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TLDR
+ Show Spoiler +Maynarding is done b/c
1)Your two bases run out of minerals evenly
2)Because 2 workers mine perfectly efficiently without any waiting time in SC2, rather than 1 worker per patch in BW, and fast expo timings occur between 9-16 workers “workers mine more efficiently” is no longer a legitimate reason for justifying maynarding in SC2.
However, reason #2 kicks in when we talk about gold bases b/c a single worker will have greater mining efficiency on a gold patch. Thus when expanding to a gold base, you should always saturate it with 12 workers, even if that would make your other bases undersaturated
Terrans have MULEs and can adjust lower natural's / newer bases' mineral count to lessen the difference of minerals left on patches on different bases.
Getting a 3rd base does not nullify the benefit of maynarding: what's true on 2 bases is true on 3 bases.
Likewise, maynarding to subsequent 3rd, 4th, 5th bases will further prolong the highest income rate and should be done as well.
Optimal worker cap factors in, and you may not want to maynard in late game.
Maynard refers to transfering workers, which was done in BW. But why do it in SC2? has anything changed? Do we still do it? There are two reasons for maynarding::
Reason #1 Bases mine out evenly, thus sustaining a higher income rate later in the game - this is significant enough to justify the loss of minerals early on.
1) The 1st expo would otherwise mine out faster, and you'd you end up with 32 workers on 8 patches, rather than 32 workers on 16 patches in both main and nat. Now some would "say money now is more important than money later!" and I was a strong believer in as well and would shout "you're ignoring the time value of money". Money earlier in time is more important than the same amount of money at a later point in time, definitely, because you can compound it, get units/upgrades/stuff out earlier, and any same nominal amount of money is a greater percentage of your income the earlier the game. However, the claim is that the amount of minerals that would be left on the nat (and thus the amount of time actually becomes significant enough in the later game in order to justify the initial money lost transfering). To put in finance terms, the discounted present value of that income difference (the amount and duration of income when transferring vs not transferring) is greater than the initial investment (minerals lost due to transferring). Maynarding really boils down to a tradeoff between a loss of minerals now, vs sustained income rate later in the game.
Corollary!: So if you're planning to end the game before your main mines out, you shouldn't maynard, but rather, rally to your natural.
And it's worth it.....or so the claim goes - if anyone has numbers, that would be greatly appreciated.
In an average game, HOW MUCH minerals are there on the natural when the main gets mined out? So far, i've gotten rough numbers of about 500 per patch from just
Reason #2: Individual worker efficiency - waiting times
2) BW - two workers on a mineral patch would incur a waiting time, so having one on a patch, even if it meant losing a bit of mining time while traveling to the natural, was worth it. In BW, there was a direct advantage in the mining rate when you had 1 worker per patch rather than 2. However, in SC2, workers start incurring a waiting time starting beyond the 2nd worker. The fast expo timing (and consequently the worker trasnfer timing) occurs when you have between 9-16 drones in both BW and SC2. But because the optimal number of workers per patch is higher in SC2, the direct income rate advantage for transferring workers is nonexistent.
In mathematical terms, you are trading a lump sum (y intercept - b) for a greater rate (slope - m) Now I'm being vague on the exact numbers and the time to break even in this little investment, but even so, in BW, combined with reason #1, it was worth doing.
Reason #2 in SC2 is not applicable anymore, since there is no wait time incurred for two workers on a mineral patch. Thus transferring workers early on (i.e. when you have 16 drones or less) for reason #2 in SC2 is a mental relic from BW that players often cite without truly having clear sight of things.
However, reason #1 is still enough to justify transferring workers in SC2.
NOTE: Transfering to Gold bases
A worker mining from a gold patch has greater efficiency than that same worker mining on a regular patch. Individual worker efficiency is has suddenly returned! Thus when you expand to a gold base in SC2, it is as if reason #2 came back to life from BW. So you will always want to transfer at least 12 drones (2 workers x 6 patches) to a gold base ASAP, even if that would make your other bases undersaturated.
But I've come to conclude an interesting exception to this rule. Terrans don't need to worker transfer b/c of MULEs. "What?! Heresy!" you say? Let me explain why I think that. Terran can send all (or enough) of their MULEsto the natural during the lifetime of both bases' mineral patches, thereby adjusting the amount of minerals left on each patch of both bases without having to transfer any SCV's and losing mining time.
Now the question remains, "are MULESs enough to balance the minerals on natural and main over the lifetime of those bases? That is still a quantitative question, and needs to be tested, but what is for certain, is that Terrans can use MULEs to lessen the effect of not maynarding.
Another Note: The 3rd base factor
Often times, the kind of analysis so far rests on the assumption that a player stays on two bases, which is partially true. It is easy to then immediately jump to the conclusion, "well, if you're getting a 3rd base, transfering workers is not necessary anymore; it won't
provide you with any benefit." However, this would be a fallacy, as what is good for you at the margin is independent of your total, to put it in economic terms. In other words, just because you made up the inefficiency of income of having bases not run out at the same time by expanding to a 3rd, that doesn't mean you would have still ended up with EVEN MORE income, had you maintaining the higher income of your first two bases.
