After a couple hundred games now, I feel like I need to say this somewhere. If I lose a few games I get super dejected and fearful of playing the ladder and wondering if I've hit the end. When I win a bunch I feel like explaining my execution plans to half strangers like some kind of role model. In either scenario, I can never binge play the ladder for a couple hours, it's so mentally involving that I need to recharge and replan before getting back into another game, not too high on a win or too low on a loss. I'm emotionally tied to a game that I'm below average at, never caring this much for other games I've been far better at. This is just weird to me.
From what I've seen, Starcraft has some sort of weird tie to your emotional state. Might be something to do with the concentration requires/some kind of adrenaline dump, but I've seen a ton of people here actually afraid to play online in case they lose. I've never seen that kind of reaction with other games so I'm wondering why Crafting Stars is so special.
I think it has to do with the 1v1 nature of the game. When you lose, not only is your opponent better at the game, he is better than you. It's just so personal. Most people have no problem diving into team games, because it's so much less stressful and involving. In a team game, you have the safety net of the other person to rely on, as well as having the ability to tell yourself that you lost because your team mate messed up.
In 1v1, every problem with your game is a direct result of you.You got supply capped. You didn't build enough guys. You didn't scout well enough.
People don't like having a game reinforce that they aren't good at something.
Thank you very much for all that analysis! I appreciate it.
I definitely suffer from the lack of a plan. I think I'm moving upwards in rank only because I have been focusing on macro (which is obviously not bad), but I need to at least give myself a general plan for what to do after the start. Since I don't have a solid plan, any time I actually interact with my opponent, I sort of lose my spot, and tend to just react, which is why I start teching up late (and forget to make SCVs). Of course, this is obvious after you kindly point it out to me!
I think the wall-in tends to make me think I can't get my army through my own door very smoothly, so I will start rallying them below the ramp, which has burned me before. I guess the fundamental issue is that I don't really know when to move out (no plan!), so I tend to just look at my ball of units until it feels "beefy," and then push. I think using the second scan to get a read on the opponent would help me a lot with seeing where he's going so I don't feel so blind (hell, I'm OP and have scan, why don't I use it!).
I've seen a lot of people post in these threads about being intimidated by laddering, and I started out the same way. In fact, I played one BW game on battle.net back in the day, and it scared me off of the entire game online (which I had ditched class in highschool to buy on release). In the end, though, you need to take each individual match less seriously. Think of losing a match like dying in Unreal Tournament or Quake 3 Arena or something like that. You don't worry about individual deaths, you just respawn and go on to kick more ass, and the more you play, the more ass you kick, and your kill:death ratio improves over time. While individual matches end up taking a lot more time, and I'll only play a few a night, it's still the same thing overall. If you're not playing in a tournament, then no single match is very significant. Just keep playing, learn from your losses without taking them badly. You're supposed to lose in SC2, just like you're supposed to get headshot in Counter-Strike. It's just part of the game, and you wait for the next round and do your best once again.
Edit: I still don't find it easy to lose, but I definitely feel better about it than I used to, especially when I really internalized the idea that I'm SUPPOSED to be losing HALF of the time, once I'm ranked properly. The FPS kill:death ratio isn't really a great example now that I think about it, since that implies that you've just gotten better than everyone else on the server, whereas SC2 is about getting placed against people of an equal skill level, so you won't dominate anyone. It's OK to lose! If you never lost, you'd never get any better at the game, because you'd never see what you were doing wrong. That's one reason why I'm avoiding YABOT until I have mastered my fundamentals. Losses teach me much more than wins, generally.
schmads on
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GoodKingJayIIIThey wanna get mygold on the ceilingRegistered Userregular
After a couple hundred games now, I feel like I need to say this somewhere. If I lose a few games I get super dejected and fearful of playing the ladder and wondering if I've hit the end. When I win a bunch I feel like explaining my execution plans to half strangers like some kind of role model. In either scenario, I can never binge play the ladder for a couple hours, it's so mentally involving that I need to recharge and replan before getting back into another game, not too high on a win or too low on a loss. I'm emotionally tied to a game that I'm below average at, never caring this much for other games I've been far better at. This is just weird to me.
