• Log InLog In
  • Register
Liquid`
Team Liquid Liquipedia
EDT 23:07
CET 04:07
KST 12:07
  • Home
  • Forum
  • Calendar
  • Streams
  • Liquipedia
  • Features
  • Store
  • EPT
  • TL+
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Smash
  • Heroes
  • Counter-Strike
  • Overwatch
  • Liquibet
  • Fantasy StarCraft
  • TLPD
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Blogs
Forum Sidebar
Events/Features
News
Featured News
Team Liquid Map Contest #22 - Presented by Monster Energy5ByuL: The Forgotten Master of ZvT30Behind the Blue - Team Liquid History Book19Clem wins HomeStory Cup 289HomeStory Cup 28 - Info & Preview13
Community News
Blizzard Classic Cup @ BlizzCon 2026 - $100k prize pool30Weekly Cups (March 9-15): herO, Clem, ByuN win42026 KungFu Cup Announcement6BGE Stara Zagora 2026 cancelled12Blizzard Classic Cup - Tastosis announced as captains18
StarCraft 2
General
Potential Updates Coming to the SC2 CN Server Weekly Cups (March 2-8): ByuN overcomes PvT block Weekly Cups (August 25-31): Clem's Last Straw? Weekly Cups (March 9-15): herO, Clem, ByuN win Blizzard Classic Cup @ BlizzCon 2026 - $100k prize pool
Tourneys
RSL Season 4 announced for March-April Sparkling Tuna Cup - Weekly Open Tournament WardiTV Team League Season 10 KSL Week 87 [GSL CK] #2: Team Classic vs. Team Solar
Strategy
Custom Maps
Publishing has been re-enabled! [Feb 24th 2026]
External Content
The PondCast: SC2 News & Results Mutation # 517 Distant Threat Mutation # 516 Specter of Death Mutation # 515 Together Forever
Brood War
General
BGH Auto Balance -> http://bghmmr.eu/ ASL21 General Discussion Gypsy to Korea JaeDong's form before ASL BSL Season 22
Tourneys
[Megathread] Daily Proleagues [BSL22] Open Qualifiers & Ladder Tours Small VOD Thread 2.0 IPSL Spring 2026 is here!
Strategy
Simple Questions, Simple Answers Soma's 9 hatch build from ASL Game 2 Fighting Spirit mining rates
Other Games
General Games
Stormgate/Frost Giant Megathread General RTS Discussion Thread Nintendo Switch Thread Path of Exile Dawn of War IV
Dota 2
Official 'what is Dota anymore' discussion The Story of Wings Gaming
League of Legends
G2 just beat GenG in First stand
Heroes of the Storm
Simple Questions, Simple Answers Heroes of the Storm 2.0
Hearthstone
Deck construction bug Heroes of StarCraft mini-set
TL Mafia
Five o'clock TL Mafia Mafia Game Mode Feedback/Ideas Vanilla Mini Mafia TL Mafia Community Thread
Community
General
US Politics Mega-thread Things Aren’t Peaceful in Palestine Canadian Politics Mega-thread Russo-Ukrainian War Thread Mexico's Drug War
Fan Clubs
The IdrA Fan Club
Media & Entertainment
Movie Discussion! [Req][Books] Good Fantasy/SciFi books [Manga] One Piece
Sports
Formula 1 Discussion 2024 - 2026 Football Thread Tokyo Olympics 2021 Thread General nutrition recommendations Cricket [SPORT]
World Cup 2022
Tech Support
Laptop capable of using Photoshop Lightroom?
TL Community
The Automated Ban List
Blogs
Funny Nicknames
LUCKY_NOOB
Money Laundering In Video Ga…
TrAiDoS
Iranian anarchists: organize…
XenOsky
FS++
Kraekkling
Shocked by a laser…
Spydermine0240
Unintentional protectionism…
Uldridge
ASL S21 English Commentary…
namkraft
Customize Sidebar...

