matches, but also due to win some...
Dunno why these "match win with short games or get better overall through 1 hour macrogames" conservation always have to start if someone is talking about early harras/pushs/attacks etc.
Imo (yeah i always have to type in my opinion - or these overreacting kids show up again ) this is total bullshit, you also get better by practising early harras and all the other shit i wrote before.....
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@Crytch
I'll have to agree with you at least on that point! I mean, "Cheese" (airquotes ftw!) and early pushes are an integral and very important part of the game. You can't rely on only winning past the 20 minute mark. I tried to take this into account when constructing this
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This looks really great - this should be something linked to new players looking to learn the game.
As has been mentioned, you should state that this is for standard games. When cheese happens, things are a bit different.
I very much like that you have micro listed so high up the ladder. Totally agree that it is overhyped.
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That's what I mean. You're focused on the short-term individual outcomes of particular games whereas this is meant to deal with overall trends. It's not saying you won't get better by practicing micro. It's saying that, assuming you've mastered neither, mastering macro will improve your win rate more than mastering micro.
This is like weather vs climate. Air conditioning will help you stay cool on days of hot weather, but moving to a cooler climate will mean you don't have to worry about it as much. You may still need AC for the days when the weather is hot, but you wouldn't need to spend as much on one and it wouldn't have to be as powerful to get the same end result: your comfort.
That being said, I agree that you shouldn't ignore any level of the pyramid. Maybe it should be seen more as a weight distribution. So yeah, spend some time practicing scouting, micro, etc., but spend MORE time making sure you have a solid foundation.
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The idea behind this is simply astonishing and this thread should be put on the Liquipedia. I have not time to read through the actual content but we can all help out to tweak that. Really cool of you to put take the time needed for this well-made post, kudos! <3
I'll go through it myself tomorrow and will respond with thoughts and constructive criticism!
EDIT: Just realized, I think "Solidness" should be a step rather than "Build". Solidness should imply in knowing how you can open (your builds) but also being able to respond in a solid fashion to, for example, an additional base, how many rax can 2 base support if I make marines? Being able to do the same opening 100 times in a row and being able to respond to your additional income is crucial in order to improve at around that level.
You've learned to make stuff, question is, how much can you make?
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Waaaaaaaaaaaah, budha agreed with me, now we can marry. ♥_♥
xD
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lots of love Crytch <3 XD
@Tryxtira
I actually think that is a great point, I will be modifying that tomorrow along with more things. I'd like to change that name though... I don't necessarily like "Build" but honestly, i like it better than "solidness" simply because it's very vague and sounds like something made up... I'd love some thoughts on that level, I'll look to improve on it.
Also, I **think** I've noticed that people talk mostly about where they are at. Am I wrong? I'd like to elaborate on that somehow.... It was really easy for me to actually talk about lower levels, but you can see the difficulty I had with that last one!
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Great diagram. Agree with the main points it makes. There may be overlap between knowledge and information ('knowledge' doesn't just mean knowledge of the diagram, right?) And WTF is dusting?
But in either case, very useful to aspiring players.
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On August 11 2011 05:58 Budha wrote:
@Tryxtira
I actually think that is a great point, I will be modifying that tomorrow along with more things. I'd like to change that name though... I don't necessarily like "Build" but honestly, i like it better than "solidness" simply because it's very vague and sounds like something made up... I'd love some thoughts on that level, I'll look to improve on it.
How about "tightness"? It's not "made up" in that people already use it, e.g. "tightening up builds."
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Hi Budha,
I like the idea of trying to structure the learning aspect of the game.
But I think the idea of a static pyramid is not suitable. It only helps when you go through the process the first time. But it is a starting point to developed structured methods in improving in starcraft 2.
I think you should improve to a method which can be run in cycles and defines input and output to the next steps and maybe integrate a middle where you can store all you improvements.
This would visualize the neverending process of improving in starcraft 2
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On August 11 2011 06:08 cogwheel42 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 11 2011 05:58 Budha wrote:
@Tryxtira
I actually think that is a great point, I will be modifying that tomorrow along with more things. I'd like to change that name though... I don't necessarily like "Build" but honestly, i like it better than "solidness" simply because it's very vague and sounds like something made up... I'd love some thoughts on that level, I'll look to improve on it. How about "tightness"? It's not "made up" in that people already use it, e.g. "tightening up builds."
Other words...
Fluidity
Smoothness
Steadiness
Consistency?
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@Crytch
I think what the size of each layer is meant to represent is order of importance in learning to play SC, not winning a specific game.
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@ Dizzy You can expand the descriptions of each section, I explain the difference between knowledge and Info. as well as "Dusting" and why I called it Dusting If you still have questions, don't hesitate! :D
@cogwheel I already like it better, but somehow sounds dirty!
@Chiller I agree that you always come back and cycle through the same aspects when improving, although I found that these cycles always come back to this analytic structure. It seems like an arrow from each level going back to the first would be appropriate? Any other have thoughts on this?
@Grimsong +1 Consistency, altought I would like to keep it related to Build Order... Maybe Build Consistency?
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The pyramid is similar to what I believe. Even if you play an early game rush style, you still need to understand economy and production. For example, two essential elements of 4-gate are cutting probes and chronoboosting WG instead of economy. I suppose you could learn the build like dogma and execute it like a robot without understanding why you cut probes and chrono WG, but if you want to improve overall, you need to understand how a 4 gate impacts your economy.
I am a mere gold player  . My approach is to treat every game as an opportunity to improve. I spent a looooong time in bronze before I started improving. What I did was load up YABOT (build order tester) and practiced just making drones, expansions and spending all the resources that came in. I didn't play ladder for about a week, until I could macro off four bases and spend all the resources.
When I started playing on the ladder, having only the ability to macro in a vacuum (no harass) I got promoted in one day to silver. Gold came soon after by working on protecting economy and macroing (turtling).
The next step for me is to be able to ALWAYS macro while engaging. Right now I'm about fifty-fifty: when I reinforce, I usually win, when I focus on micro, I usually lose with a couple k in mins.
I only move my army after injecting, making ovies, then spending all my resources or larva. I believe when I have this down solid, I will be in Plat.
TL;DR - You improve by focusing effort on the most important things in the proper order. The pyramid is a pretty good approximation of the proper order of elements that need to be mastered to improve.
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You are mostly right, but there are army compositions that are very very unforgiving where one mismicro or 2sec delay in reaction / micro WILL cost you the game.
Examples are Ling / Infestor compositions where the Infestors lack too far behind the lings, you attacking / using infestors too late / out of range will get all your lings roasted in 3 seconds. Not neural parasiting all siege tanks in range will cost you the game as well as one single tank will shred all of your infestors NPing the other tanks.
Another example are mutas that are not babysitted every second against Thors or you blindmoving Mutas across the map when they move across a bulk of stimmed marines.
This list is endless. Basically some unit comps are very very unforgiving. Well you could argue that one should stick to more forgiving unit comps at the lower levels, like Roach + X :-D
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I really think that its hard to define skills as a pyramid. For instance, you could have excellent mechanics (macro) and not beat someone with worse mechanics and execution. For instance Boxer, who is not particularly inspiring in his macro, will beat other players with tip-top macro because of his execution and creativity. Skills run parallel, synergyzing with each other, not necessarily building off each other
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This is a great tool for coaching purposes and I will direct all my newbie friends to this thread when they ask me how to improve.
I spend hours explaining to people that they need to stop trying to micro like MKP and focus on just making more stuff.
Unfortunately, most people are always looking for the easy way to the top rather than how they can work harder on the most miniscule changes to slightly improve their game.
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@Morghaine: Good point. I will take note of it and try to work that in. Because it is true that mutas demand attention and you just don't run into a tank line - although this could fit into knowledge. I will consider this in my revision, thanks for bringing it up
@CeriseCherries This is by no means a skill measurement technique. Not its aim at all :D
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On August 11 2011 06:14 Budha wrote:
@Grimsong +1 Consistency, altought I would like to keep it related to Build Order... Maybe Build Consistency?
This is fine however Consistency is not actually synonymous with what I had in mind. Consistency in your buildorders are one thing but that does not take in mind the decisions such as how many unit-producing structures are needed. Maybe Soundness is a better way to put it?
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This is a cool idea and with some tweaking would gel well with Cecil's 'How to improve efficiently' guide.
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On August 11 2011 06:52 CeriseCherries wrote:
I really think that its hard to define skills as a pyramid. For instance, you could have excellent mechanics (macro) and not beat someone with worse mechanics and execution. For instance Boxer, who is not particularly inspiring in his macro, will beat other players with tip-top macro because of his execution and creativity. Skills run parallel, synergyzing with each other, not necessarily building off each other
Boxer may or may not have the most inspiring macro, but you can't argue that without at least around the same level of macro as his opponents he would be taking games of many good players. Obviously it's hard to judge the "size" of each level of the pyramid in relation to how important it is but you can micro your first 4 hellions as much as you want in a zvt, kill 300 lings, then realize you have 2000 minerals when they die. Meanwhile your opponent put down a spire and pumped 15 mutas while you were doing all that damage. Basically I really agree with this pyramid and as several TLers mentioned it was pretty much exactly the way I learned. All the micro in the world (usually) cant save you if his army is 3x your size (Obviously there are game to game exceptions but in a broader sense I believe this is true).
