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I have a 4GB USB drive, and a lot of hours between classes during which I would sometimes like to play SC2. So I'm trying to make the smallest multi-player-able portable SC2 folder possible.
It worked before just dragging the whole SC2 folder minus the campaign subfolder, but during some patches, it would require an update which would fail.
Is there a surefire way to get a portable install, so I can just drag-and-drop a folder from a USB drive to a library computer and play pretty much asap?
Right now the subfolders I have are:
Battle.net (I assume this is necessary)
Logs (negligible space)
Mods
- Core.SC2Mod (probably everything here)
- Liberty.SC2Mod (there's like 3GB in here... no idea, probably necessary)
- LibertyMulti.SC2Mod (seems quite necessary)
- Challenges.SC2Mod (negligible space)
Support (negligible space)
Test (PTR? Probably can delete)
Versions (Can delete all but the most recent Shaders folder and most recent Base folder I think)
I still need to trim 25MB to get it to fit, but I'm not sure where.
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why don't you just buy a 8gb flash drive, they only cost like $7 or $8 bucks...(including shipping)
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Yeah gotta agree with drolkrad. 8 Gig drives are quite avaiable. This way you don't have to worry about patches adding little bits of data.
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If it's just 25mb, you can just upload it anywhere easily. Or you can do what ^ suggested and get an 8gb
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This topic was supposed to be less about my personal 25MB problem and more about trying to get it down to the most efficient size so this could turn into a sort-of guide on how to make a portable SC2 multi-player folder.
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you could just compress the shit out of it with winrar, you can get really good compress's with it.
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To be fair.. 8GB is pretty portable for today's standards. Most people own some sort of memory that is at least 8GB. If you don't, I suggest investing in one.
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On March 29 2011 15:23 Chairman Ray wrote:
If it's just 25mb, you can just upload it anywhere easily. Or you can do what ^ suggested and get an 8gb
Compressing and decompressing files isn't exactly fast.
On March 29 2011 15:29 cHaNg-sTa wrote:
To be fair.. 8GB is pretty portable for today's standards. Most people own some sort of memory that is at least 8GB. If you don't, I suggest investing in one.
"Portable" for a program means that you can run it without having go through the install, thanks for trying, though.
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On March 29 2011 15:33 ChThoniC wrote:Show nested quote +On March 29 2011 15:23 Chairman Ray wrote:
If it's just 25mb, you can just upload it anywhere easily. Or you can do what ^ suggested and get an 8gb Compressing and decompressing files isn't exactly fast. Show nested quote +On March 29 2011 15:29 cHaNg-sTa wrote:
To be fair.. 8GB is pretty portable for today's standards. Most people own some sort of memory that is at least 8GB. If you don't, I suggest investing in one. "Portable" for a program means that you can run it without having go through the install, thanks for trying, though.
No need to be brash here. He makes a valid point. I realize the point of your thread is to be minimal, but I think more to the point is most gamers have 8gb of portable storage readily available to them so it seems hardly necessary to go through this trouble.
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On March 29 2011 15:33 ChThoniC wrote:Show nested quote +On March 29 2011 15:23 Chairman Ray wrote:
If it's just 25mb, you can just upload it anywhere easily. Or you can do what ^ suggested and get an 8gb Compressing and decompressing files isn't exactly fast. Show nested quote +On March 29 2011 15:29 cHaNg-sTa wrote:
To be fair.. 8GB is pretty portable for today's standards. Most people own some sort of memory that is at least 8GB. If you don't, I suggest investing in one. "Portable" for a program means that you can run it without having go through the install, thanks for trying, though.
I know that you're trying to just have folders put in a flash drive. I was just making the general statement that 8GB flash drives are commonly available and cheap. I know that you're trying to make SC2 folder as efficient as possible and putting it on your 4GB. But if you're really fighting for 25MB of space and trying to find more things to cut, what happens when more and more updates occur in the future? I'd say just save yourself the trouble right now and get a 8GB.
Yes, obviously trying to make a list of efficiently making a SC2 flash drive is very helpful and that's awesome that you're trying to spread the knowledge, but just saying that your original message seems to be emphasizing more of a personal flash drive issue.
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I wouldn't mess with Liberty.SC2Mods. From the looks of it, quite a few core files (like textures and sounds and stuff) are contained within it, so messing with it would probably be detrimental.
Dunno about "Test." I think the PTR doesn't really install itself fully until you first attempt to run it, though you can always delete the "Starcraft II Public Test" executable if you don't plan on using the PTR any time soon.
