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Not sure if this is public knowledge or not but I often see players calling MULES on the closest mineral patches instead of the farther ones. I wanted to know if doing this was necessarily better or just a false truth, so I did an experiment.
Calling a MULE on a close mineral patch will return 270 minerals, but the MULE will actually mine 300 minerals, and die in transit to the command center, thereby causing you to lose these 30 minerals. Calling it on a far patch will still yield 270 minerals over its lifespan but the MULE dies on its way back to the mineral patch so you don't lose anything.
Just wanted to let everyone know if they didn't already that calling a MULE on a closer patch actually harms you as the game goes longer and your bases begin to mine out.
MOD EDIT:
To clear up all the misinformation flying around here..
On June 26 2011 12:20 Xapti wrote:Show nested quote +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 Show nested quote +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=5015816Look 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.
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Interesting I never knew this thanks for sharing.
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On top of that the closer patches naturally mine out faster anyways so by calling mules on the farther ones it should even it out more.
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What? Your saying that calling mules on close patches is bad because it mines the same as calling on any other patch? People will still do this out of habit.
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wait a mule mines 30 mins in one trip?
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Good to know, thanks for this.
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On June 26 2011 07:16 seefour wrote:
What? Your saying that calling mules on close patches is bad because it mines the same as calling on any other patch? People will still do this out of habit.
Minerals are limited at a patch. Calling MULEs on close spots gains nothing more except wasting minerals at your patches (30 are never returned after being harvested)
Calling MULES at the further spots gets the same amount of minerals, but it never has time to mine the 30 additional minerals that get wasted. Which is better.
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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.
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wow, nice find! you should post this in 1000 tips thread
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On June 26 2011 07:19 Chocolate wrote:
wow, nice find! you should post this in 1000 tips thread
Exactly, thats the thread I was thinking of, couldn't put a name to it. Day saver Chocolate.
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By calling down mules on a close patch you are essentially destroying 30 of your own minerals. wow, that's pretty cool. I think i'm going to test this out myself.
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WOOT, I have never noticed =o Thank you!
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thats pretty cool tbh. Will defineately try to get that into my habit! Big thanks!
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Well this is certainly good to know! Thanks!
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I just tried this and I found it not to be true
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Oh wow..... I always saw my MULES always dying half-way, but I forgot that they'd lose minerals! Great find!
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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.
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wow i never knew that i totally thought you were supposed to call it to the near ones
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I think it depends on how saturated the base is, meaning that the Mule does not switch patches
Edit: missinformation nvm
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On June 26 2011 07:26 FinnGamer wrote:
I think it depends on how saturated the base is, meaning that the Mule does not switch patches
The mule will never "switch" patches unless you que 2 mules on 1 patch, it runs out, or you personally move it...
I dont understand what your trying to say.
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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.
I think this was the case in the beta but the mule duration or speed was changed to make it so you always get 270.
Also, I'm pretty sure koreans are well aware of this as I remember seeing MMA move his mule away from the patch at the end of it's life span vs Idra in MLG.
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So each mineral patch has 1500 and you have 8 mineral patches so that's 12000 minerals. You would need to drop 30 mules on close patches to reduce your mineral income from a base by 7.5%. Each mule dropped on close patches loses you 0.25% of your total income from a base. Breaking insight into game mechanics -.-
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@OP,
its still better to call on the closest patch. you will lose 30 min for each mule, but you lose it at the end when the patch is mined out 10 minutes later. meanwhile, you get more money up front.
since terran is always the player that has a responsibility to move out (Z and P will just fast expand multiple times). thus, getting the cash fast is critically important.
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you lose 30 minerals per mule on a close patch. the 30 extra you gain is dumped on death.
close: 270 deposited 300 mined
far: 270 mined 270 deposited
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On June 26 2011 07:29 seefour wrote:
So each mineral patch has 1500 and you have 8 mineral patches so that's 12000 minerals. You would need to drop 30 mules on close patches to reduce your mineral income from a base by 7.5%. Each mule dropped on close patches loses you 0.25% of your total income from a base. Breaking insight into game mechanics -.-
I think you're missing the point. What does this require from you to do? Nothing. So why not do it?