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I would prefer:
From base to top
Mechanics + Show Spoiler +When you start with RTS, a focus on mechanics will always lead to the best long term results. Instead of focusing on what to do, you should be focusing on doing things efficiently and eventually, inefficiently for better timings.
I always liken every action in SC2 to an item in a grocery store, and you executing an action to buying that item. If the goal is to win, or have the right items to cook your dinner, you will almost always have better chances if you can choose 200 items to buy rather than 20.
And later on, it doesn't matter if you choose 80 items completely perfectly if you're still missing the 60 items necessary to cook your meal. (It doesn't matter if you make 80 perfect decisions if you didn't have enough time to make the other 60 decisions that were also completely necessary to win.)
Hence the real-time in RTS.
Understanding the game + Show Spoiler +If the previous stage was the boring humdrum part, this is the part that gets the most attention. Here's where you learn why spawns on certain maps matter. Where you start drawing relationships between choosing action X in situation Y resulting in Z.
Here's where you get many players who honestly should be focusing on their mechanics trying to figure out what they should be doing. Let's theorycraft ZZTP v PPTT! Seriously, if it takes you a full second to make an scv, you're doing it wrong. Learn your mechanics!
But if you've got all your execution down pat, here's where the strategy in the RTS comes in.
Super-efficiency + Show Spoiler +This is the shortcut step that really should not be taken so early in a player's development if he plans on being the best. Here's where you time having X units out at time Y. Optimizing everything from what second you send out a peon out so that it has the money to build as it arrives to how many peons on gas to even what second in the game you should be doing a second scout.
It's very easy to start with super-efficiency and start posting results that are not very indicative of your true skill level. You may simply be carried by a build or a timing. One patch can completely ruin your win rate.
Metagaming + Show Spoiler +Once you have learned super-efficiency, here's where using deliberate inefficiencies can come into play. Or cutting corners because you know your opponent.
TLO saving 550 minerals before throwing down 4 rax simultaneously?
F91 waiting until 1 minute after the 3hat lurker sling allin timing before going bananas on IdrA?
Taking 4 bases before you make a single bling/roach/muta because it's GoOdy?
Shoot, if your opponent isn't water and insists on having a very deliberate playstyle... his loss for being so predictable and so counterable.
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@Crytch I apologize if my post came out agressively. I was not making a statement about you as a person or the quality of your perspective, I was simply disagreeing. Though you do make a really good point that the pyramid isn't as simple as "Start at the bottom and tunnel vision focus on that, ignoring the rest". There has to be a kind of fluidity to it. But you CAN say, "I will micro my lings against that 6 pool if it comes, but unless it comes I'm 15 hatching and getting ALL my injects this game..." until it becomes second nature. But cheese and early aggression IS a valid strategy and shouldn't be minimized like it tends to on TL.
@cogwheel You summed up my perspective better than I could have myself! I guess it's like a business. You can focus on a strategy for each department and getting results on a department level, AND you can focus on a big picture "what is my business doing and how am I making money doing it (and really, how is it growing?)?". In this analogy, the idea of the pyramid suits the latter, but not the former so much.
On August 11 2011 06:09 Chiller274 wrote:
I think you should improve to a method which can be run in cycles and defines input and output to the next steps and maybe integrate a middle where you can store all you improvements.
This would visualize the neverending process of improving in starcraft 2
I LOVE this idea... you have the pyramid showing the "big picture" and the cycle that kind of breaks it down and applies the theory to reality.
Maybe like a workout kind of system? "For 5 games, focus on injects every 30 seconds. For the next game, focus on spending all your money all the time, even if you have to drop thousands of producing buildings. Next game, scout the enemies base every minute on the minute. Next game, micro your units everytime they are in battle, even to the point of forgetting to inject and macro."
Next it's 3 games of injects, 3 games of spending money, 1 game of scouting, 1 game of micro.
Next 1 game of injects, 1 game of spending money, 5 games of scouting, 5 games of micro.
I'm oversimplifying it, but I'm brainstorming at this point.
Thoughts? (besides "Wow Zestage, that's a long post!")
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I really like your pyramid, many beginners get overwhelmed by the sheer armount of different aspects you need to master in order to get better and focus too much on the wrong ones instead of working on their basics first (vods/casters and their focus on commentary do the rest).
I personally feel like your steps "force" and "management" should be more on the same level. You don't even need to be a high level player when people start using basic/easy tricks like dropping something in your main and attacking the natural with the rest of the army or running a few lings in your mineral line etc etc, nothing crazy micro or multitasking related. Forcing the zerg to not drone too much is pretty important, but all the other aspects you mentioned in your step "force" seem less important to me than the things you describe in "management".
Forcing the opponent to make certain units etc can benefit you ofc, nevertheless having basic knowledge about units (like scouting + making the right counter units) has been covered in steps 3 and 4 (knowledge and information) already. If you can manage any harass decently while still making the right units definitely outways forcing the opponent to do something (like getting detection/anti air).
However, that's just my personal opinion based on my experience, but something you should consider since you put "management" not only one step higher than "force", but completely to a new level (you divided it into basic and advanced steps).
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I like it, but I don't agree with it. For instance, Micro is what wins you games. The other steps will set you up for that win, but micro (which, btw, i would set the same as "management") is what in the end will pull you through. Therefore I would put equally amount of importance on them.
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The best example that your lower steps are right is Phoenix. Watching him play always makes my jaw drop. He can get away most games with pure ling and sometimes blings (or he used to, on KR GM ladder). He nowadays actually discovered a ressource called "gas" and has implemented it in his play (playing Muta Bling Sling most of the time).
But he used to produce pure lings and has crushed HT / Zealot / Archon comps with Lings just because his production and economy is so superior to everyone else's.
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REALLY liked your post Budha. I featured it on our site as well with slightly better clarity and color I actually like the concepts you touched upon, and if you look at the rearrangement I made, that might actually be more helpful and encourage people to read through the whole thing if you post the videos first.
Here is what it looks like when the videos are presented first. I know that here it only appears as a link, but if you label the videos clearly as you have (kinda), it won't be an issue.
http://blizzforums.com/showthread.php?30801-The-Starcraft-Pyramid-(TL-budha)-BlizzForums-Featured-Article
@ mods: I am sorry if this is not allowed, but I was merely showcasing how this article would look if presented differently to help the OP. Also, when are we getting embedded youtube? :D
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@Excludos Please provide more input. I feel like you did not really read the whole article. "For instance, Micro is what wins you games." This seems like quite the statement to make, can you elaborate?
@Fairwell Thanks for the excellent feedback! One of the more constructive! I completely agree with you with the fact that you don't need "that much micro" to harass (or to master the Force phase). I think that what I had in mind with the management phase is a bit more finesse than what I actually explained, I will try to precise that. The "Management" part was actually inspired by one of the Day9Daylies, where Day9 explained that base management was the big difference between a Diamond and a Masters player. I tried to elaborate on that, and that is why I would like to leave it at the top level of the pyramid (I will be color-coding it today)
@Emperor_Earth I will be revising the post and adding mechanics in there in a special way. I think that mechanics should not be a section on its own, but every step in the pyramid should assume the mechanics to perform it. Your next three sections are pretty much a sum-up of the whole thing. I feel like you did not read the descriptions? Especially if you mention MetaGaming - Which I cover in the final step!
@Chiller and Zestage This seems to be the big problem here, no cycle! I will add on an analogy in the "Using the pyramid" section, translating it to a waterfall. You are at the bottom, swimming your way up, and if you stop swimming, you will just fall back to the lower levels! I think it really shows the recursive aspect in Starcraft and is more adequate to the structure, as it keeps it linear, which is A LOT easier to follow if you're trying to improve of coach.
@Morghaine I LOOOVE that example Might just feature it in the edit!
@ Xacuotr I'll take a look and work in what I liked! I don't think admins will have a problem with it, because I think it will help me improve the quality of this Guide!
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This is a great guide, it shows very well where your in-game priorities and focus should be:
Economy/production > Scouting > Micro
This applies to all strategies and builds, including the four-gate. It may be easy to do the economy/production part of the 4-gate, but forgetting to reinforce from the proxy pylon is the most critical mistake one can make while 4-gating. It should be your highest priority, even if it's easy and takes little time to do.
Everyone is always scared of looking away from the battle, but the truth is, it is almost aways worth it. A few exceptions do apply, mainly when fighting against siege tanks (with anything), banelings (with marines, sentries or lings), or controlling a sentry who's job is to forcefield the ramp at a critical moment.
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I am a Platinum Protoss. I've heard numerous times that you can get into masters purely by mastering macro (constant production of workers and units). I can definitely agree that my macro is still sub-par, and I still struggle with mastering what Day9 calls "The Tap". The thing is, very rarely do I look at my loss and see that my opponent had better macro and won because of that
PvZ -- if I macro macro macro, zerg will macro macro macro even faster. He will get 2-3 more bases than me, and his broodlords or infestors will win over my deathball.
Now what do I see in your pyramid? Pressuring zerg -- Force -- is step 8. Trying to micro around infestors and broodlords (both screw up a lot with unit movement) -- Management/Micro-management -- are even further
PvT -- multiple drops into strong timing attack is what's killing me the most. (Although constant streams of mmm when I forget to order units during the battle are admittedly another big reason for my looses -- and that's just my bad macro). Banshee pressure and allins with thors are also screwing me hard. Even if my opponent builds only one banshee the whole game, it forces me stay on defensive.
