EPTI originally wanted to post this in blogs, but could not find the 'create topic' button. I guess it fits here as well.
Introduction (skip if in a hurry/lazy)
I'm a 2500 zerg, who isn't really improving as fast as I'd like to (aside from the misleading rating inflation caused by bonus pool). Puzzled about this, I started seaking for flaws in my game. Missing larva injects? Nope. I have plenty of games up in the 40 minutes, where I do not miss a single larva inject, I can post those if requested. Actually, I tend to not lose macro wars at all, this is especially apparent in ZvZs where the opponent has the same artillery and it really boils down to not missing larva injects, taking bases when possible, composing your army (usually roach + infestor), micro (although not very important because the units seem to do most of it for you) and experience. I know, for example, that hydralisks beat ultralisks pretty bad - some people don't, or tend to just not really think about it and go ultras 'because they are good (which I'd argue as well)'. A general trend I have seen lately is people opening with roaches early in ZvZ, mostly used defensively to block the ramp (the typical 3 roach ramp block), and a little bit later adding a few more to prevent a ling/bling all-in busting through regardless. As I open slings every game, I find myself having a very big advantage over roach openings, as I can get my 2nd hatch up faster and most early roach pressure is destroyed by pure slings, whereas I can go roaches slightly later with a much better economy. Protoss isn't that much of a problem either, typically, because sling + roach usually rapes the earliest of pushes (or just pure slings depending on their zealot/sentry count) anyway. Terran? Not much of a problem either, and muta harass seems to destroy them later on, allowing me to take multiple bases and kill them when they eventually move out.
So if I seem to not really have any problems in the games I play... why do I keep losing so fucking much? Digging in my memory, I could not find very many games (while I have in fact played very very many games) that I have lost because my opponent was better. This was according to my opinion, which is very obviously prone to bias and individual interpretation. Trying to be as objective as possible, I decided I would record my next x amount of losses and wins, and thoroughly analyze what went wrong and right in both games. I soon encountered the problem.
The problem
The games that I lose, I do not consider to be very worthwhile. I remember dismissing the first 4 losses or so to, and I quote myself, "gay random bullshit". My first game that I lost was a ZvZ - the match-up I consider my best (map: Xel'Naga Caverns). Why did I lose? My opponent rushed me with +1 roaches off 1 base, whereas I did not have enough roaches and slings. Ironically, I actually did send an overlord in, which only told me that he was getting a fairly quick lair and that he had already taking his 2nd gas. I did not get to see the evolution chamber or the rest of his roaches, which I did not see either when I ran a few lings up his ramp (I saw 5 to 7, can't remember). I followed with a lair of myself and made an extra queen at my 2nd and I get all-in'd. I lose. I tell my opponent he is awful and leave the game. I got the same opponent the next game, where he tried to do a fairly fast 1 base muta, faking a roach build. This time, I manage to scout his spire because he was noob and let a zergling through. I obviously counter it and beat him very convincingly. He ggs, but I apparently felt the need to restate that he is awful.
Second game I lost was a ZvP (Lost Temple). He 4-gated me (or at least I thought he did that until I watched the replay) on close positions and I die, even though I have 2 spines up. Turns out he did a very aggressive 3-gate push with almost all of his chrono on his gateways and c-core not taking his 2nd gas, seriously cutting probes. I did see him chronoboost his c-core twice, which he used in the wall-off, so I assumed he was doing a pretty harsh 4gate. Compared to a normal 4gate push, there were way more units, I barely hold off his initial attack but it costs me too much and I die to his second attack.
Third game I lost was ironically a ZvT (Shakuras, when it was still in ladder), making for a loss in all match-ups. I see a fast tech lab and a marauder and react accordingly, but he hid 2 starports and attacked me with 3 banshees. My queen gets caught out of position. My spire just finished, so I did not lose the game immediately, but I was behind so much it didn't really matter and I lost pretty convincingly after that. Upon rewatching the replay I was down 20 workers after that banshee attack.
Fourth game I lost was another ZvT (blistering sands, even). The guy drops blue flame hellions in my base while my army is at my natural and I lose everything. I did spot the starport right next to the factory being built, while the tech lab was on the factory so I assumed a timing push or banshees. Wrong.
Fifth game I lost was a ZvP, Delta Quadrant cross positions. I have absolutely no idea what to expect and can't get intel, so I decide to do a fairly general build that's kind of good against everything (main things I worried about were void ray and 4gate), while semi-expecting him to take down his back rocks to get a nexus up. He went blink stalkers and my roaches/spines were useless, I lose the game.
Is it really my fault?
