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I need to find more information about this... I'm a diamond level Terran, I don't personally use locations at all. I keep hearing about them and it just never occurred to me to use them.
So My question mainly would be, does your apm, revolve around using locations? Is it part of your repetition? I just use my control groups for my units and buildings to go back to my base, or when i need to go to an expansion then i click on my minimap.
Poll: On a Scale of 1 to 5, How Important is using Locations?(Vote): 1. They are no more useful than typical control groups, it's just preference.
(Vote): 2. They are slightly more useful for unit/building management than just control groups.
(Vote): 3. They serve a clear and unique role separate from unit control groups, they would help any player.
(Vote): 4. There's a clear gap in skill between players who do and do not use location hotkeys, USE THEM!
(Vote): 5. You simply can't get good without location hotkeys, literally every GM player uses them!
If someone like me who has played for years, and still doesn't use them, does anyone have advice for someone to start using them? Should I put a location at each base and force myself to cycle through them to do my tasks?
Thanks!
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Plenty of GM players have never used location hotkeys in their lives. Most Kespa pros use three or four. But really, they can only help.
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Guru use f2 and is top gm so dont care about mechanix huehue
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United Kingdom20326 Posts
Very useful. One example that i use often is responding to a drop:
Camera hotkey to base that's about to be dropped
box middle of screen
camera hotkey to other base
rightclick minerals
you can perform some actions simultaneously because you're using the mouse AND the keyboard instead of using the mouse sequentially with a comparable action like a minimap click. More consistent and it takes less time and effort to execute the needed actions which is important for a game like sc2
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I camera hotkey every base. As Cyro mentionned, it is easier to respond to drops that way. First base F1, Second base F2 and so on. Then in an instant I can go to the base that's getting dropped, faster than by clicking on minimap.
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In my opinion the camera hotkey are very useful. I'm a plat zerg player and I use the camera hotkeys for injects, macro while attacking, and defending vs harasses.
I started using them 2 month ago, I was gold then, and I advanced a lot since then (I changed the hotkeys so that it will be easier to use).
I'm far not a terran player, so I don't know how useful are they for terran. But I play prottoss unranked games (beating gold players from time to time), and they are useful for protoss as well. (macro and warping units while making a push, or binding a location to my proxy pylon or warp prism for faster reinforcements)
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United States4883 Posts
100% necessary if you want to improve.
There are GM players who don't use hotkeys but have godly mouse accuracy. If they used location hotkeys, they would easy jump up another level and become much better players. It's an easy skill to learn and practice, there's no reason to ignore it except ignorance or stubbornness.
Just practice F2-F4 for your first three bases and make an active attempt to use them. It makes transferring workers easy, you can check all of your tech progress in literally 2 seconds, and it also helps if you need to defend on two fronts. Guaranteed will make a huge difference in the way you play.
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When a sc2 player switches from camera location hotkey useage from no camera hotkey useage, it's likely they will improve efficiency in some area's and a slight dropoff in efficiency in other area's, especially in the start
For example:
A person who constantly clicks minimap to get around, might lose his ability to constantly see everything on the minimap because he is now using camera keys and he doesn't look at the minimap as often anymore.
However, if you have long term goals and want to become as good as possible, learning them and using them efficiently is almost always a good idea.
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I just double click my hotkeys and it takes me to it, then mouse click mini map as well... i've hotkey'd location many times but rarely use the hotkey when under attack, space bar seems to get me there quickly as well.
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I would start practicing loacation hotkeys by disabling the screen movement by mouse against ai... so you are forced to do it with hotkeys. You dont need to worry about the micro just send your units with a move towards the ai base....
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I think it really depends on which race you're playing. I assume it's pretty useful as zerg for your injects. As terran, I don't really think they're necessary since army/building groups work just as well to replace the camera to key locations.
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personal preference, i use one for my main and my opponents, but otherwise tons of top pros in korean and foreign scene never use them. literally comes done to preference just like other hotkeys
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Comes down to preference imo. Some pros use them, some don't. I personally never use them because my Hotkey settings don't allow it. I could of course change them but after playing SC2 for almost 6 years and never changing my hotkeys during that time I'd rather not witness the disaster of me doing that 
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Use them, it's hard to put into words but camera hotkeys just streamline your play so much. You doubletap your hotkey to control your units then you press F1 to immediately pan to the exact center of your base, put guys into gas and you doubletap your unit hotkey to continue controlling your units. No matter how good you are at clicking the minimap you're not going to be as crisp and fast as the camera hotkey. You have to look at the minimap, move your mouse over there and aim where you want to look, even with separate base hotkeys you're still doubletapping instead of instantly being there.
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I use location hotkeys for hatcheries only. Its useful for me to jump on specific hatchery to inject or if Im being dropped to jump on that hatch location.
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They definitely allow you to do things faster once you got the muscle memory. I'm only gold, but I really feel the camera locations are giving me a big advantage over the other gold players that don't use them. Both for macro and reacting to harass.
I have camera locations on my bases (everyone does that I think) and over my rally point (not as standard?). Allows me to quickly move to or between bases without losing my selection or having to move the mouse for a slow precise click on the minimap (that will be half a screen off anyway, and is likely to need correction with side-scroll). This is useful for
- injects (mules for you)
- building new expansions (you hotkey all bases at the start of the game)
- maynard
- running with workers from harass (location 1, drag-select, location 2, right-click minerals)
- sending units to mineral lines for harass defence.
- quickly pick up reinforcements (location, drag-select, shift-1, double tap 1)
Most of these are done even more often now in LotV.
To learn, I think the best way is to open a game vs easy computer and just force yourself to do all of the above with camera hotkeys very slowly and deliberately, making sure to go through the motions with minimum effort, don't move the mouse more than needed. Once you can do it right super slow, increase the pace bit by bit, maintaining full control and good form. After an hour or so you should have have it down pretty solidly at high speed.
Then for the coming 5-10 sessions or so, do a 10 minute camera location warmup against computer before you go on the ladder. Again start slow and with perfect form and then increase pace (which you will be able to do much faster after first time). That will make the muscle memory really stick.
Congratulations, you now are a lot faster to control what is going on in your mineral lines, which are the most important areas of the map. 
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100% amazing mechanic. That being said you can get very good without them.
So useful for maynarding drones to new expansions, taking new expansions, running workers from harass as well as responding to harass.
The keys aren't very important in a game without too much interaction, one where it's all mind-games and build orders.
However in a game with lots of harass or where things get very messy camera hotkeys enable you to do far more with your apm. Especially when dealing with multiple attacks/harass.
Previous post is a great explanation of how to learn it and it's many benefits.
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I think it depends on your general playstyle. It was very useful for macro protoss with old chrono +warpin, may not be much with new one.
WhiteRa didn't use them (from what I used to see on his streams), but when a terran dropped and attacked from 3-4 different places he struggled to change the screen fast enough
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I am a GM Zerg, I don't struggle against drops and never used a location hotkey in my life.
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Location hotkeys are excellent for minimizing actions required to perform an action.
For example
You can press F2 to go to your main base. 1 key = 1 action
Double clicking your command center hotkey to go to your main base. 2 key = 1 action
Click minimap to go to your main base. 1 key = 1 action (however, less accuracy, and takes longer to click the minimap then move your mouse cursor back to the center area of the screen to perform your next action)
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EPT
