my setup is:
1 - All Nexi
2 - Robo + Stargates
3 - Main army - Zealot/Sentry/Colossi
4 - Stalkers or Phoenix
5 - High Templar
6 - Warp Prism
7 - Observers

-I micro colossi individually or by ctrl-clicking
-I use tab to go b/w Robo and Stargates for production
-I use the 'w' hotkey for warpgates
-I use the screen capture hotkeys for my bases or for proxy pylons or areas of harass

junemermaid

United States981 Posts

November 29 2011 04:10 GMT

#42

sentries zealot archon immortal (1)

stalkers (2)

colossi and templar (3 & 4)

for sake of completion:

pylon for warping in on 5

Robotics facilities on 6

observers on 7 & 8

warp prism on 9

nexus on 0

ApocAlypsE007

Israel1007 Posts

November 29 2011 15:04 GMT

#43

On November 29 2011 11:48 cactusjack914 wrote:
interesting that not many people use "w" for warp gates. I used to keep my gates and robo on the same hotkey to free up more convenient hotkeys for army and then tabbed when i needed the robo. When I found out you could use W i was shocked and definitely think more people should implement that into their setup.

I think it's because the "w" hotkey doesn't allow to check on additional gates building unlike binding it to a key.
I used the "w" key for long to check on my warpgates, but I worked out of this to put them in ctrl group 4 to keep track of my additional gates that are building and warping them without the need to return the camera to the base. Out of habit to warp unit I still press "w" before the warpin.

Cracy

Poland221 Posts

November 29 2011 15:35 GMT

#44

I was thinking on creating another tread but maybe someone here will be able to help me. I am newbie and the question is very basic but I haven't found the answer anywhere.

I would like to know how that the shooting AI works - this is closely related to hotkeys and its usage.
How does the computer chooses the target to attack? When in PvZ the you are attacked by roach-ling at the beginning and you get the Immortal out - will it target roaches first as it is the most effective or attack the closest? I guess the latter as other wise 1A would be enough...

But if so, I guess you should have zealots and immortals under different hotkeys? And when we're on that topic, how to target particular units effectively? Shift+right click, shift+A or you shouldn't queve them?

Thanks for your help.
HF

schwza

67 Posts

November 29 2011 15:53 GMT

#45

Lowly gold, but this is what I'm currently doing:

1 - whole army
2 - varies
3 - scouting probe
4 - sentries ("four-ce field")
5 - gateway/warpgate. I thought about trying to get used to using W but a lot of times I wind up adding gateways to my control group and then when I hit 5 later I have them ready to make WGs.
6 - robo
7 - stargate
8 - nexuses
9 - forges
0 - observers

Having colossi on their own group sounds smart. I sometimes look at replays and realize that my stupid colossus was shooting a supply depot during the whole fight.

If I have robo and stargate on 6, can I make units out of both? I've never tried it.

I've also thought about having one group of nexuses that I want to produce probes from and one group for all of them (for chrono).

How do you set up camera hotkeys? Sounds pretty useful.

Mikkerthebhu

Denmark154 Posts

November 29 2011 16:26 GMT

#46

This controlgroup setup I am about to propose is for the gamer who wants to be really, really, really good. You must be able to change the control groups on the fly considering what situation you are in. I use 1-4 control groups for units and 5+6 for buildings.

5: All nexus.
6: All army producing facilities.
f1 - f5 is for save location: f1, f2, f3 and f4 are for every nexus you have. f5 is for your aggressive warp in pylon. Notice how having f5 and control group 6 close to eachother will help out your push immensely by saving so much time.

The standard deathball scenario:
1: Main melee army.
2: Main Ranged army
3: Main caster army.
4: A unit or group that needs unique attention. A scout/harrassing unit/observer/colussus/group of defending units, etc.

The Multitasking scenario, where you have to defend a drop, harrassing with some units, and maintain a major push.
1: Main melee army
2: Ranged + spell casters.
3: Defensive group of units.
4: Harrasing group of units.
note: Having trained "tab-circling units" will help you a lot!

The chaos scenario, all hell is loose.
Arrange control groups after the units position on the map.
1: furtherst left,
2: second furthers,
etc.

