[Game On] Craftin Stars Everyday: Now with 100% more Guide to Starcraft for newbies

Dangerisk · May 2008

The Zerggg!

The old SC thread:
http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=35194

Star…craft?
If you’re into computer games, you’ve probably heard of Starcraft. It is the best RTS of all time. The mere act of announcing Starcraft 2 shot the original Starcraft back into the top 10 best selling computer games chart. This is a ten year old game, and it is amazing.

How was this game created a decade ago I don’t know. I think many experienced players agree that the creation of Starcraft was a fluke. The strategies Blizzard had in mind when making the game are nothing like the strategies of today. Blizzard was completely off. No even close man. Still, somehow, the game is balanced (or at least as balanced as any game with three unique races will ever be). Starcraft was a mistake, and a very, very good one.

Starcraft pits three unique races in an epic battle of blah blah blah. Okay just play the campaign. To be honest, I don’t believe the campaign has aged well. If you’ve played other RTS games you will probably agree. Still, it is a Blizzard game so expect quality. I loved the storyline the first time I played through some many many years ago and look forward to SC2. If you’re into single player action or you’ve played the campaign already you should look into fan made campaigns and mods (www.campaigncreations.org is a good one).

However, the real greatness of Starcraft is the multiplayer. The game is huge in Korea, with a number of TV channels dedicated to only Starcraft. It is here that Starcraft is played on a professional level, with big dollars on the line. Outside of Korea, the SC scene is as strong as any game. It only pales in comparison to those fanatical Koreans and uh probably Counterstrike. You will find Starcraft players of all skill levels from North America, Europe and China. Learn more about the Starcraft progaming scene in Korea here.

Starcraft is also a brand of boats, but I don’t know anything about that.

Starcraft and Penny Arcade
We’re a bunch of average joe Starcraft players, with the odd exception. Those exceptions are either pretty good or totally suck. If you’re new to SC then you will get smashed, but don’t worry about it. There are plenty of resources to learn if you’re willing to put in the effort (see below for websites and a beginners guide). Also feel free to ask players for advice either here in the thread or after the game.

For the most part we play 1vs1 and 2vs2 with other players observing the match. If you don’t want to sit around and observe then challenge someone or organize a second game. Seriously, just do it. There seems to be many people coming in and who want to play but never put an effort to get a game going.

Generally the quality of games decrease beyond 2vs2, but we will play the odd 3vs3, 4vs4 or RW (Race Wars; a 7 or 8 player game with Zerg vs Protoss vs Terran). Free for alls are pretty meh so we avoid them. We also enjoy UMS maps as well.

Where and when do we fight?
We play on two different servers. The first is the US West server, channel PA. However, most of the time we’re on the ICCup server. Read below to learn how to get onto the ICCup server. Again, channel PA. This is a non Blizzard ladder server but you can play non-ladder games as well. Everyone’s in a different time zone but mostly everyone is from North America. We’re on any day of the week in the evening. If no one’s on make a post in the thread. Add players to your friends list make it easier to find people. Type /help in on Battle.net to get information on commands.

ICCup setup guide:
http://sc.iccup.com/info/scstart/
You must register at the ICCup site first to be able to get onto the ICCup server. The same account is used for both.

Most games take place in game pa/pa (game name pa, password pa) or pa2/pa if there are more than one games going.

Chaoslauncher
Chaoslauncher allows you to start Starcraft with various plugins implemented such as windowed mode. We used this when playing on Bnet. The best feature is the LanLatency feature, which lets you play SC with very quick response time. You can’t use this on ICCup though! ICCup has it’s own launcher.
http://winner.cspsx.de/Starcraft/Tool/Chaoslauncher.zip

PA Player List
Ask in thread or PM to be added.