We could be twins!
I don't ladder much because of my schedule, but when I get the chance it's maybe 3 games a day... sometimes 5. 10 happened like... once.
I know exactly how you feel. It is taxing, because even though I don't care much whether I win or lose, there's still that nice adrenaline injection at the beginning of a match.
But I've got something like 80 games under my belt and it's kind of subsided somewhat. I just get in there and play and see what happens.
I just watched the Day9 daily #100 for the fourth time, even I think that is getting a little weird.
Fizban140 on
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Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
edited October 2010
They are pretty entertaining.
I do think Day9 is the best caster there is though. He has an amazing game knowledge, an entertaining personality, is consistent with his presentations, they're always high quality and regular, and can talk for more than an hour about a single subject, several times a week, and not become boring.
Eh, with zerg, you can always be building "stuff" and still get rolled. This is because you have to know when drones are no longer the "stuff" you should be building.
Quoted from last page, but this is something that has always stuck with me since I started playing Zerg. I simply don't have the fine grasp of when to start diverting my larva away from drones and into units. It's all well and good to encourage people to Always Be Droning, but I've found it to be a big struggle to get the feel for when it's time to get an army up.
If you're worried about making mans or drones as zerg
watch one of your replays and pay attention to how many mans they can get at times. It's easy to forget how fast or slow the other races can make guys.
also, if it's easier, pretend you're another race and make one drone at a time and mans with the other larvae
You can also do stuff like make a drone and then 2 guys, or the spawned larva to guys and natural to drones.
ZypherIM on
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tuxkamenreally took this picture.Registered Userregular
edited October 2010
The most critical thing is that you don't *have* to make *all* your larva into the same thing. There is a medium, especially with your expansion up, where you're working with rounds of 10-14 larvae and you don't *need* to make that many drones at once. Split it up, or do half drones and half troops.
After a couple of weeks focusing on the campaign and challenges, I decided to bite the bullet and play my placement matches. Ended up ranked higher than I expected, largely thanks to two of my five opponents insta-surrendering. I considerered doing the same to balance it out, but I figure I'll get dropped down to where I should be before too long if I keep losing in gold.
I've very little experience, so if any other noobs are looking for some practice, hit me up
The most critical thing is that you don't *have* to make *all* your larva into the same thing. There is a medium, especially with your expansion up, where you're working with rounds of 10-14 larvae and you don't *need* to make that many drones at once. Split it up, or do half drones and half troops.
It's important to realize this is safe but suboptimal simply because it always pays off to have more drones earlier if you can afford it. Mixing drones and army in a single batch of larva is a safe transition tactic but you should be striving to develop a good enough game sense (augmented with good scouting habits) to know when to make all drones or all units.
Kambing on
@TwitchTV, @Youtube: master-level zerg ladder/customs, commentary, and random miscellany.
But say you scout and realize that you need, say, 3 roaches to be safe. Then it's ideal to make 3 roaches and dump the rest of the batch into drones.
Sorry, you're right. I should say it like this:
"you should be striving to develop a good enough game sense (augmented with good scouting habits) to know when to make all drones or just enough units to survive and the rest drones."
Kambing on
@TwitchTV, @Youtube: master-level zerg ladder/customs, commentary, and random miscellany.
Completely agree. I think the core concept that I was digging at, but failed to articulate, is that situational awareness and comprehension of what an appropriate response is to a threat. Knowing to build those three roaches and go back to drones is where I'm lacking and since every game feels different, I struggle trying to figure out when I'm safe (relatively) and when I'm not.
Eh, with zerg, you can always be building "stuff" and still get rolled. This is because you have to know when drones are no longer the "stuff" you should be building.
Quoted from last page, but this is something that has always stuck with me since I started playing Zerg. I simply don't have the fine grasp of when to start diverting my larva away from drones and into units. It's all well and good to encourage people to Always Be Droning, but I've found it to be a big struggle to get the feel for when it's time to get an army up.