PvP -- well, let's not even go there.
I guess that rant was pointed not at you, but at those who say that lower leagues can be mastered purely by macro. But your idea of a pyramid also suggests that.
I definitely see the learning value in your post though, and might probably use it to plan on what to focus in my SC practice. Thanks for your effort!
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You could use the words "polish" or "refine".
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@Alexj It's one thing to note that your opponents macro is not as good as your, and quite another to explode ahead of his. I truly believe that with pure macro, you should be able to win most of your matches (not all of course!). Your PvZ example is a good example of this. The zerg will indeed be able to get 2-3bases ahead of you, but a Master Protoss should be able to max out at the same time as a platinum zerg on his 2-3 bases and completely steamroll him.
I see that you mentioned multiple drops into TIMING attacks. After multiple drops timing attacks do not exist anymore. They are simply pushes, especially in the platinum and lower leagues. Drops are very hard to deal with because the mechanics required to counter them are much harder to master than the ones required to do them, but it does come into the Information section!
@Sbrubbles I like the part of not looking at the battles I think I'll mention that briefly!
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A really great Guide to improve your game !
I totally agree with you and in the importance of these steps.
A lots of Pro Gamers say that you have to struggle to become a better player!
If you only want to get into master as fast as possible just try out one all in build after another and play a lots of games. But this doesn´t make you better overall.
If you want to become a really good player just follow the piramid step by step. If you are training one thing enough, that you can do it blindly, go over to another one.
This piramid don´t show a generell concept, how games develop. If somebody want to 6 pool or 4 gate you just say gg and search for another game. Who cares about allinners in the ladder?
I will definitly try this out in the next few weeks.
A lot of thanks for this thread!
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On August 11 2011 22:32 Budha wrote:@Morghaine I LOOOVE that example Might just feature it in the edit!
Ya. He also opens 14gas/14pool, getting speed, leaving one drone on gas EVERY SINGLE GAME in every matchup. He also almost always gets a macro hatch up at 25 supply (100% against Protoss, interestingly enough). Which, obviously, you need when your production and economy management is up there.
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IMO this is one of many valid ways of approaching the game. My only problem with your model is your section describing timings. You say that timings are always pre-planned attacks that exploit your opponent's build. While this is true in the early game, there are a lot of timing attacks that rely on the outcome of various events in game. Killing workers with a hellion drop or sniping a tech structure can create timing windows which previously wouldn't have existed.
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I think the Pyramid is mostly correct but it misses the most important aspect of SC2 which is Speed.
I have played RTS for 20 years, 14 of those online. My APM is around 50-60 up from 35 in beta and I am never fast enough to do even a fraction of the things I wish to do. If I try to micro my macro goes to hell, if I ignore micro by whole army gets wiped out. So APM really puts a hardcap on your ability to progress in the game.
So the bottom of the Pyramid should be speed. Without enough speed you cannot really do anything of the above.
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Interesting concepts budha, I agree that economy and production are the most important ^^
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On August 12 2011 03:59 MockHamill wrote:
I think the Pyramid is mostly correct but it misses the most important aspect of SC2 which is Speed.
Speed is actually indirectly part of most steps of the pyramid, even things like information and knowledge (processing information using knowledge). You also need speed for production and economy, as both are not considered "mastered" when there's a lack of speed.
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Nice post budha, I totally agree with most of it.
But something special concerning Zerg: How are we supposed to manage economy without good scouting?
Terrans and Protoss may constantly produce and keep money low to have a solid fundament. But that's not possible for Zerg. What do you think about this?
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Agree mostly, however timing attacks are not always pre-planned. Good players adjust the timing of their attack ingame based on scouting. Basically "Information" is a prerequisite to employ "timing"
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@gurrpp True, Didn't pay attention to that point Will add it in
@schnullerbacke13 I guess I really just wanted to stress out the point that timings are so up there and demand alot of skills. I agree with you, I will try and clarify
@ernieohneBert Zerg is the particular race where Larva is also a ressource. Unfortunatly, the only answer to this problem before the scouting is to approach zerg as you would a terran or protoss. Simply stay on top of your macro, and produce both drones and units at the same time to start out. I still think this approach is valid, simply because of the low level of play when you are still at that point in your hike up!
Thx tang, means a lot specially since you coach so much and witness this first hand!
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Economy->Knowledge->Production->Information->Army->Control->Force->Build->Management->Micro-Management->Timings->Dusting
In my opinion I feel that this order feels more "right" I guess.
Economy is duh. But I feel without knowledge of WHAT these units do, production serves no purpose. I've played a ZvT when I was starting out where I was 4 base vs 2 base terran. I mass produced roaches, thinking its a fairly well round unit (like the protoss stalker). I maxed out much earlier than the terran, producing far more units. I send my units in, he has marauders and tanks. I lose the game, because though I have FAR production, but his units, thanks to superior knowledge over come mine.
I think control and force take precedence over build, as we've said, that this pyramid is more over towards the importance of a long macro game. The ability to apply pressure and control max armies feels more important in a macro game then getting a stargate after your second gateway.
I feel the pyramid can't be applied to short games, as production would be of little importance in a 6 pool
Either way, I think it's a good pyramid to start people off, just nit picking what I think is more important, sharing ideas all that jazz. But maybe it's better to combine groups? I feel that by making such small groups, that it becomes very specific to only the "ideal" macro situation, and leaves little variance.
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On August 12 2011 05:05 sas911 wrote:
Economy is duh. But I feel without knowledge of WHAT these units do, production serves no purpose.
I don't think so. You can just make lings and blings as I said and just shit all over your opponent till he dies (blings breaking walls zerglings killing off the rest). Everyone can a-move that takes no knowledge and if your production and eco are far superior he can micro, know and build order all day long to no avail.
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Hey Budha. It's Sparky. Great job on the pyramid!
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@sas911 I actually use to feel this way until I got to a certain level. Fun story: I was in a forum and a fellow zerg asked me what is a good strategy vs Terran. He was platinum. I answered with "Out macro him, it will not matter". Naturally this sparked a discussion, so we set off to prove it. We found a typical platinum player (around 20th) and I played him. The strategy of choice was roach hydras, and i went on to win the game producing ONLY roaches and Hydras
The point you made on build vs Force and Control - I completely agree! If it wasn't for a simple thing: is that it is sooooooo easy to steal a professional build, that it will actually help you more than the rest. Without this, I would have placed it after force and control.
The problem with combining groups - That i found - Is that it makes it overwhelming to actually steadily progress, as you are overwhelmed with information.
I know I've criticized you a lot It just so happens I've given it much thought since I just revised it. You make great points, one of the more constructive comments!
- Thanks Sparky!
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Great article , now I know on what I should focus
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I just sent you a pimped pyramid, I hope you like it.
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I would trade "dusting" by "Ph.D.".
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I got to masters league with steps 1-6, therefore I think there is a major flaw in this.
Also step 10.
Edit; Also want to say, my apm avg is 50-70
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Mm I don't know about this, PvP and ZvZ even at gold/plat league is pretty micro-heavy and management is something you need even in plat & diamond against muta harass and terran drops.
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great post, thanks dude !
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Seems like you forgot section 0: Strategy.
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OP is obviously not playing Zerg.
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OP, good job with the post! Explaining the various parts and why some are more important than others would definitely help guide newer players who don't know where to start.
I definitely agree that the whole concept of timing and especially "timing pushes" is overrated. In any league below diamond, timing isn't going to be the difference between breaking someone's defense or losing your whole army for nothing. It's much more important to just know when to commit to an attack or when to back off, depending on what you see from your opponent.
However, I think that management should be considered a lot more important.
This is when you will get harassed, you will lose bases, you will be overwhelmed by the amount of stuff going on. Management is keeping your cool.
"Keeping your cool" is incredibly important. Regardless of what level of play you're at, you can't get flustered because of an early attack or drop. Yes, it's difficult to always be perfectly unaffected and respond to everything at once, but if you let drops and such disrupt your play to a large extent, then it can really counteract everything else you had been doing right up to that point.
I'm not sure where management should be on the pyramid, but I believe it should be considerably more important.
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Budha, I will give you MASS respect for this post, in terms of time spent on it. You clearly spent a lot of effort both in planning and in writing it. However, I disagree with it completely.
Not only can you sacrifice a lower part to gain an advantage for the higher part, but a player that is far superior in, say, game decisions and control, like Goody, will beat a player who has better macro, like we see Goody do with his 5 queued marines. Players with near perfect macro and economy management lose to goody all the time because he makes better decisions than them.
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This is a great tool, because a lot of new players will suck at a lot of things, and this will allow them to focus their practice on the most important concepts first.
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information is way more important than economy
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On August 14 2011 06:39 freetgy wrote:
information is way more important than economy
Say you had your map hacks on and only have like 40 drones.
Now is information more important then economy?
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this is great good for tracking progress.
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On August 14 2011 06:44 MonkSEA wrote:Show nested quote +On August 14 2011 06:39 freetgy wrote:
information is way more important than economy Say you had your map hacks on and only have like 40 drones. Now is information more important then economy?
Look at your opponents base. No attack incoming. Make 30 drones.
So yeah, it is.
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On August 14 2011 22:07 mandingo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 14 2011 06:44 MonkSEA wrote:On August 14 2011 06:39 freetgy wrote:
information is way more important than economy Say you had your map hacks on and only have like 40 drones. Now is information more important then economy? Look at your opponents base. No attack incoming. Make 30 drones. So yeah, it is.
