Support NeoGAF

[Zerokku]

Yay for flying command centers. Only reason I won my last game. Attacked a guy, wiped out all of his stuff as he attacked mine and we more or less traded. Since he had no way to attack air I just lifted my last CC off to a corner. Only things he had left on the map were lings, roaches, spore crawlers, and drones. Managed to get an SCV to an uncharted corner and rebuild, and just kept a-moving around the map with what was left of my army (probably 20 or so marines, 10 marauders, 3 medivacs and a thor) till I finally got all of the dudes hatcheries. He just would not give up lol

Oh the joys of bronze league haha. I am so bad at this game.

 

[Paches]

i'm not sure, but i find his stream pretty agonising to watch. everything is so textbook, glacial and conservative. unless it's PvP you can guarantee he'll just meander up to three bases attempting to hold off whatever he can, then sit back and hope they eventually overcommit so he can a-move his 3/3 maxed composition to victory. never any shred of creativity or daring.

in short: a BW terran doing what BW terrans do.



the issue is none of those tells mean anything at lower levels. that's why you're better off carving through the shit leagues with a super hard timing which punishes all their unpredictable but grossly inefficient bullshit. when your timing stops working you'll know you're playing people whose builds actually mean something.

He just played a PvP where they both went DT! HAH.

 

[sixghost]

the issue is none of those tells mean anything at lower levels. that's why you're better off carving through the shit leagues with a super hard timing which punishes all their unpredictable but grossly inefficient bullshit. when your timing stops working you'll know you're playing people whose builds actually mean something.

That's true. You can't scout the same way you see in pro replays, but you can still gather important information. You aren't going to be able to predict his build based on the time they take their 3rd/4th gas, but you should still be able to tell whether he is going to be aggressive or defensive in the next 4-5 minutes.

 

[ShaneB]

Speaking of folks being aggressive, this is how terrible I am. http://drop.sc/313819 I hate this game.

 

[Wunder]

the issue is none of those tells mean anything at lower levels. that's why you're better off carving through the shit leagues with a super hard timing which punishes all their unpredictable but grossly inefficient bullshit. when your timing stops working you'll know you're playing people whose builds actually mean something.

I agree, the base mantra of focusing on your macro till plat+ is sound, but I believe you need a g ood 10-15 minute timing push for any race. It gives the lower level player a direct game plan and an end goal. He can focus on macroing and his build order up to that point and then attack. Simply telling someone to macro up forever is not that great in my opinion.

Also, I fucking hate stargate openings/allins. I scout the stargate and he knows I just scouted it, but he can easily build 3 oracles, or no oracles and VR allin me. Or 1 oracle and VR allin in. Or expand! FUCK.

 

[-COOLIO-]

I don't get the change Blizzard made to ultras. They've made them terribly effective a-move wonder units, particularly against T.

gotta micro like a mofo but you can be cost efficient against ultras when you do. spread, focus down weak ultras, and kite.

 

[Ketch]

That's true. You can't scout the same way you see in pro replays, but you can still gather important information. You aren't going to be able to predict his build based on the time they take their 3rd/4th gas, but you should still be able to tell whether he is going to be aggressive or defensive in the next 4-5 minutes.

This is where I'm at in the game. Refining a good macro focused game that punishes inefficient enemies. But the problem I'm running into is not being able to survive the cheesy all ins, because my micro is bad and I don't see it coming. So I need more games to learn how to micro and I have to actually scout to see it coming. So that's my plan moving forward, keep executing my build while trying to incorporate some scouting, getting better at micro will just come with experience. Im almost into the top 25 of my silver division, just need more games.

Also, I'm getting in too deep, just spent some of my tax return on a mechanical keyboard. Clicky clicks.

Edit: the problem I have with scouting is that I feel like can never take my eyes off my base or my macro will slip. So I send scouts blindly to there death and then maybe I can see the shadow of an expansion on the minimap afterwards if I'm lucky. I need to practice macroing while watching my scout/army.

 

[Striek]

gotta micro like a mofo but you can be cost efficient against ultras when you do. spread, focus down weak ultras, and kite.