What are some good websites about crafting stars?

www.teamliquid.net
This website concentrates on the pro scene in Korea and is the best English site for it. It’s also great for replays and VODs. Pretty big and active Starcraft community. The forums are a good place to learn. They also run great events like TL.net Attack and the Razer TSL tournament. The TSL is an online tournament featuring the best foreigners (non-Koreans). There is $10,000 is prizes and is open to everyone. After the ladder stage, the top 48 battle it out. Top 16 ard broadcast live with English commentary so it is very awesome! One of the biggest things to come to foreigner Starcraft pretty much ever.
The TSL is now over but you should download the VODs from TL.net or check out the games on youtube!
Also they have their own collection of useful links on everything Starcraft here.

www.gosugamers.net
Another news website, but Gosugamers also follows the “foreign” Starcraft scene. In Starcraft, “foreign” means stuff that happens outside of Korea. Teamliquid is still your best bet for the pro Korean scene, but Gosugamers is the best English news site for anything else. They are also a good resource for replays. In particular, look for RR (recommended replays), cause these are especially awesome. Again, look at the forums as a place to learn (generally Teamliquid is better for this though).

www.wgtour.com and www.iccup.com
Go here and sign up if you’re interested in competitive play. Prizes, tournaments, ladder. If you’re new you will get stomped here no doubt, but you will learn faster. WGTour is a bit of a joke, but it has had its good days. ICCup is where its at right now. You must download the ICCup launcher to connect to the server, and use it to start SC everytime you want to log onto ICCup. It has features such as antihack and autoreplay (saves and labels your replays automatically).

http://www.mediaesports.com/ and http://gsi.gomtv.com/
These two sites are the place to go to watch great Starcraft players with English commentary. Excellent for learning Starcraft, and a huge time waster. Micro Media is a US based Starcraft clan who hosts Ascension, an awesome tournament with a unique format featuring the best foreign players. Episodes are released weekly. GomTV is a Korean professional tournament and have recently invested quite a bit of money to spark interest in the foreign community. They have hired Nick “Tasteless” Plott, a TL.net member, to do live English commentary. The future of gomTV’s English broadcast depends on viewer numbers, so please try to support it. Unfortunately, Korea happens to be on the other side of the world so the hours are late. GomTV is broadcast every Sunday!

http://www.scforall.com/
This website is run by the same company that owns eStro, a Korean progaming team. The site is specifically for bringing Korean Starcraft to the English world. Being associated with eStro, they get a lot of inside interviews, games and other nice stuff both with progamers inside and outside of eStro. Currently they are running the Spirit tournament, a tournament to bring "foreigner" (non-korean) SC players into Korea. Like the TSL, it is played on ICCup and has a ladder stage followed by a tournament. Weekly showmatches will also be played between top foreigners and progamers with commentary from Artosis (of Ascenscion fame) and Coach Lee (retired eStro coach). Both are very knowledgeable about the game, and Coach Lee knows a lot of inside info on the progamers.

http://www.worldcybergames.com
World Cyber Games also supports Starcraft, along with all the other popular competitive computer and video games. Its pretty much the Olympics of video games and a good chance to see foreign players face off with Korean pros. This takes place during the summer, ending with the WCG Finals event in a new host city every year.

And of course, there are plenty of Starcraft videos on Youtube. Baezzi is your best source for uploads of the Korean pro scene. Diggity, Moletrap and Klazart are some people who do commentary on Starcraft games, but really you should go to Ascension or gomTV for that, cause these guys aren’t very good.
http://www.youtube.com/user/Jon747

www.sclegacy.com
A very old SC website. They don’ bother with competitive Starcraft news at all, which is good cause TL.net and GG.net do a good enough job of that. Go here for interesting bits about any other happenings such as SC2, mods, maps, campaigns and other neat stuff. Because they’re so well known and established they sometimes get some nice stuff from Blizzard (inside information on SC2, prizes). They are also the creators of the popular Pimpest Plays annual feature, where the top 10 amazing Starcraft plays of the year are highlighted. You can find these on YouTube if you’re interested.

www.fighterreplays.com
Upload your own replays or download and rate others. Replays of all skill level here. Nice website since it provides quite a bit of information on the replay so you can decide if its worth downloading. This is a relatively new website run by the same guy who do Ascension.

www.campaigncreations.org, www.broodwarmaps.net and www.staredit.net/
Some of the best fan made campaigns, maps and mods are hosted here.

http://www.genesoul.net/gundamcentury/
Awesome Gundam mod for Starcraft, very nicely made. Balance sucks though.

http://dominionwarmod.com/
Another nice looking mod, this time Star Trek. This mod has been in development forever, I think you can download the beta.

http://boxerbiography.blogspot.com/
The biography of Lim Yo Hwan, aka SlayerS_`BoxeR`, possibly the best Starcraft player ever and definitely the most loved. His words are slowly but surely being translated into English for you to enjoy.