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Doesn't SC2 tell you that It can't find a reg entry when you run it via copy and paste? It's what happened to me when I tried running SC2 beta at school.
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This is also very much applicable to all the people with smaller ssd drives that want to save space, so I'm interested in hearing more tips, for sure.
So maybe we could stop talking about how big/cheap flash drives are today and focus on his question.
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You'll be pleased to know that StarCraft doesn't care if you copy paste it around. However you need to bring your personal StarCraft II data with you. eg My Documents/StarCraft II.
If you don't want to have to re-download all the maps/portraits etc, you will also need to copy ProgramData\Blizzard Entertainment.
I expect you'll spend more time trying to work out which files you can get away with cutting then is worth it. Get a job, work for an hour, buy a bigger flash disk. That's the optimal solution.
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Assuming you have internet I recommend finding a small file in there that fits the size restriction and ticking it into dropbox or a few rars and emailing them to yourself.
I'm not sure about the PTR thing but the executable should be removable if you don't plan on getting on it.
Inside the Support folder the SC2Editor doesn't appear to do anything? it's 18mb that goes a good ways toward helping you fit it on.
If you haven't already I'd delete all the SC2.exe's inside the versions folders. They don't appear to do anything either
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Is there any way to run it with all the files localized to one folder? Maybe something like linking the paths that SC2 searches for (like ProgramData/Blizzard) to your own folders if you were using Linux?
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I hope someone actually answers your questions OP, I would love to hear of a way to minimize the space SC2 would take to be played off of a Flash Drive (which I understand it as what you refer to as "portable").
Suggestions on getting a bigger flash drive don't actually answer the question being asked...
I don't have enough expertise to help, but you have my support.
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How big is the Test folder if you've never run PTR? It's nearly a gig if the PTR client is installed. If it's bigger than the amount of space you need to trim, I'd try that first.
I assume you can safely delete the map editor. It's in the Support folder and it's just over 18MB.
Yes, everyone, this problem could obviously be resolved by using a bigger flash drive, but people can do that now. What's wrong with trying to find a way to do it on a smaller drive if possible?
I imagine your first map load each play session would be ungodly slow off a flash drive. Flash over USB has a respectable seek time (the time needed to start loading a particular file into memory) but a really bad transfer rate for large files like textures. Might wanna load a game vs. the computer first, so you don't get dropped for slow loading on ladder or have crazy lag at game start that screws up your initial worker micro. Just some rampant speculation from someone who's never run this particular game off a portable drive.
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It won't.
All components of SC2Mods are used at some point in the game; the only way I see it running is that you'd yank the single player portion out of them by editing the MPQ but then at any patch the launcher will tell you to fuck off.
Plus SC2 writes a shitload of stuff into the registry.
The only way I see it working reliably is that you directly install SC2 onto an external solid state drive (flashdrives will have atrocious access rates), copy/sniff then export all the registry keys as a "patch" for the location you'll play from.
AND you need to insure the drive will have the correct letter too, sometimes some configurations won't allow you to randomly switch hard drive 'drive letters' (forgot the correct word) unless you purposefully set them off limits to like Z:\ while making partitions.
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Well you could try removing high quality textures and that sort of stuff from MPQ, along with single player files, as I doubt you would like to use anything higher, that should save you some odd megs or gigs. Oh and in worst case scenario, you may need to replace something with dummy files. BUT remember that this kind of tinkering is against TOS afaik, but one thing you could try to do is get blizzard do "multiplayer" only client (like they had with SC1 and Diablo). Find some site where you can pull up petition and get people sign it.
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Thanks for the help, guys.
Even if I had an 8GB drive, which I plan on grabbing next time I'm out, I still want to be able to take up as little space as possible.
It's worked for me previously with both beta and launch versions of the game. The only time it's failed to run is during patching (I'm not sure why it tries to patch even when I have the latest version downloaded).
The only surefire way to get it to run is to run the install on the computer. The install file is ~7GB iirc, so that takes up quite a bit on even an 8GB drive
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Get a fast usb drive with lots of space, probably 32GB, create a bootable win7 install on it and install/update sc2. Boot from the usb drive at whatever computer you're using.
Or do the same with a small portable hard drive.
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I'm not sure how well that would work. If you copy/paste SC2 to another machine, it will start the patch process to download anything else that is needed. I don't know, but I've never found a way around that. I know this has been suggested a few times, but I'd go to the StarCraft 2 folder and delete some of the older "Versions" and that should get the installed folder to 8 gig. Then throw that on a flash drive (Or your phone if you have Android with a decent sized SD Card) and just copy it to the new computer, run the .exe and let bnet install anything it's missing like registry keys and you'll be good to go.