I've been watching pro terrans struggle with it on ladder (most seem to favour picking up and doing a quasi-basetrade in the late game) as well as myself, I think its harder than you are making out. But its not the point whether you can beat it, its why make Ultras twice as effective at mowing down bio when you're already giving them blinding cloud that actually takes some effort for the zerg to use. They're the dumbest anti-climatic units in the game along with voidrays. They're still mostly useless in ZvP and ZvZ too.

 

[fatty]

I'm gonna focus on incorporating actual scouting into my game so, newbie question: When do you send your scouting drone? Like specifically, is it at a certain supply? or time?

I see that you are also following FilterSC's build (as am I) so I will offer a little advice on what I'm doing. I used to always scout with the first drone made after my 9-Overlord but don't anymore and just focus on my macro early game. I still scout, just not with drones.

So for ZvZ:

I send my very first Overlord toward their natural expansion. My second Overlord (which is normally sent to my natural to scout canons or bunkers from Protoss or Terran) is instead sent a little outside my natural expansion along the opponent’s path to my base. The first Overlord will help spot zerglings coming your way if your opponent does a very early aggression and the second will help spot and also detect if he starts making banelings outside your natural.

I used to send my first Overlord directly in their base if positioning was close enough but I would then miss the zerglings coming my way if he decided to do a 6-10 pool so I've seen that this way helps me more. If no early aggression is coming my way as soon as my pool is finished I pop out 2 zerglings to scout and see what he is doing.

The ZvZ match-up I think is the trickiest because with the FilterSC build the 15-hatch can make it tough to hold off from very early aggression. But with experience it gets a little easier to know what to look for and how to react. Also having a spine early at each base (I believe part of the build) helps out quite a bit. Below are some of my replays with different early aggression situations and what I was looking for:

10 pool all in with drones:
http://drop.sc/313793

Best case scenario on scouting is if their base is situated where your first Overlord can follow the path AND still get into their base but in this case I would have missed the zerglings if I did a straight shot over. As soon as my overload caught the zerglings coming I used my larvae to make zerglings and popped down a spine. Kept my hatch going at my natural in case he attacked that first to buy me more time and then I would cancel at the last minute. But he didn't attack it and I was able to use it as well.

6 pool
http://drop.sc/313800

My overlord was able to catch the zerglings coming even though he tried to stay away from the overlord's vision. As soon as my pool hatched I threw down 2 spines because it seemed like quite a few zerglings. I was hoping he would stop at my natural to give me more time but he was smart to go after my main. I canceled the natural to give me more economy to hold them off. After this initial stop I didn't handle it the best but I was able to still get the job done.

Early zerg baneling pressure into mutas
http://drop.sc/313802

My zerglings at 4:30 saw that baneling nest so I had to deviate from the build and defend my choke and throw down a roach den early. During his attack I botched it a bit because I wanted to focus on the banelings and have two queens block my ramp to protect my main. Was able to get all of the banelings except one and I should have just let my drones mine because one baneling won't kill them.

As soon as the lair is done I always scout again as soon as possible. I think this is critical. The first scout gets you ready for early pressure but the overseer will spot what path they are going with their build. Because of this, even though my build was off, I was able to see that he had mutas and I dropped a hydralisk den asap.

Early zergling/baneling pressure large choke
http://drop.sc/311810

Even though I try to stick to the Bronze to Masters' build, I had to modify this a bit as well. With the large opening to my natural I knew it would be hard to hold off a lot of zerglings. But I saw he threw down his natural before me so I thought I was OK...

At the 5 minute mark I only see 4 zerglings and figure they were just scouts, but at 5:30 I see him bringing more so I plop down some more spines and my roach warren and gas. I didn't see banelings but I assumed they were coming so I placed my evo chambers to help wall off my natural. Sure enough, banelings came in as well as zerglings but since I had 4 queens at this point I was able to block the choke of my main (which I meant to do on the previous example) and prevent the banelings from coming in and eventually the roaches finally hatched to secure victory. If he attacked earlier though, it would have been a lot harder to hold off.

Early roach push
http://drop.sc/313762

In this case when I get my zerglings there at 5:50 I see a roach den so I'm assuming one base roach so I pop down a couple of more spines and situate my evo chambers to help hold off the initial attack while sticking to the build as much as possible.