As long as you have marauders (or anything, really) to tank hits for marines, zerglings aren't a threat. Honestly, something that most people don't do versus zerg is to have a small (3+) squad of hellions with their main armies. They melt zerglings and make them a non-issue. The hard part of this tactic is the controlling. Without proper control, hellions tend to get right in front and die instantly.
Still, though.. once people learn to do this more often... ouch.
As long as you have marauders (or anything, really) to tank hits for marines, zerglings aren't a threat. Honestly, something that most people don't do versus zerg is to have a small (3+) squad of hellions with their main armies. They melt zerglings and make them a non-issue. The hard part of this tactic is the controlling. Without proper control, hellions tend to get right in front and die instantly.
Still, though.. once people learn to do this more often... ouch.
This just falls in line with blizzards love for the idea that useful units you'd want at the back of your army tend to move faster than the things you want in the front.
This is why it is necessary to baby sit a Stalker/Zealot army going anywhere, especially against zerg because if those stalkers show up like a second ahead of the zealots, you should give up right there.
As long as you have marauders (or anything, really) to tank hits for marines, zerglings aren't a threat. Honestly, something that most people don't do versus zerg is to have a small (3+) squad of hellions with their main armies. They melt zerglings and make them a non-issue. The hard part of this tactic is the controlling. Without proper control, hellions tend to get right in front and die instantly.
Still, though.. once people learn to do this more often... ouch.
Hellions are 150(?) Minerals a piece. Depending on what his build order is, it may not be viable. If he goes for lings/Mutas, yeah. Roaches/Hydras, not so much.
Aren't hellions only 75 each? 225 minerals for 3 hellions that demolish lines and lines of lings is definitely worth it!
Of course, this is all theorycraft. I've had this happen to me a couple times but I'm sure it was more of an accidental thing like "I'll just get a crapload of units" and hellions happened to be in there. If I made more roaches and less lings, it wouldn't have mattered as much.
Speedlings are my curse. I love them so much but they're really quite fragile.
EDIT: 100 each. 300 minerals for 3. Not too shabby still.
Posts
We could be twins!
In 1v1, every problem with your game is a direct result of you. You got supply capped. You didn't build enough guys. You didn't scout well enough.
People don't like having a game reinforce that they aren't good at something.
I definitely suffer from the lack of a plan. I think I'm moving upwards in rank only because I have been focusing on macro (which is obviously not bad), but I need to at least give myself a general plan for what to do after the start. Since I don't have a solid plan, any time I actually interact with my opponent, I sort of lose my spot, and tend to just react, which is why I start teching up late (and forget to make SCVs). Of course, this is obvious after you kindly point it out to me!
I think the wall-in tends to make me think I can't get my army through my own door very smoothly, so I will start rallying them below the ramp, which has burned me before. I guess the fundamental issue is that I don't really know when to move out (no plan!), so I tend to just look at my ball of units until it feels "beefy," and then push. I think using the second scan to get a read on the opponent would help me a lot with seeing where he's going so I don't feel so blind (hell, I'm OP and have scan, why don't I use it!).
I've seen a lot of people post in these threads about being intimidated by laddering, and I started out the same way. In fact, I played one BW game on battle.net back in the day, and it scared me off of the entire game online (which I had ditched class in highschool to buy on release). In the end, though, you need to take each individual match less seriously. Think of losing a match like dying in Unreal Tournament or Quake 3 Arena or something like that. You don't worry about individual deaths, you just respawn and go on to kick more ass, and the more you play, the more ass you kick, and your kill:death ratio improves over time. While individual matches end up taking a lot more time, and I'll only play a few a night, it's still the same thing overall. If you're not playing in a tournament, then no single match is very significant. Just keep playing, learn from your losses without taking them badly. You're supposed to lose in SC2, just like you're supposed to get headshot in Counter-Strike. It's just part of the game, and you wait for the next round and do your best once again.