No, it is not more important, and you almost said it directly in your statement. You used the information to get a bigger economy. The information is the tool that lets you get the economy, because with the better economy, you can win the game.
If information was more important than economy for winning the game, then all you would have to do to win every game of starcraft is turn on a maphack, but this is not true. If you are a very good zerg and know how to manage your economy and production, then having a map hack will win you every game, because you know what is coming and you are able to manage your production and economy accordingly. Zerg definitely has a higher use for information than the other races, but it's not more important than economy or production.
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@aookami, thats actualyl pretty good I think Ill do that in next revison
@thaniri Well... srsly... I don't know what to say... You really really did not understand this article even a little bit I mean.. this basically says you can get to masters with steps 1-6 with average APM of 50-70... And you say thats wrong... but thats what you are? Anyways, read the article plz if you have not.
@pingas startegy is actually included in the "Information" part. I will take note to actually add emphasis on it
@mandingo I am actually a zerg player. 1-0 me
@satoros That is actually a pretty good point. I really do think that "keeping your cool" is actually a very important part. Althought, the Management does not uniquely focus on this. Keeping your cool will include keeping up with the previous steps under pressure. I will definatly rephrase the management.
@bigbeau You are giving some very very very high level examples here. These players you mention obviously mastered preety much all of this stuff. Again, this isnt a set of RULEs, it is a suggestion, a guideline, a tool, whatever you want to call it. PS.: thx for the props
@freetgy Unless you bring anything else to the conversation, I will just have to replay "No it isn't" as we have proved time and time again in this post.
@Azzu Thanks, I think you got the jist of what I'm saying :D
I can't stress this enough: THIS IS NOT A SET OF RULES. It is a mere guideline, an wide-view approach to the game. It is a tool to help you underatand the game and make progress, to help you coaching, to figure out the fundamental problems with your game. Pros have basically mastered everything there is in here. And once more, the upper levels can exist without the lower ones, I'm just saying it will diminish their efficiency. Most of you actually have to read the article before posting please. Of course better micro can win a game. 1 blink stalker can take on infinity ultralisks. That's not the point.
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answer this question?(via youtube)
Me: how can you coach if you're not on GM?
Budha: Is this a serious question?
Me: Yes, i'm sorry if I dont posted on TL or offended you. But I think you have to be a pro gamer to teach how to be one. I coached a friend when I was plat. The guy is masters playing on keyd team now, but I realized 2 months later I said a lot of shit while coaching him.
IMO people can find their mistakes but dont know how to fix it. The pyramid points all things you could do wrong in a SC2 game, i've seen a lot of threads with guides here, they are all good, but they wont tell you how to fix it.
Once you know all the concepts listed on your pyramid, you're on diamond. Then you have to fix/polish your gameplay to go past masters. So far the only guy who teaches how to fix your mistakes is day nine. Or you learn by yourself.
Don't say "I have to improve", you have to do something, like next game to fix stopping SCV production I will press the 5 key every 10 seconds.
I'm stuck in diamond. I dont want to be that guy who has 2000+ ladder wins and is still on diamond.
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@DW-Unrec
Thanks for posting here, Youtube really isn't the place to do so BTW, no offence taken, I actually wanted to know if it was a serious question or a troll
Even though this isn't really in relation to the topic, I will try to show my position on it as clearly as I can, but I will keep it brief because this isn't the place to discuss it (You can PM me if you want to keep talking ) Though I might write a "Basic Coaching Misconception" article soon or something of that fashion, which will be the place to discuss it.
Anyways.
I would like to point out that the pyramid is a simple tool. It will not help you on it's own (I just updated the OP to clarify this).
On the other hand, I do believe that anyone has the ability to help coach anyone. Although, not every one SHOULD. There is a huge difference between analyzing a game and actually playing it. Do you see day9 in the GSL? No. Not because he can't out-think players, he just can't keep up with it (for many reasons) Another example is Nazgul (or any other team coach). They might not be the best players on the team, but they can certainly point out fundamental mistakes and help their team improve.
What I mean to say is that the GrandMaster status will obviously help A LOT when coaching, but it is not a prerequisite. I mean, I don't think a bronze player can help a Master player! But - and I think most players have this problem - There is a huge difference between knowing what to do and actually doing it (or remembering to do it). Someone might have great game-sense, knowledge, and insight when watching - but can't keep up with his thoughts!
Try it yourself, get a diamond buddy and look at your game with him. He will definitely point out things you haven't seen, and it will spark a discussion. Just that might help you improve.
Now for Day9's quote. This is perfect. I totally agree with it. And the pyramid won't help you here! This is why some people are coaches, some people are casters and some people are players! A coach will help you identify precisely what you can do to actually improve. The pyramid will tell you WHERE to look, not what to look at!
I hope this helps, I will limit myself to this here. PM me if you want to discuss it further, or see if I can actually help you in-game
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Great thread very insightful =) i think this will help a lot of people!
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You're rite, lets not turn this threat into a coach discussion. I think the guide is good and usefull. But remove some of the spoilers.
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What do you mean remove some of the spoilers? Leave all the text open?
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![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/hpfEm.png)
Hi, this is my 3rax.
Bottom up.
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Care to explain this?
The pyramid is a general concept, it does not apply to a specific build, nor should it, or it would be besides the point (then it would simply be precisely that, a build!)
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you need a build to play at silver level and you need to be able to scout and react ETC in gold level (atleast on EU)
its wrong in other ways aswell, it really changes depending on what strats and styles are flavor of the month
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On August 15 2011 00:07 azzu wrote:Show nested quote +On August 14 2011 22:07 mandingo wrote:On August 14 2011 06:44 MonkSEA wrote:On August 14 2011 06:39 freetgy wrote:
information is way more important than economy Say you had your map hacks on and only have like 40 drones. Now is information more important then economy? Look at your opponents base. No attack incoming. Make 30 drones. So yeah, it is. No, it is not more important, and you almost said it directly in your statement. You used the information to get a bigger economy. The information is the tool that lets you get the economy, because with the better economy, you can win the game. If information was more important than economy for winning the game, then all you would have to do to win every game of starcraft is turn on a maphack, but this is not true. If you are a very good zerg and know how to manage your economy and production, then having a map hack will win you every game, because you know what is coming and you are able to manage your production and economy accordingly. Zerg definitely has a higher use for information than the other races, but it's not more important than economy or production.
I'm not sure how this made any sense in your head, but it seems completely illogical in mine. If economy was more important than information, then why would people waste time scouting? The drone would be better off mining, wouldn't it? You can't blindly build workers forever and expect to win. Information tells you whether or not you should be building an economy, an army, and/or tech; therefore, it is more important. Although information is more important than economy and production, this doesn't mean that economy and production are nonessential to winning.
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@Buzerio Really, you guys have to stop doing this. read the article. PLEASE!! That is just hate your spamming there. At least explain yourself.
@bransom Srsly. Read. The. Whole. Thing. Who ever said that economy was better in every situation than information? Cmon, don't be dumb! No one actually thinks that! This isn't black & White. Of course you need to scout with a drone! Just read the damn thing and then post.
Although information is more important than economy and production, this doesn't mean that economy and production are nonessential to winning.
Did you ever stop to think of the opposite? That's what your preaching
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On August 15 2011 10:40 Budha wrote:
@Buzerio Really, you guys have to stop doing this. read the article. PLEASE!! That is just hate your spamming there. At least explain yourself.
I am saying, that you need to focus on working on your micro in plat you can just wait till your masters, you need to focus on learning a variety of builds in silver, you cant wait till plat, I dissagree with the leauges you have put for things, you cannot see that people may belive that the order should be diffrent and presume I havent read the thread, you should be more open minded and stop presuming everyone who has a diffrent opinion hasnt read the article
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@Buzerio
Ok, I will remove that part of the post, since people tend to misinterpret it. Btw "I havent read the thread, you should be more open minded and stop presuming everyone who has a diffrent opinion hasnt read the article" means you ahve NOT read the thread. GJ... please read the article. I am very open minded if you actually look at this thread, you will see that. But it really is obvious when someone did not read the article.
I'm sorry if it came out aggressive, it was not my intention. But you are stating stuff that I explicitly speak of in the article, or at least in the latest revision.
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This is really awesome.
I think Management and Force could be switched though.
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@TheTurk
I have been getting this a lot lately, considering it. But I don't know if I was just unclear in my way of explaining it? Could you elaborate please?
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On August 15 2011 10:40 Budha wrote:@Buzerio Really, you guys have to stop doing this. read the article. PLEASE!! That is just hate your spamming there. At least explain yourself. @bransom Srsly. Read. The. Whole. Thing. Who ever said that economy was better in every situation than information? Cmon, don't be dumb! No one actually thinks that! This isn't black & White. Of course you need to scout with a drone! Just read the damn thing and then post. Show nested quote +Although information is more important than economy and production, this doesn't mean that economy and production are nonessential to winning. Did you ever stop to think of the opposite? That's what your preaching
Give me a scenario where economy is more important than information. In any given scenario, knowing what your opponent can/can't do will allow you to know what you can/can't do. In a game of limited information, scouting is far more important than setting up an economy for the late game. And yes, I did stop and think about the opposing view, but as I clearly stated, I think information is more important than both economy and production. Obviously an economy, and production are necessary, but you don't know how much, nor what you need to produce unless you gather information.