There are many other websites, but these are the main ones.

Starcraft 2 Info
Hell, it's about time!

Starcraft 2 Q&A Archive
http://www.battle.net/forums/thread.aspx?fn=sc2-general&t=1&p=1&#post1
For all your important SC2 questions! Check often for more.

Official SC2 system requirements
http://www.starcraftwire.net/articles/954/starcraft-2-graphics-requirements-confirmed

Blizzard wrote:

For Starcraft II, we wanted to maximize compatibility with less capable systems to ensure hasslefree game play for as broad a player base as possible. Yet we also wanted to utilize the full potential of any available hardware to ensure the game’s looks were competitive. This meant supporting a wide range of hardware, from ATI Radeon 9800/NVIDIA GeForce FX’s to the ATI Radeon HD 4800s and NVIDIA GeForce G200s.

Blizzcast
http://www.blizzard.com/blizzcast/
New information on all Blizzard games being produced.

SC2 wiki
http://www.starcraftwire.net/wiki/Main_Page
Wikipedia is a legitimate source right guys?

Screenies!
http://www.starcraft2.com/screenshots.xml

Release date

Hah you wish. Stop whining and load up SC1.

Guide to Starcraft
See Cynic Jester's post below. The OP was too long cause there is too much awesome in here.

Cynic Jester · May 2008

Dangerisks Guide to Life, The Universe and Starcraft
This part got far longer than I intended, but here’s where I’ll write about some basic things that the newbie should learn, along with some nice simple tips for the intermediate player to improve your game. If you want to get better, read this and go visit some of the above websites. Watch replays, videos and read the forums. Review your own replays and ask others for tips after a game. Really, the best way to get better is just to play.

If you want help on a specific topic or have a question then make a post! Also upload and post any replays that you want feedback on.

The guide:

If you pick up nothing else from this guide, remember these three things:
1. Make workers. This is one of the biggest newbie mistakes. You should almost never stop making workers until late game. There are few exceptions to this detailed below.
2. Spend your money. Now that you’ve got all these workers bringing you shiney minerals, you need to spend it. The less minerals you have saved up the more units and buildings you have out there. Spend spend spend.
3. Expand. You might be seeing a trend here. Get more bases for more money. Oh wait! You need more workers for your new bases. Yeah, I know.

Anyways, on to the fun stuff.

Build orders:
http://www.blizzforums.com/showthread.php?t=772
This website contains all the basic build orders for a large number of strategies. It details all races and different match ups. The guide is a bit dated, but is still a good place to start. You will notice a list of numbers, each with a building name on the right. The number is your current food count you have when you build the building listed (example: 12 hatchery would mean you have 12 drones when you put down the hatchery). The build orders are optimized for efficiency, so you should be spending as soon as you get the money. The build order will only carry you so far. The rest of your build order is adapted to the play of the other player. Note that workers are almost always being made.

Economy, technology and unit production:
Starcraft is an economy game. Having a stronger economy than the other player allows you to overwhelm him with superior numbers or defeat him with higher technology. As such, you should almost always be making workers until late game. The optimum number of workers is somewhere between two and three workers per mineral patch, but you often want a higher ratio than this so you can transfer workers to your new expansion. There are diminishing returns for how many workers you have per mineral patch, so transfer as soon as possible.

If the game progresses to a point where you have 3-4 bases saturated with workers is when you can finally cut worker production. Note that you should still be expanding so that you can transfer workers when a base runs out of minerals. Yes, this means that you will have maybe sixty or more workers in a long game.

When you get minerals there are three options. Invest these minerals in getting more minerals, invest in technology, or invest in attacking units. Any of these three will give you an advantage over your opponent, but there is a balance. By reinvesting in your economy, you gain an advantage by being able to produce more units than your opponent at a point later in the game. You do this by running the risk of being overrun by an opponent who has invested in units instead. However, your opponent may choose to target your economy specifically with his superior unit numbers or technology. By doing this he hopes that he can do enough damage to put your economy behind his. Similarly, by teching up you run the same risks but gain advantage by having more powerful higher tier units that may swing the battle in your favour.