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On June 26 2011 07:29 seefour wrote:
So each mineral patch has 1500 and you have 8 mineral patches so that's 12000 minerals. You would need to drop 30 mules on close patches to reduce your mineral income from a base by 7.5%. Each mule dropped on close patches loses you 0.25% of your total income from a base. Breaking insight into game mechanics -.-
30 minerals per mule could easily add up to several hundred minerals lost in a long game. It's definitely a relevant concern, it gives a clear (but small) benefit.
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On June 26 2011 07:29 seefour wrote:
So each mineral patch has 1500 and you have 8 mineral patches so that's 12000 minerals. You would need to drop 30 mules on close patches to reduce your mineral income from a base by 7.5%. Each mule dropped on close patches loses you 0.25% of your total income from a base. Breaking insight into game mechanics -.-
I hope you know the koreans are better because they train more and know all these little mechanics, every little bits adds up and give you an advantage.
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doesnt matter if its a small benefit, benefit = benefit which you can do without much efford. The same as 9 overlord and pushing probes on minerals
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On June 26 2011 07:32 dybydx wrote:
@OP,
its still better to call on the closest patch. you will lose 30 min for each mule, but you lose it at the end when the patch is mined out 10 minutes later. meanwhile, you get more money up front.
since terran is always the player that has a responsibility to move out (Z and P will just fast expand multiple times). thus, getting the cash fast is critically important.
You get the same amount up front either way (270 minerals) but if you call it on far patches you gain 30 minerals later. You actually lose 30 minerals (per mule in close spots) when the base is mined out because the mules drops 30 minerals (when it dies) in close patches.
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United States7166 Posts
of course you do get your 30 minerals a little bit quicker each return if its on the close one though. but how often are you really waiting for that 30 minerals, it's probably better to just use the further patch
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I'm surprised people didn't know about this... It is instinct to call it down on closer patches, sure, but after awhile wouldn't people notice it happen at least once?
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According to Liquipedia: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Mule
Mules mine 270 (and lose 30) on close patches.
And 240 on far patches.
I assume the OP is going to provide some videos or screenshots or etc. to show that you always get 270 on every patch.
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The same problem is synchronizing SCVs/Probes/Drones on close minerals patches to max out the mining potential in the begging of the game. I think I remember Polt doing the opposite, in order to have full base saturation, until all minerals are mined at almost the same time. I think this needs a more serious discussion :/
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Wow really?
How has this not been shared before =O
in so many times and places casters and pros have said that mining the closer one lets you mine extra -.-
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It's also better to not constantly call upon on the same patch. Think about it, if you have 5 patches with 800 minerals each, you'll get only a total of 25 minerals per trip, since unless you have mules scvs will mine one at a time. If instead you had 8 patches with 500 minerals each, you'd get a total of 40 minerals per trip.
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I had thought about this before but never actually tested it. Thx for sharing.
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You lose 30 minerals later, but you get the 270 minerals faster. The few seconds might make a difference. By the time the mineral patch would run out, the fact that it has 60 or 90 less minerals on it shouldn't matter since you should already have another base to mine from at that point.
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I can't believe no one figured this out until now
well, maybe not until now, but I'm sure a lot of people didn't know
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On June 26 2011 07:48 dhe95 wrote:
It's also better to not constantly call upon on the same patch. Think about it, if you have 5 patches with 800 minerals each, you'll get only a total of 25 minerals per trip, since unless you have mules scvs will mine one at a time. If instead you had 8 patches with 500 minerals each, you'd get a total of 40 minerals per trip.
however, less patches means you can saturate with less workers. which saves you some workers to use in your expansion.
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On June 26 2011 07:53 latan wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 07:48 dhe95 wrote:
It's also better to not constantly call upon on the same patch. Think about it, if you have 5 patches with 800 minerals each, you'll get only a total of 25 minerals per trip, since unless you have mules scvs will mine one at a time. If instead you had 8 patches with 500 minerals each, you'd get a total of 40 minerals per trip. however, less patches means you can saturate with less workers. which gives saves you some workers to use in your expansion.
yeah I agree with this
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Wow, never knew this. Thanks!
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On June 26 2011 07:45 Ketara wrote:According to Liquipedia: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/MuleMules mine 270 (and lose 30) on close patches. And 240 on far patches. I assume the OP is going to provide some videos or screenshots or etc. to show that you always get 270 on every patch.
