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Reddit starcraft has recently been plagued by a lot of discussion around some lower level players complaining about the advice they get from diamond/masters level players. The usual advice is "focus on macro, you can get to diamond by macro alone". The complaints had to do with bronze/silver players saying they faced more cheese so they don't get to macro.
One redditor decided to put it to the test. He made a guest account, threw his placement matches, and then proceeded to play games just macro'ing to near max army of strictly stalkers then a-moving to victory.
Original Post with replays
Follow Up to outline when he started losing games
I figured it was worth reposting this over here as I see a lot of the same conversations going on in the [L] strategy threads here (I'm only a platinum myself) and it's nice to see an attempt at some actual evidence behind an argument.
I might quibble that this is a pretty expansive definition of macro (he is doing a number of basic mechanical things at a much higher level that his opponents), but it's a pretty interesting experiment and he's obviously not using any unit composition or micro tricks.
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That's pretty neat. It seems like that's the same response I always get when I tell my friends how to play.
This is a good post, I wonder why more people haven't posted :X
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Nice. Definitely am just going to try reach a faster 200 army with Z and go attack lol
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I dunno, he didn't play many games and was playing high leaguers pretty quickly. Also, I want to see him try again as zerg. As zerg, you must adapt or you will die, at any level. You would have to have ridiculously good macro to beat for example a deathball protoss or biomech terran. As with no micro, you will get crushed in one battle and lose it all.
Of course macro is the main skill that will increase one's rank, but simply saying "only macro and you will be in diamond" is plain wrong. I'm in gold now, playing sivelr-platinum level players and there are a lot of timing pushes and aggressive plays that I just wouldn't be able to handle at all if I didn't scout and react.
EDIT: And ZvZ, it just won't work there period. Such a volatile match-up, being beaten in a paper, scissors rock without scouting your opponent you don't have a hope.
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On January 24 2011 13:56 Tomo009 wrote:
I dunno, he didn't play many games and was playing high leaguers pretty quickly. Also, I want to see him try again as zerg. As zerg, you must adapt or you will die, at any level. You would have to have ridiculously good macro to beat for example a deathball protoss or biomech terran. As with no micro, you will get crushed in one battle and lose it all.
Of course macro is the main skill that will increase one's rank, but simply saying "only macro and you will be in diamond" is plain wrong. I'm in gold now, playing sivelr-platinum level players and there are a lot of timing pushes and aggressive plays that I just wouldn't be able to handle at all if I didn't scout and react.
As a master league Zerg, i can tell you that macroing hard will get you definetly into diamond even as zerg. Protoss deathballs are deathballs because they can reach to that point without losing the game before or letting you get 5 bases, in bronze-plat, you can get to 200/200 before they get to that point (can't tell you how much faster i can max than people from that league, but if you macro correctly you can get like 3-10 minutes faster depending on how bad is the other player).
Just to note, i was given a new account like 3 months ago, and i went 15-0 only doing muta/ling every game, in any mu, so trust the people that tell you to macro, because it actually work, and is the fastest way to get to diamond/master.
OP thanks for sharing this, even day9 talked about doing just stalkers and seing ow far he could get, but i think he didnt have the time to do it 
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as zerg you should mass roaches and 200/200 roaches will beat any bronze-plat player (except if he mass air) composition, since basicly u'll have double his army, as this posts graph shows. zvz no exception(except mutas again in which case u should just mass hydra).
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Macro isn't everything. However, it is the backbone of any strategy. If your macro is limiting your strategy, it becomes difficult to say what counters what, which tactics are useful in a given situation, simply because getting supply blocked and forgetting production cycles will make anything you do weaker than its potential. There is a reason pros and higher players alike say macro can get you to Diamond; macro is the limiting factor -- you can't really develop a good game sense or strategic repertoire if macro is limiting your play.
This sums up the argument for practicing macro nicely, if your macro is not excellent you are holding yourself back and everything you do will be naturally weaker.
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On January 24 2011 14:03 Nobu wrote:Show nested quote +On January 24 2011 13:56 Tomo009 wrote:
I dunno, he didn't play many games and was playing high leaguers pretty quickly. Also, I want to see him try again as zerg. As zerg, you must adapt or you will die, at any level. You would have to have ridiculously good macro to beat for example a deathball protoss or biomech terran. As with no micro, you will get crushed in one battle and lose it all.
Of course macro is the main skill that will increase one's rank, but simply saying "only macro and you will be in diamond" is plain wrong. I'm in gold now, playing sivelr-platinum level players and there are a lot of timing pushes and aggressive plays that I just wouldn't be able to handle at all if I didn't scout and react. As a master league Zerg, i can tell you that macroing hard will get you definetly into diamond even as zerg. Protoss deathballs are deathballs because they can reach to that point without losing the game before or letting you get 5 bases, in bronze-plat, you can get to 200/200 before they get to that point (can't tell you how much faster i can max than people from that league, but if you macro correctly you can get like 3-10 minutes faster depending on how bad is the other player). Just to note, i was given a new account like 3 months ago, and i went 15-0 only doing muta/ling every game, in any mu, so trust the people that tell you to macro, because it actually work, and is the fastest way to get to diamond/master. OP thanks for sharing this, even day9 talked about doing just stalkers and seing ow far he could get, but i think he didnt have the time to do it
I have no reason to doubt you and I'm certain that you can macro much harder than anyone I play. I do focus on macro, but my opponents like to take advantage of that. Especially biomech terran will set up defensive tank positions meaning once I get to 200/200, it doesn't matter as attacking into them would be suicide and they are basically free to split the map and catch up economically. And deathball protoss obviously the key is to have a larger army, but once they have critical mass colossi, my ground army is dead before my corruptors have a chance to take them out, no hope at all if I don't micro corruption and focus fire.
