The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
SC2: Long Live the new thread!
MNC Dover
Full-time Voice ActorKirkland, WARegistered User regular
Full-time Voice ActorKirkland, WARegistered User regular
(Artwork provided by forum member Wakkawa. Visit his site and buy some amazing work at inexpensive prices. Commissions available!)
The Starcraft II discussion thread
(Channel PA on NA)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lu0rHPviPXY
Master's level Protoss Analysis.
Our good friend s_86 will be reviewing his games as he goes. Click on the image above to visit his blog page.
The SC2 thread proudly presents!
1. The Weekly Forum Challenge
(Organizer: MNC Dover)
-What the hell is the Weekly Forum Challenge (WFC)?
The WFC is a new idea I came up with that will pit one forum member against everyone else in the forum. Basically, you apply to be in the WFC and when your name is called, you take on everyone else in the forum.
-Huh? Why would I want to do that?
Because it's fun, keeps the forum more interactive, and allows you to improve your game by playing a lot of different playstyles.
-OK, who do I play against?
Everyone. It doesn't matter if your Bronze or Master, these games are no ranks barred. Yeah, if you're a Bronze level player you'll probably get splattered, but you will be learning something and have a set of replays from which to study. You could use this opportunity to practice a single build and see how it fares against several other types of builds. Either way, it will be a good learning experience and fun!
-Sounds interesting....what are the rules?
If your name is called, you will take all invites from Sunday to Saturday that week. Opponents can challenge you via forum posts, PM's, or on B.Net. You must try your best to take on every challenge, so be prepared to spend a few hours on b.net during your week.
-I'm only a Bronze leaguer. I'll get squashed so I don't want to enter.
Hold on there a minute, I'm not done yet. Any WFC entrant can request a live-coach regardless of their rank. Yes, any rank. The coach may only give advice during play in ally chat to you and you cannot ask questions. The coach also cannot tell you what the enemy is doing or steer your build to screw over the enemy. Only tips like, watching your supply counts, build more structures, drone up, scout, expo, spend money, etc. The coach can be anyone the WFC wants and can change from game to game. You can talk with your coach before and after games to discuss strats, build orders, and the like.
-Awesome! I think I want to participate. How do I enter?
PM a message to me with "WFC" as the title and the following information:
-Forum name
-B.Net ID with 3 digit code
-Race played (please only use one to reduce headaches)
-Rank
-Do you want a coach?
-Timezone (easy conversions for us lazy Americans please)
-At least three different weeks you want to apply for with your most favorable choice first (example: 03/20-03/26, 03/27- 04/05, and 04/13-04/19)
-Your choice of how you want to play matches, either bo1 or bo3
-Great, I sent out the information and got accepted. Now what?
Now you have to openly accept challenges from the forum. Post the time or times you will make yourself available for matches. Other people can set-up appointments for matches or play however you choose. If you only want to accept appointments great, if not, you can do a first come, first pwned set-up.
-What maps do we play on?
For bo1's, the WFC player gets to choose the map. Sorry folks, that's the advantage of manning up and taking on all comers. For bo3's, the first game is on Shakura's Plateau with the loser choosing the next map from the official Blizzard Ladder pool. Yes this means the maps may change over time. We'll manage.
-What happens when my week is over?
You gather up all your replays, name them "WFC vs (insert enemy name), add them to gamereplays.org (info found in the OP), and then post EVERY SINGLE GAME into a single spoilered post. The thread creator will add your games into the OP and they'll stay there until the next person's turn is over.
-When does all this begin?
How does this Sunday sound? I'm taking applications now!
-I had an emergency mid-week! What do I do?
No biggie, we all understand that real life stuff happens. Let everyone know and I'll do my best to find someone to fill in the spot. No problem at all.
-Anything else?
Glad you asked. I really think this can be fun, especially if we have some of our more charismatic people bring some light-hearted, jaw-jacking to the table. I'd also really like it if some of the lower ranked players step up and give this a go. In reality, it's no different then playing against PA people anyway, but now it will have more of a focus. You can have a target on your back which might change the way you play by adding or removing pressure.
