StarCraft II

[Malakili]

They're really trying to nerf reapers hard aren't they. Doesn't bother me as I hardly ever use them, but it'd be nice for reapers to find their niche. Roach range is a nice change, it feels too short right now.

I really think they need to figure out what they want reapers to be.  Take away the ability to make them early and they aren't worth getting at all, but thats less a problem to do with rax before depot and more to do with the fact that as a unit they just don't hold up in the mid-late game.

[K9]

Yeah, as glass cannons they only really work well when there's low risk of them being shot at. Their DPS is stellar, especially against buildings, but their fragility means that you can't rely on them inside a normal army ball. I guess they would be some sort of late-game base raider, but air units do this so much better, as they have an easier escape.

[Malakili]

Yeah, as glass cannons they only really work well when there's low risk of them being shot at. Their DPS is stellar, especially against buildings, but their fragility means that you can't rely on them inside a normal army ball. I guess they would be some sort of late-game base raider, but air units do this so much better, as they have an easier escape.

I wonder how much of it is map design.  There don't seem to be done of opportuities to abuse their jump after the early game either, maybe just hanging out at towers easily.  I can imagine raiding the back of your opponents second base in Delta Quadrant for example, but you're almost always better off just doing a drop at that point.  Terran drops are fucking brutal to begin with.

[Fordel]

The theoretical Reaper mid/late niche would be to fulfill the building harass role in situations where dropping isn't possible.

The issue is that any defense that shuts down drops, also shutdown Reaper harass pretty much. You also have the ability for the drop to just rejoin your main army without issue after the drop. Four Marauders and a Drop ship is just going to be more effective then a equivalent cost reaper force. Maybe if you are in some weird situation where you are mineral starved (as terran  ) and gas heavy. 



Maybe there is some really good positional play to be had with Reapers in a army, using them to flank behind and surround somehow, but I don't see it yet.

[Malakili]

The theoretical Reaper mid/late niche would be to fulfill the building harass role in situations where dropping isn't possible.

The issue is that any defense that shuts down drops, also shutdown Reaper harass pretty much. You also have the ability for the drop to just rejoin your main army without issue after the drop. Four Marauders and a Drop ship is just going to be more effective then a equivalent cost reaper force. Maybe if you are in some weird situation where you are mineral starved (as terran  ) and gas heavy. 



Maybe there is some really good positional play to be had with Reapers in a army, using them to flank behind and surround somehow, but I don't see it yet.

I think you've really gotten at the point here.  Sure, there might be some useful ways to use them, but they aren't more useful than just spending those resources on something else.

[Fordel]

I think my theory-craft hurdle with Reapers in an army, is what can Reapers do for an army, that Hellions don't do better AND cheaper?

That would be a weird ass map that lets you flank with cliff walking but not with hellion speed.

[slog]

Baneling bust I pulled off near the end of this 15 minute replay.  Great fun.  (screw Terran)  Just as he's moving down his ramp I was moving up :D

[sinij]

Baneling bust I pulled off near the end of this 15 minute replay.  Great fun.  (screw Terran)  Just as he's moving down his ramp I was moving up :D

List of suggestions watching your replay.

1. 14 expand is risky, especially if you are doing it without having clear idea what your opponent is up to.  You kind of have to build static defense at your expo and/or religiously scout or risk loss against early aggression. Key idea behind early zerg expansion is that you focus on scouting and have static D and enough larva to fight off early aggression then use econ advantage to crush your opponent.
2. Your scouting needs to improve. Here is /minimum/ you should have done in that game - park 1 zergling at Xel Naga tower, park 1 zergling outside of T's ramp. This way you will know *exactly* when T leaves his base to attack or expand, this generally lets you build units to defend or deny expansion.
3. Make banlings part of your defense against Terran early push. I generally have couple banelings on stand-by at all times as part of my defense. I prefer to pre-make them and keep at expo, but if you trust your scouting you can keep them as zerglings.
4. I did not like your expand - gas - pool build all at the same time. Too many drones lost to buildings at the same time. I suggest 14 expo 16 pool. YMMV
5. You saturated 2 bases with drones, but you weren't good at spending it all. Build extra hatcheries so you can dump it faster.
6. Your static D placement is highly questionable.  I prefer 2-3 spikes up front at natural right behind 2 evo chambers (why evo, because they are cheap) and 1-2 spore colonies in the mineral line to prevent air harass and drops.

[slog]

Baneling bust I pulled off near the end of this 15 minute replay.  Great fun.  (screw Terran)  Just as he's moving down his ramp I was moving up :D

List of suggestions watching your replay.