Since I'm bored and enjoy quoting myself, I did my own test.
On far patches you do in fact only mine 240 minerals, and still lose 30.
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Note quite true. charliemurphy made a thread near the beginning of beta showing that on some ladder maps there are patches that
1) mine 300 minerals
2) mine 270 minerals but mule dies on transit (so 30 minerals are lost)
3) mine 270 minerals, 30 minerals are not lost
so in theory you should know which patches on which maps satisfy #1 and always mine those.
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On June 26 2011 07:54 Kiarip wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 07:53 latan wrote:On June 26 2011 07:48 dhe95 wrote:
It's also better to not constantly call upon on the same patch. Think about it, if you have 5 patches with 800 minerals each, you'll get only a total of 25 minerals per trip, since unless you have mules scvs will mine one at a time. If instead you had 8 patches with 500 minerals each, you'd get a total of 40 minerals per trip. however, less patches means you can saturate with less workers. which gives saves you some workers to use in your expansion. yeah I agree with this
Me too. As long as the worker is working does it really matter?
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Oh thank god, I'm always losing by a margin of 30 minerals. This is the answer to my prayers
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STS17 dropping some knowledge, thanks
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because mining from a closer location is worse..... give me a break. why dont you long distance mine to the natural expo off the start since those minerals will take longer to mine out!
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United States527 Posts
Cute find. Had to test it myself to believe it though  I don't really think it matters though, its kind of like Worker splitting in the beginning of the game. It doesn't matter too much, but maybe just by a tiny bit.
So for those that want to do every little thing to try to get better, well, this is for you.
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I'm assuming that almost all minerals patches are slightly different considering that's how Blizzard tends to design their maps (uneven) and so everyone that is claiming anything in this thread is correct in some regard.
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On June 26 2011 07:54 Kiarip wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 07:53 latan wrote:On June 26 2011 07:48 dhe95 wrote:
It's also better to not constantly call upon on the same patch. Think about it, if you have 5 patches with 800 minerals each, you'll get only a total of 25 minerals per trip, since unless you have mules scvs will mine one at a time. If instead you had 8 patches with 500 minerals each, you'd get a total of 40 minerals per trip. however, less patches means you can saturate with less workers. which gives saves you some workers to use in your expansion. yeah I agree with this
Would you rather have 8 patches with 1500 minerals each, or 1 patch with 12000 minerals? To get the same income you would have to have 7 other bases
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On June 26 2011 07:59 Ketara wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 07:45 Ketara wrote:According to Liquipedia: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/MuleMules mine 270 (and lose 30) on close patches. And 240 on far patches. I assume the OP is going to provide some videos or screenshots or etc. to show that you always get 270 on every patch. Since I'm bored and enjoy quoting myself, I did my own test. On far patches you do in fact only mine 240 minerals, and still lose 30.
This is important, it suggests the OP is incorrect.
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If op's findings are true, then this really only affects players at the pro level where small edges can make a difference. But for the majority average joes like myself, we should not be concerned with things like this and other stuff like splitting workers at the beginning. We should be working on micro/macro, decision-making etc.
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um it is all dependend on where the mule lands and the patch itself. 240-300 can happen (300 is not in ladder maps i think, unless you do some mule micro). If you want to be super effectiv learn the point of no return for the mule. the point on the lifespan bar when the mule won't return minerals.
It only matter in macro games and there the terran in general plays either mech and doesn't need mules or will play bio and needs one of the bases of the opponent side to survive the complete mine out. (terrans will mine out earlier with bio, sooo if the opponent survived that point with the map still cut in half the terran effectivly lost)
But its always nice to watch your main and natural mules, every mineral in those counts as those will mine out probably in every game.
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On June 26 2011 08:00 AcrossFiveJulys wrote:
Note quite true. charliemurphy made a thread near the beginning of beta showing that on some ladder maps there are patches that
1) mine 300 minerals
2) mine 270 minerals but mule dies on transit (so 30 minerals are lost)
3) mine 270 minerals, 30 minerals are not lost
so in theory you should know which patches on which maps satisfy #1 and always mine those.
i made the thread, its quoted on liquipedia i believe. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=119738
this has been known since beta but it is map dependant
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haha thanks, i always call it down on the closest patches
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You still get the 270 minerals faster.
