Starcraft 2 - Read Post #2 for a useful beginner guide

[Barfo]

Sorry but you have to be really bad to lose to a worker rush. I'm pretty bad, and if I can beat it, anyone should.

Plus most the people doing it are awful players. I was worker rushed by 2 players in a 4v4. Managed to kill them all and was left with a single SCV with a couple hitpoints, lulz ensued.

Not as easy as you think. Note that workers do not attack or defend themselves automatically, they just keep harvesting. Even if he picks off just 1 before you have your workers go into attack mode, the simple majority means he wins. And if there is nowhere to move your CC to (like on blistering sands), you are screwed.

Obviously you should react the moment you see your workers being attacked, which shouldn't be too hard since that early in the game you have nothing else to be looking at. Plus you should have more workers than him because while he was traveling to your base you were pumping workers out.

 

[Barfo]

lol, I still haven't finished my placement matches... I'm 4 for 4 so far, so #5 is extra fucking scary. 1v1 is so damn intense. Like I don't really care if I win/lose, but ooof it's intense; facing off w/someone 1 on 1 always gets my adrenaline going, no matter what the game is (even chess, lolz). Even in custom games where I *know* I'll win, I feel the anxiety.

<---big pansy, apparently :/

Hah, I guess it's because if you lose in 1v1 you have no one to blame but yourself, but winning 4 out of the first 4 placement matches will most likely put you in platinum.

 

[NikolaeVarius]

Not as easy as you think. Note that workers do not attack or defend themselves automatically, they just keep harvesting. Even if he picks off just 1 before you have your workers go into attack mode, the simple majority means he wins. And if there is nowhere to move your CC to (like on blistering sands), you are screwed.

Unless you're not paying attention at all, which is kinda hard to believe cause thers not anything else happening, worker rushes are simple mto defeat.

I swear people are blind. I had a game where I managed to build a pylon and 3 cannons right next to his mineral line withoutthe other guy noticing. It wasn't even out of sight either. He just didn't see the cannons. He gg'd out calling me a douche.

 

[eLiu]

Unless you're not paying attention at all, which is kinda hard to believe cause thers not anything else happening, worker rushes are simple mto defeat.

I swear people are blind. I had a game where I managed to build a pylon and 3 cannons right next to his mineral line withoutthe other guy noticing. It wasn't even out of sight either. He just didn't see the cannons. He gg'd out calling me a douche.

lol, do you watch day9? On last week's funday monday, there was a game of qxc doing a 1v3 (vs noobs but still, 3 is a lot). At one point, qxc marine drops one opponent's mineral line. And day9 switches to that player's cam while ALL of his scvs are dying... and he doesn't notice at all. He's getting all the flashing red lights being like "OUR SCVS ARE UNDER ATTACK OMFG HELP THEM PLZ" and... nothing. Hilarious

Barfo: yeah exactly. The pressure is always on in 1v1 competition to play my best. With many v many, it's pretty much a crap shoot anyway so you're just screwing around. And in like 2v2s with people I play with regularly (well really just 1 irl friend of mine), we complement each other's weaknesses pretty well & are much stronger as a team than either of us are individually. He's not as good at spending money & maintaining armies... I suck balls at harrassing/pressuring. So just flip on that shared unit control & we're awesome

 

[Aikouka]

lol, do you watch day9? On last week's funday monday, there was a game of qxc doing a 1v3 (vs noobs but still, 3 is a lot). At one point, qxc marine drops one opponent's mineral line. And day9 switches to that player's cam while ALL of his scvs are dying... and he doesn't notice at all. He's getting all the flashing red lights being like "OUR SCVS ARE UNDER ATTACK OMFG HELP THEM PLZ" and... nothing. Hilarious

That had nothing on the crazy tale of love and woe of Anguila and Kowaii from this week's Funday Monday .

 

[ThePro01]

Maaan i cant install it i need to upgrade my rig...

 

[Oceandevi]

Not as easy as you think. Note that workers do not attack or defend themselves automatically, they just keep harvesting. Even if he picks off just 1 before you have your workers go into attack mode, the simple majority means he wins. And if there is nowhere to move your CC to (like on blistering sands), you are screwed.

If you select all your scv's and then click on a mineral, they will all bunch up. You can then get them to surround easier. Also be sure to have health bars on so you can micro your low hp scv away. Also use auto repair. And also be aware of enemy units. If you let 1 scv die that early without noticing then you are farting around. HTH!!

 

[eLiu]

Shit, the insane AI isn't fucking around, geez. They will bring on that "2 gate" (in quotes b/c the insane AI actually has like 3 gates w/its mineral hax) rush FAST. I could keep up with the worker count, but even w/the same # of workers, that bitch outgathers me by like 50&#37;. D: And it has the uncanny ability to expand no more than 20sec after I expanded.