Yet Another Note:Transfering to 3rd and 4th and 5th bases
Maynarding to 3rd 4th and 5th bases. If maynarding is true for your 2nd base, it is true for subsequent bases. Maynarding should not be limited to the natural. We see even progamers having low saturation on their 3rd 4th and 5th bases late game (even in BW) all the time.
Granted, we must factor in the “optimal worker cap”. If the optimal number of works is X out of 200 food, then as long as we have a spot for all X workers to mine without workers, it doesnt matter where they mine (economically speaking, ignoring positioning, and other factors) At that point, maynarding isn't very beneficial or significant.
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the Idea is to over saturate your main then transfer the excess to your natural so that its instantly saturated, effectively doubling your income. In addition most drops occur in the main so its a little safer to have those drones split up a little.
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well, see, players still split drones even if the main isn't over saturated. that's the crux of the idea, and reason #1 explains why doing that is actually can be bad.
this is a purely economical analysis, ignoring factors like dropping and whatnot. so we can actually isolate the principle, and then incorporate factors like that afterwards.
anyways, thanks for not reading
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I do not agree that you can simply ignore the effect of drops or harassment in general. As deeply rooted in economics as maynarding is, it is still part of a strategy. In SC(2) you have three options: Army, Economy or Tech. If you do one, your other two are weaker.
Maynarding stabalizes your economy longer than onebasing then 100% transfer when you are mined out. This allows you to pursue either Army or Tech as you choose. The win condition of the game requires that you are able to produce an army that can defeat the opponent. Therefore, the less effort spent on maintaining your economy, the more effective your subsequent armies should be.
For example: expanding for zerg is necessary to keep up larvae production. Maynarding allows them to quickly saturate both bases sooner and maintain mineral collection while being harassed, which in turn allows him to continuously pump out units to attack. If he didnt maynard (lets assume an in-base hatch) then he suffers much more to the harassment than if his workers were split between multiple bases.
All in all, I believe that maynarding is a vital part of expanding to make full use of the resources available.
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The question you should be asking yourself is whether or not pros maynard. If they do, you'd be smart enough to do the same. If not, then you shouldn't. Afaik, every pro that i see maynards. If that is the case, i think you put in alot of effort into the OP, but achieved nothing but waste time.
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While this may not be the intention of your thread, you've brought an idea to mind. In a standard game, your original "main" base is the last to be destroyed. So, when you expo, why not transfer all workers (except gas) to the expo? When that gets mined out, you always have mineral patches at your original base to return to, and eliminate the "necessity" of taking an expansion later in the game, giving you a serious advantage over your opponent.
Good idea? No? Just a thought.
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Only reason I see maynarding MIGHT be good is to take advantage of the close patches?
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Another point about maynarding is the fact that it makes it much easier to macro your economy. If my drones are evenly split, I can spam drones in a hurry and know that they will split the difference pretty evenly at each base. If I am putting 20 drones on base 1 and almost nothing on base 2, I'll waste time transferring drones from one OR I waste time clicking all my eggs onto base 2's mineral patch. Add that to the point already made about resilience vs. harassment, and I think there remains a strong case for why we all should maynard after establishing a new expansion.
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wait so you only need 16 peones (if there are 8 patches of minerals) to have 100% efficient mining?
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On December 22 2010 11:15 Exxo wrote:
While this may not be the intention of your thread, you've brought an idea to mind. In a standard game, your original "main" base is the last to be destroyed. So, when you expo, why not transfer all workers (except gas) to the expo? When that gets mined out, you always have mineral patches at your original base to return to, and eliminate the "necessity" of taking an expansion later in the game, giving you a serious advantage over your opponent.
Good idea? No? Just a thought.
If you transfer all of your workers then you're losing all of your mining time. The idea is to have 2 bases running, even if neither of them are at 100% saturation.
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If you don't maynard to your natural (and subsequent bases) then once you reach saturation, you have to stop using that CC/Nexus and your worker count doesn't accelerate. One might argue that you could simply rally to your newest base, but that provides its own set of complications.
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i don't agree with your second reason. There has been many mathematical analyses of the number of workers one has at an 8-patch base vs. the mining rate that base has. In general it is similar to a negative exponential function. As you get more workers the benefits from each additional worker becomes less than that of the previous one you made; however the benefits from the additional worker does not vanish entirely. In fact 24 workers on 8 patches gives you more minerals faster than 16 workers on 8 patches. It has been proven. So if you can afford try and get it up to 24 at both, and you can sustain that for your 3rd and 4th and 5th (if the map allows) and 6th, etc...
source: http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Mining_Minerals
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On December 22 2010 11:15 Exxo wrote:
While this may not be the intention of your thread, you've brought an idea to mind. In a standard game, your original "main" base is the last to be destroyed. So, when you expo, why not transfer all workers (except gas) to the expo? When that gets mined out, you always have mineral patches at your original base to return to, and eliminate the "necessity" of taking an expansion later in the game, giving you a serious advantage over your opponent.
