StarCraft II Beta

[Malakili]

Uninstalled and not buying.  I just don't have what it takes, and there is no fucking way I'm going to spend the time to learn.    I just wish I could sit down with someone that was good at these games and just understand what I'm even doing.   I know I just sound like I'm complaining a lot in this thread, but I'm really dumbfounded about what exactly I am supposed to be doing to play this game even remotely correctly.  

I never played SC1 seriously, and the only other RTS I've played remotely competitively was DoW2, and that didn't require NEARLY the skill this does, and I even burnt out on that in short order because I ran into a brick skill ceiling in short order.    Its really odd, there is almost nothing I've EVER run into in my life, gaming or otherwise that I've had more trouble with than learning this genre, from playing instruments, to ballet, to sports, to writing, to building circuit boards, literally everything has come easier to me than this.  I'm really at a loss for words because I really haven't had this experience before.  I've very rarely exceptionally bad at things I do.  I might not be GOOD at them, but I'm not used to being utterly incompetent and helpless.

Sounds kind of lame I guess, but its ljust like...yikes.

[Ironwood]

Um.  Why are we still posting here ?  Is it betaing again ??

[Malakili]

Um.  Why are we still posting here ?  Is it betaing again ??

Yes.

[Rasix]

Um.  Why are we still posting here ?  Is it betaing again ??

Until the 19th.

edit: I just played a guy that didn't realize that the waypoint for his collosi was set to the font of my base.  Right into my stalkers. 

[Ironwood]

Well Fuck.

Where was my memo ?

I must dig out the installation again....

[Rasix]

Heh, this got lost in the hub bub over Blizzard stealing our names.  But I don't think they sent anything out.

I just got promoted to Gold.. wooo hoo mediocrity.  High gold too.. god, I'm going to get reamed.

[Malakili]

Heh, this got lost in the hub bub over Blizzard stealing our names.  But I don't think they sent anything out.

I just got promoted to Gold.. wooo hoo mediocrity.  High gold too.. god, I'm going to get reamed.

I was losing every single game I played in Bronze, so don't feel bad.

[DLRiley]

Heh, this got lost in the hub bub over Blizzard stealing our names.  But I don't think they sent anything out.

I just got promoted to Gold.. wooo hoo mediocrity.  High gold too.. god, I'm going to get reamed.

I was losing every single game I played in Bronze, so don't feel bad.

lolz thats what you get for playing mmo's, makes you bad at video games 

[Malakili]

lolz thats what you get for playing mmo's, makes you bad at video games 

Nah, its cool, I'm good at shooters.  In fact, I blame my decade of focus on that genre for sucking at RTS :(.

[Abagadro]

I now have -1 placement matches remaining as I have played three and it hasn't stuck me into any category yet.

[Rasix]

I now have -1 placement matches remaining as I have played three and it hasn't stuck me into any category yet.

Need 5 total. It'll place you.

[DLRiley]

lolz thats what you get for playing mmo's, makes you bad at video games 

Nah, its cool, I'm good at shooters.  In fact, I blame my decade of focus on that genre for sucking at RTS :(.

i've been playing shooters forever now, the difference between you and i is the mmo's we play lolz.

[Abagadro]

I now have -1 placement matches remaining as I have played three and it hasn't stuck me into any category yet.

Need 5 total. It'll place you.

Ah. I'm 4-0 at this point. This is going to be ugly.

[Rasix]

I now have -1 placement matches remaining as I have played three and it hasn't stuck me into any category yet.

Need 5 total. It'll place you.

Ah. I'm 4-0 at this point. This is going to be ugly.

Have fun in Diamond. 

My placement matches were pretty brutal. I think in my second or third one I got place against a guy (kiwikaki) who was in a "day9 daily" when he was featuring TLO.  That was humbling.

[Ironwood]

Damn, it's even more fun than it was.

Fuck Blizzard. Fuck Activision for being a bunch of motherfuckers.

I'll try to post my ID when I know it and Eurofags can match up again.

[K9]

I'm

name: nerfed
code: 244

on EU

Information is in the add friends panel.