Website Feedback

Closed Threads



Active: 4098 users

[G] Worker Transfers - Page 4

Forum Index > StarCraft 2 Strategy
Post a Reply
Prev 1 2 3 4 All
TheHardSix
Profile Joined January 2012
4 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-01-17 17:07:00
January 17 2012 08:05 GMT
#61
edit: clarified
Elefes
Profile Joined September 2011
Russian Federation164 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-01-17 09:01:44
January 17 2012 08:48 GMT
#62
TheHardSix, there are many good threads regarding optimal saturation, liquipedia can't reflect all details.

From what I read, your numbers suggest that having three workers on a patch produces different productivity depending on the distance of the patch.
- correct

More strikingly, your numbers also suggest that having three workers on a patch makes the patch itself less productive than when it is being mined by two workers -correct, but in terms of efficiency (if you have more than 16 workers, total income per minute will increase, of course!)

Can't find these numbers in OP, and bet they are incorrect.

Look at the table:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=197826
Marginal income after 16th workes is pretty low. Even though 3x at far patches is profitable, IMO it's pretty difficult to have 20 perfectly placed probes, at least for me o_O

P.S. Lol russians are just math nerds, just trust me ^_^
Also regarding OP: #1 #2 #3 well OBVIOUSLY, #3 sucks,
#1 is the most rewarding long-term, #2 is pretty efficient and economically safe
it's all about risk/reward ratio, which is hard to estimate
Malhavoc
Profile Joined October 2010
Italy308 Posts
January 17 2012 09:15 GMT
#63
When I play Zerg and fast expand, I think #2 is strictly better than #1, as (differently from the other races) you can make spawn all (or most of) your drones at the expansion, limiting the travel time for new drones (some may need to anyway, of course, if you are droning heavily).
Tobberoth
Profile Joined August 2010
Sweden6375 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-01-17 09:24:26
January 17 2012 09:24 GMT
#64
On January 17 2012 18:15 Malhavoc wrote:
When I play Zerg and fast expand, I think #2 is strictly better than #1, as (differently from the other races) you can make spawn all (or most of) your drones at the expansion, limiting the travel time for new drones (some may need to anyway, of course, if you are droning heavily).

You should always drone heavily. Sounds like a bad idea to me, you'll be making a ton of your drones from the main, especially since you'll generally already be at 16+ drones when your nat goes up. Another reason to quickly get some drones to the nat is to be able to throw up spines quickly.

I mean sure, in ZvZ for example, you'll be building lings etc constantly, so you can definitely make sure to make drones at nat and army from main, but that requires quite a lot of extra APM just to slightly increase efficiency.
TheHardSix
Profile Joined January 2012
4 Posts
January 17 2012 17:06 GMT
#65
Elefes,

Thanks for the reply. What didn't become clear to me until I referenced the table you mentioned is that when a third worker is introduced to, say, a close patch, it adds a value of 12 minerals/minute, without lessening the theoretical higher mining rates (45/min) of the other two workers. The language used in the post I quoted was rather ambiguous, and this being my first read on the subject it was easily misinterpreted, as I was thinking in averages of all three workers on a patch.

Apparantly that misunderstanding merited a warning rather than an explanation. Pity.

Practicality notwithstanding, this is pretty insightful, and I thank OP and michaelhasanalias for the contributions.
Randomaccount#77123
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
United States5003 Posts
January 27 2012 21:42 GMT
#66
--- Nuked ---
BronzeKnee
Profile Joined March 2011
United States5219 Posts
January 27 2012 22:22 GMT
#67
I prefer case #2. It allows me to mine off my main for longer, since I only get 16 there.
ODKStevez
Profile Joined February 2011
Ireland1225 Posts
January 27 2012 22:29 GMT
#68
Wow, so much math behind something I just took for granted.
Luppa <3
Eladen
Profile Joined October 2011
Slovakia54 Posts
January 28 2012 09:39 GMT
#69
On January 28 2012 06:42 Barrin wrote:
Has anyone brought up mind games?