ABOVE ALL, I just want everyone to have fun and play more SC2.
So, who's in?
The WFC is a new idea I came up with that will pit one forum member against everyone else in the forum. Basically, you apply to be in the WFC and when your name is called, you take on everyone else in the forum.
-Huh? Why would I want to do that?
Because it's fun, keeps the forum more interactive, and allows you to improve your game by playing a lot of different playstyles.
-OK, who do I play against?
Everyone. It doesn't matter if your Bronze or Master, these games are no ranks barred. Yeah, if you're a Bronze level player you'll probably get splattered, but you will be learning something and have a set of replays from which to study. You could use this opportunity to practice a single build and see how it fares against several other types of builds. Either way, it will be a good learning experience and fun!
-Sounds interesting....what are the rules?
If your name is called, you will take all invites from Sunday to Saturday that week. Opponents can challenge you via forum posts, PM's, or on B.Net. You must try your best to take on every challenge, so be prepared to spend a few hours on b.net during your week.
-I'm only a Bronze leaguer. I'll get squashed so I don't want to enter.
Hold on there a minute, I'm not done yet. Any WFC entrant can request a live-coach regardless of their rank. Yes, any rank. The coach may only give advice during play in ally chat to you and you cannot ask questions. The coach also cannot tell you what the enemy is doing or steer your build to screw over the enemy. Only tips like, watching your supply counts, build more structures, drone up, scout, expo, spend money, etc. The coach can be anyone the WFC wants and can change from game to game. You can talk with your coach before and after games to discuss strats, build orders, and the like.
-Awesome! I think I want to participate. How do I enter?
PM a message to me with "WFC" as the title and the following information:
-Forum name
-B.Net ID with 3 digit code
-Race played (please only use one to reduce headaches)
-Rank
-Do you want a coach?
-Timezone (easy conversions for us lazy Americans please)
-At least three different weeks you want to apply for with your most favorable choice first (example: 03/20-03/26, 03/27- 04/05, and 04/13-04/19)
-Your choice of how you want to play matches, either bo1 or bo3
-Great, I sent out the information and got accepted. Now what?
Now you have to openly accept challenges from the forum. Post the time or times you will make yourself available for matches. Other people can set-up appointments for matches or play however you choose. If you only want to accept appointments great, if not, you can do a first come, first pwned set-up.
-What maps do we play on?
For bo1's, the WFC player gets to choose the map. Sorry folks, that's the advantage of manning up and taking on all comers. For bo3's, the first game is on Shakura's Plateau with the loser choosing the next map from the official Blizzard Ladder pool. Yes this means the maps may change over time. We'll manage.
-What happens when my week is over?
You gather up all your replays, name them "WFC vs (insert enemy name), add them to gamereplays.org (info found in the OP), and then post EVERY SINGLE GAME into a single spoilered post. The thread creator will add your games into the OP and they'll stay there until the next person's turn is over.
-When does all this begin?
How does this Sunday sound? I'm taking applications now!
-I had an emergency mid-week! What do I do?
No biggie, we all understand that real life stuff happens. Let everyone know and I'll do my best to find someone to fill in the spot. No problem at all.
-Anything else?
Glad you asked. I really think this can be fun, especially if we have some of our more charismatic people bring some light-hearted, jaw-jacking to the table. I'd also really like it if some of the lower ranked players step up and give this a go. In reality, it's no different then playing against PA people anyway, but now it will have more of a focus. You can have a target on your back which might change the way you play by adding or removing pressure.
ABOVE ALL, I just want everyone to have fun and play more SC2.
So, who's in?
Our tenth WFC player will be Raz! Here's his info:
Forum name: GarethMagis
B.Net ID with 3 digit code: GarethMagis 504
Race played: Protoss
Rank: Silver
Do you want a coach?: If someone doesn't mind
Timezone: PST
bo3 format
Challenge our player by sending him a PM, post, or b.net message to set up times!