1. 14 expand is risky, especially if you are doing it without having clear idea what your opponent is up to.  You kind of have to build static defense at your expo and/or religiously scout or risk loss against early aggression. Key idea behind early zerg expansion is that you focus on scouting and have static D and enough larva to fight off early aggression then use econ advantage to crush your opponent.
2. Your scouting needs to improve. Here is /minimum/ you should have done in that game - park 1 zergling at Xel Naga tower, park 1 zergling outside of T's ramp. This way you will know *exactly* when T leaves his base to attack or expand, this generally lets you build units to defend or deny expansion.
3. Make banlings part of your defense against Terran early push. I generally have couple banelings on stand-by at all times as part of my defense. I prefer to pre-make them and keep at expo, but if you trust your scouting you can keep them as zerglings.
4. I did not like your expand - gas - pool build all at the same time. Too many drones lost to buildings at the same time. I suggest 14 expo 16 pool. YMMV
5. You saturated 2 bases with drones, but you weren't good at spending it all. Build extra hatcheries so you can dump it faster.
6. Your static D placement is highly questionable.  I prefer 2-3 spikes up front at natural right behind 2 evo chambers (why evo, because they are cheap) and 1-2 spore colonies in the mineral line to prevent air harass and drops.

Thanks for the feedback.  I pretty much expand at 14 every time except for ZvZ battles.  I like the baneling idea a lot too.   (I pretty much need to work on all of those.)

[K9]

In other news: Grinding portraits in bronze using worker rushes makes people butthurt.

[Malakili]

In other news: Grinding portraits in bronze using worker rushes makes people butthurt.

If he wants to waste his life that badly, who am I to deny it to him?

[Ironwood]

That's not judgemental at all.

[bhodi]

The thing that IS obnoxious, however, is people abusing the 3v3/4v4 mechanic where if you leave and your party gets a win, you still get a win. Endless numbers of people are grinding up the ladder by just repeatedly leaving games and hoping their teammates pull through without them. Even if they only win 1 in 4, that's still more wins than you would get in the regular course of play.

With ZvZ, given a short rush distance and comparable skill, you must 10pool to banelings or you will lose the game to someone who does.


Slog, If you're going to fast expand before your pool, you MUST tighten your timings up. Sinji noticed oddities but failed to connect the reason for them - you didn't even pull a drone off the mineral line until you had 300 minerals. By time he got to your expansion, you had 450, and so was able to drop the pool almost immediately, but you didn't - you had over 300 by time the pool went down. Had your opponent microed those reapers AT ALL, you would have died right then. Practice until you can move your drone out at the right time and drop the structure just as you get money for it, ~200 for the hatch, ~175 for the pool.

[K9]

Not that I'm condoning that sort of play, but wouldn't those folk sink down to Bronze pretty fast?

[Malakili]

That's not judgemental at all.

  I'm not going to try to convince him to stop, but damned if I'm not going to say its stupid to worker rush for weeks on end to get an achievement.  Then again, I've never understood the appeal of going after achievements in games anyway...

[Rendakor]

And the difference between grinding achievements and grinding to climb a ladder is...?

[K9]

Most of these people de-level to bronze to grind achievements, so the people who lose out are generally beginners. Cheesing your way up the ladder is somewhat less of a deal, since you should reasonably expect most gold+ level players to be able to recognise and counter most of the basic cheese strategies. Also in ladder ruhsing you play to win at least, the achievement farmers quit 50% of their games by all accounts, which screws up the lower leagues.

[Rendakor]

My comment was aimed at Malakili criticizing the appeal of achievements, despite continuously working to improve his rating. I've no problem with either; play the game however you feel is fun, for whatever reward you might desire.

[sinij]

Since I am connoisseur of cheese rushes, here some of my less-known findings.

If you want to do portrait grind by far most effective rush is 6 pool with workers. Idea behind this rush is that you mine just enough for pool + 6 lings, then send your workers into enemy base to prevent choke. If your enemy uses probes to attack - you kite until lings arrive, then 6 lings + 6 probes will win against 12+ workers given equal micro.

To use this

vs. Terran - use 2-3 drones to kill off SCV that builds barracks and keep blocking T from building second supply depot to complete choke.
vs. Zerg - Zerg has the best chance to fight it off, so you have to combine this with building sunken colony on his creep and instead of fighting with drones and lings just make sure they don't kill off sunken.
vs. Protos - use 2-3 drones to make sure they don't completely wall off

This strat, unlike pure worker rush, will work in Silver-low Gold. It takes only slightly more time than just worker rush. It also works on 4-man maps since you are a lot less sensitive to being there ASAP.


Here are some other fun cheeses:

Flying Shitbox (Planetary Fortress) rush - build 10 workers, Gas, Engineering Bay, research +1 range (a must) while flying your Center to enemy base. Land next to enemy Nexus/CC and wreck his base. Downsides - Terran can fly away taking minimal building loss. Zerg has creep, so only maps like Scrap Station where you can land on other side of the mineral line work. You can also prevent landing with a worker, but your own worker attack usually provides enough distraction to land.

Evo Chamber rush - 14 drone builds Hatchery in the enemy base, cancels, then builds evo chamber on residual creep (you have about 0.5 sec to place chamber). Make about 4 chambers. When they die due to HP loss because no creep they release a lot of scourgelings that can wreck starter base.