*EDIT* Just to note, I've been able to copy an installed version of SC2 to 3 different computers without having to re-install.
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self extracting compressed file? im sure you can squeeze a couple MB even if most of the textures / models are already compressed in their formats.
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Note: Current version works flawlessly :D
On March 30 2011 01:59 CyberPitz wrote:
I'm not sure how well that would work. If you copy/paste SC2 to another machine, it will start the patch process to download anything else that is needed. I don't know, but I've never found a way around that. I know this has been suggested a few times, but I'd go to the StarCraft 2 folder and delete some of the older "Versions" and that should get the installed folder to 8 gig. Then throw that on a flash drive (Or your phone if you have Android with a decent sized SD Card) and just copy it to the new computer, run the .exe and let bnet install anything it's missing like registry keys and you'll be good to go.
*EDIT* Just to note, I've been able to copy an installed version of SC2 to 3 different computers without having to re-install.
Yeah I've had success, too, but sometimes it crashes while patching (even using the most recent version files).
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Wouldnt you risk running into some anti cheat stuff from running from a non standard install?
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Just buy a 16gig flash drive...
also you gonna need admin right... cause the game have to write some info in the registry.
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On March 30 2011 04:44 ChThoniC wrote:Note: Current version works flawlessly :D Show nested quote +On March 30 2011 01:59 CyberPitz wrote:
I'm not sure how well that would work. If you copy/paste SC2 to another machine, it will start the patch process to download anything else that is needed. I don't know, but I've never found a way around that. I know this has been suggested a few times, but I'd go to the StarCraft 2 folder and delete some of the older "Versions" and that should get the installed folder to 8 gig. Then throw that on a flash drive (Or your phone if you have Android with a decent sized SD Card) and just copy it to the new computer, run the .exe and let bnet install anything it's missing like registry keys and you'll be good to go.
*EDIT* Just to note, I've been able to copy an installed version of SC2 to 3 different computers without having to re-install. Yeah I've had success, too, but sometimes it crashes while patching (even using the most recent version files).
What if you leave all of the current version files in there? That's the only thing I didn't do (Since there wasn't any need to make the files smaller). Sure, it's not what you were wanting, but this may be the only / fastest way?
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i so could see myself playing starcraft in our school library while everyone else around me is studying for finals lmao!
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SC2 writes stuff to the registry, so it will only work on a computer that previously had SC2 installed anyway.
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There is one way:
Contents in the 4gb USB:
Battle.net (keep all inside the folder)
Logs (keep all inside the folder)
Mods (keep all inside the folder)
Support (keep all inside the folder)
Versions ( remove everything except Shaders[biggest number] and Base[biggest number]
Starcraft II.exe
You can only ladder or play melee custom games. UMS/campaign won't work.
EDIT: also, I think you can't watch previous version of the replays. Note: you won't be able to patch with just your usb.
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Wait... Can someone explain what the purpose of doing this is? Can you open the USB on any computer and open the game?
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On March 29 2011 15:20 drolkrad wrote:
why don't you just buy a 8gb flash drive, they only cost like $7 or $8 bucks...(including shipping)
Were? all the ones i find are at least 16.
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you're still going to need to install the game on an OS.. carry the cd
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On March 30 2011 05:05 Mute wrote:
Wait... Can someone explain what the purpose of doing this is? Can you open the USB on any computer and open the game?
If you have a sc2 directory in your usb, you should be able to run it from your usb.
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On March 30 2011 05:18 Daiki wrote:Show nested quote +On March 30 2011 05:05 Mute wrote:
Wait... Can someone explain what the purpose of doing this is? Can you open the USB on any computer and open the game? If you have a sc2 directory in your usb, you should be able to run it from your usb.
I can't believe I didn't know this! Mind Blown!
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On March 30 2011 04:56 Turing wrote:
SC2 writes stuff to the registry, so it will only work on a computer that previously had SC2 installed anyway.
Not true. I've been able to just copy/paste the installed folder from one computer to a brand new machine that has never had SC2 installed.
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I too have been looking into trying to get sc2 (Online only of course) as small as possible so i can play at school where i am not allowed to install.
this is my question though (As i am not super computer savvy, but not totally innept either):
If I have one 4gb flash drive, and one 1gb flash drive, could I copy the bulk of the files to the prior, and then copy the one folder that puts it over the limit to the latter? I mean, if I am just copying the files to the desktop from both drives anyway, is this feasible?