I guess it's good that the AI manages its army poorly pretty often...??? I was always going into fights like 10-20 food down and just scratching by. I love my stim'd MMM ball. Who builds 4 gates & 2 robos on one base? lawl the insane AI does!

It was T(me) v P on steppes of war, btw. Anyone who hasn't should give the insane AI a run. It's no slouch. Whatever the AI's deficiencies are, its massive macro advantage make it a good challenge. Well, at least if you don't try to trick/bullshit it or otherwise take advantage of the programming. Just fight it straight up.

 

[Udgnim]

finally got around to beating SC2 single player

story was pretty meh

Blizzard did a much much better job of building up the villians (Kerrigan & Arcturus) in SC1 & BW

also, Blizzard's decision to make a 1 race focused campaign didn't work out imo. there were too many filler missions in the 25 mission campaign which resulted in poor pacing. they had some side stories in the campaign which I cared very little about. hope they do a better job with their next expansion, but I think the SC1/BW single player model worked out a lot better due to the main story needing to be pushed forward due to limited mission quantity per race.

 

[dust]

Shit, the insane AI isn't fucking around, geez. They will bring on that "2 gate" (in quotes b/c the insane AI actually has like 3 gates w/its mineral hax) rush FAST. I could keep up with the worker count, but even w/the same # of workers, that bitch outgathers me by like 50%. D: And it has the uncanny ability to expand no more than 20sec after I expanded.

I guess it's good that the AI manages its army poorly pretty often...??? I was always going into fights like 10-20 food down and just scratching by. I love my stim'd MMM ball. Who builds 4 gates & 2 robos on one base? lawl the insane AI does!

It was T(me) v P on steppes of war, btw. Anyone who hasn't should give the insane AI a run. It's no slouch. Whatever the AI's deficiencies are, its massive macro advantage make it a good challenge. Well, at least if you don't try to trick/bullshit it or otherwise take advantage of the programming. Just fight it straight up.

To my shame I haven't found myself any working strategy so far, so I have to rely on youtube. If I straight build I get owned from the first or second assault.

1v1 with insane is pretty tough for me. TvP with me terran I can only win by building 2-3 rax to block his exit and a bunker if he gets stalkers out. As soon as I have 5-6 rax pumping out marines I move into the base, usually there's a colossus waiting by then but not much else, 3v3,4v4 are way easier as long as you go for the resource points only(banshees/voids/mutas) and let your team(insane AI) handle the fight, but you have to be quick and preferably get the megaton map.
6-pool rush is also effective against terran but it's hit or miss, depending on your micro.

I like the coop games, but it's hard to find a good team to handle v hard, let alone insane, so I'm back to hard, where the lame rushes happen. I guess people are more concerned about their achievements than playing the game.

 

[eLiu]

To my shame I haven't found myself any working strategy so far, so I have to rely on youtube. If I straight build I get owned from the first or second assault.

1v1 with insane is pretty tough for me. TvP with me terran I can only win by building 2-3 rax to block his exit and a bunker if he gets stalkers out. As soon as I have 5-6 rax pumping out marines I move into the base, usually there's a colossus waiting by then but not much else, 3v3,4v4 are way easier as long as you go for the resource points only(banshees/voids/mutas) and let your team(insane AI) handle the fight, but you have to be quick and preferably get the megaton map.
6-pool rush is also effective against terran but it's hit or miss, depending on your micro.

I like the coop games, but it's hard to find a good team to handle v hard, let alone insane, so I'm back to hard, where the lame rushes happen. I guess people are more concerned about their achievements than playing the game.

Hm I've never tried finding a random group to co-op with online. I can definitely imagine it being a crap shoot though. Hard enough to get decent players for team 3v3 or 4v4 play, lol.

For TvP, I'd suggest playing defensively until you have a sizeable army. As far as I can tell, early pushes are not a good idea b/c it's incredibly unlikely that your army will outsize the computer's army in the first like 10 minutes. I guess if you have good micro you could potentially out-play the AI. I usually wall-in (a bunker behind the depots can be helpful). Wall-ins might be necessary b/c it often rushes me with a lot of early zealots if I don't wall. Hold a xelnaga or leave an SCV outside of his base for vision, so you'll see when the push is coming.

You want to try and force engagements that are positionally favorable for you. The computer is pretty aggressive, so set up a good concave & draw it to you. Don't just "a-click" into his base; you'll get reamed. Or let it get choked on your ramp. I usually strictly defend (first my main ramp, then my expansion ramp/choke/whatev) for the first 2-3 pushes by the AI. Keep in mind that the AI won't harass you, so you don't have to be afraid of like, muta-harass or warp prism surprises.

But I bet harassment would work great against AIs, esp if you're engaging their army during the harass. I can't manage that many things at once, so I rarely harass.

