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![[image loading]](http://i25.tinypic.com/28nw2u.jpg)
These tests were preformed with Terran on Lost Temple in YABOT at the 6 o'clock natural. The 'minutes' referred to are Game Minutes as observed through watching a replay.
This spot was selected by the seemingly large discrepancy between patches 3 4 5.
![[image loading]](http://i28.tinypic.com/4pxvl2.png)
What does this tell us?
The Minerals per minute from from the first workers can vary from at least 38-45.
The maximum minerals per minute from each patch is ~105.
Worker 2 is equally efficient as worker 1, while worker 3 can vary between 30% and 75% efficiency.
What can I do with this?
Be diligent at the start of the game to ensure that you have 2 workers on each patch before any patches get saturated with 3 workers. The auto mine is smart but occasionally it will hit a harmonic in which patches will get 3 workers while others still only have 1.
In an ideal situation (from this example) you would want 2 workers on patch 4 before having any workers on patch 6. Although the auto mine will usually kick in and say "I see an empty patch! Let me go there instead".
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This is huge for me thanks for doing the research!
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thanks OP
I thought 2 workers on one patch > idle patch was worth it in some scenarios but now i know
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This has been looked at and analyzed many times with very similar results, nontheless thanks for putting in the time on this post OP. Higher level players probably already should know this stuff not because of doing the math themselves but because of simply being aware of where workers are going on the mineral line, and making sure the line looks even.
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wow i dnt even know abt this..thx a lot!
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good work...i didnt know that...well i knew it was way less efficient at the third worker on patch but not that much....
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Excellent. Love this type of analysis. This along with the Gas Matters thread written a while back really makes it worth while to read these forums.
Thanks again
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Haven't really noticed that some patches have 3 workers before saturating all the patches with 2, but still interesting.
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Nice data, it helps figure out the exact optimal time to expand ( to get the most mins/minute with a # of workers), but that will require further analysis.
Thanks for the work you put into this!
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Some of this is due to poor map design, mappers havent figured out ways to efficiently place minerals like they did in Broodwar so that the patches didn't have as big discrepencies but still useful information. Maybe if you include other starting points mappers can geta n idea on how to place minerals better.
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Very interesting information. I'll try to keep this in my mind while playing, but I'll probably forget :D
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Hey I have also noticed, during downtime when I seven pool the insane AI on steppes of war, that specifically telling your drones to return to closer mineral patches causes you to have about 10-15 more minerals when you spawning pool pops up. That can be the difference between immediately queueing 3 sets of zerglings or having to wait a few seconds to gather those last 15 minerals before you can spawn them.
Now this is a very limited application, but I'm curious about how significantly this affects mules. I think most people try to distribute their mules in a cycle, one at each mineral patch, so they don't mine out of half their mineral nodes with the rest at still ~200 minerals left. But I'm thinking that the difference between muling a close mineral patch vs. a far mineral patch could result in a rather significant difference in total minerals harvested over the course of a typical game. I'm thinking it would be far more efficient to use your mules ONLY on closer mineral patches and allow your SCVs exclusively to mine out the 2 far mineral patches that are typically at each start location.
Edit: I actually just tested it and the mule's lifetime is such that it brings back exactly the same amount of minerals regardless of whether it's a closer patch or a farther patch. It does take a little longer for each mineral patch to be returned but because of the timed life it's not that big of a difference. I actually think summoning mules exclusively on the far mineral patches is then more efficient so that those will get mined out, allowing you to transfer more SCVs to your expansion and allowing your scvs to mine the more efficient close mineral patches (it makes a difference for the SCVs because they are not timed).
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I think this helps mass expanding zergs more than anything. So many of us just think "3 per patch if correct saturation" while we should be thinking "2 per patch is most efficient"
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On August 13 2010 11:01 Keap wrote:
I think this helps mass expanding zergs more than anything. So many of us just think "3 per patch if correct saturation" while we should be thinking "2 per patch is most efficient"
thats what most do.
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ya i always suspected that 2.5 workers r needed to saturate a base.
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EPT