Like,

(1) I make an expansion at my natural...
(2) Expansion finishes; I have about 16-18 mineral workers in the main

(3) here I can either (a) transfer workers or (b) rally everything to natural

but,

(4) he scouts my expansion like 15 seconds later; the first time in several in-game minutes

now here's the deal:

if I chose to leave workers in the main and only rally workers, then it's safe for him to assume that the expansion is brand new

HOWEVER, if I chose to maynard a bunch of workers, he has to either scout my main and count the workers there (totally deniable), or he has to rely on his game sense to GUESS (a) how many workers I have and (b) how long ago I planted the expansion down.


Cant he just click on a mineral patch and see how much of the inititial 1500 minerals are gone? That is at least what I use to do
E[ max(0, S-K) | S<K]*P(S<K) + E[ max(0, S-K)| S>K]*P(S>K) = E[0 | S<K]*P(S<K) + E[S-K | S>K]*P(S>K)
Schnullerbacke13
Profile Joined August 2010
Germany1199 Posts
January 28 2012 11:42 GMT
#70
On January 17 2012 18:15 Malhavoc wrote:
When I play Zerg and fast expand, I think #2 is strictly better than #1, as (differently from the other races) you can make spawn all (or most of) your drones at the expansion, limiting the travel time for new drones (some may need to anyway, of course, if you are droning heavily).


its just a trade, new drones then have a shorter travel time, however the transfer itself makes drones travel instead of mining. In fact from a pure economy pov, transfer does pay off only if one base is oversaturated. Early minerals are more worth than later minerals, so a drone transfer is worse compared to rallying new drones to the nat, because the lost mining time hits you earlier (and at once) then.
However there are other strategical aspects (mineout, early defense) which make drone transfers viable. Depends also on build order.
21 is half the truth
sabas123
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
Netherlands3122 Posts
January 28 2012 11:47 GMT
#71
On January 28 2012 20:42 Schnullerbacke13 wrote:
Show nested quote +
On January 17 2012 18:15 Malhavoc wrote:
When I play Zerg and fast expand, I think #2 is strictly better than #1, as (differently from the other races) you can make spawn all (or most of) your drones at the expansion, limiting the travel time for new drones (some may need to anyway, of course, if you are droning heavily).


its just a trade, new drones then have a shorter travel time, however the transfer itself makes drones travel instead of mining. In fact from a pure economy pov, transfer does pay off only if one base is oversaturated. Early minerals are more worth than later minerals, so a drone transfer is worse compared to rallying new drones to the nat, because the lost mining time hits you earlier (and at once) then.
However there are other strategical aspects (mineout, early defense) which make drone transfers viable. Depends also on build order.

didn't knew that thxs man
The harder it becomes, the more you should focus on the basics.
Veetz
Profile Joined April 2010
Canada109 Posts
January 28 2012 11:58 GMT
#72
there is another benefit from transfering half of your workers right away.. though you may lose mineral due to lost mining time immediatly.. by transfering these workers right away.. you will mine your main out slower.. in the event that your 3rd base gets sniped and you need to send your excess workers back to mining from main/natural.. it would suck if your main was already mined out and u gotta send 60 workers to 1 base.. this is why sending half of your workers (or atleast a good ammount) should always be done when your natural finishes.. (you want your main and natural to run out of minerals at the same time)
kcdc
Profile Blog Joined April 2010
United States2311 Posts
January 28 2012 17:46 GMT
#73
Can we get the incorrect information in the OP either corrected or removed?

The analysis is based on a silly notion that splitting half/half gets you 1020 minerals per minute while splitting 16/rest gets you 800 minerals per minute. It isn't true and it screws up the results.
freetgy
Profile Joined November 2010
1720 Posts
January 28 2012 18:08 GMT
#74
you should always transfer as many as possible.

