Calling MULES On Close Patches is Bad - Page 6

Jaeger

United States1150 Posts

June 26 2011 02:54 GMT

#101

On June 26 2011 08:04 JamesJohansen wrote:
Oh thank god, I'm always losing by a margin of 30 minerals. This is the answer to my prayers

There was a TvP at MLG columbus that had 180 mules called down if they all lost 30 minerals he would've thrown away 5400 minerals that game.

Think you could lose a game by a margin of 5400 minerals?

Lunchador

United States776 Posts

June 26 2011 02:56 GMT

#102

On June 26 2011 10:47 Tipany wrote:

Show nested quote +

The difference is negligible... isn't that an obvious fact already?

Are you even reading this thread? Many of the replies imply that they might change their MULE dropping habits or at the very least, think about any potential losses. The pros who read this thread already are thinking if it's worth it to change their MULEs around or not because you need virtually every damn possible advantage to win!

And for every 100,000 games where it won't make a difference in the outcome, you can bet your ass off there is that ONE game where the player won it by a 30 mineral margin. And it would be absolutely, without-a-doubt, worth it and glorious.

Now I'm saying I personally won't change how I do MULEs, and I strongly advise everyone to just blindly change their minds because there are advantages to doing things both ways, which is what I fear is really happening in this thread. But that doesn't mean everyone else has to follow me.

runforyourllife

United States73 Posts

June 26 2011 02:56 GMT

#103

wow ive been calling it only on the close ones for all of my sc2 career!
thanks man

Helixpython

United States14 Posts

June 26 2011 02:57 GMT

#104

On June 26 2011 11:54 Jaeger wrote:

Show nested quote +

There was a TvP at MLG columbus that had 180 mules called down if they all lost 30 minerals he would've thrown away 5400 minerals that game.

Think you could lose a game by a margin of 5400 minerals?

Not if i win in the first 5 mins

On topic, very useful note, will be put into practice!

Cubu

1171 Posts

June 26 2011 02:57 GMT

#105

On June 26 2011 11:54 Jaeger wrote:

Show nested quote +

There was a TvP at MLG columbus that had 180 mules called down if they all lost 30 minerals he would've thrown away 5400 minerals that game.

Think you could lose a game by a margin of 5400 minerals?

No not when u hav the mins of wat 180 mules yield.

ppl will still call mules on closer patch, out of habit.

Golgotha

Korea (South)8418 Posts

June 26 2011 03:01 GMT

#106

30 minerals lost, even if it was compounded is still extremely negligible. Yes, like some of you argue, it would make a difference in 1 out of 10000 games. but then couldn't I say the same thing about calling mules on close position because I can get that little extra mineral a second faster than calling on a far away mineral?

TheAmazombie

United States3714 Posts

June 26 2011 03:03 GMT

#107

Why are so many people hating on this? I know it will not drastically change a game, but I would think that pro-players and lower players trying to be optimal could use little tricks like this. Sometimes games are decided by half a second and in that time a few more mins could be helpful.

I just see it as a tip for people that is very simple, not time-consuming at all, that causes a player to just be slightly more optimal than another player. Good find!

peawok

United States71 Posts

June 26 2011 03:07 GMT

#108

I've always seen mules do this, but never thought that he lost the minerals. Silly me!

I'd thank you more, but I play protoss

Lobber

Canada414 Posts

June 26 2011 03:11 GMT

#109

Even if that wasn't the case, it's a bad idea. mining out the close patches faster just means that your scvs have to go farther to mine later in the game...

alan25

United States379 Posts

June 26 2011 03:16 GMT

#110

i'm confused about this... you get more mineral from patches further away? like what lol?

Xapti

Canada2473 Posts

June 26 2011 03:20 GMT

#111

On June 26 2011 07:24 Xxazn4lyfe51xX wrote:
I was under the impression that the opposite was true. By calling down a mule on a far patch, he dies on the way back from returning a load, thus you lose 30 minerals.

Yes, this. I heard that a long time ago, and it was by quite well-respected people as far as I remember.

Something like 240 and a wasted trip if you went on far patch, 270 and no wasted trip if you went on a close one.

Maybe Blizzard did some sort of hidden update? or is someone just mistaken?

One thing I do know though... it's it is not as simple as close patch and far patch... there are close patches and far patches, but there are also patches inbetween, some which are more shorter, others which are more further, and probably some (not sure how many) that are truely in between them both.