Here are the replays of the WFC prior:
2. PA showmatch series #2 & #3
(Organizer: Enigma435)
Admiral Adama wrote:When you step on this deck, you be ready to fight, or you dishonor the reason why we're here. Now remember this: When you fight a man, he's not your friend.
Watch PAers engage in friendly (most of the time) combat for your entertainment!
Penny Arcade Curvy Star League
<insert curvy star logo here because i don't know where to find the image and i'm jailed anyway>
When: Friday 3rd of June at 8pm EST
Where: North American server.
Please sign up with the naming format: Name.IdentifierRace (Dhal.517T)
Name.IdentifierRace
Maps
I'm changing the way I select maps for this time around. Because the tournament is being organised with more notice than previous ones, I'm going to select the maps randomly from a combined pool of both the GSL map pool and the tournament map pool. This will help us get a bit of variety into our tournament, as these are good maps and worth playing some games on. Take the next couple weeks to play some practise games on these maps!
Maps selected randomly using www.random.org
1. Xel'Naga Fortress (GSL)
2. Shakuras Plateau (Ladder edition only!)
3. The Shattered Temple
Finals only:
4. Terminus RE (GSL)
5. Tal'darim Altar Ladder edition
Format
16 player
Single elimination. Players are seeded randomly
Every match is a best of 3. Finals is a best of 5.
Sign-up HERE!
3. Replay(s) of the day! (5/29)
(Organizer: whoever created this thread)
A random replay of the play donated by our forum-goers. Make sure to upload your replay submissions to submit your replay using gamereplays.org. And be a pal and mark your replay as ROTD material in your post so they're easier to find.
Start here to better craft some stars.
The SC2 thread goes a million miles per hour and will leave you in the dust if you aren't prepared. All things are open to discussion here from build orders, practice partners, race match-ups, tournament talk, and general bizarre Korean stuff (usually brought to you by the letter S and the number 86). In order to keep up, I highly recommend you check out the following resources:
- General
- Team Liquid. Team Liquid is the biggest Starcraft related fan site out on the Internet today. They follow everything Starcraft related including the pro scene. Many great articles, forums, and information can be found here. A must bookmark for any Starcraft fan.
- Wellplayed.org. Starcraft 2 aggregation site from the SCReddit group.
- Talk shows
- State of the Game podcast. The pillars of the starcraft 2 community --- JP, EGIncontrol, Liquid`Tyler, and Day[9] --- talk (mostly) about current events in the starcraft community every Tuesday.
- Educational
- Help guides for new players painstakingly created by fellow forum goers. Please read these first before asking questions.
- The Day[9] Daily Live Stream. Sean "Day9" Plott is an 11 year Starcraft veteran, so he knows his shit. He does a live stream Sunday through Thursday that airs 7pm PST/10pm EST. If you miss a stream, you can watch it, and every other streams he's ever done, in his archives. BOOKMARK HIS SITES! You will not be disappointed.
- Starcraft II Liquipedia. Team Liquid has created a wikipedia site for everything SC2 related. This will be updated as time goes on and all information found here should be legit as possible.
- Learn from the Pros with Mr. B Mr. Bitter aka Flabulous gets lessons from pros about how to play Starcraft and streams the whole thing for our learnings. He started with 12 weeks of zerg goodness and is now moving onto terran and protoss.
- Common timings and when they hit. Exactly what it sounds like.
- CecilSunkure's guide to improving efficiently at 1v1. A very good read if you find yourself in a rut with your improvement in 1v1 or if you don't know where to begin improving your game.
OK that's all cool, but I want to play with some PA people.
1) Log into Battle.net and join channel PA (on the NA realm). We all hang out there. Chat, 1v1 lobbies, and team shenanigans are always going on!