Now I could make a topic about this on a forum (be it this forum, a clan forum or any other sc2-related forum), but I find the advice to be worthless in 99% of the cases, especially when 'scouting' is their """advice""", which is funny when I use every way of scouting possible (zerglings running up the ramp multiple times, sacrificing an overlord and sending in an overseer as soon as lair finishes) in a single game and still lose to something because I did not scout it. Another piece of useless advice could be 'mass slings would have beaten that'. I know what would have beaten that, but I also know that virtually every other opening would have beaten mass slings and I did not know he was doing that particular opening that requires mass slings. Aside from the advice being generally worthless, most people who give advice also tend to be either very stupid or fucking assholes (or worse: a combination). On all forums I visit, even the battle.net blizzard forums (aka crying bronze noob haven), hinting at imbalance is always met with animosity and on some forums (i.e. this one) even against the rules. Another common response is 'just wait until the game is more figured out and the apparent randomness will disappear', which really doesn't help me much at all now does it lol? -_- Another problem I find to have is that if I play too safe (i.e. making a lot of military units), I find myself to be fairly far behind if my opponent doesn't do an early attack.
Trying to find an answer, I summoned a 3k (at the time of writing this) zerg friend. This friend is much better than I am. To further increase the skill disparity, I would be playing my worst race (terran, whereas zerg is my best race) while he would be playing his main (zerg). We play a series of games, from which I shall post one game (he asked me not to post the others + I am not interested in hearing your 'advice' on 'what could have been done differently', while it really couldn't have been done differently, or comment on little irrelevant things like a worker being idle for 5 seconds as if you are claiming that that is the reason why I lost the game, while my opponent had 1 worker idle for 2 minutes and still had 50 marines in my base).
Game 1: Scrap station, TvZ. I open the same way as the Terran I lost to on shakuras (with the exception of also getting cloak and doing 11gas 13rax instead of the more usual 12rax 13gas), making sure he sees my marauder. I move in with 3 banshees, catch his queen out of position and manage to take down the spire before it is completed. He loses the game.
Game 2: Xel'Naga, TvZ. I wall in at the bottom of my ramp with a depot and a barracks. I don't know about you, but when I see this as a Z I usually expect a 2rax build. Instead, I tried to trick him by doing a banshee build again. He rushes me with roaches and I am unable to defend the bottom wall-in and then my base. I lose the game.
Game 3: Xel'Naga, TvZ. I open 11 gas 13 rax. He sees the reactor and factory building, then steals my gas. I do make hellions but try to go banshee as fast as possible off 1 gas. I got about 40 hp off of his 2nd queen with the hellions, as well as maybe 2 drone kills, before I lost everything to speedlings (he was obviously expecting it). My banshee and follow-up banshees kill him, he complains and leaves the game.
Game 4: Xel'Naga (yes, we got lazy with different maps), TvZ. I blatantly proxy 2 barracks a bit behind the back path to his natural, while he did hatch first. He sends out his scout at 11 (extrac trick build), but it's too late and he loses.
Game 5: Lost Temple, close air positions. I load up 2 medivacs with marines and drop them in his main. He loses the game.
Game 6: Xel'Naga, TvZ. I wall off the bottom of my ramp with a 12 rax 12 gas. I open with a quick reaper and get 5 drone kills, as he was doing an aggressive roach push again and was still chasing my scout (successfully) out of his base with 2 lings. I spot his warren with my reaper, too, so I bunker in front of my rax and make marauders, after his roach push fails he quits.
Game 7: Lost Temple, close air positions. I do a regular 2 rax, he holds it off and kills me. I lose.
Game 8 is the one I am going to post. It is also on Lost Temple, we are close positions. Here is the replay:
http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays/120113-1v1-terran-zerg-lost-temple
Now I am actually going to walk you through this replay, so I would like it if you would watch this replay (perhaps in window mode?) while having the following text ready, with the timings:
2:20 - he sees 2 barracks going down
2:45 - he sees I have not taken my right gas yet
3:10 - he sees I do not have my left gas yet
3:14 - he checks the other gas again to see if i have maybe taken it, he now knows I have not taken my gas yet, which indicates that I'll most likely be making either a lot of marines or a command center
3:15 - he takes my gas to get the SCV off the drone's tail, then cancels it and scouts the front again
3:33 - he sees 1 marine and still 2 barracks
3:43 - go to his 2nd base (his natural), you'll see he has 3 drones there prematurely and then moves them out a bit to check for SCVs or bunkers. Right now, he's afraid, because he has to decide between making drones and zerglings. Remember: he only saw 1 marine and 2 raxes,
if he makes a lot of zerglings and I, instead, make only 1 more marine or so and then a command center, he is pretty far behind. He plays it safe and makes 4 zerglings at 3.56 (open up the production tab in left corner)
3:59 - he makes another set of zerglings (6 total)
4:08 - another set of zerglings (8 total), shortly after he makes ANOTHER set of zerglings. If I had thrown down a command center right then...