For Terran and Protoss:

I send my first Overlord to the choke of the natural to scout for an early expand. If I don't see anything against Terran I then move just outside their natural to avoid getting sniped by a marine, for Protoss you have a little more time to peek in before his cyber core and stalker are done. Again, for both races I make a pair of lings with my first egg after pool is finished to get more info. Remember, timing is critical so make sure you’re hitting those benchmarks from Filter’s guide. If you see double gateway or barracks there's a good chance he's sending early pressure so throw down a couple of spines at your natural and keep those same lings just outside their choke to see when they leave. I like to keep one at the choke and the other at the tower close to the opponent. If things look good (no rush by the opponent), I will make another pair of lings, one for the other tower and one for their third.

For all races:

Make sure you have your Overloads placed around the map at strategic spots (along the path for Zerg as mentioned above) and to watch for drops (esp. against Terran). As soon as that Lair is finished I make an Overseer to scout again before pushing out with the roaches. Don’t forget to hit ‘C’ to drop another spy before scouting with the Overseer. The info gathered at this spot will help determine if you keep cranking roaches or if you go tech and expand.

Hopefully this helps. I've been working on FilterSC's build but trying to figure out how to scout and focus on early economy without having to send a drone. Feel free to post replays on games you have questions on.

Edit: the problem I have with scouting is that I feel like can never take my eyes off my base or my macro will slip. So I send scouts blindly to there death and then maybe I can see the shadow of an expansion on the minimap afterwards if I'm lucky. I need to practice macroing while watching my scout/army.

I hear you, that is why I use the overloads now instead of worrying about my drone. Just gotta keep checking that minimap. Very, very important. I think almost all of my early reactions to cheese posted above were just by checking the minimap.

 

[EscapingJail]

Replay for you guys before I go to bed.

dat skytoss feel

http://drop.sc/313835

 

[Corran Horn]

2-0 today wee. 10-2 total on plat ladder ;;

Promote me blizz yo

 

[mercviper]

Speaking of folks being aggressive, this is how terrible I am. http://drop.sc/313819 I hate this game.

:< The biggest thing I noticed is that you didn't use your probes to attack the lings when your zlot came out. At that point you probably could've killed all the lings before going back to mine. It take what? 4 lings to kill a zlot? With 6 there you need to have at least 5 probes helping to even win the fight. Faster just to attack with all though since you had about 400 mins banked.

There's more and maybe you panicked but try to keep in mind that workers can fight too!

 

[Aylinato]

2-0 today wee. 10-2 total on plat ladder ;;

Promote me blizz yo

You get promoted when I damn well feel ready to promote you.

 

[profit]

Oh man, finally some time to post.
Havent touched HoTS in a week, feels bad man....

Hopefully I can relax and play a bit after this week, I'm really starting to need a break.

 

[AdventureRacing]

I've been watching pro terrans struggle with it on ladder (most seem to favour picking up and doing a quasi-basetrade in the late game) as well as myself, I think its harder than you are making out. But its not the point whether you can beat it, its why make Ultras twice as effective at mowing down bio when you're already giving them blinding cloud that actually takes some effort for the zerg to use. They're the dumbest anti-climatic units in the game along with voidrays. They're still mostly useless in ZvP and ZvZ too.

Completely agree with this. I hate when a team ends up with mass void ray or ultra. It's boring to watch, encourages death balls and just seems to have a really low skill requirement.

 

[Boken]

how does one keep up in 1v1 with fulltime work? I just gave up, theres so much to read and im so mechanically deficient

 

[Yoshichan]

What's Artosis' apm?

 

[DerZuhälter]

Any advice for PvZ? Seriously can't handle (although my TvT is win rate wise the worst, but that's just because I'm dense) this matchup at all. I'm too dumb/mechanically inept to pull off a sentry immortal push from 2 base and can't handle hive tech units.
Is Skytoss the only safe option now? I feel that I can't throw anything at Zerg, as long as he is scouting good, but can't really move up the map to deny his scouting (except for MSC).

EDIT: About me: Random player, Platinum, low APM (HotS 100-120ish, WoL 60-80ish)

 

[Vaporak]

I wish there was some tournament on to watch. >.>

Any advice for PvZ? Seriously can't handle (although my TvT is win rate wise the worst, but that's just because I'm dense) this matchup at all. I'm too dumb/mechanically inept to pull off a sentry immortal push from 2 base and can't handle hive tech units.
Is Skytoss the only safe option now? I feel that I can't throw anything at Zerg, as long as he is scouting good, but can't really move up the map to deny his scouting (except for MSC).