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hmm good fact to know, you should add that to the 1000 tip thread =)) cheers for the info btw!
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United States10154 Posts
excellent, thanks for the news. now i wont have to worry where like 1k of the mienrals went (lolz jokes dudes.)
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Nice find. Guess this will be something I will just sprinkle onto my play and I guess the benifits of an extra 30 minerals a mule will multiply more and more over the course of the game. Thanks.
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Oh man Terrans and their minerals..
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I'm not a Terran player, but this is nice to know. Thanks.
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So many bad replies and misinformation in this thread, and people not even taking the time to read the OP to figure out what this thread is about.
The OP is right and is beneficial in almost every way, besides maybe taking a split second longer per MULE return. Your base isn't mined out as quickly, and you get back the same minerals.
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This. Changes. EVERYTHING.
Great now I have to change my mule dropping habits...
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On June 26 2011 08:31 tyCe wrote:
You still get the 270 minerals faster.
BARELY
like the OP said it dies on its way back so you save maybe like 3 seconds if that for 30 minerals by the end?
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On June 26 2011 08:00 ThatMoose wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 07:54 Kiarip wrote:On June 26 2011 07:53 latan wrote:On June 26 2011 07:48 dhe95 wrote:
It's also better to not constantly call upon on the same patch. Think about it, if you have 5 patches with 800 minerals each, you'll get only a total of 25 minerals per trip, since unless you have mules scvs will mine one at a time. If instead you had 8 patches with 500 minerals each, you'd get a total of 40 minerals per trip. however, less patches means you can saturate with less workers. which gives saves you some workers to use in your expansion. yeah I agree with this Me too. As long as the worker is working does it really matter?
if you're constantly training scvs you'll need those extra patches to be fully saturated with all your workers in use
it's not about saturating bases, it's about how many workers you can use effectively and how can you say that having 40 workers to fully saturate your base vs. 50 is not worse?
If it still doesn't make sense at this point, just think about why 3 base vs. 2 base is such an advantage. You just have more mineral patches available.
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I thought close patches = 300 mins, middle patches = 300 with 30 dropped, and far = 270?
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Truthfully, I dont think this is going to make a huge deal anyway, but nice find
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No wonder Terrans all around the world seem to be running out of minerals on one-base.
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Papua New Guinea1059 Posts
Those calcualtions may be correct, taken the patch you callthe mule down on is actually unoccupied and the mule doesn't have to change.
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Yeah what about the middle patches? any information on those?
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Cool find, i really had no idea. So thank you, sir!
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Talk about the most minuscule of calculations but an interesting find none the less.
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huh really? i thought it made the extra trip back.. interesting
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Nice find.
But consider this: If you MULE from a close patch you do get your money coming in very slightly faster. This might be desirable in early game. The detrimental effect of losing 30 minerals forces you to expand slightly earlier. That means if you play on a map where it is easy to expand, its not really an issue.
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Well thank you for that useful information. I shall use that in the future!
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the best way to use mules is one time on each of your mineral patches so your entire mineral line as a whole mines out at the same time, thus maximizing your income speed for that base
the 30 mineral lost per patch is of zero importance compared to making sure you drop a mule on different patches to have dispersed mining
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Or you put it on the closer patch, get 270 minerals faster, and stop it before the last trip.
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I realised this when I played Terran but have since forgotten. Nice tip!
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Excellent tip, I've seen it happen but it doesn't register in my mind
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On June 26 2011 10:37 HaIf wrote:
Or you put it on the closer patch, get 270 minerals faster, and stop it before the last trip.
if you can handle that kind of extra multitask be my guest
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United States527 Posts
On June 26 2011 10:37 HaIf wrote:
Or you put it on the closer patch, get 270 minerals faster, and stop it before the last trip.
Making too much work for yourself and you would never be able to manage that.
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before they patched the glitch where you could mine faster... you could get 300 from close patches... that might be why tasteless said mine from close ones back in season 2(ish) of gsl
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tester worked this out in the beta, atleast the few replays where he played terran he would stop the mules last mining trip as not to waste the 30 minerals and still gain them faster
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I'll still be calling my MULEs on close patches regardless of "permanent resource losses". It's kind of like gold expansions: They actually have a much lower resource count than a normal base but the extremely high income rate makes it worthwhile.
