|
Today ive decided i want to be a C- terran on iccup. I've played the game on and off for 4 years but now I want to be C-. I've played against other low level players (700-900), I feel I'm a bit better than them at times. I want to play players with more points but I'm scared of getting crushed so I ban players with 1100-above.
My main problem with terran is that die I early to harrass/pressure. My turrets die so fast.
I wish star1 had similar mechanics to star2. Whenever I play, I feel like I'm playing against myself and my opponent.
Latest game on iccup: PvT Beltway
Some questions I need to find answers to.
When do I take a 3rd and 4th?
How do i properly use vultures? How do i micro vultures?
How do i utillize my scouting information?
|
Aotearoa39261 Posts
|
It seems like you just started playing. Goto liquidpedia and select one build order and practice that build order until you can do it precisely. Once you get familiar with it you can start to see what is the strong point and weak points. After a while you would be able to know that your bo is working good on some bo the toss using while other is countering your bo.
Also think of making a smurf account and just use that as your practice id. Play against d+ players too. Dont be afraid. Actually i found playing against d+ players easier because alot of skilled players use smurf account. Those clean 1200 d players are mostly smurfs.
|
I watched the replay, and I saw that you hesitated during midgame. Basically, you are good but needs serious work on macro. Try to work on your midplay. Your 2nd command center was idle for a while. Also you were supplied blocked, not enough facs... no armory... no teching... etc.. etc
You had dangerous time while trying to containing toss too early. As you see, he broke your containment very easily. I would advice on bringing more scv to build turrets. You got lucky because toss didn't use any shuttle. Also it is a good idea to bring the ebay to the battle. If you have it hover ahead of you, you gain vision + goon being stupid.
Oh and place mines on toss' expansion spots. So you will know when ninja expo happened.
|
With vultures, look up vulture patrol micro on Liquidpedia and YouTube. It's actually quite easy. Something else you'll want to learn is how to get mine surrounds off on groups of goons.... I'm not sure if there are any tutorials on YouTube, but I drilled my mine surrounds with UMS training maps. Search around the forums, I think there might be a UMS pack somewhere?
Learning how to interpret scouting information comes with experience. Liquidpedia actually has quite a large wealth of information in each build's section regarding the soft and hard counters and what they look like/how to react. Looking up the build pages for Z and P builds isn't a bad idea either. Watching pro games will also help in this respect.
|
Be prepared to cry yourself to sleep a lot.
|
If you ban players simply due to their rating, you will never substantially improve. You have to play people better than you to force yourself to raise your level of play to match theirs. Strong players force you to multitask, macro, and micro at levels you will never be required to against D- players. Because of this lax environment, you aren't under any pressure to improve. No one got anywhere by beating D- players repeatedly - you become better at noobstomping, not better at the game. Why? Because D- players are the least likely to use standard builds with standard timings (EDIT: Standard is standard for a reason - when you become a solid player, inefficient and silly D- builds become easy to deal with), or if they do, their execution is subpar. These factors lead your own play to be based upon their shortcomings, which renders you powerless against superior players.
IRL Analogy: You are a runner. You run with a bunch of people who are out of shape and show no desire to get in shape. They always run at the same speed and never push themselves to run faster. You run with them and you usually beat them by a few seconds. You do work up a bit of sweat while running against them, it's wrong to say you don't try at all. But, you're never forced to run until your legs don't move anymore, you never feel pressured while you're in the lead. However, you're scared of running with people who you think will be faster than you, because you don't want to lose and you don't want to feel inadequate. So, you enter a state of complacency, limiting your competition to those beneath you, forever being a big fish in a small pond. To truly improve, you need to run with fast people, so you can see how far behind you are and how much work you need to put in to catch up to them. Observing their running and breathing techniques teaches you something you never learned in your time running with fat people. You push yourself every day to try to catch up to the faster runners, improve your technique, and eventually you will match them.
StarCraft Example: You use the FD build against D- Protoss players. Their lack of multitasking and poor execution of the Range-Expand build gives them only 3 Dragoons by the time you arrive at their choke. They proceed to fumble with their micro and lose to your push, even though you forget to bring an SCV and rally your second Vulture. You accept this as normal and continue to play without fixing these mistakes, because they aren't obstacles to you besting your competition. If you play D+ players, they will have 4 Dragoons, decent micro, and a 5th Dragoon on the way. Suddenly, your shortcomings become apparent, and you yourself will know what you need to improve on because the skill gap will make it evident.