2) Sign up for a replay site such as gamereplays.org or drop.sc. This is a site where you can upload your replays. The perfect way to share your replays with the thread and get advice on how to get better. Gamereplays lets you post the cool banner that you frequently see on the internets and drop.sc lets you upload replays without having to create a new account.
3) Register with the PA SC2 1v1 Ranking site. Sign up for this awesome site to see where you stand amongst fellow PA members. Remember, this is important in the nurturing and expanding of your e-peen. Add yourself by clicking on [Manage Characters] on the top right side.
4) Sign up for the PA mumble page. Sign up if you want to chat with fellow PA users during games or watching tournaments. Thanks to Exoplasm for hosting the service and providing the step-by-step process for installing mumble.
2) Sign up for a replay site such as gamereplays.org or drop.sc. This is a site where you can upload your replays. The perfect way to share your replays with the thread and get advice on how to get better. Gamereplays lets you post the cool banner that you frequently see on the internets and drop.sc lets you upload replays without having to create a new account.
3) Register with the PA SC2 1v1 Ranking site. Sign up for this awesome site to see where you stand amongst fellow PA members. Remember, this is important in the nurturing and expanding of your e-peen. Add yourself by clicking on [Manage Characters] on the top right side.
4) Sign up for the PA mumble page. Sign up if you want to chat with fellow PA users during games or watching tournaments. Thanks to Exoplasm for hosting the service and providing the step-by-step process for installing mumble.
JK. I like watching Starcraft instead. Where can I watch some good games?
Major tournaments. Starcraft is e-sports. Follow these major tournaments and you will not be disappoint.
And those are only the major ones! Follow the Team Liquid Tournament Tracker for more competitive goodness.
Streams. Perhaps you prefer something more intimate. Maybe watching starcraft 2 like it's Being John Malkovich? Thanks to the power of the Internet, there are infinity streams available for your voyeuristic pleasure. Here are our favorites.
Want more streams? Check out Teamliquid's live video stream page for more goodness.
- The GSL. The premiere korean starcraft 2 league. Where the best go to play. Casted by Tastetosis, the casting archon.
- The TSL. Team Liquid's major tournament where foreigners stomp koreans and everyone attributes it to lag.
- Major League Gaming. North American e-sports powerhouse now features Starcraft 2 (as long as their stream is online). "tahts halo dont worry".
- North American Star League. The upstart league headed by fan-favorites Incontrol and Gretorp. $400k up for grabs in the first season alone.
- IGN Pro League. Everyone's getting into e-sports, even IGN! 16 of the top players from North America duking it out for fabulous prizes.
And those are only the major ones! Follow the Team Liquid Tournament Tracker for more competitive goodness.
Streams. Perhaps you prefer something more intimate. Maybe watching starcraft 2 like it's Being John Malkovich? Thanks to the power of the Internet, there are infinity streams available for your voyeuristic pleasure. Here are our favorites.
- General commentary
- Seguer. Aussie protoss currently casting the Taiwan Clan League.
- The Day[9] Daily Live Stream.
- HD Starcraft.
- HuskyStarcraft.
- TotalBiscuit.
- Terran
- Protoss
- Zerg
Want more streams? Check out Teamliquid's live video stream page for more goodness.
Need a voice actor? Hire me at bengrayVO.com
Legends of Runeterra: MNCdover #moc
Switch ID: MNC Dover SW-1154-3107-1051
Steam ID
Twitch Page
Legends of Runeterra: MNCdover #moc
Switch ID: MNC Dover SW-1154-3107-1051
Steam ID
Twitch Page
MNC Dover on
0
Posts
Reposting!
one of the best ways to improve, though it can be a bit of a douche move, is to play at a much much lower level than your actual current skill level, and play no cheese builds and never make a move to end games, always defend defend and force macro games by playing safe and solid. That was what I did to make the push from Diamond to Masters as Protoss. tanked my rating down to Bronze (before Blizzard started banning for such), and did nothing but fast expand builds in PvZ and PvT. You play a lot better when you're not worried about losing at all, which is conducive to a good learning environment. Playing 50 games at a low level with safe builds will immeasurably improve your basic mechanics.
tl;dr - If you want to improve quickest on the ladder, stop using cheese or 1base builds entirely, and stop playing your games to win. Instead, play them to "not die". Just defend everything your opponent throws at you, and wait for them to make a mistake that gives you an insurmountable lead before you end the game.
edit: Also: Why won't my sig update? I am ranked, dammit!