Also the massive amount of 2gate/proxygate/2rax/3raxallin etc on the NA server means it is necessary to have a reasonably early scout, I usually do at 14 at the same time as my gas.
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well, it might be true that u can bruteforce ur way into low diamond by macro alone, but imho the higher level players are making it very easy for themselves to always only point out to the generic "bad macro" when lower players ask for help. often times, there are very obvious and more severe flaws in the play of gold/plat level players which simply get overlooked because every1 cries "hurrr durrrr ur macro suxxx, get better macro and u get to 3.5k masters level easily" whenever they see a single missed worker before the 8 minute mark.....
actually the graph of his game against the platinum player shows that the plat player had about the same ability to pump out units as he did, he just won because he went for the upgrades quicker. which is actually less of a macro ability than a longterm strategical decision which can be considered "expert/experience knowledge".
other than that, mass stalkers is by far the strongest t1 unit to mass mindlessly.
so yes, macro is the most important one of the fundamentals, and it can get u to high plat /low diamond on its own. but still i dont think a player should only start to think about anything like timings, strategy or micro once his macro has reached absolute perfection.
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Try abusing mobility. If you have a better eco/better army as Z, try doing something like nydus worming into their base. If they're tanked up around the outside of your base, you can just throw away units into his main/expansions, because they can get replaced instantly. He'll take losses and/or have to withdraw.
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The results of the experiment was completely expected. I'm currently a master league terran and I'm pretty sure I can get into diamond just by macroing stalkers and a-moving them. A lot of people are arguing for the sake of arguing - for instance, some ppl claim that just purely macroing will cost some games. Of course it is going to! However, what they fail to realise is that good macro will win more games in the long run.
For those zerg players wanting to repeat this experiment, I'll advice them to just mass hydra/roach. I'm pretty sure it'll work fairly effectively.
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Macro is so important for someone just starting sc2. Knowing how sc2 econ works is huge and definitely should be the priority for beginning players. Obviously, once your good enough on macro you can incorporate things like scouting, reacting, micro, unit compositions, harassment etc into your game.
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Calgary25981 Posts
Nothing new here. Macro alone will easily get you into the 80th percentile, as shown. It's cool that he actually put his money where his mouth to put some tangible results next to the claim though.
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like others have said macro is the success to winning battles. But at the same time a common T strat is the bioball. And marine/maurader can easily be rolled over by bling/ling, respectively.
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Add me to the list of Zerg gold/platinums wanting to see the zerg equivalent to this "macro only, no scouting" strategy. i don't care how many roaches you have, one tank/thor drop on LT and AFAIK you are toast. Or voids harassing your mineral line on pretty much any map. I want to know the magic Zerg build order that will win without scouting. Mass hydra is not the same as mass stalker. I lose plenty of games where I have more food, more workers/bases, and more minerals/gas invested in my army. Will that same build order plus a-moving really beat a 15 nexus, an all in 4 gate, cannon contain, bunker contain, mass banshees, speedling all in, early mutas, or 1 base roach, all of which i my gold/plat opponents are capable of doing?
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Why do people use absolutes? Why do some people take it literally? It's for the bronze-plat players that watch day9 to learn diamond-level strategies, without never becoming better since they don't understand that starcraft is 75%mechanics and 25% strategy on their level. Everyone should have the apm to keep up a solid economy while not rolling their banelings straight to siege line.
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I don't doubt having extremely good macro would get you up to diamond. However, I look at the game a bit differently. Yes, macro is important to the game, but that doesn't overshadow the other fundamentals. It's like any other complex activity. All the fundamentals matter. I'd rather be medicore and well rounded with the ability to improve all of those skills than just be a macro monster who has to go back and relearn all the other fundamentals.
I don't doubt this is accurate, but its almost seems the same as if tiger woods played a round with only his 5 iron and then was like "See, You can get into the PGA just by having a good swing"
But to each his own. I just play this game for fun.
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Macro is the fundamental to learn. Everything else becomes rather simple to add to your play once macro becomes second nature, and execution ends up being much smoother as well.
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macro is about as fundamental as you can get?
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Seems like all the platinum and lower players and still saying the same stuff even after this guy did this "experiment". I'm not saying that one guy doing this proves everything he claimed, but I'd say that's at least some solid evidence. Yet all lower level players continue on saying the same things.
I knew NOTHING about unit counters and things such as bonus damage to light/armored/etc. or any build orders. I didn't even use chrono boost or research warp gate technology (used mostly stargate/robo units). My apm was probably about 50ish, definitely much lower than 100. I went 3-2 placed into platinum then ended up getting like 24-14 into diamond.
I mean clearly you shouldn't focus ONLY on macro and do stalkers only every game like he did, but simply by improving macro and continually using resources you should naturally get better at the game. If you remember to continually produce units and workers then eventually you'll end up having more time left over to do other things like scout or upgrade/research tech/harass/etc.
When it comes down to it...just get better? I mean I'm not pro or ranked or anything but I have plenty of friends that play and complain about every aspect of starcraft and are too focused on the small things and advanced high level play rather than basics and fundamentals (primarily, MACRO).
They lose a game while sitting on 3.5k min and 2k gas and wonder what unit composition/counters and what micro tactics or gimmicks they needed to win.
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EPT