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@bransom This is going to be my last reply to you.
"You can't blindly build workers forever and expect to win. Information tells you whether or not you should be building an economy, an army, and/or tech; therefore, it is more important."
I will use your own Sophism against you. So here it goes:
Even if you have a maphack and you can perfectly respond to what your opponent is doing, you cannot produce anything if you have 2 workers. Ergo, economy is more important.
Point made? I don't think so, but apparently, it's enough for you.
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On August 15 2011 11:36 Budha wrote:
@bransom This is going to be my last reply to you.
"You can't blindly build workers forever and expect to win. Information tells you whether or not you should be building an economy, an army, and/or tech; therefore, it is more important."
I will use your own Sophism against you. So here it goes:
Even if you have a maphack and you can perfectly respond to what your opponent is doing, you cannot produce anything if you have 2 workers. Ergo, economy is more important.
Point made? I don't think so, but apparently, it's enough for you.
If you have two workers, you aren't perfectly responding to the information gathered. If you were maphacking, you'd know how many workers you could make, how much of an army, and what that army composition consists of based on what your opponent was doing. Ergo, information is more important. You're using a scenario where you don't use the information, making your point invalid.
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@bransom Sry, THIS is going to be my last reply to you. Learn what a Sophism is, and stop using them.
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I think it should be "Defending cheese" up to high master, then maybe some of the other stuff, bronze to diamond is just different skill levels of cheese in my experience.
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@ziktomini haha definitely defending cheese is there. Although Cheese is too much of a tagged word to actually include in this, and this should apply to every game, including cheese. Hypothetically of course! Also, try avoiding using the ranks. I have removed them from the post because they brought too much confusion
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On August 15 2011 11:42 Budha wrote:
@bransom Sry, THIS is going to be my last reply to you. Learn what a Sophism is, and stop using them.
It's ignorant of you to call me a sophist without disproving my logic. Your point was that if you had unlimited information (i.e. maphack), and two drones, then you would still lose. My point was that if you had two drones, you probably weren't responding correctly to the information gathered.
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@bransom A Sophism is by definition false logic, no need to disprove it. You are clearly following business speak and radical approaches models.
We will just have to agree to disagree on this one, unfortunately, it has become out of context, and I will have to ask you to stop, as we are tracking besides the point. I think both of us have made our points in previous posts. We can keep talking via PM, I will be glad to explain further and discuss, but this discussion has no more link to the pyramid.
Sorry for not holding my promise of not responding too tempting !
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i like this thread. interesting
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I noticed a few problems with your diagram, I revised it a little bit to fit the current metagame.
+ Show Spoiler +
OT: There is no way to even give a rudimentary diagram of which area of play is more necessary as it completely differentiates between games, different styles, etc.
For example, you put Timings near the top. Timings are really freakin important even for a silver player: When a stim push should be, when medivacs should come out. You also have micro higher then map control. In certain cirumstances, such as in ghost vs ht, its all about winning the micro war, and map control doesn't matter that much. However in PvZ, a zerg losing map control loses way's to know if the protoss is going to push or not. You cannot rate certains assets of play more then others as it changes so much from matchup to player to game.
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Woah, amazing info in a single post. I'm a long-time Starcraft player, but I've just started playing ladder and most games are overwhelming. Props for putting that info together.
If I can give my two cents:
I feel the pyramid is more about "I suck at multiple aspects, what should I work on improving this week ?" and not "I have 60 APM and I'd need 400 APM to do everything I want in the next 15 seconds, what do I ditch ?". The second question is highly dependant on the game itself and is important for winning that game, while the first one is game-independant, and is what people need to do to improve long-term.
Bransom, I'll take a shot at your question (Give me a scenario where economy is more important than information) with a real-life example. I convinced a friend to try to play against other humans instead of AIs. He did exactly what he's used to in the campaign: he built 15 SCVs, never more, and didn't scout. I believe he would improve more working on improving his economy (don't stop making SCVs until at least 40, possibly 60) than on working on improving his scouting. Sure it's tempting to say "he'll get even better doing both !", but it's exactly why this pyramid is so awesome. You have dozens of areas to improve in SCII, the hard part is figuring out which ones to work on first. Trying to improve all of them at once just doesn't work well. I think this pyramid is pretty much spot-on for priorities. Another way I see the pyramid is "What's easiest to get a lot better at quickly ?" It's common sense to improve something you can get much better at really quickly, than to train a skill that will take a long time to show some results.
However I agree with the previous posters mentionning cheese, new players need to learn how to defend against them properly. If not they'll just start cheesing themselves and never macro properly, which is really bad for getting better at long-term.
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@Mortilia Great comment! I +1 that, I really think you are spot on, and truly understand the reason why I worked on this pyramid! In an ideal world, of course all of this would be 100%, my goal was to prioritize things in a comprehensible fashion
I will also try to take a stab at Cheesing. I do believe that cheeses are a very big and important concept in Starcraft. Honestly, I don't even think "cheese" should have a negative connotation, and I think it's as much a part of the game as a standard macro game. That is why I actually tried to build this pyramid to incorporate it in the game and it's progression. I came to the same conclusion as other TL-ers did. That most high-end aspect take a higher priority in a short cheese-focused game. I remedied to this by focusing the pyramid on a purely theoretical and hypothetical case. What I mean by this is that in a cheese situation IF you could somehow over-produce or out-position your opponent, you would still get the advantage. The only problem in these games are that, unfortunately, you can't! Which is why the upper-levels tend to pop up in your face I hope I clarified this aspect and that it makes sense
BTW, Mortilia, thanks for posting, one of the most constructive and supported comments. I am currently taking notes for a final revision of the article, would love to have your input (or anyone elses) on re-formulating some parts to make it clearer
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I appreciate this pyramid and I agree with it quite a lot. Especially with the "dusting" part. Albeit I would of called it something different though.
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On August 15 2011 11:43 Ziktomini wrote:
I think it should be "Defending cheese" up to high master, then maybe some of the other stuff, bronze to diamond is just different skill levels of cheese in my experience.
This is covered by a combination of Scouting and Knowledge.
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Also, I prefer the word Multitasking to Management, as I find it more descriptive.
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I like this pyramid and found your explanations quite informative. Thanks - if I can find the time to play more starcraft, I'll keep this in mind (I had a fairly similar picture in mind, but had the issue of wanting to move to more advanced topics than I really am prepared for).
I know that if I play more and learn to scout and learn a few good BOs I'll be out of Plat. I think you've really laid it out quite well!
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Great noob advice, anybody that hasn't made masters league yet would be helped by reading and following the steps to focus on in improvement.
Production/Economy ARE the foundation.
Knowledge/Information/Army ARE first pillars.
Like I commented on your YouTube video, a related thought can be worked out in regards to Build Orders in the *specific* application of coaching. A loose build order is great to learn as you automatically get practice in its execution as you develop your economy and other skills. Now, if you have problems just building probes, keep at it with no knowledge of developed build orders until you're pretty good hitting nexus hotkey and getting another probe built. Once that's in its basic area, I teach and encourage students to be thinking about, "Is my army ready to fight?" (ARMY key concept) and "Am I scouting (later harassing) him?" So one of the beginning lessons is as we practice build orders, seeing "Oh he has marauders. I know what I want against a bio army and I know the spending of gas on marauders limits the possibilities of other stuff he could be building that I need to be prepared for!"
Of course for the sake of a pyramid, the Army itself takes precedence over Build because player's conceptions of what a build is (regimented pro builds) is second in priority to building the Army you wand with a *loose* build order. On the other hand, as I say in the previous paragraph, the teaching and learning of loose build orders (structure order without huge emphasis on exact supplies to 30) prepares you to have an initial army that is capable of dealing with early threats AND gaining early scouting information/deny enemy scouting information.
Thanks for posting this!
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Hmm, that's a really good point... Instead of 15 hatch 15 pool 14 gas 16 ov whatever, for new players it should be something like "put down a hatchery first, then a pool when you get the money. As soon as your pool is down make gas, and make sure you are making overlords!"
Zerg is a bad example, because of the whole "build drones as long as you can" mechanic, but you get the idea...
@danglars, did i understand your post correctly?
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As to Econ vs intel, if you have maphacks and can see everything, that's great, but if you don't know how to drone up, the intel isn't going to help you. Watch a pro player's supply, take note of it at certain parts (say, 5 minutes in, 8 minutes, and what time they get maxed), then watch a silver player do the same, an you'll find that they have drastically different amounts of stuff... One has the capacity to use intel to Econ, and the other doesn't.
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On August 16 2011 07:24 Mortilia wrote:
Woah, amazing info in a single post. I'm a long-time Starcraft player, but I've just started playing ladder and most games are overwhelming. Props for putting that info together.
If I can give my two cents:
I feel the pyramid is more about "I suck at multiple aspects, what should I work on improving this week ?" and not "I have 60 APM and I'd need 400 APM to do everything I want in the next 15 seconds, what do I ditch ?". The second question is highly dependant on the game itself and is important for winning that game, while the first one is game-independant, and is what people need to do to improve long-term.