Edit: I still don't find it easy to lose, but I definitely feel better about it than I used to, especially when I really internalized the idea that I'm SUPPOSED to be losing HALF of the time, once I'm ranked properly. The FPS kill:death ratio isn't really a great example now that I think about it, since that implies that you've just gotten better than everyone else on the server, whereas SC2 is about getting placed against people of an equal skill level, so you won't dominate anyone. It's OK to lose! If you never lost, you'd never get any better at the game, because you'd never see what you were doing wrong. That's one reason why I'm avoiding YABOT until I have mastered my fundamentals. Losses teach me much more than wins, generally.
I don't ladder much because of my schedule, but when I get the chance it's maybe 3 games a day... sometimes 5. 10 happened like... once.
I know exactly how you feel. It is taxing, because even though I don't care much whether I win or lose, there's still that nice adrenaline injection at the beginning of a match.
But I've got something like 80 games under my belt and it's kind of subsided somewhat. I just get in there and play and see what happens.
PSN: Threeve703
I do think Day9 is the best caster there is though. He has an amazing game knowledge, an entertaining personality, is consistent with his presentations, they're always high quality and regular, and can talk for more than an hour about a single subject, several times a week, and not become boring.
Not many people can do that.
Quoted from last page, but this is something that has always stuck with me since I started playing Zerg. I simply don't have the fine grasp of when to start diverting my larva away from drones and into units. It's all well and good to encourage people to Always Be Droning, but I've found it to be a big struggle to get the feel for when it's time to get an army up.
day9tv Sean Plott
Btw no daily tonight! At blizzcon rehearsing >.<
watch one of your replays and pay attention to how many mans they can get at times. It's easy to forget how fast or slow the other races can make guys.
also, if it's easier, pretend you're another race and make one drone at a time and mans with the other larvae
B.net: Kusanku
This makes me a sad panda
Games: Ad Astra Per Phalla | Choose Your Own Phalla
I've very little experience, so if any other noobs are looking for some practice, hit me up
It was a damned good daily.
It's important to realize this is safe but suboptimal simply because it always pays off to have more drones earlier if you can afford it. Mixing drones and army in a single batch of larva is a safe transition tactic but you should be striving to develop a good enough game sense (augmented with good scouting habits) to know when to make all drones or all units.
But say you scout and realize that you need, say, 3 roaches to be safe. Then it's ideal to make 3 roaches and dump the rest of the batch into drones.
Sorry, you're right. I should say it like this:
"you should be striving to develop a good enough game sense (augmented with good scouting habits) to know when to make all drones or just enough units to survive and the rest drones."
Day9 did a daily on this exact subject: Newbie Tuesday: Drone Timing
i want to start laddering as zerg again, because i hate marauders and its against my religion to play protoss. im so bad at zerg though
im thinking about it
im picturing it in my head
and im getting upset
Wait for my coffee to finish, then we do them!
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just watch it it was a fantastic episode
day9 knows how to explain concepts
Sure? :P
marauders aren't great against lings
though I understand what you're saying
Well, let me just take a look at the unit counter list here...
Ah yes, zergling. You'll be fine.
marines: weak against zerglings (until high food levels)
marines+marauders: pretty good against zerglings
Still, though.. once people learn to do this more often... ouch.
You forgot stim for marines. That will fuck up Zerglings quick.
This just falls in line with blizzards love for the idea that useful units you'd want at the back of your army tend to move faster than the things you want in the front.
This is why it is necessary to baby sit a Stalker/Zealot army going anywhere, especially against zerg because if those stalkers show up like a second ahead of the zealots, you should give up right there.
Hellions are 150(?) Minerals a piece. Depending on what his build order is, it may not be viable. If he goes for lings/Mutas, yeah. Roaches/Hydras, not so much.
Of course, this is all theorycraft. I've had this happen to me a couple times but I'm sure it was more of an accidental thing like "I'll just get a crapload of units" and hellions happened to be in there. If I made more roaches and less lings, it wouldn't have mattered as much.
Speedlings are my curse. I love them so much but they're really quite fragile.
EDIT: 100 each. 300 minerals for 3. Not too shabby still.