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What do you guys think is the best way to hone your skills offline? Are there any particular UMS maps that you would give a thumbs up or thumbs down to?
Or is there a certain way of practicing despite not having an opponent that will have a positive impact when you decide to hit the ladder?
The reason I ask, and I'm sure some of you may have run into this situation is because of the chance that you may be caught without internet either due to provider issues or just the general situation that you are in.
I'm sure that "Macro or Die" can be a good option in some ways and in some ways it may not. So what do you guys think? Maybe some of you already have emergency procedures in case your internet decides to die.
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Stockpile replays, and think A LOT about the game.
Once your mechanics are high enough it just comes down to theory in my opinion.'
I would use the YABOT maps, or maybe the 1a2a3a map to practice your mouse precision and keyboard precision.
I wouldnt suggest playing against insane AI, because they just cheat!
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Back in the beta, whenever it went offline, I would use the green tea AI to practice offline using the launcher, not too sure if it exists still. But that was a good way to get your macro up, if your a total noob, but it's only good for that. If your macro is decent, it might actually be detrimental, because the higher levels of difficulty uses map hacks, and tends to make your play very defensive.
And the other thing I used a lot was the multi tasking trainer, now that is awesome. I still cant beat it in the higher difficulty settings.
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Interesting question....
While I've never played any of the custom maps you mentioned, so I can't specifically comment on them, I can at least offer my opinion here.
I think Galaxy_Zerg's ideas are good ones. I'd especially like to emphasize his suggestion to stockpile replays, although I suppose you might get caught without internet by chance at a time you don't have any new replays downloaded.
Or you could just invite some of your IRL friends over and play some LA.....
: /
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IIRC Flash in his prime used to train by not playing as much and spending more time playing the game in his head.
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Study replays and take notes, play YABOT to practice your macro mechanics as well as builds
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To improve mechanics do drills that improve your multitasking and macro rhythm such as playing a normal game alone while keeping a worker constantly moving in circles in the middle of the map.
To improve theory, carefully pick apart pro games and analyze the choices they make.
To improve your builds play through them solo and watch your replays afterwards, brainstorming potential variations and improvements.
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On June 25 2011 13:48 Galaxy_Zerg wrote:
Stockpile replays, and think A LOT about the game.
Once your mechanics are high enough it just comes down to theory in my opinion.'
I would use the YABOT maps, or maybe the 1a2a3a map to practice your mouse precision and keyboard precision.
I wouldnt suggest playing against insane AI, because they just cheat!
really uninformed post. why do people think parroting will work in advice threads? this is why the subforums are getting purged.
practicing strictly your build order or control will inevitably cause your other aspects of play to wilt. the only way to practice SC2 is to practice SC2.
but go ahead, make a perfect build order to 120 food and learn to baneling split well offline, i hope it will go well for you.
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the "multitasking trainer" by TL is something that helps me alot because i have no real rts background. it´s good for me multitasking and mechanic wise, something i struggle the most with.
i also like the QXC buildorder map because you can reset with [shift+1/2/3 depending on the race] which is a huge timesaver. if you mess something up or dislike how it plays out, just reset instantly.
if you are gosu and not a FPS to RTS intruder like i am =(((( i guess replays are the only way to go.
good luck with your internet connection :D
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On June 25 2011 14:05 brazenraven wrote:Show nested quote +On June 25 2011 13:48 Galaxy_Zerg wrote:
Stockpile replays, and think A LOT about the game.
Once your mechanics are high enough it just comes down to theory in my opinion.'
I would use the YABOT maps, or maybe the 1a2a3a map to practice your mouse precision and keyboard precision.
I wouldnt suggest playing against insane AI, because they just cheat! really uninformed post. why do people think parroting will work in advice threads? this is why the subforums are getting purged. practicing strictly your build order or control will inevitably cause your other aspects of play to wilt. the only way to practice SC2 is to practice SC2. but go ahead, make a perfect build order to 120 food and learn to baneling split well offline, i hope it will go well for you. you think not playing at all and having your mechanics deteriorate in addition to the more dynamic aspects is the superior choice? you will be way worse if you just stop altogether, your post makes no sense. neither situation is optimal, but you can certainly pick the other aspects back up more easily if you maintain some level of mechanics
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On June 25 2011 14:15 Nexic wrote:Show nested quote +On June 25 2011 14:05 brazenraven wrote:On June 25 2011 13:48 Galaxy_Zerg wrote:
Stockpile replays, and think A LOT about the game.
Once your mechanics are high enough it just comes down to theory in my opinion.'
I would use the YABOT maps, or maybe the 1a2a3a map to practice your mouse precision and keyboard precision.
I wouldnt suggest playing against insane AI, because they just cheat! really uninformed post. why do people think parroting will work in advice threads? this is why the subforums are getting purged. practicing strictly your build order or control will inevitably cause your other aspects of play to wilt. the only way to practice SC2 is to practice SC2. but go ahead, make a perfect build order to 120 food and learn to baneling split well offline, i hope it will go well for you. you think not playing at all and having your mechanics deteriorate in addition to the more dynamic aspects is the superior choice? you will be way worse if you just stop altogether, your post makes no sense. neither situation is optimal, but you can certainly pick the other aspects back up more easily if you maintain some level of mechanics
nice edit, but i'm not debating with you and i said none of those things. simply that you'll feel strange if you only practice one aspect of your play and come back to find your strengths and weaknesses completely different than from the last time you played. the game would feel entirely different and it's up to the OP to decide for himself, after all.
you're also arguing that "mechanics" are independent of anything, which is lol.
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Code a "progamer bot" and play against that like  Blackman did.
e: or was it just against bots, i dunno.
+ Show Spoiler +And yes, i know that was just a rumor or joke.