Bransom, I'll take a shot at your question (Give me a scenario where economy is more important than information) with a real-life example. I convinced a friend to try to play against other humans instead of AIs. He did exactly what he's used to in the campaign: he built 15 SCVs, never more, and didn't scout. I believe he would improve more working on improving his economy (don't stop making SCVs until at least 40, possibly 60) than on working on improving his scouting. Sure it's tempting to say "he'll get even better doing both !", but it's exactly why this pyramid is so awesome. You have dozens of areas to improve in SCII, the hard part is figuring out which ones to work on first. Trying to improve all of them at once just doesn't work well. I think this pyramid is pretty much spot-on for priorities. Another way I see the pyramid is "What's easiest to get a lot better at quickly ?" It's common sense to improve something you can get much better at really quickly, than to train a skill that will take a long time to show some results.
However I agree with the previous posters mentionning cheese, new players need to learn how to defend against them properly. If not they'll just start cheesing themselves and never macro properly, which is really bad for getting better at long-term.
I'm not saying that macro is not important. Sure, it would be great practice for your friend to make workers constantly. However, my argument is that information is superior to economy. The term "information" could be interpreted ambiguously, but in my opinion, knowledge about the game itself, gathering information, and properly responding to the given information all fall under the term "information." If your friend is constantly making workers to 40 or 60, but doesn't know how to scout or respond to a 6 pool, he will still lose. Information gives you the ability to make decisions on whether or not economy, tech, and/or army should be invested in, which is why I believe information is the most important part of this game. The reason I feel information is more important than execution is that if you do not know what to execute, then execution becomes seemingly worthless.
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This may have been mentioned by someone else, but what about the aspect of mind games and trickery? Suddenly playing optimal and efficient doesn't pay off 100% especially if someone is going to purposefully not play optimal to trick you.
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On August 18 2011 05:27 1Lamb1Rice wrote:
This may have been mentioned by someone else, but what about the aspect of mind games and trickery? Suddenly playing optimal and efficient doesn't pay off 100% especially if someone is going to purposefully not play optimal to trick you.
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.
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On August 18 2011 04:41 Zestage wrote:
Hmm, that's a really good point... Instead of 15 hatch 15 pool 14 gas 16 ov whatever, for new players it should be something like "put down a hatchery first, then a pool when you get the money. As soon as your pool is down make gas, and make sure you are making overlords!"
Zerg is a bad example, because of the whole "build drones as long as you can" mechanic, but you get the idea...
@danglars, did i understand your post correctly?
You get the aspect of what I mean by a "loose" build order, yes. Memorizing and focusing on executing it flawlessly is not the goal in first couple lessons. It's having something that gives you units to work with, units to scout with early, and usually plans around maintaining worker production throughout it. It's a framework which puts off a few of the upper tiers of the pyramid while letting you practice Economy, Production, Army etc etc.
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I like this. Very important for lower level players to not get bogged down trying to take on the finer points instead of working on the basics. I think you should include scouting, but I'm not exactly where that would fit in. It can be as rudimentary as 'information' but as refined as 'dusting'
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this is awesome!!
thanks brotha for the awesome post.
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@bransom "knowledge about the game itself, gathering information, and properly responding to the given information all fall under the term "information." This proves that you haven't actually read the whole thing. Can you please read it before continuing? If your gonna keep saying that you read it but that "it's your opinion that info. should include knowledge" please refrain from doing things like that because they are counter-productive. I can understand wanting to change definitions and rearrange stuff, but say it explicitly, because the way you are formulating your responses really indicate that you have not read all descriptions.
@1Lamb1Rice I feel like this aspect should be included in the last step of the pyramid, "Dusting" for now. But I will revise this, as I do believe that it can pose some problem before getting to the top. I also feel that this might be included in proper scouting as low as the "Information" part, but seems too low. Let me think about it
Thanks to all supporters and discussions I'll be working on final version soon
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Great read, mate! Appreciate your work. I'm sending this to a couple of my mates.
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On August 18 2011 07:18 Budha wrote:@bransom "knowledge about the game itself, gathering information, and properly responding to the given information all fall under the term "information." This proves that you haven't actually read the whole thing. Can you please read it before continuing? If your gonna keep saying that you read it but that "it's your opinion that info. should include knowledge" please refrain from doing things like that because they are counter-productive. I can understand wanting to change definitions and rearrange stuff, but say it explicitly, because the way you are formulating your responses really indicate that you have not read all descriptions. @1Lamb1Rice I feel like this aspect should be included in the last step of the pyramid, "Dusting" for now. But I will revise this, as I do believe that it can pose some problem before getting to the top. I also feel that this might be included in proper scouting as low as the "Information" part, but seems too low. Let me think about it Thanks to all supporters and discussions I'll be working on final version soon
OK, then take my argument and use the words "knowledge and information" to substitute for "information." I figured the two were interdependent upon each other, but perhaps I should have clarified. My argument still stands.
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@bransom I see your point, and it does make sense. I mean, who won't agree that you need to see a 6-pool coming to some extent? But remember that the pyramid is not an absolute, it is a mere guideline. You do not simply walk up the pyramid step by step. A player will sample all steps even if he is not particularly skillful.
Plus, I want to add that this is also a very theoretical and hypothetical concept. The point of the economy and production beeing lower than information is that IF you could outproduce your opponent - in a hypothetical way - you will beat him no matter what. This means that - again, hypothetically - if you could out-mine and out-produce your opponent while he 6-pools you, you will win. Of course you cannot. Also, in a 6-pool scenario, it is very very very very very easy to keep up with economy and production, which is why a player will feel that scouting will take predecence on them. The same phenomenon takes place with the 4-gate and micro - which I have covered in the article. I hope this makes sense and clarifies things.
@Alejandrisha Scouting is included in "information". Trickery and scouting the trickery (ex.: canceling a nexus to 4gate) is still a debate in my head as where to put it Thx
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On August 18 2011 11:10 Budha wrote:@bransom I see your point, and it does make sense. I mean, who won't agree that you need to see a 6-pool coming to some extent? But remember that the pyramid is not an absolute, it is a mere guideline. You do not simply walk up the pyramid step by step. A player will sample all steps even if he is not particularly skillful. Plus, I want to add that this is also a very theoretical and hypothetical concept. The point of the economy and production beeing lower than information is that IF you could outproduce your opponent - in a hypothetical way - you will beat him no matter what. This means that - again, hypothetically - if you could out-mine and out-produce your opponent while he 6-pools you, you will win. Of course you cannot. Also, in a 6-pool scenario, it is very very very very very easy to keep up with economy and production, which is why a player will feel that scouting will take predecence on them. The same phenomenon takes place with the 4-gate and micro - which I have covered in the article. I hope this makes sense and clarifies things. @Alejandrisha Scouting is included in "information". Trickery and scouting the trickery (ex.: canceling a nexus to 4gate) is still a debate in my head as where to put it Thx
I guess it's just the impression of a pyramid that makes me think the bottom is "most important" rather than just a stepping stone to the next level. Perhaps making it "The StarCraft Ladder" or something along those lines would help give off the impression that you are intending people to infer.
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As a low level starcraft player who has just started playing starcraft2, I think this provides a great way to start getting good at it. Thank you so much!
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i like this idea. Good work! hopefully this gets refined and corrected if there are pros that spot errors in this.
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Seems like Knowledge should be first of all of them as if you dont know anything about the game its basicly impossible for you to win even with production if you dont know what your doing
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Zurich15323 Posts
I like this a lot, thanks for the write up! Agreed on basically everything.
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I guess any (replay)self analysis can be based on this order.
Why did i lose? Check your play from bottom to top.
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On August 24 2011 23:11 NemesysTV wrote:
Seems like Knowledge should be first of all of them as if you dont know anything about the game its basicly impossible for you to win even with production if you dont know what your doing
think of it like this:
if you have knowledge of the game, but no production or economy, you will know what to do with the units but you won't have any units to do anything with.
if you have knowledge and production, but no economy, you will build very little units in comparison to your enemy, and then even if you know what to do with those units, you will still lose because his stuff doesn't need to be as efficient as yours.
if you have knowledge and economy, but no production, you will have the resources to produce, and you will know what should be best to produce, but you still won't have it because your not producing.
if you have economy and production, but no knowledge, as long as you have 5 times more stuff than your opponent you don't need to know what the units do, "they kill stuff" is enough, and if you don't know the units "kill stuff" then what are you doing playing a game about killing your opponent!?
if you have economy, production and knowledge however, then you will have lots of stuff that you know how to use, and so the power of "economy+production" is multiplied.
the pyramid isn't "you need the lower step to do the next" it's "the above steps can only have it's full potential used if the below steps are satisfied"
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@Roblin Couldn't have explained better myself Thx Roblin! I think I will add this quote to the original post
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I think "Force" shifts in league level.
The higher the league, the less important force is.
On the sub-masters level, force is insanely powerful, just poking and prodding around, taking opponent's focus elsewhere. He will slip massively in all the other steps, mainly production, but also eco.
Thus, on sub-masters level, Force is probably on-par with even information.
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I am impressed. Very good post.
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This pyramid is great. It's not perfect, but I never assumed that for a game as complex as SC2, blindly following a strict hierachy of improvement would be. To me, it requires operating under the following assumption:
Every level is important. However, you can only achieve 100% of a level if you have 100% of every level below it. For example, we'll use Bransom's information example.