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Oh, this is actually really useful. Thanks a lot <3. I've always noticed that they die halfway but I've never tested the various math on different patches.
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On June 26 2011 10:44 Lunchador wrote:
I'll still be calling my MULEs on close patches regardless of "permanent resource losses". It's kind of like gold expansions: They actually have a much lower resource count than a normal base but the extremely high income rate makes it worthwhile.
The difference is negligible... isn't that an obvious fact already?
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Would'nt it bring its minerals to you faster (say a mule on a far patch takes 5 seconds round trip and one on a close patch does it in 4 you would get the minerals faster which would help for all-ins or rushes)?
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SOME close patches return 10 cargo loads for 300 minerals mined and 300 minerals returned
SOME far patches return 8 loads and mine 9 - for 240 minerals, wasted 30.
inbetween patches sometimes mine 10 but usually only mine 9.
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On June 26 2011 08:35 Spacely wrote:
Oh man Terrans and their minerals..
I sure wish there were as many threads on how to optimize larva injects.. Press v, next hatchery.. press v again.. then do it again.
I jk I jk.
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On June 26 2011 09:16 Meteora.GB wrote:
Great now I have to change my mule dropping habits... I know right, fuuuuu...
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Did a quick test on various mineral configurations. Some close patches MULES would start to mine the last patch, but would die before getting the 30. There are a few close patches they would die with the 30 minerals in hand. Also depends on where the MULE lands as you call it down.
Play it safe and pick a further patch. Good to know.
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As if 30 minerals makes any difference.
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cool find, but when in any game ever will having an extra 30 minerals on a patch affect a game
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30 minerals isn't exactly game changing, but if you do this all-game then it adds up quickly enough that you can wind up 150-200 minerals behind. Not going to matter always, but at least some of the time that's enough to lose a game.
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Australia8532 Posts
On June 26 2011 10:53 Grotchen wrote:
Would'nt it bring its minerals to you faster (say a mule on a far patch takes 5 seconds round trip and one on a close patch does it in 4 you would get the minerals faster which would help for all-ins or rushes)?
According to his test (assuming it is true) they both return 270 minerals; since MULEs have a timed life i guess there is little to no advantage in terms of timing; the timing advantage would be the time of a trip to and halfway back to the CC-is it worth losing 30minerals; you essentially are losing 30 minerals by dropping it on a close patch.
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On June 26 2011 11:44 bkrow wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 10:53 Grotchen wrote:
Would'nt it bring its minerals to you faster (say a mule on a far patch takes 5 seconds round trip and one on a close patch does it in 4 you would get the minerals faster which would help for all-ins or rushes)? According to his test (assuming it is true) they both return 270 minerals; since MULEs have a timed life i guess there is little to no advantage in terms of timing; the timing advantage would be the time of a trip to and halfway back to the CC-is it worth losing 30minerals; you essentially are losing 30 minerals by dropping it on a close patch.
Yeah, pretty much this. A far patch will have 270 mins mined, period. A close patch will have 300 mins mined, but will only return 270 because the last 30 mins are just lost; therefore, one "loses" 30 mins for every MULE called down on a close position patch!
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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
Way to be rude? I guess you make a supply depot at 11 too since making one at 10 wont make you win the game outright?
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Ahh clarity, thanks for the testing.
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On June 26 2011 11:48 sereniity wrote:Show nested quote +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
Way to be rude? I guess you make a supply depot at 11 too since making one at 10 wont make you win the game outright?
This is a bit different. There is an advantage to randomly making things at weird timings, it throws your opponent off somewhat. Even if you make everything only 1 worker later it changes the timings by several seconds.
Sen did it all the time in BW. He and his 12/13/14 pool in zvt raping Idra.
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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?
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On June 26 2011 10:47 Tipany wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 10:44 Lunchador wrote:
I'll still be calling my MULEs on close patches regardless of "permanent resource losses". It's kind of like gold expansions: They actually have a much lower resource count than a normal base but the extremely high income rate makes it worthwhile. 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.
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wow ive been calling it only on the close ones for all of my sc2 career!
thanks man
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On June 26 2011 11:54 Jaeger wrote:Show nested quote +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?