You should try to help yourself this way first - play against players indiscriminately, watch replays of particularly bad losses and take note of 2 things: the build order of your opponent/what he has at that timing, and why you were not able to match his army at this point (assuming standard macro game). This will also help your issue of scouting information, because you will see what buildings and timings are precursors to what builds and therefore what resulting strategies. I am certain you will find that your mechanics are the greatest limiting factor at this point - getting supply blocked, having your minerals go too high, forgetting to add production facilities, having poor SCV production, etc. These issues are only fixed with determined practice. One method I have had success with is playing against a computer, or even with no opponent (start the game with a computer, before the countdown timer gets to 3 you change the computer player to open or closed, when the game asks if you want to leave or continue, click continue) and you try to achieve 200/200 with a standard build order, expansion timings, and army composition as fast as possible. Your main goal of course is to optimize your depot building and addition of factories. A good time to aim for is around 13 minutes, depending on how Vulture-heavy your army is.
I know this did not address all of your specific questions, but I am of the opinion that you asked the wrong questions. In other words, I think that what I have said above will be far more beneficial to your play than the information you requested, because you do not yet have the means (mechanics) nor the proper setting (level of competition) to take full advantage of it.
Best of luck! Your determination is commendable. Don't give up!
|
I just started too with the same goal, I'm mediocre at SC2. Day9 said that learning timing attacks is the way to go. If you watch the flash build video that stylish made its a TvP +1/+2 timing attack http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=86770. If you want to add me on Iccup my name is cojoTer.
|
United Arab Emirates5090 Posts
eh... C- is no joke... you probably won't get there this iccup season. if you're just playing scrubs you're getting nowhere. just make a practice account and mass game, like 20 games a day for months. watch pro replays and fpvods. increase your apm
you probably won't get C- though just saying
|
I think reaching C- is not difficult. I reach C- at the end of season because I just accumulated points. It because you gain more points when you win. Also if you consider additional points gathered by winning against better ranked players and map of the week perk, you can have like 100 wins 180 losses and still be C-.
My point is, I only practiced one BO for each races, and after playing around ~150 games, I reach C-. However, staying at C- or being better is totally different story. I usually jump back and forth between D+ and C-.
|
United States9925 Posts
On January 27 2012 05:23 mtwow789 wrote: I think reaching C- is not difficult. I reach C- at the end of season because I just accumulated points. It because you gain more points when you win. Also if you consider additional points gathered by winning against better ranked players and map of the week perk, you can have like 100 wins 180 losses and still be C-.
My point is, I only practiced one BO for each races, and after playing around ~150 games, I reach C-. However, staying at C- or being better is totally different story. I usually jump back and forth between D+ and C-. reaching C- is actually getting more difficult by the day due to the masses of D/D- players leaving for a more beginner friendly game of SC2 (no i have nothing against sc2...) So real D players are now hard to come by.
As for what you are saying, don't play against D- people. D- people are the really bad players who dont even know the proper BOs, or if they do, they just fail at pulling off the timings or have like 50 apm. play against mid D and higher players (though if i were you, avoid the [KR] tags if you know what i mean) this way, you will get better because you play better opponents. I sometimes play C level players and always ask them sometimes wat i did wrong or some tips at the end of the game when i lose. most C level players of one race usually know how to play the other races to C-/D+ rank so they can still be lots of help to you in matchups.
As for playing TvP, you should look at liquipedia for lots of info. build orders and strategies are there and are very helpful, especially the actual population timings :D I use minimized screen scbw so i usually have liquipedia in the background so i can alt tab to see my build order xD
|
Wow, thanks for the response guys. I feel really encouraged to play against solid D and up players. I appreciate the support and tips.I'll provide an update as soon as I'm done with 20 games on the iccup server, which hopefully will be by next Friday.
|
On January 27 2012 18:14 MCeast wrote: Wow, thanks for the response guys. I feel really encouraged to play against solid D and up players. I appreciate the support and tips.I'll provide an update as soon as I'm done with 20 games on the iccup server, which hopefully will be by next Friday.
Post the replay of the game you think you need help or do not know where you have gone wrong . MCeast FIGHTING !.
|
Agreed with "Jealous"
On the other hand, I'd be glad to play some games with you. Add "omoy" on iccup, though I'm not that great of a player.
Good luck reaching your goal
|
On January 27 2012 06:57 FlaShFTW wrote:Show nested quote +On January 27 2012 05:23 mtwow789 wrote: I think reaching C- is not difficult. I reach C- at the end of season because I just accumulated points. It because you gain more points when you win. Also if you consider additional points gathered by winning against better ranked players and map of the week perk, you can have like 100 wins 180 losses and still be C-.