Smite: Plutoniumwombat
Also, finished watching the TSL finals tonight...just amazing.
sc2sig is dead unfortunately. There are a couple of inferior replacements up, such as the (slow) one in my sig.
You probably are going to. The only people who haven't been stomped by pretty much every Diamond/master during their WFC turns is the people who WERE Masters and they just didn't get any challenges
Tasteless and Artosis are casting at Columbus!
So that's awesome. I'm really excited.
Guys help me think of witty things to say to them, can't have Tasteless steal my ladder points when I ask for a picture and don't pass his test!
Steam ID
What's the test? Your request needs to be witty if you want a signature?
p.s. EG's team league is pretty good. sixjax v mouz right now at onemoregame.tv.
Steam ID
I could never find you on to stomp your face in!
Ah, the old "never saw you online". The most epic dodge of all time
Fuckin' dodgers.
Also thanks for taking a look at that replay previously, much appreciated
Legends of Runeterra: MNCdover #moc
Switch ID: MNC Dover SW-1154-3107-1051
Steam ID
Twitch Page
like, i cannot even explain why i did the things i did today on ladder
hopefully tomorrow im better
need to practice some openings or something, methinks
...wakkawa?
Steam ID
<insert curvy star logo here because i don't know where to find the image and i'm jailed anyway>
When: Friday 27th May at 8pm EST
Where: North American server.
Please sign up with the naming format: Name.IdentifierRace (Dhal.517T)
Name.IdentifierRace
Maps
I'm changing the way I select maps for this time around. Because the tournament is being organised with more notice than previous ones, I'm going to select the maps randomly from a combined pool of both the GSL map pool and the tournament map pool. This will help us get a bit of variety into our tournament, as these are good maps and worth playing some games on. Take the next couple weeks to play some practise games on these maps!
Maps selected randomly using www.random.org
1. Xel'Naga Fortress (GSL)
2. Shakuras Plateau (Ladder edition only!)
3. The Shattered Temple
Finals only:
4. Terminus RE (GSL)
5. Tal'darim Altar Ladder edition
Format
16 player
Single elimination. Players are seeded randomly
Every match is a best of 3. Finals is a best of 5.
Sign-up HERE!
I am also up to cast if anyone wants a co-caster.
I haven't actually played in months, so I'd probably just get smashed.
There's EST and EDT. We're in EDT right now, which is GMT-4. When we're in EST (fall/winter) it's GMT-5, but spring/summer are EDT.
Daylight Savings Time is fucking retarded as shit.
a flat 12 hours behind my timezone then
To be fair, tradition is also to not leave 1 month between tournaments, but its been busy.
Steam ID
And hey! It has youtube!
Omgs!
There's a second replay and analysis in the blog, and both replay download links can be had there.
SC2 NA: exoplasm.519 | PA SC2 Mumble Server | My Website | My Stream
You're not restricted from entering! The normal CSL is open to all. Yeah, you'll probably get crushed by the first Diamond or Master player you face, but who knows, maybe you'll take a game off them by doing something unexpected that they haven't seen! You may not, but by god if you do you'll feel fucking fantastic. And hell, you may end up facing another equally skilled player in the first round and make it into the second round! And any tournament experience is good for your game!
if you're going to be online at that time, throw up your name for a signup!
SC2 NA: exoplasm.519 | PA SC2 Mumble Server | My Website | My Stream
but it will be MLG/GSL versions of maps for all possible maps excepting Shakuras.
Why can't I play good!?
sign up anyway! I only said gold and platinum as a sort of arbitrary distinction.