Not if i win in the first 5 mins
On topic, very useful note, will be put into practice!
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On June 26 2011 11:54 Jaeger wrote:Show nested quote +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?
No not when u hav the mins of wat 180 mules yield.
ppl will still call mules on closer patch, out of habit.
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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?
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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!
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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
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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...
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i'm confused about this... you get more mineral from patches further away? like what lol?
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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.
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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.
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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.)
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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.
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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.
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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
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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.
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This just shows how the use of liquipedia or the search function could prevent threads like these >.<
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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
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On June 26 2011 07:59 Ketara wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 07:45 Ketara wrote:According to Liquipedia: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/MuleMules mine 270 (and lose 30) on close patches. And 240 on far patches. I assume the OP is going to provide some videos or screenshots or etc. to show that you always get 270 on every patch. Since I'm bored and enjoy quoting myself, I did my own test. On far patches you do in fact only mine 240 minerals, and still lose 30.
this. i wanna see some real results from testing.
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On June 26 2011 12:50 Flavor wrote:
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
Why do people keep saying this. You realize you can transfer workers right? and that you get a message when mineral patches are mined out?
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Posts like the OPs is why I came to team liquid.
Great find man this will help a lot as I see 90% of terrans muleing close patches.
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On June 26 2011 08:15 hoot00 wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 07:54 Kiarip wrote:On June 26 2011 07:53 latan wrote:On June 26 2011 07:48 dhe95 wrote:
It's also better to not constantly call upon on the same patch. Think about it, if you have 5 patches with 800 minerals each, you'll get only a total of 25 minerals per trip, since unless you have mules scvs will mine one at a time. If instead you had 8 patches with 500 minerals each, you'd get a total of 40 minerals per trip. however, less patches means you can saturate with less workers. which gives saves you some workers to use in your expansion. yeah I agree with this Would you rather have 8 patches with 1500 minerals each, or 1 patch with 12000 minerals? To get the same income you would have to have 7 other bases
Ok, while this is true I don't really feel like mineral income is such a huge issues for terran. I mean a huge portion of Terran's income comes from mules and having 1 patch less isn't gonna affect your ability to mule, on the other hand I feel like Terran's design kind of promotes low worker count end-games in favor of free'ing up more supply for the main army, so while I'm sure it makes a very small difference I feel like it plays better into the grand plan for Terran late-game where you only have like 35 SCVs total, and can have 165 supply dedicated to the army or something like that you know?
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I wouldn't be surprised if the haters split workers in the beginning of the game. Lol.
Thx OP.
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The real pro will stop the mule before it mines it's last 30 minerals. You need it on close patch to mine faster...
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No one noticed that by just playing?
-_- oh team liquid.
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The OP's experiences differ from my own, as I have done some tests in previous patches and my results agreed with Liquipedia.
It is possible that Blizzard changed some mechanics in recent patches or there may be quirks in map layouts since Blizzard tweaks them every so often.
This thread needs more replays. I am more inclined to believe that Cheec's thread, Liquipedia and my own experiences are correct until the OP provides evidence otherwise.
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Man, now reading through the last couple pages I'm even more confused with all the conflicting reports being posted... I guess I will continue MULEing on close patches till a more conclusive solution is reached, mining 270 minerals and dieing with 30 is probably better than only mining 240.
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Seeker
Where dat snitch at?37023 Posts
How about instead of aruging who's right who's wrong. We all just try it out for ourselves. I guarantee we will all have people saying they got the same results AND people saying they got different results.
Bottom line: This probably depends on what map/mineral positioning/where you put your mule.
Just play the game, and switch your mule positioning to the further patches at your own discretion.
I agree with Xapti, 4 POSSIBLITIES:
Close patches:
300
270 (30 loss)
Further patches:
270
240 (30 loss)
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Whole lot of misinformation in this thread.
The OP is basically a generalization. While not untrue, it depends on the individual map and the individual patches. There are clearly some patches on some maps where you only get 240 and lose 30.
There are so many people on every page though replying and just saying "Thanks OP, this is why Team Liquid is great!" that it is clear they are not reading the thread through, and that this is causing a lot of misinformation.
Pretty upsetting, really.