If you want to gain an economic advantage in early game, you want to spend the bare minimum elsewhere. You make only just enough units and defensive buildings to hold off the attack. Hopefully, you suffer no damage to your economy in the attack and thus you are now at an advantage. You make these defensive units and buildings as late as possible to maximize resources put towards your economy and mining time. This is usually only possible in early game as you won’t be able to produce a large enough force fast enough to fend off attack in mid and late game.

A good example is early Zerg vs Terran or Protoss. With your oh so awesome scouting skills you count the number of units the enemy has. You realize that an attack could destroy you, so you quickly throw down some creep colonies and produce zerglings. You delay his attack with any zerglings that you already have. The key is to produce just enough in the nick of time to deflect his attack. By doing so, ideally your sunken colonies finish morphing just before he arrives at your door. If you want to play it safe, put your creep colonies down but don’t morph them. Only do so when you see him move out.

One reason to cut worker production is for timed attacks. By cutting worker production, you can make a few extra units for attacking. This gives you a short window of opportunity of a few minutes to attack the other player with superior numbers. Remember, each moment that passes means that his economy is getting stronger whereas yours is stagnant.

Upgrades:
Upgrades can tip the battle in your favour. An example often used is the Protoss ground upgrade when playing versus Zerg. Getting level 1 ground attack gives zealots +2 attack on top of their base 16. Alright, big deal that’s like nothing. However, zealots now kill zerglings (35 hp) in two hits instead of three. That is a huge difference. A fast attack upgrade is another type of timed attack, where the Protoss immediately attacks after his ground upgrade has completed.

A Zerg may counter this by getting armour, nullifying the Protoss attack upgrade. A clever Protoss will counter this by getting armour upgrade instead of attack, as a +1 armour zealot vs a +1 armour zergling is favourable for Protoss. A very very clever Zerg would take this a step further, and instead of getting the expected armour upgrade he opts for the attack upgrade, which nullifies the Protoss armor upgrade.
Okay so this is basically a game of chance; rock, paper, scissors. Generally I play it safe and get the basic armor upgrade as Zerg and attack upgrade as Protoss. Or, you can go ahead and upgrade both attack and armor at the same time for further ass kicking. Also note that there are different unit sizes and damage types in Starcraft. Different damage types do various amounts of damage to different sized units. This is a % of the listed unit damage, and never goes above 100% (example: explosive type damage does 50% to small units, 75% to medium units and 100% to large units).

The armour and damage types are listed here
http://www.battle.net/scc/GS/damage.shtml

Recon
Information is as important a resource as minerals. Knowing what your opponent is doing allows you to adapt your play and prepare for coming attacks. At higher levels of play, you can predict what your opponent is doing merely by counting how many units he has. If he has fewer units than he should, he has probably teched up or plans to expand. You will have to get a feel for this.

You should always send out a scouting worker in early game to see what’s going on (the time you send out your worker depends on race and your build order). Look to see if he gets gas early (indicating fast tech) or what buildings he puts down. Keep that worker alive in his base as long as you can (using waypoints helps here).

As Protoss or Terran keep a probe in front of your enemy base in early game. Use your observers and scans later in the game. Send out workers and observers to check for expansions all over the map, but use scans sparingly as possible as you might need them at a critical moment. When you have 2-3 scanners and Science Vessels is when you can be more liberal with your scans. As zerg the same things apply, but after that scouting drone its cheaper to send out a single zergling to do the scouting. Overlord placement is key. Place your overlords over expansions and in a safe position infront of your enemies base. Create a perimeter around your base with them to watch for incoming attacks.

At the same time, scout denying is also huge. Block your ramp with your first units to prevent scouting and continue to deny scouting as much as you can throughout the game. If your opponent does not know what you are doing, he may be forced to spend extra money on defense, thus giving you an advantage. If he does not do this, he runs the risk of being unprepared for your attack. Even if you do not plan on attacking, the advantage is still yours as he must spend those extra minerals.