[Wolf]

I have a problem with this game - it's too taxing. I'm realtively good, if I play zerg I don't lose much and I'm guessing I'm a lower tier diamond player. I know how to play to my strengths - never rush, go for macro, 4-5 expand games, lean on my skills from '99. Like I said, I hardly ever lose unless I'm seriously outclassed - macro faceroll is too powerfull :)

But my problem is that games take 25-30mins, are really tiring and I have to focus and pay attention at all times. Instead of just log on to wow, press 6-7 keys and stay out of fire. I can generally play 2-3 games and than I have to do something that requires less brain 

Single player will be awesome though and I'll save myself for release. I want the Queen of Blades portrait :P

[LK]

But my problem is that games take 25-30mins, are really tiring and I have to focus and pay attention at all times. Instead of just log on to wow, press 6-7 keys and stay out of fire. I can generally play 2-3 games and than I have to do something that requires less brain 

Pretty much why I have a hard time with any RTS game.

[Ironwood]

Ironwood  102

[K9]

I played a lot of games today and I'm having more fun; people seem to be playing differently since phase one, slightly less cheese or so it seems. Still had a few fuckers do build-in-base against me, which just annoys me, but overall the game feels fun. On the other hand, I just realised how stupidly powerful EMP is against protoss 

The achievements are fairly fun too, although some of them just seem tedious. The one to mine out 10 rich nodes basically requires you to get the upper hand in a game and then sit on an opponent for about 20 minutes while you mine, hoping they don't gg out. My best attempt I had the guy quit when I had done 9 nodes and had ~150 minerals on the 10th left.... Others, like the spawn 15 hallucinations one, are just funny. There are some which seem to genuinely come from decent play, but others seem to be ones you would only do once you had basically won the game, or would completely ruin your build order. Also for the life of me I can't seem to get the Fast-Expand achievement.

[Phry]

Hurm i tried to log on and play but apparently i have an authenticator against my account now?  Guess i've been hacked somehow. :(

[Rasix]

Hurm i tried to log on and play but apparently i have an authenticator against my account now?  Guess i've been hacked somehow. :(

Yep.  Having your battle.net account go dormant pretty much ensures you'll be hacked if there's no authenticator already on it.

[Lantyssa]

How do they know?  It's like they've already hacked everyone and are just waiting for that "your account is inactive" mail.

[K9]

Patch 17

Bug Fixes


Many of the following bug fixes were intended for internal testing only, and are now being reverted.

250mm Strike Cannons can no longer deal damage to hidden targets.
Barracks build time decreased from 65 to 60 seconds.
Bunker build time decreased from 40 to 30 seconds.
Canceling morphing Banelings now returns 75% of the cost like other morphing Zerg units.
Hellion range reverted from 6 to 5.
Reaper build time decreased from 45 to 40 seconds.
Zealot build time decreased from 38 to 33 seconds.

[Rasix]

I can't seem to crack Terran timing pushes.  Raven/tank/marine or mass mauder deathball or just harrassment into huge bioball push just eat me alive.  Throw in a ghost and I might as well GG as soon as it leaves the barracks.  The only time I beat a Terran is if they are REALLY bad. Like "lift off to gold on a 2 player map" bad or "mass banshee v units that shoot up" bad.

It feels like I'm going to be stuck at 20ish gold until I stop playing like an idiot.  Even zerg is starting to clean my clock, and that's my best matchup. Mostly because I don't counter mass muta very well.  That shit can get out of hand fast, especially for someone that can't micro and macro at the same time.  "dude, where are my probes?"

[Ironwood]

Yeah, my criticism of this game remains the same.

When you lose, it's likely because you lost quite some time ago and just didn't know it.  Otherwise, you're probably playing a very long game.

[Paelos]

Let me thank you gents for posting these comments. You are giving me, in full colorful detail, all the reasons why I will never ever be good at this game. Nothing makes a game feel more like work than trying to figure out where I'm not maximizing my time.

[Malakili]

Yeah, my criticism of this game remains the same.

When you lose, it's likely because you lost quite some time ago and just didn't know it.  Otherwise, you're probably playing a very long game.