Though BSing the AI can be pretty fun. When I need a quick break from work, I'll fire up the insane AI and cannon rush it The code they added to make the AI resist building pylon/forge in its base is not robust. Trying different things makes the AI do all sorts of hilarious shit.

 

[Barfo]

Those numbers at the home screen where it tells you how many online players are in your region are bogus. I asked my friend in the Latin American region how many players where connected and we had the exact same number. I'm not surprised though.

 

[JJChicken]

Those numbers at the home screen where it tells you how many online players are in your region are bogus. I asked my friend in the Latin American region how many players where connected and we had the exact same number. I'm not surprised though.

I guess its a worldwide number.

 

[Barfo]

No, it clearly says something like "number of players in your region". Not too important anyhow.

 

[imported_Alx]

So many people have stories of getting worker rushed, it makes me jealous because it's never been done to me; it's like I'm missing a part of the game. >200 1on1 games played and >800 overall. Not a single worker rush

 

[Dumac]

So many people have stories of getting worker rushed, it makes me jealous because it's never been done to me; it's like I'm missing a part of the game. >200 1on1 games played and >800 overall. Not a single worker rush

It's never happened to me either. I guess it only happens in the lower leagues?

I don't even know

Sometimes people bring workers with their rush, but I've never encountered a straight-up worker rush on ladder.

 

[Ns1]

in typical blizzard fashion, I installed the game yesterday and went straight to multiplayer.

 

[JTsyo]

What should I do in this scenario?

I run into protoss as terran. He has stalkers and Colossi. I have marines Marauders and 2 ghosts. Is this a winnable scenario for terran?

What ended up happening was the Colossi cleaned up my marines, I only managed to kill a few stalkers.

 

[Molondo]

In that case you can either:
A. stim and run
B. emp+stim and shuffle kite. or if he is positioned badly just FF the cols, most toss will panic and retreat.

 

[onza]

What should I do in this scenario?

I run into protoss as terran. He has stalkers and Colossi. I have marines Marauders and 2 ghosts. Is this a winnable scenario for terran?

What ended up happening was the Colossi cleaned up my marines, I only managed to kill a few stalkers.

Run away and get 6 vikings on your reactor starport.

 

[Aikouka]

In that case you can either:
A. stim and run
B. emp+stim and shuffle kite. or if he is positioned badly just FF the cols, most toss will panic and retreat.

Definitely don't forget the EMP... I mean, that's one of the major reasons you get Ghosts against Protoss! If you can, try and avoid keeping your units clumped up and try and get your Marauders in front of the Marines to avoid the Stalkers picking off your Marines.

Although, it'd be nice to have numbers here... are we talking only 1-2 Colossi? You can easily stim and focus fire only 1-2 down, but if we're talking 3-5 and no Medivac support? Ouch....

EDIT:

Run away and get 6 vikings on your reactor starport.

If he doesn't already have medivacs, chances of getting vikings quickly is probably pretty low.

 

[Dumac]

What should I do in this scenario?

I run into protoss as terran. He has stalkers and Colossi. I have marines Marauders and 2 ghosts. Is this a winnable scenario for terran?

What ended up happening was the Colossi cleaned up my marines, I only managed to kill a few stalkers.

it depends on the exact unit composition of each side, the actual placement of units, and the terrain

 

[Chrono]

Who is down to play? Add me. chrono Code: 167

 

[eLiu]

What should I do in this scenario?

I run into protoss as terran. He has stalkers and Colossi. I have marines Marauders and 2 ghosts. Is this a winnable scenario for terran?

What ended up happening was the Colossi cleaned up my marines, I only managed to kill a few stalkers.

Vague situation is vague

How many units were on each side? Did the colossi have thermal lance? Did you have stim/shields/slow? If you had like 10 marines, 3 marauders, and 2 ghosts to his 15 stalkers & 2 colossi, you lose no matter what you do. Numbers is really, really, really important here.

Where did you meet? If you met on wide open ground where you have space to spread out & minimize the colossi splash, that's very different than engaging him at a choke. This is also important b/c a numerically (in terms of resources spent) superior army can lose if it engages in a really disadvantageous spot.

How close was he? If he's already in your face, running away is going to be pretty hard. But if it was more like you saw him approaching & had to decide whether to back off or move in, that's entirely different.

But assuming that the army sizes are roughly equal & the battleground is at least neutral, I'd probably stim and fall back, hoping that he gives chase. Stalkers will pull ahead of the colossi & you can do some hurt. Unless he's clumped up, in which case I'd try to get off 2 good EMPs, stim & attack. EMPs do crushing damage to clumps of protoss units; they're so efficient for taking down shields.

 

[DrunkenSano]

What is the best protoss counter to mutalisks if they sending a clump of them at your or your ally's mineral line? Is the only thing to do to Forge/cannon your minerals? I hate having to park a large group of stalkers there since they are needed to push out.