My point is, I only practiced one BO for each races, and after playing around ~150 games, I reach C-. However, staying at C- or being better is totally different story. I usually jump back and forth between D+ and C-. reaching C- is actually getting more difficult by the day due to the masses of D/D- players leaving for a more beginner friendly game of SC2 (no i have nothing against sc2...) So real D players are now hard to come by. As for what you are saying, don't play against D- people. D- people are the really bad players who dont even know the proper BOs, or if they do, they just fail at pulling off the timings or have like 50 apm. play against mid D and higher players (though if i were you, avoid the [KR] tags if you know what i mean) this way, you will get better because you play better opponents. I sometimes play C level players and always ask them sometimes wat i did wrong or some tips at the end of the game when i lose. most C level players of one race usually know how to play the other races to C-/D+ rank so they can still be lots of help to you in matchups. As for playing TvP, you should look at liquipedia for lots of info. build orders and strategies are there and are very helpful, especially the actual population timings :D I use minimized screen scbw so i usually have liquipedia in the background so i can alt tab to see my build order xD
Yeah, D players these days play at around C- level circa three years ago. Most of the real newbies left, and D rank got a LOT harder.
|
On January 26 2012 10:16 MCeast wrote:Today ive decided i want to be a C- terran on iccup. I've played the game on and off for 4 years but now I want to be C-. I've played against other low level players (700-900), I feel I'm a bit better than them at times. I want to play players with more points but I'm scared of getting crushed so I ban players with 1100-above. My main problem with terran is that die I early to harrass/pressure. My turrets die so fast. I wish star1 had similar mechanics to star2. Whenever I play, I feel like I'm playing against myself and my opponent. Latest game on iccup: PvT BeltwaySome questions I need to find answers to. When do I take a 3rd and 4th? How do i properly use vultures? How do i micro vultures? How do i utillize my scouting information?
I'm at work but I'll write a small summary. First let's start off with your first paragraph where you wrote:
I want to play players with more points but I'm scared of getting crushed so I ban players with 1100-above.
First off, if you want to improve, you can't be "scared of getting crushed". However, when you do get crushed this gives you an opportunity to find the chink in your armor and a chance to fix it. You will never get better playing lower caliber players. Let's dissect some of your sentences. You die to early harass and pressure? Sounds to me like your defense isn't in tact. Tighten up your defenses and unit positioning. I recommend watching Flashes TvP vods/replays because he's the king of defense.
|
Remember what Hiya said, you can't copy Flash because he is Flash.
Anyway, I agree with the OP that when he plays, he's against himself and the opponent. If I could see more shit on my 26" screen that I'm playing on, I'd have much less of a headache. The friggin command centre takes up 1/2 my screen.
|
On January 28 2012 08:50 Zariel wrote: Remember what Hiya said, you can't copy Flash because he is Flash.
Anyway, I agree with the OP that when he plays, he's against himself and the opponent. If I could see more shit on my 26" screen that I'm playing on, I'd have much less of a headache. The friggin command centre takes up 1/2 my screen. Play window mode ^^;
|
On January 26 2012 10:16 MCeast wrote: When do I take a 3rd and 4th?
You take your 3rd as early as you can manage without dying. You take your 4th after you've already made a claim of territory, usually during/after a 3-base push.
How do i properly use vultures? How do i micro vultures?
Key thing is to use vultures. There are many followups to an FE. Ideally you have an SCV scouting for the P's 3rd timing and are getting a feel for how many dragoons are on the map. You can get a second machine shop and push out with tanks/marines if you think you can do damage, or you can get vulture speed and delay the 3rd, threaten a runby, and contain the protoss with mines. Against D opponents who aren't mass gooning off 2-base, you should be able to get enough breathing room to think about how you want to take your 3rd (build turrets, set up tanks, depots, and lay some spider mines). And if you can't take your 3rd right away, just remember that any other race that's even on base count with a terran is behind, so use those vultures to pick off stray probes and keep macroing.
Vulture micro for these purposes is primarily knowing how to get mines out without glitches. Also, if you place a mine at the base of a ramp, it can see units on the top of the ramp. If you're killing mining probes, just queue attack orders on individual probes and go back to macroing rather than try to keep your vultures alive forever. Do try to use all of your spider mines before losing your vultures.
How do i utillize my scouting information?
Basic game sense is understanding when your opponent took his expansions (whether you're ahead or behind), and scouting when your opponent masses units. If you see (with scan or vulture) that the protoss is taking his 3rd off only 2-3 gates, you can probably take your 3rd without much risk. If you see that the protoss has many gates and hasn't taken a 3rd, then you will need to be extremely cautious about taking a 3rd, let alone surviving an all-in attack.
This can be difficult to judge depending on your build, but if you use vultures well you should be able to get a lot of information.
I recommend watching some streams to get an idea of good decision-making. In_Dove and TopStar are very good at punishing abusive play and mistakes.
|
And as others have said, iccup is getting harder as the number of players decreases. However, D is the base rank, and there are still plenty of players who aren't gosu but are able to maintain a positive score.
I agree that BW is more a game against your own shortcomings than it is about outsmarting your opponent. I like that aspect of the game.
|
|
|
|