Micro and Macro:
Micro is short for micromanagement. This is handling your units in battle. Superior positioning of units will win you many battles and maximize the efficiency of your units. Every different unit has different techniques associated with it, so really you’ll have to learn this yourself.

Generally, for melee units you want to surround their units quickly when you engage. Pull away units that are taking the most damage. This causes the enemy unit to change target to the next nearest unit. You can now send your damaged unit back in. To fight against this, players focus fire single, damaged units to kill them off quickly. Against ranged units or a stray unit you should right click (move) a position behind your enemies units. When your units overtake the enemy, target their unit or use attack move so that your units engage. Doing this surrounds their units and prevents escape.

For ranged units you want to spread your units in a line so that all are in range to fire and make it difficult for the enemy to surround you. Note that this positioning also makes your units less venerable to area of effect spells such as psi storm. A counter to this is to engage from the weak side. For example, if there are a straight line of dragoons facing North, then you want to try to flank and engage from the East or West. His units at the end of the line will not be in range to fire and you can also easily surround his units from these directions. When this happens, a good enemy player will quickly reestablish another line perpendicular to your attack so do it fast. In addition to the flank, the vice is also very effective. This is where you attack from the two or more directions and is particularly effective with melee units. The vice works because your units may surround and engage more quickly. If you come from one direction, your units will bump into one another and fewer units can engage at the same time.

As Terran, the line method is pretty difficult to do with large infantry forces since you have so many units. The low health of your infantry also makes the line method very vulnerable to flanks and harass from your weak sides so keeping your infantry in a big “ball” isn’t uncommon. The ball is good versus zerglings as it prevents your units from becoming isolated from each other. Lurkers, plague or psi storm will trash you apart though. Where the line method is very effective for Terran is engaging lurkers. Lurkers shoot in a straight line and do damage to any unit along the path of the spikes. Thus, if your marines are in a thin straight line perpendicular to the lurker spikes, only one or two marines will take damage. A ball of marines would have been ripped apart.

When using ranged units, focus firing units is easy to do and very effective. The technique here is to fire and then run away while your units are in cool down. Fire again when ready. This minimizes the damage done to your units as the enemy will have to chase. You will get a feel for how long the cool down is for each unit and be able to time your attacks. If the opponent can easily surround you with superior mobility and numbers then don’t bother with this micro. Just run. If it’s hopeless to try and escape then just try to kill as much as possible.

Learn hotkeys, they make micro and macro a lot easier. Doing things quickly and efficiently is very important. Use your groupings (ctrl + #) to hotkey units and buildings. This lets you control large groups of units in battle while keeping your production up. When you get better, you will be able to fight battles while reinforcing your units at the same time. Use rally points to reinforce your units or to gather them in a single location so you can easily find them. Use waypoints (shift + an action) to keep units moving while performing tasks elsewhere (easy example is having your first scouting worker run circles inside the enemy base to stay alive while you manage your own base).

Later game you will find it difficult to manage all your units and production buildings with only 10 hotkeys. How many hotkeys you use for units and how many for buildings is up to you and dependent on your own style. Try to find a good mix that works for you. Always hotkey important units and buildings (science vessels, defilers, high templars, comsat).

Terrain:
Always use terrain to your advantage. Choose where and when you fight. When your units are on top of cliffs, the enemies units below will have a fairly high % chance to miss your units. This makes a huge difference so use it. Units under trees or behind rocks will also have extra protection, but there are rare moments where this is useful since trees are pretty sparse.

Defending choke points is another way to use terrain. The enemy must funnel his through a couple at a time and are easily taken down by your superior forces. Note that ramps are both choke points and cliffs, so ramps are a powerful defense. While choke points are great, they can still work against you. The enemy can set up position outside your choke. While you are stuck in your base, he continues to expand. Terran is particularly good at this with their siege tanks. In such instances you will have to break his position with superior numbers or micro. Note that your production facilities are closer than his, so his reinforcements will be slower in arriving. The best defense is to just never let this happen unless you are trying to delay for some tech or extra units that will give you an edge. In all cases try to break the contain as soon as possible.

And if someone has a huge terrain advantage on you, run away! Be patient.