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guess this makes mules balanced 
jk but this is pretty important. You end up calling a lot of mules....thats a lot of money being killed. I know myself I usuallly call mules onto close patches out of habit from mineral micro.
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If you call down 20 mules in the course of an entire game that's 600 minerals that you are losing out on. I don't see how 600 minerals is negligible by any means.
Edit: Wow 4 possibilities... hmm well that complicates things a bit. Getting 240 minerals while losing 30 would be very bad. I guess memorizing the differences in map mining is only solution.
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I tested this extensively during the beta, and all of my results agreed with Liquipedia.
I just tried it on Metalopolis, and the OP's claim is correct on this map: mules mined 270 from all patches, but close patches ended up losing the last 30 minerals mined without returning them to the base. Strange, because I'm sure I tested the mule on this map during beta. Probably just another unmentioned patch change at some point.
I'm sure some enterprising soul will break this down for each of the maps and update the LP entry.
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On June 26 2011 12:52 Gnax wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 12:50 Flavor wrote:
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
Why do people keep saying this. You realize you can transfer workers right? and that you get a message when mineral patches are mined out?
No... the point is, you want your minerals to be mined out evenly, so your SCVs are always working at their highest possible efficiency.
That is why dropping MULEs on the same mineral patch every time is bad (it will get mined out really fast, meaning the SCVs will end up mining from 7 instead of 8 patches way earlier than they should be). You should alternate between the mineral patches.
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Just don't do what I saw on KOTH last night. Specifically, don't call down 15 mules to the same base. A mule will not mine over top of another mule, so the max you ever want to do is 1 per mineral patch.
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OP is incorrect.
MULEs mine 270 minerals on close patches.
240 minerals on far patches.
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Russian Federation4295 Posts
I'm glad, that someone find way for buff mules.
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Sad that this turned into an ego stroking, OP bashing thread instead of useful mining efficiency discussion.
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this is assuming that you aren't saturated correct? Because mules change mining positions all the time from my experience.
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Russian Federation905 Posts
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If it is true that a mule has the potential to lose 30 minerals, then I would say that this is poor design on blizzards part.
The mule should simply stop mining if time to mine + travel time is > than mules timespan left.
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On June 26 2011 07:28 RivalryRedux wrote:Show nested quote +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. I think this was the case in the beta but the mule duration or speed was changed to make it so you always get 270. Also, I'm pretty sure koreans are well aware of this as I remember seeing MMA move his mule away from the patch at the end of it's life span vs Idra in MLG.
That's pretty baller.
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I don't understand why people instantly adopting the OP as truth when it has no images or videos to back it up and it disputes what is written in Liquipedia.
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How counterintuitive and helpful. Guess I'll have to remember this from now on.
Oh, and now I have another thing to call an opponent a scrub over. If I ever see them MULEing a close patch, I can say that they are a no-skill and ridicule them! Hurrah!
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On June 26 2011 15:05 SecondChance wrote:
If it is true that a mule has the potential to lose 30 minerals, then I would say that this is poor design on blizzards part.
The mule should simply stop mining if time to mine + travel time is > than mules timespan left.
The game shouldn't hold your hand on the primary racial mechanic. The player makes the choice on which mineral patch to send the mule and if it is going to lose 30 minerals, that is the player's responsibility. Same deal for protoss, it's not the game's responsibility to check if the unit is supply blocked for chrono boost.
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Except that you didn't test the other part of this... The mule makes less trips if you send it to a far patch. thus giving you less resources than close patch.
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On June 26 2011 15:25 AIRwar wrote:
Except that you didn't test the other part of this... The mule makes less trips if you send it to a far patch. thus giving you less resources than close patch.
?
He says it still gets 270 mins, thus the same amount of trips... With close, you get an extra "half" trip, thus you lose an extra trip's worth, or 30 mins.
That's what he said. Dunno if it's true.
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On June 26 2011 07:29 seefour wrote:
So each mineral patch has 1500 and you have 8 mineral patches so that's 12000 minerals. You would need to drop 30 mules on close patches to reduce your mineral income from a base by 7.5%. Each mule dropped on close patches loses you 0.25% of your total income from a base. Breaking insight into game mechanics -.-
but why would you just leave minerals on the table especially when mining close patches gives no discernible advantage. It's just smart playing, regardless of the reasoning behind it. Quit trying to bring the OP down with petty remarks like this.