The reason is very simple, it extends the time when your main is mined out, which can be importent in 2 base vs. 2 base situations.
sky`380
Profile Joined January 2011
United States49 Posts
January 28 2012 18:33 GMT
#75
Doesn't (T÷5) * 5 simplify to just T?
Prev 1 2 3 4 All
Please log in or register to reply.
Live Events Refresh
The PiG Daily
22:00
Best Games of SC
Solar vs ByuN
MaxPax vs Solar
Rogue vs Percival
Cure vs Solar
herO vs Solar
LiquipediaDiscussion
[ Submit Event ]
Live Streams
Refresh
StarCraft 2
NeuroSwarm 293
RuFF_SC2 293
Nina 155
ProTech128
StarCraft: Brood War
Shuttle 616
Noble 95
Icarus 5
Dota 2
monkeys_forever765
LuMiX1
League of Legends
JimRising 610
Heroes of the Storm
Khaldor138
Other Games
ViBE125
Trikslyr80
Mew2King49
Organizations
Other Games
gamesdonequick867
Dota 2
PGL Dota 2 - Main Stream127
StarCraft 2
Blizzard YouTube
StarCraft: Brood War
BSLTrovo
sctven
[ Show 13 non-featured ]
StarCraft 2
• davetesta56
• AfreecaTV YouTube
• intothetv
• Kozan
• IndyKCrew
• LaughNgamezSOOP
• Migwel
• sooper7s
StarCraft: Brood War
• BSLYoutube
• STPLYoutube
• ZZZeroYoutube
League of Legends
• Doublelift5252
• Lourlo633
Upcoming Events
RSL Revival
6h 53m
herO vs MaxPax
Rogue vs TriGGeR
BSL
16h 53m
Replay Cast
20h 53m
Replay Cast
1d 5h
Afreeca Starleague
1d 6h
Sharp vs Scan
Rain vs Mong
Wardi Open
1d 8h
Monday Night Weeklies
1d 13h
Sparkling Tuna Cup
2 days
Afreeca Starleague
2 days
Soulkey vs Ample
JyJ vs sSak
Replay Cast
3 days
[ Show More ]
Afreeca Starleague
3 days
hero vs YSC
Larva vs Shine
Kung Fu Cup
3 days
Replay Cast
3 days
KCM Race Survival
4 days
The PondCast
4 days
WardiTV Team League
4 days
Replay Cast
4 days
WardiTV Team League
5 days
RSL Revival
6 days
Cure vs Zoun
WardiTV Team League
6 days
BSL
6 days
Liquipedia Results

Completed

Jeongseon Sooper Cup
WardiTV Winter 2026
Underdog Cup #3

Ongoing

KCM Race Survival 2026 Season 1
BSL Season 22
CSL Elite League 2026
RSL Revival: Season 4
Nations Cup 2026
NationLESS Cup
BLAST Open Spring 2026
ESL Pro League S23 Finals
ESL Pro League S23 Stage 1&2
PGL Cluj-Napoca 2026
IEM Kraków 2026
BLAST Bounty Winter 2026
BLAST Bounty Winter Qual

Upcoming

ASL Season 21
Acropolis #4 - TS6
2026 Changsha Offline CUP
CSL 2026 SPRING (S20)
CSL Season 20: Qualifier 1
Acropolis #4
IPSL Spring 2026
Kung Fu Cup 2026 Grand Finals
HSC XXIX
uThermal 2v2 2026 Main Event
IEM Cologne Major 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 2
CS Asia Championships 2026
Asian Champions League 2026
IEM Atlanta 2026
PGL Astana 2026
BLAST Rivals Spring 2026
CCT Season 3 Global Finals
IEM Rio 2026
PGL Bucharest 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 1
TLPD

1. ByuN
2. TY
3. Dark
4. Solar
5. Stats
6. Nerchio
7. sOs
8. soO
9. INnoVation
10. Elazer
1. Rain
2. Flash
3. EffOrt
4. Last
5. Bisu
6. Soulkey
7. Mini
8. Sharp
Sidebar Settings...

Advertising | Privacy Policy | Terms Of Use | Contact Us

Original banner artwork: Jim Warren
The contents of this webpage are copyright © 2026 TLnet. All Rights Reserved.