I am playing against a progamer, and I have a maphack. In order to perfectly react to my unlimited information, I must know what it means, and what I have to do about it. I must master knowledge. Now that I know what to do, I must be able to make everything I have to make in order to do it. I must master production. However, I cannot produce everything unless I have the money I require, so I must first master economy. The fact that I can perfectly utilise the army I create doesn't matter unless I can get as much money as I can, spend it properly, and know what to spend it on in order to exploit my information.
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.
(Note: Because of the presence of Zerg, Economy can be really difficult. In PvZ or TvZ, I think it'd be better to look at your own economy, and see how much you were getting, vs. how much idle larvae he had. It's not perfect, but Zerg fucks up most generalisations of economy. Alternatively, if you're already at a high enough level, look at how much you had vs. how much he had, and compare it to what you should have. E.g, if Zerg should have 50 drones when you have 40 probes (Numbers are arbitrary))
Again, it's so RIGHT. It doesn't matter if you were producing stuff if you didn't have the money to produce enough of it. It doesn't matter if you knew what you needed to make if you didn't make it. It doesn't matter if you scouted him if you couldn't interpret that info. It doesn't matter if your army could have prevented his win if you didn't know what he was doing. Naturally, it is important to use your opponent as a benchmark, that way when you didn't make your 67th SCV for 3 seconds, that's not cause to end your analysis unless he played more perfectly, despite the fact that you actually lost because you only produced 8 units in the first 15 minutes. This avoids the trap of trying to have 100% perfect economy before even giving a crap about production.
That's where I see the pyramid being used for me, not as a strict hierachy of improvement, but as a way of analysing every loss. And naturally, that will lead to improving: I'm in Platinum, but I can still lose a game due to Economy (I didn't expand to my fourth early enough, despite the fact that I could have!) and then I know where to focus my efforts. It's also a FANTASTIC way of seeing results. If I'm losing all my games due to Knowledge and Information, then I can feel good if I start losing because of Army, because it meant I had all the info I needed, which means I didn't make any scouting mistakes.
So think about using it in that way. I think it's a more effective analysis tool than a method of what to focus on at any given time. Either way, it's a great model. Thanks so much for this.
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Incidentally, in Norwegian "Dusting" means moron.
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the pic is like superrrrrr small. any way to bump it up in size just a bit?
other than that, awesome read: )
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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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I think this should be pinned tbh. It should be the bible for all sub masters players and will hopefully eliminate a lot of low level whine about balance If people read it of course.
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On August 18 2011 06:00 Roblin wrote:Show nested quote +On August 18 2011 05:27 1Lamb1Rice wrote:
This may have been mentioned by someone else, but what about the aspect of mind games and trickery? Suddenly playing optimal and efficient doesn't pay off 100% especially if someone is going to purposefully not play optimal to trick you. 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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I'm only mid-diamond but I pretty much agree with the pyramid. Right now I feel like I got a solid grasp on everything below it but I still struggle with my control. I lose a lot of games that I shouldn't because I get caught unsieged, don't spread my units properly, don't land EMP's or simply don't have my army correctly positioned at all times.
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Pretty good post nice job.
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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.
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I think your section on timings could use some work. More specifically where it says that it must be planned before the game. Of course you plan things before the game starts, but that is meta-game; not timings. If your opponent doesn't do exactly what you expect at exactly the time you planned, before the game even started, then the only attack that time is on is your own.
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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Any links to a bigger pic?
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Great job OP. There's criticism being made, but overall you've got some wonderful work. As xlava said, this will really help correct mid-level play by identifying problems in play.
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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Can you explain this though: if you aren't a GM player, how do you know what it takes to become a GM player?
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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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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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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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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When you click on the pyramid it doesn't take you to the full sized image, I think something messed up there with the linking of the image... as the one I see embedded into the page is very blurry.
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This is exactly what I've been looking for to help my gameplay. It helps to have a well defined system to break down my game, and rebuild it one part at a time.
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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It looks like the OP's image hosting is messed up at the moment but I had saved the pyramid image beforehand. I re-uploaded it and posted it below, hopefully the OP can be updated shortly as well.
+ Show Spoiler +
EDIT: The OP has been updated :D
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I just wanted to stop in and say thank you for this. I've used this as a general guide that has helped me stay structured on what I need to focus on as I advance. Since first seeing this guide I've gone from Silver to 750ish pt Plat.
Anyway. Huge help and a big TY from me!
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It really doesn't work this way. Even pro-gamers need to work on their economy and production management, which is why some players are considered "really good macro players" and some aren't.
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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@everyone Thx for keeping this up here!
@Buddhist What "masters" section? - If you saw a masters section somewhere, I think you have fundamentally misunderstood the article. PM me we can discuss
PS.: Buddhist arguing with Budha :D Gotta love it !!
PPS.: I _KNOW_ Buddha takes 2 "d"s.
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Being a Warcraft 3 player, this Pyramid seems so-out-of-whack for me.
Very nice post nonetheless!
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Beautiful.
I echo a sentiment. "TIMINGS" is more like "BUILD."
a "BUILD" is done usually for the purpose of "TIMING" an opponent. Example: 3 Barracks Build. You do it to "TIMING" attack the opponent with stim pack and a good chunk.
I move to replace "TIMINGS" with "OPPORTUNITY".
You sense weakness because your scouting revealed a low army. TIMING HIM!
You sense a rush coming because the nexus isn't glowing and he's not building workers. TURTLE!
"OPPORTUNITY" - the ability to have the best response based on a very quick glance.
could also call it "GAMESENSE"
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I think the league icons might be confusing people who think it means "you only need micro at masters level" or something, which seems hard to believe.
Also in the Control section you have This section will also includes SPELLCASTING during engagements, like storms, fungal and stimpacks, and where to place your spellcasters inside the army.
Now to my mind those are all parts of micro gameplay.
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LEVEL UP!!
Lvl 7:
NEW FEAT: "CONTROL"
Micro +5
Macro +7
Misleading since most of the "elements" are improving continuously through your game career.
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I think people are being way too nitpicky here. It's just a guide for those seeking help that identifies what areas should receive more focus, as the levels are approximately ordered by overall importance. Even if you don't agree with the exact ordering, just reading through the descriptions for each level is pretty informative.
On September 30 2011 19:08 Cibron wrote:
LEVEL UP!!
Lvl 7:
NEW FEAT: "CONTROL"
Micro +5
Macro +7
Misleading since most of the "elements" are improving continuously through your game career.
Did you actually read the entire post, where he specifically says this is not how it's suppose to be interpreted, or did you just glance at the picture?
On September 30 2011 09:34 Buddhist wrote:
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 point is that all other things being equal, it is more beneficial for a low level player to work on their macro before working on their micro. If your macro is much poorer than your opponent then you're probably going to lose regardless of micro. The pyramid is just supposed to illustrate relative importance, it's not saying that you can get to high masters with terrible micro.
On September 30 2011 09:34 Buddhist wrote:
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.
I wouldn't say it's entirely neglected when there is an entire section called "What about Mechanics?" that addresses this.
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.
If your macro is bad enough you can lose against any level opponent so I'd be interested to see what your definition of horrible macro is if you're competitive in master league.
As for your roommate you're probably not giving him enough credit, you need a certain understanding of the game to be competitive, even at gold. Learning the hotkeys alone does not make you a good player, it's just lets you execute your plan more efficiently. I guarantee you there's bronze and silver level players who use hotkeys and are still in bronze and silver so I'm not sure what your point is.
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@MysteryHours +1
@Trump this is actually interesting... If I ever get to updating the image, I think I just might do that!
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I love the fact that the "Pyramid" in the back ground is from Stargate the movie
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Great post and tremendously helpful for looking at the big picture, taking your entire game into perspective and working on elements of it. Knowing what those elements are is very very helpful as well!
Thank you
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This is awesome. I am a gold-platnum player myself and I have to say THANK YOU to budha, this is really a useful guide in helping to better understand the game of starcraft 2. At first i was skeptical, but as I went through the pyramid i was really blown away. Budha, on behalf of trekkkies everywhere, I salute you.
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I think this is really nice, you can't make it 100% accurate, but this is about as well put as it can be if you wanna explain the learning process like this.
Also, for you who are talking about timings... A build with specific timings on when to attack et.c doesn't mean you've understood the concept of timings at all. Understanding timings means that you can basically look at the clock at any time at the game and estimate what your opponent should have at that time with the usuall standard strats, or from whatever you expect him to have from your earlier scouting. Having a perfect understanding of timings is probaly something that is top master / GM quality stuff imo.
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On September 30 2011 19:08 Cibron wrote:
LEVEL UP!!
Lvl 7:
NEW FEAT: "CONTROL"
Micro +5
Macro +7
Choose your perk:
Day[9] Acolyte: Constant +20% Knowledge, +5 Production, -2 Micro
Buy New Equipment: +5 Control, +5 Micro
Switch to Protoss: +10 Macro, +10 Control, +5 Timings, -5 Economy, -20 Information
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Learning processes aren't pyramides, they're circles.
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Wat is dusting
User was warned for this post
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United States4883 Posts
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this is great first time i have seen this thread, Im going to use this as reference for when i coach. I usually tell my students that their is always 1 deafening thing separating each league from the next. This helps put that idea into a visual form.
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On August 26 2012 06:54 SC2John wrote:
Edit: Nevermind
Although a very silly post, thanks for bumping this. I lost this thread. :D
I remember back when I just started this game, I felt really lost and had no Idea what to focus on. This really helped me structure my game so I was consciously (that doesn't look right -.-) reminding myself to build stuff instead of micro.