EDIT: About me: Random player, Platinum, low APM (HotS 100-120ish, WoL 60-80ish)

Protoss in PvZ has probably the widest range of "roles" they have to be able to play of any matchup in the game, so there isn't really any general advice to give besides the basics. Can you be more specific?

 

[xmShake]

Any advice for PvZ? Seriously can't handle (although my TvT is win rate wise the worst, but that's just because I'm dense) this matchup at all. I'm too dumb/mechanically inept to pull off a sentry immortal push from 2 base and can't handle hive tech units.
Is Skytoss the only safe option now? I feel that I can't throw anything at Zerg, as long as he is scouting good, but can't really move up the map to deny his scouting (except for MSC).

EDIT: About me: Random player, Platinum, low APM (HotS 100-120ish, WoL 60-80ish)

Try forge fast expand into robo and sentries in order to take a safe third. Then make colossus and start getting void rays.

If he goes muta you should get twilight council with blink but if you scout it fast enough you can do 2 stargate phoenix if you turtle a little bit. Anything else you should just continue doing what you're doing, you really want to get out voidrays and colossus or high templar (colossus are easier and safer). Upgrades are important too, try to get +1 air when you're starting your stargate and make a twilight council when your 1/1/0 is done off your initial forge, then add another so you can do 2/2/0.

You don't necessarily have to attack in PvZ, especially since no zerg is going to have the ability to defeat the end game protoss army at that skill level, but if you scout a lack of units, you can go ahead and go kill a base. There isn't much risk involved as long as your keep your mothership core in the back since you can just warp home with minimal losses. Use your observer to try to safely get into a location where he can only come from 2 paths, so you can just forcefield one of them. If his army looks like it might be able to surround you before you can get to a spot like this (usually outside a 3rd base), then you probably shouldn't commit. Another thing you can do to get map control is send out 1 zealot to your watchtower or both watchtowers depending on the map. In a lot of maps, you can position your zealot in between the watchtower and the wall its against such that only 1-3 zerglings can attack at a time. This means that he has to send his whole to go kill it and you'll get a good scout off on what he has at the very least.

Some other things you can try to do is warp prism drop with 4 zealots and warp in more, or send a couple voidrays + a mothership core to snipe some buildings, then recall when stuff comes, but if you're going to completely drop macroing while doing this, its better to forego until you get better.

 

[DerZuhälter]

Unable to secure a third properly and don't know when to do it. Usually open with a forge expand build in PvZ which most of the time gets countered by a fast third hatch.
Just go crazy on probes after that and send out some hallucinated phoenixes to scout.

When should I secure the third, how do I react on barely no pressure from the zerg around 8 mins, and how should I react tech-wise on scouted Hydra-Den/Spire? Roach-hydra compositions give me headaches as soon as hive tech/vipers hit the battlefield, mutalisk compositions makes it very hard/strenous to move out of the base without loosing too much stuff.

Should I hide pylons early on and randomly hit the third with zealots to disrupt the early droning up?

 

[xmShake]

Unable to secure a third properly and don't know when to do it. Usually open with a forge expand build in PvZ which most of the time gets countered by a fast third hatch.
Just go crazy on probes after that and send out some hallucinated phoenixes to scout.

When should I secure the third, how do I react on barely no pressure from the zerg around 8 mins, and how should I react tech-wise on scouted Hydra-Den/Spire? Roach-hydra compositions give me headaches as soon as hive tech/vipers hit the battlefield, mutalisk compositions makes it very hard/strenous to move out of the base without loosing too much stuff.

Should I hide pylons early on and randomly hit the third with zealots to disrupt the early droning up?

If you scout early third you can take an earlier than normal third yourself, off a couple sentries and some zealots. As long as you make cannons there, it will be hard to the zerg to attack it on most maps. Try to wall off the entrance to your third with extra gateways (which you need anyway) and pylons. With cannons behind this, it's really tough to break, especially once you have colossus.