EDIT: OK this makes perfect sense and it's what I remember

LIQUIPEDIA: MULE
It has been noted that depending on the mineral patch a MULE has been ordered to mine, it may make eight or nine trips. Specifically, on mineral patches with optimal efficiency (usually the ones closest to the Command Center) the MULE will mine and return its cargo nine times providing the largest possible income. On the farthest mineral patches, the MULE will only make eight trips returning a total of 240 minerals before being destroyed. The last (and worse) case are mineral patches that have an average distance from the main building. When mining these minerals, the MULE will gather nine times but will be destroyed before it returns its last cargo, wasting 30 minerals completely.
Therefore it is recommended that players take note of which mineral patches are "optimal" on each map to ensure maximum efficiency from the use of MULEs.

So It is MEDIUM distance patches that will cause this problem. Far distance patches will only make 8 trips and die, which is still very bad. Close distance patches will yield 9 trips and should not be dying with minerals in their arms.

Take a look at this link:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewpost.php?post_id=5015816
Look at the pictures of the mineral positions. The map screen shots are old, so they may not be accurate (aside from many of the maps not even being used anymore), but it is not very intuitive as to which patches are close and which are far.

Maybe... there are actually FOUR distances...

270 with wasted 30
270 (no waste)
240 with wasted 30
240 (no waste)

I find this somewhat hard to believe though, because liquipedia doesn't pick up on it, nor do those other people who peopled about this long ago. You'd think if they picked up on the 240+30 they would have picked up on the 270+30.

Maybe all that information is so old, it was before the patch that fixed worker micro trick to speed up mining time, which was enough to affect the mules from mining extra (or missing a trip) to being able to return that trip, or mining extra. This seems like the most probably explanation, but I'm suprized that no one would have picked up on it long ago. Maybe it's just that I don't play terran and hence don't follow this as much as others.

SkimGuy

Canada709 Posts

June 26 2011 03:20 GMT

#112

What the guy said about Brood war being based on these little tips is true. Terran players sometimes build the first supply depot under their CC to get their SCVs to spawn closer to the mineral patches xd

Thanks for the tip OP.

Nevuk

United States16280 Posts

June 26 2011 03:22 GMT

#113

On June 26 2011 12:03 TheAmazombie wrote:
Why are so many people hating on this? I know it will not drastically change a game, but I would think that pro-players and lower players trying to be optimal could use little tricks like this. Sometimes games are decided by half a second and in that time a few more mins could be helpful.

I just see it as a tip for people that is very simple, not time-consuming at all, that causes a player to just be slightly more optimal than another player. Good find!

In BW T pros would frequently build their first depot in a spot that increased mineral mining efficiency. However, it only increased it on some maps. Still didn't stop people from doing it on every map on every position.

(What was a bit more normal was people sending their peons to the fastest mining patches initially, which varied for every position on every map. So people would memorize which patches were best. I never fooled with this, as I was a C- player- but people definitely did it. The most infamous map for this was python, which actually featured a spawn with really inefficient patches after the first few minutes, but was one of the few spawns to allow certain greedy builds if you sent workers in the appropriate order.)

TedJustice

Canada1324 Posts

June 26 2011 03:23 GMT

#114

I guess the ideal option would be to use the closest patches and then move your mules away from the minerals on their last trip.

But that would require a lot of attention.

oblong

United States86 Posts

June 26 2011 03:28 GMT

#115

On June 26 2011 07:19 MERLIN. wrote:
Maybe a strategy forum post, I really don't know where this fits... Actually, simple question, simple answers or some form of simplistic thread. I don't really think this warranted a thread though, since common sense isn't that hard to come by, I could be wrong. That's why theres mods active, : P.

Good point though, but should be obvious, even without the 30minerals, theres less movement time so you want those to stay around longest.

what the fuck?
are you really saying that what he posted isnt important enough for its own thread?
yeah, no.

Bloog

United States44 Posts

June 26 2011 03:29 GMT

#116

Cool, thanks for sharing. I play Terran as an off race, and it's pretty abysmal, but this will help a tiny bit at least

Sv1

United States204 Posts

June 26 2011 03:41 GMT

#117

I would think that you would still want to eventually mule your non-close patches. As one thing you DONT want to do is to constantly mule the same patch, or same few patches as this will bring you down to less patches faster with more scvs on them.

If you are however savvy enough and expand at appropriate times you can transfer scvs when patches have been depleted.

CheeC[h]

United States137 Posts

June 26 2011 03:47 GMT

#118

This just shows how the use of liquipedia or the search function could prevent threads like these >.<

Flavor

Canada8 Posts

June 26 2011 03:50 GMT

#119

Also, when you get into a habbit of calling down mules on the close patches, they tend to get mined out first making your scv's less efficient