I would love for someone who has actually done this to do a step by step guide, even if that is just a couple screen grabs and some bullet points because a lot of people are probably as confused as I am.
Thanks for the help in advance 
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On April 07 2011 15:51 WackaAlpaca wrote:I too have been looking into trying to get sc2 (Online only of course) as small as possible so i can play at school where i am not allowed to install. this is my question though (As i am not super computer savvy, but not totally innept either): If I have one 4gb flash drive, and one 1gb flash drive, could I copy the bulk of the files to the prior, and then copy the one folder that puts it over the limit to the latter? I mean, if I am just copying the files to the desktop from both drives anyway, is this feasible? I would love for someone who has actually done this to do a step by step guide, even if that is just a couple screen grabs and some bullet points because a lot of people are probably as confused as I am. Thanks for the help in advance
It is definitely doable to split the folder up into multiple chunks and split it over different flash drives.
The biggest issue you'll run into will be hardware on your school computers (most schools don't have decent graphic cards in their computers) and the presence of directX if running on XP or lower.
Another problem you'll run into will be permissions. School computers are often locked down so that you cannot run un-authorized programs.
Anyways, good luck!
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Lol my phone has a 8gb card. Go to your local phone retailers and ask if they have any extra usb sticks or cards, i use a usb kingston adapter the reads my 8gb ssd
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Just a tip on how to run it once you do get it to fit. If you go into your support file and run the exe "SC2switcher.exe" you should be able to run the SC2 program without installing it. At least 6 months ago for the SC2 club at my university that is what we used to play it on the school computers without installing it. Of course back then it would fit on a 4GB stick no problem.
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Here's a guide to get it down to fit in a 4gb stick while maintaining multiplayer functionality for the most recent patch.
It breaks: Single player, old replays
Note: this only works if you updated to the latest patch. If there is a new patch you'll likely have to redo the whole process
Starting size: 9.87 GB
1) Delete The "Campaigns" folder (-4.42 GB = 5.44 GB)
2) Delete everything except the highest version number in \Versions\
* For patch 1.3.1 as of April 7, 2011: Keep only folders "Base18092" and "Shaders14515" (-1.05 GB = 4.39 GB)
* Deletes previous versions, will break replays from previous patches, but cuts back size
3) In \Mods\Core.SC2Mod\, delete Backup.MPQ (-241 MB = 4.16 GB)
* Backup data for rolling back corrupt stuff, not needed for multiplayer play
4) Delete \Test\ (-703 MB = 3.47 GB)
* This is the PTR data, not needed.
5) Delete "StarCraft II Editor Public Test.exe" and "StarCraft II Public Test.exe" (-6 MB = 3.47 GB)
There you go, 3.47 GB, fits easily on a 4 GB flash drive.
>> Tested in a quick custom on Shattered Temple... all my computers have SC2 installed so I can't tell you if this is truely portable, but it should be
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Thank you so much whsper! following one of the above guys i was about .3gb over, but deleting the backup made it fit on just my one flash drive!
Also, i dont think the computer specs will be a problem, i go to a film school and am in the 3d modelling program 
GL to everyone out there trying to get this to work - I'll be seeing you on the ladder :D
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Good work. I was about to post what I did to make my game fit on a 4GB drive, but it's the exact same as whsper. Some brief notes though, some instability can be caused by deleting older versions. You won't be crashing left and right, but I've had a couple of crashes with the modified version.
To all you naysayers, you can very well copy and paste a SC2 folder on any computer and run it problem free. SC2 will create any more required directories or files when you start it up for the first time.
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Gah.... ok, I'm at school, and I copied the files over fine, but now when i run SC2switcher from the support folder, the screen goes black, then it goes to the desktop and during that it deletes all the folders from where i copied them too expect for the support one...
>.>
any suggestions?
I'll keep trying to get it to work, and edit this if i find a way - heres hoping
EDIT:
ok so apparently copying it to the "Temp" folder wasnt a good idea... putting it on the desktop resolved the issue.
im an idiot 
EDIT02:
Now it is not letting me connect to battle.net, any ideas why this is happening? I know people at the school have played hand held games online using the internet, so i dont think its blocked or something, but could it be?