If you scout some sort of roach ling timing, make immortals. Hydra den, colossus.
You'll want to pair both robo units with some sentries (6-8) which isn't much more than you started with initially. This comp really sucks until he gets viper or he gets a good surround so try to attack right around the time his hive starts morphing. Unless you get surrounded really bad, you should destroy this pretty easy.

As for spire, your reaction should depend on when you scout it. If you scout it very late or see mutas, start getting blink, upgrades, and make 1-2 cannons at each base. Then try to get archons. Once you have 1-2 archons (and hopefully a good blink or 2), you can go attack and take a 3rd and he'll have to defend, allowing you to get your nexus and cannons up at your third. Then you can recall home if need be.

If you scout it like right when it begins, you can get away with buildings double stargate and chronoing out +1 phoenixes. This will completely shutdown mutas and the zerg will have to counter the phoenixes which you can then use to kill overlords, harass mineral lines, and so on. Once you have enough phoenixes, or see that he stopped making mutas, go ahead and start pumping out voidrays, which together with colossus should kill everything.

And yes, hidden pylons are a good thing.

 

[DerZuhälter]

So unless I'm doing some funky timing attack it's basically defend until I'm close to max supply?

 

[profit]

how does one keep up in 1v1 with fulltime work? I just gave up, theres so much to read and im so mechanically deficient

Its hard. The best thing is just playing the game to have fun. I'm a very competitive person so I can get pretty demotivated if I try and get better at this game, but goes at such a snails space I can get pretty upset if I constantly keep making the same stupid mistakes.
I mostly play better when I do it to have fun.

 

[Lord Griegous]

Its hard. The best thing is just playing the game to have fun. I'm a very competitive person so I can get pretty demotivated if I try and get better at this game, but goes at such a snails space I can get pretty upset if I constantly keep making the same stupid mistakes.
I mostly play better when I do it to have fun.

This is what I actually love about the game. I can be happily residing at my mid-gold level and having fun winning some losing some. The ladder works perfectly for me and that is why I keep playing 1v1 when none of my friends is online.

Obviously I get nervous and excited playing, but at a manageable and gratifying level. I never would have believed that an RTS ladder would work for me before WoL came out.

 

[Striek]

Unable to secure a third properly and don't know when to do it. Usually open with a forge expand build in PvZ which most of the time gets countered by a fast third hatch.
Just go crazy on probes after that and send out some hallucinated phoenixes to scout.

When should I secure the third, how do I react on barely no pressure from the zerg around 8 mins, and how should I react tech-wise on scouted Hydra-Den/Spire? Roach-hydra compositions give me headaches as soon as hive tech/vipers hit the battlefield, mutalisk compositions makes it very hard/strenous to move out of the base without loosing too much stuff.

Should I hide pylons early on and randomly hit the third with zealots to disrupt the early droning up?

As protoss you should do some form of pressure (mommaship core + couple stalkers seems quite nice in HoTS, or else the ol' standard +1 4gate), and then either expand off phoenixes or immortals, or do an all-in.

Assuming you want to play macro what you're really looking for with your third timing is what tech is zerg committing to and can you defend it. Generally speaking unless they're going for a hydra-bust you'll be able to defend a third at the ~9 minute mark. Just simcity it properly, keep active with your phoenixes and/or observers.

PvZ is a nice matchup because more often than not you can get the information to tailor your build quite a lot to what the zerg is doing, when you need said information. And the planetary nexus' make base defence a lot easier in the beginning than in WoL.

I don't think theres a lot of point hiding pylons early, you can take map control with your stalkers/mommaship core and send a probe behind them if you're doing a warpgate rush.

Defending until max supply is never a bad idea in PvZ, especially at lower levels, but its not really necessary. Warp prism harass is very useful, and depending on the flow of the game you can hit many timings or pressure and take a fourth behind. Use observers, use hallucinated and real phoenixes, and make a judgement call based on what you see. Forcefields and recall let you exert map control relatively risk-free if you have some forward vision.

 

[AdventureRacing]

So i'm trying to play a bit of random. I've got no idea how to play terran or TvT in particular so when i got one i decided to go for a stupid cheese strat i thought up as the game went on.