To OP, thanks <3
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I like the way this pyramid makes me think in terms of concepts Thanks for this!
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A problem with this that I have experienced is that with Terran, you have to learn Micro and Macro at the same time: You can't learn to Macro perfectly and then suddenly learn to Micro perfectly while Macroing perfectly, you have to learn the basics of Macro and then slowly start to add in Micro while Macroing, basically doing as much Macro as you can while during the breaks(production time) Microing as much as you can.
I did it the other way, so I relied on 3CC builds constantly, but then suddenly I had to learn to micro, which with Terran you have to learn or you die to AoE (unless you play Mech), so I was stuck at low masters for a long time.
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On August 26 2012 09:21 Fencar wrote:
A problem with this that I have experienced is that with Terran, you have to learn Micro and Macro at the same time: You can't learn to Macro perfectly and then suddenly learn to Micro perfectly while Macroing perfectly, you have to learn the basics of Macro and then slowly start to add in Micro while Macroing, basically doing as much Macro as you can while during the breaks(production time) Microing as much as you can.
I did it the other way, so I relied on 3CC builds constantly, but then suddenly I had to learn to micro, which with Terran you have to learn or you die to AoE (unless you play Mech), so I was stuck at low masters for a long time.
You have to learn everything, the way I interpret the pyramid is more of a 'what to smooth out' kind of thing, like what to focus on.
I always thought of this picture more as a neat thing than an actual guideline anyway.
Something you see after you went from bronze to masters and go like: that's cool!
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The way I like to look at it is to look at my replays, and compare it either to my opponent or to my usual benchmarks. "Was my economy absolutely flawless? No? It was economy." is not the best way to play imo. If you're routinely beating your opponents economically, you don't need to do even better at economy to win. Instead, a replay analysis might go something like this, in a hypothetical game where a 2-base mech push kills me in ZvT.
Did I lose because of Economy? At X time, I had 62 drones to 34 SCV's, and my economy kept ahead of the Terran all game. No, I didn't lose because of Economy. I could have had 70-ish drones by X, but he could have had 40+ SCV's, too.
Did I lose because of Production? When my opponent pushed out, my opponent had way less army value and supply than I did. Even taking into account that the Zerg army has to be bigger, I am ahead here.
Did I lose because of Knowledge? I had a Muta/Ling/Bling army against a lot of Thors and Hellions, and lost the engagement hardcore. Did I know what to do against this army? Yes: Scout it and make mass roaches, and be aggressive.
Did I lose because of Information? I had no idea what my opponent's army was, and didn't counter it. His Hellion/Thor destroyed my Muta/Ling/Bling because of this. Yes, I lost because of Information.
Do this for enough games, and your focus needs to be on the lowest level of the pyramid you routinely lose in. (This level will change over time, up and down. If your economy is good enough to consistently outmacro Golds, you may find yourself losing economically in Diamond.) If I had held off my opponent's Hellion/Thor attack with mass roaches and then proceeded to win, he would have lost because of Economy: He wasn't making constant workers, and fell incredibly far behind, as shown in the first step. You don't even need to look at anything else. As long as the Zerg was safe in droning up that much (He went 1 Rax FE, so I was) he lost because of Economy.
Essentially, it's a useful tool for figuring out the most basic areas you are failing at. Rather than saying "Well, I really needed to flank with my Muta/Ling/Bling here on creep" you can say "If I sacced an Overlord at X time, I'd know exactly what was up and could mass roaches and just roll over him." Much simpler and easier to do.
This also works for shorter games, too. Let's use a hypothetical example where I get bunker rushed and lose.
How was my Economy? Fine. I built workers until my Pool finished.
How was my Production? Fine. I built lings after the Pool finished, had no idle larva for more than a few seconds.
How was my Knowledge? Fine, I know how to hold it off.
How was my Information? Fine, I scouted it promptly.
How was my Army? That was bad. I attacked into a choke and lost all my lings at a time I really needed to keep them alive. I also had a few lings in my main for a while that really could have helped out. I lost because of Army.
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Micro would be lower for Terren.
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Intresting pyramid, I will try practice on what i need acording to the pyramid to see if this will help me progressing.
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Its really interesting to see that theres coming more and more guides and tips on how to improve effieciently thats like how it is done in sports and music. Like starting with concentrating on fundamentals and working your way up.
Back in the bw days the usual advice was "just mass game". I believe that with all these guides around people who spent the time and work to put this stuff into practice should be rising up in skill much faster than people who just mass gamed on ladder.
I will try it out for myself for sure.
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I think this is very ironic because this is how it was for me from bronze to diamond xD
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I got a warning that this is an old thread, which looks true in a sense. But on a long enough timeline the survival rate for all threads is zero. So whatevs.
I started playing a little while ago and pretty quickly looked around for something that would give me a good place to start getting better. This thread was one of the first things I found and has been the only bit of advice that is both understandable and seems to work consistently. Granted, that could just be me.
This is the kind of instruction I was was available for everything else. The pyramid makes perfect sense! It's like a list of the things that have the largest impact on performance in-game. If you don't have the bottom, the stuff at the top won't make up for it.
Anywho, I have an example of why the pyramid works. A lot of the discussion seems to be theoretical because it's impossible to replicate the conditions of a game. But the challenge missions are always identical. So, things like economy don't really matter in the first one, because #duh. But Information does matter since the whole point is to figure out which terran counter which zerg units. I already had a pretty good idea, so I went with that and got the first achievement. The next time through I experimented with different formations. I tried to arrange my defense so that everyone had nice overlapping fields of fire and whatnot. That carefulness got the second achievement. But then I got stuck. I won every engagement but I always lost too many units. So I did some more research and found that there were some situations in which an active defense (moving around) was better. So I tried kiting and focus-firing and that got the last achievement.
Knowledge got me the first achievement (which units to pick)
Army got me the second achievement (how to position them)
and Micro got me the third achievement (moment by moment commands)
This thread is just kind of a thank-you to the people who put the pyramid together and explained how to use it and a bump to be sure that anyone else who's new is more likely to see how it works.
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Wow, this is an old one.
After reading it though I thought to myself I wish I saw this back in 2011. Could have helped me.
I think the new method of the Staircase is very similar and also works though.
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Despite the original post being 3 years old, what you can garner from it is immeasurable. As someone who has only made it as far as plat (and that was in HotS beta) I really appreciate that this thread exists. Thanks OP, truly
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I like how you put the emphasis on the base of the pyramid. That's something that helped me a lot at lower levels.
I will always remember this example of Jakatak teaching players to simply build marines, workers and barracks until they have no more money. I feel it's a way better approach to the game than confuse lower level players with '' it depends, if he does X you do Y ''. You don't need that info at lower levels because you don't even have to production and mechanics to utilise a strategy.
I did this with a friend who hated the game. Taught her only about the steps of the pyramid she was at, without ever bothering her with the higher steps, and it made her love the game much much more. I think one very important thing to remember is that the player needs to feel competent and good at what he's doing. Focusing on your step of the pyramid and evaluating yourself only on that is a great way to have fun !
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1 Rax FE Spam marines!!! no micro!
I actually got to platinum doing this on a smurf account. Funny stuff. This definitely makes the game easy for lower league players. Even though the OP says the Pyramid is NOT an absolute truth, I beg to differ. It's pretty dam close. Keep this thread bumped man!
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These steps describes exactly how I got from bronze to master.
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those mid levels is exactly what i needed to read. best necro ever. keep this alive.
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Very useful mental framework to understand your own progress and improvement.
Makes sense with my experience from bronze to diamond over the past few years, currently scratching Masters and management like you theorize. Good stuff :D
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Good Stuff! But I think you should change FORCE to LEVERAGE
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I wanted to thank Budha for the work put into the pyramid, it makes for a really nice, easy way for a player to visualise a route to improvement. I used it as the basis for a Planetary Annihilation pyramid I put together because I think it's a clever training tool.
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I think the idea was let’s just go into this blessedly free of concept,” says frontman Colin Meloy. “The idea was let’s give ourselves time and let the songs dictate what that cohesiveness would be. That was something we had never done. It was conceptual in the sense we wanted to to take away all concepts, and as an experiment take all the time we needed to make the record.”
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Bot edit.
User was banned for this post.
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On January 13 2015 07:05 Quitch wrote:I wanted to thank Budha for the work put into the pyramid, it makes for a really nice, easy way for a player to visualise a route to improvement. I used it as the basis for a Planetary Annihilation pyramid I put together because I think it's a clever training tool.
Absolutely brilliant. I've taken possibly a permanent break from Starcraft for personal reasons, but I still love to read about it, follow it and watch it on twitch. Namely because of the poker and chess elements of the game. I want to actually learn poker and play poker because I believe that would reinforce very important thinking skills that carry over to Starcraft. Obviously this aspect is "Play the player, not your hand."
You see any of my other posts, I'm usually flaunting the idea of play less, think more. Which is pretty important if you are still improving below Masters level. Or, if you are an aspiring pro player in Masters, playing less, and learning more is pretty critical to not only your consistency, but to efficiently learn new skills, strategies, play styles and your thinking process in a game.
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Lol at everyone that is thinks this is the greatest thing ever, if it truly worked for you then that's wonderful though. But this defiantly doesn't describe my 'journey' through Sc2. Keep this dead T_T
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EPT![[image loading]](http://imgur.com/vPZkp.png)