Good idea? No? Just a thought.
I was also intrigued by the idea, however, that would require every game to last long enough to get that far (most easy expansions mined out). As well as the fact that you'd have 90+ drones for your original halfway gone original base, and not using the plethora of unit producing structures I have spent all game to produce out of.
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On December 22 2010 11:31 Raidern wrote:
wait so you only need 16 peones (if there are 8 patches of minerals) to have 100% efficient mining?
you need 16 drones mining to get OPTIMAL mining time. you are not FULLY saturated till you have ~3 per mineral patch. so if you have 16 mining then maynarding might be the better choice. even though you are not fully saturated, after 16 your workers will incure a wait time.
some games in 3v3 i will fast expand to a close gold, when i do this i will transfer nearly all my workers to instantly saturate the gold. the get my main re saturated after.
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On December 22 2010 11:14 ace246 wrote:
The question you should be asking yourself is whether or not pros maynard. If they do, you'd be smart enough to do the same. If not, then you shouldn't. Afaik, every pro that i see maynards. If that is the case, i think you put in alot of effort into the OP, but achieved nothing but waste time.
You realize that people in BW didn't transfer their workers until Maynard standardized it right? Copying what the pro's do without thought or innovation is a good way to become a mediocre player.
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On December 22 2010 11:15 Exxo wrote:
While this may not be the intention of your thread, you've brought an idea to mind. In a standard game, your original "main" base is the last to be destroyed. So, when you expo, why not transfer all workers (except gas) to the expo? When that gets mined out, you always have mineral patches at your original base to return to, and eliminate the "necessity" of taking an expansion later in the game, giving you a serious advantage over your opponent.
Good idea? No? Just a thought.
your still posing the necessity to expand by not mining your main out and needing to instead expand. i transfer drones as the patches start to deplete and try to keep 3 bases MINING not just get a third by the time my natural runs dry like most p/t players do.
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On December 22 2010 11:47 Saechiis wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2010 11:14 ace246 wrote:
The question you should be asking yourself is whether or not pros maynard. If they do, you'd be smart enough to do the same. If not, then you shouldn't. Afaik, every pro that i see maynards. If that is the case, i think you put in alot of effort into the OP, but achieved nothing but waste time. You realize that people in BW didn't transfer their workers until Maynard standardized it right? Copying what the pro's do without thought or innovation is a good way to become a mediocre player.
then why did everyone start doing it after he did it???? because they were copying a pro. and subsequently getting much better at the game.
lets say your gonna make meat loaf and youve never ever made meat loaf befor. wouldnt it make sense to watch a pro do it or read a pros directions?
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I'm confused as to why there is a huge debate here. Maybe it's because I play Zerg and transferring workers makes sense to get the economic advantage? If maynarding wasn't a viable strategy then a FE wouldn't be either.
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1) If you have more than 16 on Minerals, transferring any of the workers in excess of 16 will yield a higher income for a small initial lost of time spent mining
2) If you transfer slightly over half your workers, and continue constant production at both bases, you will saturate both at the same rate and hopefully mine out both at the same time. This -can- be an issue if your timing on taking a third is off.
3) If you transfer to a new location you are going to have to defend a new location as well as your main.
On Zerg FE. Zerg need to have a higher rate of larvae production available off two bases to compete with the unit production of other races. Thus a secondary hatchery with a queen is a -very- nice thing to have early on. However the Fast Expand comes from a Brood War mentality that "If I'm going to build another hatch to get more units, why don't I build it near minerals if I can defend it"
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On December 22 2010 11:50 charlie420247 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2010 11:47 Saechiis wrote:On December 22 2010 11:14 ace246 wrote:
The question you should be asking yourself is whether or not pros maynard. If they do, you'd be smart enough to do the same. If not, then you shouldn't. Afaik, every pro that i see maynards. If that is the case, i think you put in alot of effort into the OP, but achieved nothing but waste time. You realize that people in BW didn't transfer their workers until Maynard standardized it right? Copying what the pro's do without thought or innovation is a good way to become a mediocre player. then why did everyone start doing it after he did it???? because they were copying a pro. and subsequently getting much better at the game. lets say your gonna make meat loaf and youve never ever made meat loaf befor. wouldnt it make sense to watch a pro do it or read a pros directions?
The fact that a guy like Maynard sought to innovate his play was what made him a pro, not because he copied what others did.
The reason other players started doing it is because it became obvious that it was a better way to play the game. Before his innovation though every pro played a suboptimal game, and you suggest everyone to follow it blindly because they're dubbed "pro's".
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EPT