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Just tested this, Op is right.
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I think during a critical moment in the game when you're worrying about your micro, macro, drops etc, this might be a distraction, but otherwise, it's great thing to do during the earlier stages of the game.
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http://www.mediafire.com/?qve58qarjaefz4c
OK, here is some testing.
AND A REPLAY hehe. On XNC, you're welcome to test others.
For most close patches, the mule dies just before it completes the mining animation to get the extra minerals. So for most close patches, the mule mines 270, and doesn't get you a 30 min deficit. It's just faster than the far patches.
(I just look at mins remaining for close and far patch)
(Obv far patches are 270 and the mule dies on way back)
Some close patches are like what the OP says, like in bot 3rd base, (about 21mins in the replay, don't ask me why I spent so much time looking at mules mine, they're cute) then the situation the OP states does happen, 270 mins and 30 min deficit compared to far patch.
Tested the top gold as well, no difference there just for ur info.
So just to be safe, just hit far patches.
Or actually it doesn't really matter in a real game.
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This Thread needs a video in the op, please! we would very much like it!
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there's an old thread about this : http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=119738
Assuming that your information is correct, Bilz secretly changes the mineral distance since according to that thread, all close patches yield full 270 mineral. So in order to find the optimal patch to mule, one needs to test it on every map. Considering that 30 mineral lost is not that big of a deal, the testing might be too time consuming, but it would be cool to see nonetheless
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On June 26 2011 12:52 Gnax wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 12:50 Flavor wrote:
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
Why do people keep saying this. You realize you can transfer workers right? and that you get a message when mineral patches are mined out?
Whats better mining? 40 workers mining 16 crystal patches or 40 workers mining 14-12 patches? think about it. Yes you can transfer workers, but that is more actions, and obviously less efficient for you mining. THINK about it.
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This will never impact the outcome of a game.. Seriously..
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On June 27 2011 05:30 Flying_Cake wrote:
This will never impact the outcome of a game.. Seriously..
Why do people say stuff like this? Every little thing matters at a high level. It's just another small thing a player can add to their game and take advantage of. All the little things add up. Every mineral has value.
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On June 27 2011 05:30 Flying_Cake wrote:
This will never impact the outcome of a game.. Seriously..
Neither will worker stacking in the start - oh wait....
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Actually it is quite big considering the amount of mules used in a game. It could easily add up to 300 Minerals.
Even on 1 Base Vs 1 Base this can be huge if you loose like 120 minerals.
On the same notion I don't get why zergs would ever build buildings with drones that carry minerals or workers with minerals are sent to harvest vespene.
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Interesting, thanks for sharing.
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On June 26 2011 07:54 Kiarip wrote:Show nested quote +On June 26 2011 07:53 latan wrote:On June 26 2011 07:48 dhe95 wrote:
It's also better to not constantly call upon on the same patch. Think about it, if you have 5 patches with 800 minerals each, you'll get only a total of 25 minerals per trip, since unless you have mules scvs will mine one at a time. If instead you had 8 patches with 500 minerals each, you'd get a total of 40 minerals per trip. however, less patches means you can saturate with less workers. which gives saves you some workers to use in your expansion. yeah I agree with this
I don't. Because it makes absolutely no sense. The more patches you have mining, the higher you income, for about any amount of workers (as long as you have about an equal amount of harvesters per base and some other caveats...).
Seriously, kiarip and latan, you better rethink that "mining out patches saves you harvesters" logic. It's pretty darn broke.
[=
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On June 27 2011 05:43 KazaDooM wrote:
Actually it is quite big considering the amount of mules used in a game. It could easily add up to 300 Minerals.
Even on 1 Base Vs 1 Base this can be huge if you loose like 120 minerals.
On the same notion I don't get why zergs would ever build buildings with drones that carry minerals or workers with minerals are sent to harvest vespene.
Also: workers with minerals are sent to scout.
I always assume they bind workers to a group beforehand (at any given time when they feel they have "free time") so they can execute the transfer/build command faster.
I does make sense, you know... "time is money", and wasting precious seconds to micro in your base might cause you to lose your scout or something. Although I feel in the early early game those 5 or so minerals can delay things meaningfully at high levels of play.
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EPT