Anyway pretty fun replay if very low in quality lol. http://drop.sc/313875

Edit: Yeah it feels as though in PvZ our hands aren't anywhere near as tied as protoss. You can actually control the map a bit and it's possible to pressure without being allin. I haven't played much but the 2 stalker + core pressure seems very nice. Depending on the damage i will either expand and branch into stargarte or immortal pressure or just kill them out right with an allin. Looking forward to trying more of this matchup.

 

[Veezy]

How do I join the NeoGAF scrub group?

 

[Felix Lighter]

Speaking of folks being aggressive, this is how terrible I am. http://drop.sc/313819 I hate this game.

I watched. You got 6 pooled. The bane of a new players existence.

If having ladder points on the line stresses you out even a little bit, just play unranked. I've played sc for almost 5 years and I still end up clicking unranked MM moreso that ranked. You still get matched up with players in the ranked ladder that are around your skill level, so there's almost no difference.

edit* I forgot to mention the most important advice. WATCH YOUR REPLAYS. I know it's the worst feeling in the world to watch a replay where you played like crap, but you need to do it. Watch a replay until you understand why you lost and what you could have done differently. If you can't figure it out, post it here or ask someone.

Yeah, I've been watching the replays and really the most frustrating thing to see is my opponent fast expanding all over the map because I just let them go for so long. I have to just push out and scout better so at least if I lose my army, it wasn't because I sat back and let my opponent take over the map.

the issue is none of those tells mean anything at lower levels. that's why you're better off carving through the shit leagues with a super hard timing which punishes all their unpredictable but grossly inefficient bullshit. when your timing stops working you'll know you're playing people whose builds actually mean something.

I'm sure that's best but I guess I was hoping to be a little more flexible while I learned. That may also be an issue. I try to do too much.

 

[ShaneB]

:< The biggest thing I noticed is that you didn't use your probes to attack the lings when your zlot came out. At that point you probably could've killed all the lings before going back to mine. It take what? 4 lings to kill a zlot? With 6 there you need to have at least 5 probes helping to even win the fight. Faster just to attack with all though since you had about 400 mins banked.

There's more and maybe you panicked but try to keep in mind that workers can fight too!

Noted. But yeah, I wasn't in the best of moods, and stuff like that just annoys me and I basically gave up and just didn't care.

how does one keep up in 1v1 with fulltime work? I just gave up, theres so much to read and im so mechanically deficient

I certainly can't. As much as I love/hate the game, I have to fully accept that I can't devote a lot of time just to learning one game for a very long time. But I'd like to think it's something I'll keep installed and keep coming back to, especially if the GAF nights remain fun. I just don't think I'll ever care much for 1v1.

How do I join the NeoGAF scrub group?

I don't think there's an actual group Just friend other scrubs and we'll play each other eventually.

I watched. You got 6 pooled. The bane of a new players existence.

Yeah, I have no idea what that means

 

[Mumei]

Yeah, I have no idea what that means

Your opponent made 2 drones, saved until he had enough to make a Spawning Pool, and then made lings with his saved larvae; 6 [drone] pool.

 

[Crimsonlink]

Yeah, I have no idea what that means

Cheeses 101 (If there is any mistakes please quote and fix it or let me know or to add cheeses)

Zerg:
6 pool: A 6 pool is a Zerg specialty. They make 2 drones and wait until they have the 200 for a spawning pool and then its ling time 65 secs later. Expect 6 lings heading towards your base to deal economic damage while the Zerg drones ups to catch up in economy. Lings are 25 so its cheap and effective to make them to attack early. If you are caught with your wall down or no units and they get inside your base then usually its GG. Good on smaller maps but bigger maps vary as the Zerg has to scout the correct position.

Baneling bust: Mostly used against Terran though with Widow mines and Tanks not needing Siege research this is likely to go away. Can be effective against Toss if they don't have sentrys or just Zealots. Pretty much works to break down walls and flood lings in to kill the opponent. Scout and prepare by looking for the Baneling nest.

7 Roach Rush: Not really a cheese but it does put the Zerg behind in economy if you hold it off with minimal losses. Watch for early gas and Roach Warren as you might lose if you have no units.

Protoss:
Cannon Rush: The most common and most used cheese of Protoss. Not all in if they cancel but it does put them behind. Best way to counter is to check for probe and if it is building the cannon/pylon then kill the probe first if possible. Very important to kill the probe so that it doesn't keep building inside your base. Pretty weak vs Terran but forcing a liftoff does damage the Terran economy and puts the toss back into the game.