Proxy Cannon rush - go pylon forge at your base, build pylon in enemy base then stagger them into mineral line. Build 1 cannon at your base to prevent counter-pushes from wiping your econ (resulting in stalemate).

Reaper in a Bunker - build barracks outside enemy base off 8th worker, then lab (you obviously need refinery). Hide SCV in the enemy base before they finish choke. Start building bunker next to mineral line about the time when reaper arrives. 9/10 people start chasing reaper and do not notice building bunker. If they attack building SCV with workers - kill all workers with Reaper. If they attack reaper - finish bunker then hide inside with reaper. Ether way - no mining for your victim.

[Malakili]

My comment was aimed at Malakili criticizing the appeal of achievements, despite continuously working to improve his rating. I've no problem with either; play the game however you feel is fun, for whatever reward you might desire.

I don't play to improve my ranking...I play the game to improve at it.    Sometimes I lose 10 games in a row an end up better than I was before hand, but I'm lower on the ladder...thats a win for me regardless. 

In any event, I'm not going to get into some kind of moral argument about the virtues of playing starcraft 2, so get over it.  I'm calling something stupid that I think is stupid.  Its an internet forum about video games, what do you expect?

[tgr]

I just stumbled over an article which mentions how you can get suspended or banned from battle.net for cheating in singleplayer:

http://www.cheathappens.com/article_blizzardbans.asp

Just figured I'd mention this in case it hasn't been mentioned before.

[Thrawn]

Evo Chamber rush - 14 drone builds Hatchery in the enemy base, cancels, then builds evo chamber on residual creep (you have about 0.5 sec to place chamber). Make about 4 chambers. When they die due to HP loss because no creep they release a lot of scourgelings that can wreck starter base.

Hmm, I've never seen this one....to B.net!

[Muffled]

Not really all that great as cheese goes, but the lulz are pretty good from an evo chamber rush if they mess up the defense.

[Abagadro]

I'm getting a mini-crash desync or crash to desktop in 80% of my games now. It's driving me crazy. I've disabled my anti-vrius auto-update, tried disabling firewall, updated video driver. I do have a 4 year old system, but I can't even find anything in the message boards having the same problem. Grrrr.

[slog]

If you want Lulz, drop an evo chamber between his gas and Hatch at the start of the game.  His workers would have to path around it, totally screwing up his timing.  If he kills it, Broodlords come up and attack his workers.

In practice though, every ZvZ is a 10 pool speedling/baneling battle where you should be bringing up two workers to drop spines while you micro around.

[Malakili]

If you want Lulz, drop an evo chamber between his gas and Hatch at the start of the game.  His workers would have to path around it, totally screwing up his timing.  If he kills it, Broodlords come up and attack his workers.

In practice though, every ZvZ is a 10 pool speedling/baneling battle where you should be bringing up two workers to drop spines while you micro around.

I hate mirrors in general for reasons like this.

[jakonovski]

I don't play for a month and I can't beat even the lowest of the bronze now. This game totally does not cater to the casual, so I'm tempted to uninstall. 

[slog]

Best part of Silver league play with the new patch is that Terrans have to scout for the 5 RR  now.  When they don't this happens.

[bhodi]

For you zergs to want to abuse the new roach mechanic, try my new favorite, the new 7 roach rush:

14 pool
Drone
14 gas
Drones to 18
Queen
Roach Nest
Drone
2 overlords
3 roaches
4 roaches with the queen larvae
Speedling upgrade
Build Zerglings to taste

You take an econ hit, but it's not quite as drastic as an all-in. With proper micro, you can do serious damage with those roaches. It's generally enough to break a terran wall-in & any 13 pool speedling, even with one sunken. It puts the serious hurt on any 13gate 15 crono, and the only thing it really loses to outright are <=10pool fast banelings or a 2gate proxy.

It's similar to the 5RR but the delayed overlord timing makes it subtly different and somewhat stronger.

[El Gallo]

Im actually doing worse vs terran since the patch.  Ts used to go bioball all the time, which I could handle usually.  Now they all go tank and thor, which beat me before and beat me now.  Note that I really suck.

[jakonovski]

Thank god, I have my mojo back this morning. Cheesing Protoss are fucking annoying, but if you get past that phase, rushing to battlecruisers is sweeeeeet. Have one hovering above an MMM blob and it wrecks shit up.

[Malakili]

Today I learned not play play Starcraft before breakfast, my god I'm sloppy playing this game in all but the most optimal conditions.  I still have a lot of trouble doing simple things likehitting the correct keys from muscle memory, and I just have to assume that comes from years of not playing RTS games so I have basically no fundamentals.  Everything has to be deliberate, which is why my APM is mediocre, and I'm do prone to mistakes unless I'm really at my most alert.

Anyone have tips for building RTS fundamentals besides just playing a ton.  Maybe I just can't make up for 10 years of not playing them in 2 months.

[slog]

As a Zerg how I am supposed to handle 4-6 Thors with Marines/Mauraders?

[K9]

Infestors and Banelings?

[slog]

My micro really isn't good enough for Neural Parasite :)