EDIT03:
On the side of the login screen it is saying something about problems with loging in or something, maybe it isnt me, its them. i just wanna play before my next class starts in 2 hours cuz im stranded here
EDIT04:
I've decided it is a firewall, im gonna go talk to my head of staff, lets hope he is a cool guy, if not... ;_;
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On April 08 2011 02:42 aksfjh wrote:
Good work. I was about to post what I did to make my game fit on a 4GB drive, but it's the exact same as whsper. Some brief notes though, some instability can be caused by deleting older versions. You won't be crashing left and right, but I've had a couple of crashes with the modified version.
To all you naysayers, you can very well copy and paste a SC2 folder on any computer and run it problem free. SC2 will create any more required directories or files when you start it up for the first time.
strange i haven't had any issues at all... I found out I was using the modified copy to ladder last night (by accident of course)
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Whsper pretty much covers all of it in his post.
+ Show Spoiler +On April 07 2011 16:35 whsper wrote:
Here's a guide to get it down to fit in a 4gb stick while maintaining multiplayer functionality for the most recent patch.
It breaks: Single player, old replays
Note: this only works if you updated to the latest patch. If there is a new patch you'll likely have to redo the whole process
Starting size: 9.87 GB
1) Delete The "Campaigns" folder (-4.42 GB = 5.44 GB)
2) Delete everything except the highest version number in \Versions\
* For patch 1.3.1 as of April 7, 2011: Keep only folders "Base18092" and "Shaders14515" (-1.05 GB = 4.39 GB)
* Deletes previous versions, will break replays from previous patches, but cuts back size
3) In \Mods\Core.SC2Mod\, delete Backup.MPQ (-241 MB = 4.16 GB)
* Backup data for rolling back corrupt stuff, not needed for multiplayer play
4) Delete \Test\ (-703 MB = 3.47 GB)
* This is the PTR data, not needed.
5) Delete "StarCraft II Editor Public Test.exe" and "StarCraft II Public Test.exe" (-6 MB = 3.47 GB)
There you go, 3.47 GB, fits easily on a 4 GB flash drive.
>> Tested in a quick custom on Shattered Temple... all my computers have SC2 installed so I can't tell you if this is truely portable, but it should be
In the event of a patch, it is possible to manually copy the files that have been modified. You will need access to a computer that has a full install to patch with. After that you need to identify which files have been modified (this is easy using the 'details' view mode and then sort by date)
I've been running SC2 out of a computer lab at university and have found that the following files are changed during a patch:
+ Show Spoiler +STARCRAFT II ->
- StarCraft II Editor
- StarCraft II
- StarCraft II Public Test *Not required to run regular ladder mode*
STARCRAFT II -> Battle.Net-->
- battle,net-patch.MPQ (The original battle.net.MPQ is not altered in patches)
STARCRAFT II -> LOGS
- Its like 500 kb max, just copy the whole folder again
STARCRAFT II -> Mods --> Core.SC2Mod-->
- Backup.MPQ *This may not be needed to play*
STARCRAFT II -> Support
- SC2Switcher
- SC2Editor
- Battle.net.dll
- Blizzard Updater
- Blizzard Downloader
- Repair
STARCRAFT II -> Versions
- This will be the highest value for the 'Shader' and 'Base' folders.
I have found that it is easiest to run the game using the file "SC2Switcher" from the support folder, as noted by Lunares above. This by-passes the registry and prevents any unnecessary pre-launch patching on computers that do not have SC2 installed.
Altogether the method outlined by Whsper should give you a folder that is 3.70 GB. I use this method as well and it is completely portable. However, the game WILL crash at the login screen if a patch has been released. Its not a big deal as its easy enough to fix when you know to add the more recent files, but it was a huge headache the first time it happened to me since I was like 'WTF COMPUTER I WANNA PLAY Y U NO STARCRAFT'
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The game has become larger than 8 gbs because of the patches you'd need more space to carry to whole thing around
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On April 09 2011 11:52 Locustrockz wrote:
The game has become larger than 8 gbs because of the patches you'd need more space to carry to whole thing around
Completely true, but the OP is not trying to carry the "whole thing". He only wants to be able to play ladder matches online. It is possible to get the game down to under 4GB and still log into battle.net and play some ladder matches. At present, the bare minimum space requirement is around 3.5GB
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This is awesome. So everytime a patch comes out just update on your computer than look at ur usb and find the files that have changed after the patch and copy those files to the usb?
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You might not need Liberty.SC2Mod or Challenges.SC2Mod.
I think Liberty is for campaign, LibertyMulti is for online, and Challenges for challenges (obviously).
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i have a question. Say i have a 16GB usb. All i have to do is put the starcraft 2 folder from my computer onto my usb and it will work anywhere i go? or what do i need to do?
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EPT
