EPTIntroduction
I've been playing team games since the beta, and I believe all this hate on cheese is because people haven't played enough 2v2s to understand the mechanics. For people who play both 1v1 and 2v2 recognize that 2v2 is just another build order. I'm going to explain why 95% of 2v2s are not cheese.
(Images in this thread are linked if they do not completely show up just click on the image)
Exactly what is cheese?
I've heard numerous definitions of cheese. People consider cheese something that is easy to beat when scouted and difficult to beat when not scouted. I'll go through some examples about what is cheese/all-in and what isn't.
- Any pool between 6-8 is cheese. You are skipping gas and you need to damage or you will be far behind.
- Any Proxy that involves you moving your worker outside your base before you have 12 supply with the intention of doing damage.
![[image loading]](http://img600.imageshack.us/img600/9972/55039482.png)
Hurr!
- Any attack that involves bringing over 95% (some exaggeration) of your workers into battle outside of your base. (not applicable if you somehow chased and army outside of your base after pulling workers)
Believe it or not, those are the only three conditions that apply to cheese. Here are some examples that people think are cheese:
- 10pool, which most lower level players recognize as a 6 pool even though the lings have speed and continual waves are coming.
- Hellion Ling, This strategy is now actually pretty old. People are learning how to defend against it. Zergs know that they can hold off a 10pool with a spine crawler then teching straight to roaches (and getting them before the hellions show up)
- 4 gate, the most common build protoss uses in 2v2s. It helps them stay alive, and gives them the ability to generate aggression.
None of these builds are designed to kill. 10pool gives map control, allowing the terran to get hellions out or a protoss to 4gate without building any units, which is essentially sacrificing economy in order to buy time. This brings me to the teamwork factor.
The Teamwork Factor
Teamwork and communication is huge at upper levels of AT and even RT. The first part is knowing what your ally is doing and being able to assist in helping him or her do it. For example, Hellion Ling required the zerg to build lings early so the terran can build a barracks, reactor, and factory without building a single marine first.
Helping your ally wall off, sharing resources, sharing control are all part of teamwork. When your ally is dead that doesn't mean he can't control your units. This is a big thing. You can macro while a single banshee, dark templars, drops, zerglings are being perfectly micro'd around the map, doing guaranteed damage.
When someone thinks they have been cheesed, a lot of the time it is because they are getting 2v1'd. This is usually when someone suffers from an early push involving marines, zealots, or zerglings. As a player begins to play more 2v2s, the player learns that they can defend against these rushes 1v2. Photon cannons, bunkers, cutting probes to chrono out a zealot or stalker, early spine crawler always assist in holding for a little while. (Eventually if the opponents mass up and then you get 2v1'd, you can blame your ally for not helping.)
Spells/Combos
Everyone knows what happens when you combine two races together or even the same race. You can get to one point faster. Terran can get both stim and medivacs at the same time if both players choose to tech a different direction, Protoss can get both voids and colossus, zerg can get hydralisks and roaches.
![[image loading]](http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/7995/69893872.png)
Those marines would've never been able to hit those speedy mutas without that fungal.
Macro Games
Believe it or not, macro games are a huge factor in 2v2s. You see those people on the top 100 of 2v2 with high win rates? (keke) That's macro talking. Without macro, you cannot deal with people who can defend against your so called "all-ins" or "cheeses". About 80% of my games move into macro games. Either the opponents defend our early rush or we defend theirs, both teams are forced into a macro scenario. Mass is a huge part of starcraft 2. Having a bigger army is a good thing.
![[image loading]](http://img19.imageshack.us/img19/3010/94700366.png)
Would you believe this game started with 6 pools?
I guarantee you that people who are doing the exact same thing every game (Examples include double 6 pools, korean 5 gate speedling, double zealot proxy, etc.) are not winning 85% of their games. This is because the strategy they are doing is not stable. That is because you find stability when you can have a safe opening and still be able to transition into a macro game without dying.
Being able to keep yourself from being supply blocked, everything that you see in those long 1v1 games all apply to 2v2. If you want to stay ahead and win most of your games, you need to learn how to macro and not just how to execute early aggression.
Micro and unit control
Micro is huge in team games. Keeping your units alive and getting the most value out of them is crucial. Believe it or not, a 2 rax opener can hold a 2 gate proxy easily. Some marine kiting and maybe a few SCVs pulled will be enough to keep you alive. Micro keeps you alive against unscouted early aggression and helps you get the most out of your units.
Micro in larger battles is crucial too. Fungal growths, forcefields, EMPs all apply. Focus firing down a baneling could save all your partner's lings.
![[image loading]](http://img695.imageshack.us/img695/3226/12745767.png)
Trapped!
The only way to practice micro is to micro. You have to make the most out of your units. This isn't cheese acting against you, it's just in-game mechanics.
Conclusion
The only way to get past all the cheese is to experience it firsthand. Then you start to realize you can actually defend against it even if two players are at your door trying to baneling bust it down. You should realize this isn't solo, you can cut workers in order to stay alive. (I am 100% certain it is beneficial to stay alive) You have to play in order to get good. That is just what practice is. Complaining isn't going to get you anywhere, and you know it.
Resources
http://sc2ranks.com/ranks/all/master/2
Sc2ranks has a great replay system, go click on anyone in the top 100 of 2v2 and I guarantee you they have games posted with openings that you can experiment with.
http://justin.tv/hackprotech
#1 RT and AT. You know you can learn from someone when they play against Arranged Teams while playing RT and still manage to win some games without a coordinated plan with ally.
http://www.teamliquid.net/video/streams/deltamal
Player that picks protoss in team games. (which is kind of a big deal, I would consider protoss "underpowered" because you pretty much can't reinforce forces quickly until warpgates are done. (unless you proxied)).
http://www.youtube.com/iriestarcraft
The only commentator on youtube that does competitive team games. Its actually harder to cast team games, especially when the game stretches out and multiple attacks are happening at once.
Not many people stream 2v2 -_-;;