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On June 25 2011 14:05 brazenraven wrote:Show nested quote +On June 25 2011 13:48 Galaxy_Zerg wrote:
Stockpile replays, and think A LOT about the game.
Once your mechanics are high enough it just comes down to theory in my opinion.'
I would use the YABOT maps, or maybe the 1a2a3a map to practice your mouse precision and keyboard precision.
I wouldnt suggest playing against insane AI, because they just cheat! really uninformed post. why do people think parroting will work in advice threads? this is why the subforums are getting purged. practicing strictly your build order or control will inevitably cause your other aspects of play to wilt. the only way to practice SC2 is to practice SC2. but go ahead, make a perfect build order to 120 food and learn to baneling split well offline, i hope it will go well for you.
You do realise that he is asking on HOW to practice offline not WHETHER practicing offline is good.
How ironic saying another person's post is uninformed when he is actually giving advice on HOW to practice offline while apparently your way to practice offline is to practice online.
Back to the OP
I would recommend practicing build orders so u can properly execute it cleanly in a real game.
Other than that you can do like what people have said earlier about practicing ur apm, mouse movement etc (like D9D 252)
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i guess your post isnt too specific but the tone just seems to imply that practicing builds will not benefit you (versus not play at all in this case), and i cant see how that could possibly be true
On June 25 2011 14:39 LXenJin wrote:Show nested quote +On June 25 2011 14:05 brazenraven wrote:On June 25 2011 13:48 Galaxy_Zerg wrote:
Stockpile replays, and think A LOT about the game.
Once your mechanics are high enough it just comes down to theory in my opinion.'
I would use the YABOT maps, or maybe the 1a2a3a map to practice your mouse precision and keyboard precision.
I wouldnt suggest playing against insane AI, because they just cheat! really uninformed post. why do people think parroting will work in advice threads? this is why the subforums are getting purged. practicing strictly your build order or control will inevitably cause your other aspects of play to wilt. the only way to practice SC2 is to practice SC2. but go ahead, make a perfect build order to 120 food and learn to baneling split well offline, i hope it will go well for you. You do realise that he is asking on HOW to practice offline not WHETHER practicing offline is good. Yeah I guess this is what is causing me the most confusion with your post brazen ;p
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On June 25 2011 14:40 Nexic wrote:
i guess your post isnt too specific but the tone just seems to imply that practicing builds will not benefit you (versus not play at all in this case), and i cant see how that could possibly be true
On June 25 2011 14:05 brazenraven wrote:
but go ahead, make a perfect build order to 120 food and learn to baneling split well offline, i hope it will go well for you.
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I like to play vs comps in offline mode or use the QXC build order map that can quick reset. I feel this has helped me improve because I can really refine build orders to limit the amount of drones I need to execute cheesy builds and also by trying to get specific units out as soon as possible it helps me learn the timing for those units when I am playing against that race. For example I know the fastest I could get Mutas is 7 minutes so I know I don't have to build AA when facing zerg any quicker then that. fast DTs also come at about the same mark so I wont need detection sooner then that.
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On June 25 2011 13:51 dartoo wrote:
Back in the beta, whenever it went offline, I would use the green tea AI to practice offline using the launcher, not too sure if it exists still. But that was a good way to get your macro up, if your a total noob, but it's only good for that. If your macro is decent, it might actually be detrimental, because the higher levels of difficulty uses map hacks, and tends to make your play very defensive..
I disagree about the "map hacks" personally. I think a cheating (map vision) AI is useful as it gives "worst case scenario", situations where you moved your force at the worst time, or they moved their force at a perfect time, or they happened to bindly get the right build to counter yours, etc.. Also, an AI should really benefit as much as possible from such an advantage considering their current sorry state.
Which brings me to my next paragraph. Green tea AI does still exist, as well as at least one modified version of it, and possibly other AIs (I haven't heard of others), but they haven't changed a whole lot since beta, which I think is terrible.
I don't know WTF happened... if the creator(s) just lost interest, started playing SC2 more, or in some other way moved on to other things.
One thing that sucks though that is a big setback is that Blizzard did not include the ability for AI to really map or detect cliffs/walls/chokes that well. Via pathing or other algorithms they can detect if a unit will fit, or if the area is accessible by ground, but aside from that they are completely daft I think.
Anyway, even with that huge problem... I could virtually guarantee that if I spent time on learning more about bot programming around launch (or beta, or a month after launch), I could have a very good AI.
Did you guys know that no AI bases their builds off the opponent's race currently? It's ridiculous! what kind of idiots are working on this stuff? That's like the #1 thing that players need to learn about starcraft 2, (after production and scouting). you don't run siegetank marauder in TvZ, yet for the last year that's what green tea has been doing randomly in TvZs.
Blizzard's AI does the same thing i think, just much less variety in builds, and they are more balanced to handle different situations.
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To answer the OP, I'd say AI is the best option though. Try out the latest green tea AI a few times, or Fyndor's (fyn AI, modified green tea) whenever he updates it to be better. Aside from the occasional very hard Blizzard AI game.
Overall, its' all very easy, but I personally find that multitask trainer's aren't my thing, but I guess micro trainers can be useful if you need work in that (and if your race/builds have units to micro)
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On June 25 2011 13:56 sluggaslamoo wrote:
IIRC Flash in his prime used to train by not playing as much and spending more time playing the game in his head.
Idra does the same thing. He only plays a few hours a day to keep his ladder rank up/bonus pool down. I think it's realistic for a player of Idra's caliber because his mechanics are so refined and at such a high level. He just needs a few hours of daily maintenance. He mostly thinks about the game, which isn't surprising since he gave up a partial scholarship for physics. He can probably play a whole game in his head. Same thing as chess.
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EPT