Oracle rush: New cheese where Toss rushes out a Oracle and if the Terran doesn't have enough Marines or a Turret/Widow Mines/Air units usually equals GG. Effective vs Zerg if there is no Queen or static defense and enough drones are killed.

Terran:

8-8-8 Reaper rush with bunker: Flash used this to take out Life. Good vs Zerg not so much vs Protoss. Early Reaper and build a bunker. If the Zerg doesn't react in time then their 2nd base is gone and the Terran is usually ahead.

Proxy Marauder: Build a proxy rax with techlab and research concussive shells to attack a Terran opponents. Requires lots of micro to kite Marines and kill SCVs. Good vs FE without rax. Impossible vs Zerg due to speed and sheer number of possible lings, decent against Toss but Marauder DPS too low to effectively kill Zealots.

There are a few more I'm sure I missed and some new ones being worked out in HOTS. I didn't include All-ins because those can come at different times but most cheeses are before the 6 min mark.

 

[Ketch]

How do I join the NeoGAF scrub group?

Yea, just friend me, mbmonk, felix lighter, shaneB, or fork.

I made a group, so when I get back I'll invite everyone to it, and make it so everyone can invite.

 

[mercviper]

Your opponent made 2 drones, saved until he had enough to make a Spawning Pool, and then made lings with his saved larvae; 6 [drone] pool.

In SC2 you don't even have to make the drones!

Cheeses 101 (If there is any mistakes please quote and fix it or let me know or to add cheeses)

Zerg:
6 pool: A 6 pool is a Zerg specialty. They make 2 drones and wait until they have the 200 for a spawning pool and then its ling time 65 secs later. Expect 6 lings heading towards your base to deal economic damage while the Zerg drones ups to catch up in economy. Lings are 25 so its cheap and effective to make them to attack early. If you are caught with your wall down or no units and they get inside your base then usually its GG. Good on smaller maps but bigger maps vary as the Zerg has to scout the correct position.

edit: Okay technically I think those are 8-pools but yeah the idea is they make fast lings and rush you before you get a decent army size out.

 

[Schuhu]

I wouldn't call Oracle opener cheese tbh. It's a viable strategy and not allin-ish at all

 

[Crimsonlink]

I wouldn't call Oracle opener cheese tbh. It's a viable strategy and not allin-ish at all

You have to cut Stalkers and Sentries. If the Terran loses only 1 or 2 marines and kills the Oracle due to poor control and they have 2rax to reinfoce then it might as well be GG for the Toss. I'm talking proxy Stargate with 1 gateway with warp gate not even being close to finished by the time Oracles are out there. Assuming the toss even researches the warp gate before Oracle lol.

Edit: Yeah I can see that its not all-in and so is Roach Rush as the Zerg can simply pull back and drone up. Not all cheeses end in GG for either side if enough damage was done to recoup lost economy for the cheesing player.

 

[Schuhu]

You have to cut Stalkers and Sentries. If the Terran loses only 1 or 2 marines and kills the Oracle due to poor control and they have 2rax to reinfoce then it might as well be GG for the Toss. I'm talking proxy Stargate with 1 gateway with warp gate not even being close to finished by the time Oracles are out there. Assuming the toss even researches the warp gate before Oracle lol.

Edit: Yeah I can see that its not all-in and so is Roach Rush as the Zerg can simply pull back and drone up. Not all cheeses end in GG for either side if enough damage was done to recoup lost economy for the cheesing player.

Roach rushes are the trademark build for platin&below zergs (at least that's my impression), they won't work at a solid forge FE wall and a few minutes later you can deny his third because he had to drone up, ultimately leading to his loss

Also the Stargate play seems to be very popular because 90% of the Terrans I see go 1 rax CC into lotsa bio

 

[blainethemono]

Cheeses 101 (If there is any mistakes please quote and fix it or let me know or to add cheeses)

Protoss:
Cannon Rush: The most common and most used cheese of Protoss. Not all in if they cancel but it does put them behind. Best way to counter is to check for probe and if it is building the cannon/pylon then kill the probe first if possible. Very important to kill the probe so that it doesn't keep building inside your base. Pretty weak vs Terran but forcing a liftoff does damage the Terran economy and puts the toss back into the game.