4:11 - made a spine crawler (again, imagine if I had gone CC)
4:30 - I want you to pause the game and compare the worker count. Even though I'm doing an extremely aggressive strategy, I'm ahead. Once again, keep in mind what would have happened had I thrown down a CC.
5:15 - he held off the attack, which is to be expected because he prepared for it.
--
Now, the second guessing game begins. What do I do? If I'm going for banshees, he will need to get lair up in case of cloak, and then an overseer. If I'm just going to do a second all-in, he needs a bling nest and speed researched, unless I am retarded and engage on a long creep road. Or am I now throwing down a command center? Had I perhaps already thrown it down? Should he powerdrone? Put units on gas? Have I taken my gas? Will I make banshees? Biopush? Will I add marauders? Hellions? He doesn't know, so he is going to try and find out. Meanwhile, he makes a few drones (and barely catches up, with only 1 or 2 drones ahead).
--
5:27 - he wants to run up my ramp to scout, but is met by 5 marines. So essentially he scouted that I have at least 5 marines there. He plays it safe and runs back, expecting more to come.
6:00 - he realizes that nothing is probably coming and proceeds to take the watch tower for a brief second to be sure
6:08 - takes watch tower, sees nothing
6:09 - moves to my ramp
6:12 - he makes 2 drones, because there is no immediate threat + he has a spine crawler up
6:22 - he runs up the ramp to see if perhaps I was a fucking newb and placed buildings in a place where he could scout it. He sees no additional marines except the ones he saw at 5:27, so he (wrongly) assumes I am doing something that is not another marine all-in. He has just begun mining gas. spending everything on minerals and drones so far (he is 1 worker ahead).
7:12 - he sees me moving out. This is the fastest he could have seen me move out (save perhaps 1 or 2 seconds earlier if he had decided to run up my ramp again at that exact time). I kill him. """"good"""" game.
Game 9, Metalopolis close position. He agreed on playing 1 final game, even though he said (in-game as well) that game 7 would be his last. I proxy a barracks on the high ground at his mensk statue, he went 14 pool and I manage to get 2 bunkers up at the bottom of his ramp. He immediately throws down a spine crawler, but is unable to stop me from taking it down even with queen support. I decide to throw up a cc and switch into marauders as soon as I have the resources, but he already GGs.
How am I able to get 7-2 vs. a player who is 1. much more skilled than I am, indicated both by ladder points, tournament results and personal experience and 2. is playing his main race against my worst race? Not to forget, all games were fairly short, the majority under 10 minutes. Also, this is just an example with T, I'm sure the same concept can be applied with PvZ, and I'm sure that zerg has a few options as well (although obviously way less options because they are forced to build on creep and cannot block their ramp as early and effectively as T or P).
The issue: bad maps?
I think the issue is mostly the maps - the distances are too close, allowing for less reaction time. In other words, you already need to have a set amount of units out in order to counter all of the possibilities that you are unable to scout. I'm not saying everything is unscoutable - if for example I see his first barracks not having a tech lab, sure... he could have a barracks in the back with a tech lab, but I know I'm not going to face a stim biopush as early as x:xx, because that would literally be impossible due to his first barracks not having a tech lab.
If the distances were bigger, this would open the option of more macro-oriented builds but most importantly, give you less randomness and guesswork. I find that if I'm up against a toss on metalopolis in cross position, I can usually wait with making units until the very latest when he moves out of his base. He will usually grab a watch tower first, further delaying his push. I find that I can -usually- spend my round of larvae on army and be in time to fend off his attack (or not fend off, depending on skill and insight - not so much on randomness and incorrect guesswork). Ideally, the distances should be even bigger (because if I just made a round of drones I'm still fucked).
Even though this is mostly a zerg issue, the same concept applies, in some way, to TvP/PvP/TvT. The reason as to why it only applies slightly to these match-ups is because they are less easy to break and do not necessarily need a quick early second base. Protoss has sentries with forcefield, Terran has a bunker with repairing ability which is virtually impossible to break unless you have so much army and he has so little that it is hardly an 'issue', more like totally being misguided about the game and deserving to lose. Not to forget, you'll usually have a few units out and are gradually adding to that pile of units, simply due to the mechanics of the T and P race. With Z, you cannot really decide to make 1 or 2 drones with your round of army. I've tried it and have discussed it with very good zergs, it simply loses you the game and every pro not playing this style kind of reinforces that thought in my head.
With bigger maps (both air and ground distance), I feel like SC2 would be much much much better, and cancel a lot of build order wins and guessing games. What do you guys think?