Its why when you are watching pro games a lot of times they with gg out at seemingly odd times.  The last game of the HDH invitational saw Idra gg out of the final game (7th game in best of 7 series), and he said something like "The prize money isn't worth losing a long game."  Effectively saying "Even though I'm not losing by all that much right now, WhiteRa (his opponent) was only going to get FURTHER ahead from that point on, so I might as well just gg now and save us all the trouble." 

[Rasix]

Yeah, my criticism of this game remains the same.

When you lose, it's likely because you lost quite some time ago and just didn't know it.  Otherwise, you're probably playing a very long game.

That's mostly true.  There's not a whole of times where great micro is going to save you or defenses will be strong enough to overcome great differences in army strength/composition.    However, I do think there is a lot you can do to influence this given the skill levels aren't totally out of whack.

Good (or lucky) scouting, given moderately close skill levels, will often determine the outcome long before it comes to blows.  If I see someone going heavy roach or heavy hydra and I have enough time, I can deal with that rather decisively (well, if I'm too far away from collosi, I'm going to have problem with Hydras). Good harass also, can turn what would be a close game into a decisive win for someone else.  Mutas/thorship (HATE U)/early voidray/etc can really screw up an economy or just throw someone off their game long enough for you to get ahead.

However, this runs into some problems with lower level play. Lower level players don't defend good harasses very well.  I know a bunch of circling mutas is probably going to completely screw me over once they hit the field.  A good Thorship is going to hose me pretty badly as well. Luckily, most people are really bad at reaper harass and those don't seem to survive my first stalker.  

Lower level play also has problems dealing with play styles that require heavy micro (that pretty much applies to what I was saying previously). This is where I run into problems with Terran (specifically Terran mech).  You have to tech rather high and be able to micro very efficiently against an army that can take the fight to you the second siege mode is done.

A better player can micro Phoenixes or get some quick Templar and actually pick out a ghost in a giant bioball or be able to storm well enough to hold off a Terran mech push.  Or survive long enough to get some collosi (who really aren't that good against mech.. heh).

It's just certain strategies and unit comps at this point that are beyond my skill to deal with and thus you see them all over the level that I'm at.  Gone are silly shit like 6 pools (those are funny) only to be replaced with fast expanding zerg, steam rolling terrans, and not a whole lot of protoss (I've had like 3 PvP games out of 30).  

I suppose that was a too long way to say "I disagree, but only slightly".  There's room for comebacks or improbably victories (I should see some replays, I could be kidding myself here), but mostly the early actions are writ large on the rest of the game.  I don't have many gripes about long games, though, especially since I blocked off Desert Oasis.  Past a certain point in the game, I'm either always attacking or already dead. 

[bhodi]

Regarding TvP, day9 reviews an absolutely brutal mass marine+early ghost strat:

http://day9tv.blip.tv/file/3752216/


Basically, barracks+tech lab then barracks+reactor, then ghost academy, tech for shield+stim, factory+starport, pump out mass medivac and attack when stim's done. Seems to be incredibly effective against a majority of protoss strats; marines murder stalkers, you can wall up for DT, are OK against void ray, and the timing push happens before colossi.

It's good enough that I'd expect it to be the flavor of the month, at least for a while.

I do sort of wonder how it'd be against chargelots/sentries, though I don't go that anymore since they nerfed sentry damage.

[Rasix]

It is. It's fucking brutal, especially since early on one EMP will hit an entire group of Protoss gateway units.

TvT is getting fucking retarded to watch.  I HAEV MOAR VIKINGS. I WIN!  It's worse than baneling trading in ZvZ.

[Malakili]

!  It's worse than baneling trading in ZvZ.

I disagree, nothing is worse than baneling trading in ZvZ.

[Soulflame]

What is baneling trading?

[Rasix]

What is baneling trading?

Both Zerg try to baneling bust each other non stop. Usually ends when a baneling finally gets to the drones. It's as retarded as it sounds.

[trias_e]

It's also pretty much the only legitimate way to play ZvZ  : /

You can try to go roaches, but well played lings will overwhelm at the critical stage, and then 2 banelings to the workers = death.

I am almost into diamond after months of flirting with it!  Squeee!  My new favorite build for zerg is ling->infestor->ultra.  It's pretty nasty, I like to get an early +1 for the lings attack, which helps with the ultras end game.  Infestors are pretty great against all sorts of midgame pushes.