If you're like me and you suck at scouting and the guy manages to get cannons down outside your base, if you can get a mothership core out and get the energy up for photon overcharge before the guy gets cannons close enough to your mineral line/nexus it can pretty much stop the cannon rush by itself along with a couple stalkers to kill probes. the range on the photon overcharge is crazy.

http://drop.sc/313950

Maybe this guy was just bad at placing his cannons though. It would have been better if I had pulled probes to check the natural after seeing his forge but I kind of just thought he was bad because I had just played a game where a dude tried to cannon up everywhere and go straight to mass carrier/tempest

 

[Yoshichan]

Anyone? Artosis' APM?

 

[SamuraiX-]

Anyone? Artosis' APM?

After watching some of his streaming from last night, I say it's gotta be somewhere in the 350-400 range on average.

 

[Yoshichan]

After watching some of his streaming from last night, I say it's gotta be somewhere in the 350-400 range on average.

WoL APM? That would be like 600 APM in HotS... that's insane.

 

[ghst]

After watching some of his streaming from last night, I say it's gotta be somewhere in the 350-400 range on average.

no way. he's a plodder.

 

[usctrojan]

My game has so many stutters post HoTS... It's annoyingly unplayable if I really want to get better. Should I just wait for an update or so you all think my issue might be local to my machine?

I searched and found others complaining about it but didnt bother to read their dxdiags to investigate potentially similar hardware bottlenecks. Any help? I really want to play.

 

[Felix Lighter]

My game has so many stutters post HoTS... It's annoyingly unplayable if I really want to get better. Should I just wait for an update or so you all think my issue might be local to my machine?

I searched and found others complaining about it but didnt bother to read their dxdiags to investigate potentially similar hardware bottlenecks. Any help? I really want to play.

My game was running perfectly fine until yesterday. I was playing against the AI and the game kept suddenly stuttering, actually more than a stutter, more like a perceivable pauses. Super frustrating and it wasn't an issue until yesterday. The unranked games I played after that were much smoother.

 

[usctrojan]

My game was running perfectly fine until yesterday. I was playing against the AI and the game kept suddenly stuttering, actually more than a stutter, more like a perceivable pauses. Super frustrating and it wasn't an issue until yesterday. The unranked games I played after that were much smoother.

Yea mine is super recent too. WoL was smooth and I cant remember those pauses when I was campaigning HoTS the night of launch. Now all of a sudden it doenst matter if I set everything at super duper low. it does that pause junk.

 

[AppleSmack]

After watching some of his streaming from last night, I say it's gotta be somewhere in the 350-400 range on average.

He looked much closer to mid 200s to me.

 

[Schuhu]

If you're like me and you suck at scouting and the guy manages to get cannons down outside your base, if you can get a mothership core out and get the energy up for photon overcharge before the guy gets cannons close enough to your mineral line/nexus it can pretty much stop the cannon rush by itself along with a couple stalkers to kill probes. the range on the photon overcharge is crazy.

http://drop.sc/313950

Maybe this guy was just bad at placing his cannons though. It would have been better if I had pulled probes to check the natural after seeing his forge but I kind of just thought he was bad because I had just played a game where a dude tried to cannon up everywhere and go straight to mass carrier/tempest

I'd recommend sending the probe who builds your first pylon to scout immediately, its not a huge loss in economy but a huge gain against such things.

Also, you should build a Zealot out of your gate, even if he can't help with the cannons directly you can send them to their base (if they placed their cannons not at your entrance) and pressure them.

Next you could've killed all the builidings on the low ground because he had no vision, mhm ... In my opinion you would've had no problems dealing with the cannons as soon as you had 2 stalkers out, if you send your mothership core to his base, he has to no real way to deal with that besides spamming cannons.

 

[Snkfanatic]

I am getting the same kind of pauses but it also did it for me before the release. Everything runs at 60fps then just pause.....not breaking to me but annoying.

 

[XPE]

Finished the campaign

Spoiler

Jimmy saves the day JUST as it should be =)

 

[Veezy]

Is there a place I can read what the story might be for the next expansion? I could gives a damn about spoilers.