When and how to engage:
So you’ve done your recon, what now? If his army is too powerful you may want to try to do a guerilla style, picking off stray units and delaying his attack so you can build up your main army. If his army looks weaksauce then you want to organize your troops so the important ones are where they need to be. For example, as Zerg it is very easy to simply send your Ultralisks in first to absorb enemy while your Zerglings are the real damage dealers. As Protoss, you want your High Templars near your front lines so they are in range to cast Psi Storm. Also take your opponents position into example, and remember about the terrain! Basically, you want as many units attacking as possible at any moment while your opponent has as few of his units attacking. That sounds pretty logical but it’s very hard to pull off. Often you will see players with half their army still in transition or unable to get to the front lines cause their own units are in the way. You fix this by spreading your units out before the battle so that when you attack they get a full surround on the enemy. The micro section applies here, but it is very hard to micro hundreds of units in the late game. Therefore you should worry more about positioning your army.

Actions per minute (APM):
Actions per minute is something that might come up as you learn more about Starcraft. It is a count of every mouse click and button press you do. It allows you to control your units perfectly in battle while amassing units at home and expanding at the same time. Professional players will get as high as three or four hundred average, and peak at six hundred at some points in the game. You do not need to do this to be a good player. Many players do very well with far less APM. Many beginners do not realize this but what you pay attention to becomes important. Players will make the conscious decision to concentrate on an important battle over unit production. This does not mean that you should ignore your production buildings while a fight goes on. The key is to not over micro your units. You must find a balance that works.

A good amount to aim for is 150, but only if these are useful actions. Lots of people have high APM but lose anyways through poor strategy or useless spamming of hotkeys. I myself have about 140-160 average APM. I’m not a big hotkey user. This might be a fault in my play, but I still do well versus heavy hotkey users. Without hotkeys I would be nothing though. Don’t put too big a difference on APM, just try to get things done. I have beaten players with APM over 300. Yes, there is an obvious DBZ joke to be made here and yes we’ve already heard it.

I'm also going to throw this in here. They are FPVODs (first person VODs) of Nony, a very good American Protoss player. You can see all the actions he performs. He has an APM of 300+. I'm only putting this up just to emphasize the speed you need to accomplish all the necessary tasks. You'll notice that Nony has a lot of unnecessary "spam" actions. You don't need to do this. Many players do this just to keep their hands moving fast, but unless that work's for you it's completely unneeded. Nony does commentary in these videos and talks a lot about his play and why he does things, so this is also a good learning tool in general.

This link is dead sometimes but you can find some of them on youtube as well.
http://ngdev.net/files/NonY/
Youtube

VOD1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGn3Ni_GeSw
VOD2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuCqj0Ey5jU
VOD3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rovVBg3yucU&feature=related
VOD4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0EcZd6n3GU&feature=related
VOD5 1/2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3KcQrcRBYs&feature=related
VOD5 2/2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJMDHh7dYjM&feature=related

http://bwchart.teamliquid.net/
This is a program called BWchart that lets you see your APM by loading up your replays. It has lots of graphs and charts that probably mean nothing at our level of skill, but it’s a nice tool to have. You can also figure out build orders used by the professionals by loading up one of their replays.

Tips n Tricks:
These are some small tips and tricks that are can sometimes make a huge difference in your game. This is only a small list, the rest come from experience and talking with other players. I can’t stress how important some simple, simple things can impact your game. Something as simple as having an Overlord at your new expansion to detect invisible units can win you a game. However, regardless of your skill level I suggest you check out the magic boxes blurb since it is very, very important once you get your bearings on basic Starcraft.

Easy
Overlords: Slow and useless right? Nope. Get them into key positions to watch enemy troop movements and lookout for incoming drops and attacks. Form a perimeter around the outskirts of your base. Once you play a map enough you will know safe positions that will allow you to do this. Positions over water or a cliff will keep your Overlord safe from ground units.

Building placement: Try to keep an organized base, with all your production buildings close together. This will help you mass units easier. Using buildings as barriers for your defensive structures is also very useful.

Pylon / Supply depot lookout: Similar to how a Zerg will place Overlords around the perimeter of his base, good Protoss players often build pylons to do this. The same applies for supply depots. Keep in mind that these will be easy to pick off, so don’t do it versus Zerg as mutalisks are common.