Con and Pro's for doing this setup:
Cons: This setup is one of the hardest to learn, and is both an intellectual and physical challenge.
Pros: It gives the possibílity of multitasking on more than just 2 groups. You can easily defend a drop while harrassing while doing your major push effectively. Once you master this, go try and outplay a player with just 2 or 3 unit hotkeys. It feels amazing to actually be able to say that you outplayed someone technically.

Mikkerthebhu

Denmark154 Posts

November 29 2011 16:58 GMT

#47

On November 28 2011 14:39 Zerksys wrote:
I use a really inefficient hotkey setup and I don't know how to break out of it.

1 - Main army
2 - Infestor
3- Mutas/Lings (depending on if I go muta heavy or roach heavy)
4 - all hatcheries
5 - queens
6 - third base
7 - evo chambers
8 - Scouting overlord/overseer late game
9 - Scouting lings
0 - any burrowed units.

Can someone tell me a better setup for zerg?

I hope you see this, but I used to play zerg, and depending on how good you wanna be there are some different sets of hotkeys that might suit you.
There is a hotkey that lets you browse through all of your hatcheries (I believe it is backspace). Find it and bind it to somewhere that fits you. Select all your queens. Hold shift and press the inject button. Click on your browse hatchery button, click on every hatchery while you browse them all. EG.Machine uses this way of injecting, and you won't believe how fast he is, it is absolutely amazing.

For the beginner:
1: Main army.
2: Infestor
3: All hatcheries
4: All queens.

Advanced:
1: Melee units.
2: Ranged units. If you use this hotkey for mutalisks, then put roaches and hydras into control group 1.
3: spell caster.
4: All hatheries
5: All queens.

The very hard and very good:
1: Melee units
2: Ranged units:
3: spell casters
4: Harrassing/defending/scouting/burrowed unit that requires unique control.
5: All hatheries
6: All queens.

Note: control group 3 won't be used as infestors before we are pretty far into the game. Until then you can easily use it as a scouting overlord etc.
With the control groups you currently got, I strongly believe you should try the last one I mentioned. You could even make 0 as your evolution chamber and enhance it according to your style (which I would be very interested to see).

Nuclease

United States1049 Posts

November 29 2011 20:44 GMT

#48

On November 07 2011 04:45 Hertzy wrote:

Siege: Colossi. I want to keep them on a-move as opposed to focus-firing, and generally standing back from the rest of the army.

Actually, if you look at the games of progressive and skilled Protoss players (Creator, Sage, Alicia kind of, and Oz especially) then you will find that they use force fields and focus fire small clumps that they create by herding with FFs. Moreover, they will focus fire important units because 3 Colossi one-hits everything they are a counter to. So, you should use this control group to focus fire.

Other than that I agree with you for the rest of your control groups, and mine are very similar.

Balgrog

United States1221 Posts

November 29 2011 23:27 GMT

#49

My set up changes on my unit comp and what not so I will give you a few examples (seems odd but works well for me)

Opening
1-scouting probe
4-worker probe
5-nexus

Mid game w/ air
1-ground force (usually just stalker w/ no blink, sentry, zealot)
2-air units
3-stargate
4-worker probe
5-nexus

late game
1-main army
2-warp prism and the units within it (usually templar or sentries) or overall harrass
3- High Templar
4-worker probe
5-nexi
6-robo

I have great micro and control with mouse so manuvering my army with it being on 1 is no big deal, I tab between sentries and stalkers. I ALWAYS focus fire my collos to make sure they are doing maximum damage or I can shut down some flanking roaches really fast. then if I get in a oh shit moment to move my whole army minus templar which I want to always have a designated hotkey for, is just as easy as taping "1" and moving them.

Amui

Canada10567 Posts

November 29 2011 23:44 GMT

#50

I prefer to have my army seperated everything except stalkers and HT in one group, stalkers in one group, templar on one group, and then 78 are for observers.

Kharnage

Australia920 Posts

November 30 2011 00:25 GMT

#51

On November 28 2011 12:53 Zergrusher wrote:
so most of the time toss uses 1 hotkey for there army?

so it would be hard for them to deal with multi pronged attacks? hmmm

The best way to deal with multiprong attacks is warpin a bunch of zealots at the right location since you pretty much need your army together.
It's hard to havea hotkey for the units you haven't created yet.