Rally points: This helps you keep your newly produced units organized. Have a common rally point for all your production buildings, and a rally point near your mineral line for your workers.

Advanced
Mineral timer: This only applies if you’ve achieved quite a bit of speed and accuracy with your keyboard and mouse movements, and you have a strong understanding of build orders. The idea is that you can use your minerals as a kind of clock. Progamers use this to attack and defend. For example (making these numbers up), your main base minerals are at around 1100, this means that you should move out and attack. Or maybe they’re at 1300, so if your opponent was rushing Dark Templars they would be arriving soon. You could also use food count as a timer, similar to build orders. One that I know of is that for a three hatchery mutalisks you should be around 35 supply when you begin saving larva and supply to make nine mutalisks. Both types of timers are pretty advanced techniques, and only apply if the game hasn’t involved any huge early game attacks or some other interference.

Muta micro: I’m covering this because it’s so important in modern Starcraft Zerg play. Basically, you group your mutalisks with an overlord, larva, or any “trapped” unit (example: a zergling stuck behind your mineral line). This will cause your mutalisks to stack up on top of each other, allowing you to move them as one. This is huge, as they are a highly mobile unit available in relatively early stages of the game. There’s tons of information on muta micro on the net, so I will just list them here. I’ve also included a link to marine micro against mutas for you dirty Terran users.

Muta Micro
http://teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=58620
Scourge dodging. This is insanely hard to do in a game:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m41zVGA86p4
Marines vs Mutas
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=64215

Larva moving: This is actually very easy to do but I’ve included it in the advanced section cause it’s really something you shouldn’t worry about if you’re a beginner. It has a small impact on the game. Basically for some bizarre reason when you group your larvae in with an overlord and press stop (S hotkey) your larvae will move to the left, but only to the left! Therefore if your mineral line happens to be on the left side of your hatchery then you can gain a small economic boost by moving larva over. Therefore the new drones you create will be able to reach your mineral line faster. Don’t even bother to do this after the first 3 minutes of the game. Oh, and remember to keep your Overlord moving (scouting!) after each time you stop it.

Watch your mini map: You need intel on incoming attacks and troop movements so you have to do this. Harassment such as Psionic Storm drop is hard to catch on your mini map (the shuttle is just a dot) but can devastate your economy.

Unloading transports: There’ a technique to unload transports without having to slow down or stop your transports. Simply press unload (U) and click on your transport. It will proceed to drop every unit one at a time while still moving forward. For unloading a group of transports, you can either hit U and click on each transport many times or hit U once and click the “centre of mass” of the transport group. The centre of mass technique is very hard to do, I don’t usually do it cause it can fail often.

Worker stack: Notice how workers that are mining don’t collide with each other or other units? You can abuse this. Example, a lone zealot has gotten into your mineral line and is picking off drones. Select all your drones and right click a mineral beside the Zealot. When they’re all stacked on top of each other right click a spot beside the Zealot and then attack it when your drones are near or on top of the Zealot. Your drones will begin to unstack immediately but the Zealot will often stop attacking because of the collisions. Hard to explain but you’ll see it pretty often in games. It’s also useful for sneaking a worker into an enemy base to scout. For example, if you have an Overlord over your opponents mineral line but he’s blocked the entrance with a Zealot. Right click a drone on his minerals and his drone will pass straight through the Zealot like a ghost. It’ll still take hits though.

Magic boxes: Every notice how sometimes when you storm with multiple Templars selected they all storm the same spot (useless - stacking storms doesn't work) and other times its all nice and spread out? The answer is understanding "magic boxes", a strange imaginary box that Blizzard threw in and told no one about, but allows for tons of neat tricks. Muta micro, efficient vulture mine laying, and many other tasks are things that magic boxes can do for you. There is a nice thread on TL.net explaining it with pictures and all, so I will just send you there.
http://teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=33677

The Essentials
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=77449
Excellent videos on basic but very powerful Starcraft moves. Great learning tool.

Smasher · May 2008

Man, great OP. Haven't read the strategy section yet but judging from the length I'm looking forward to it.

Dangerisk · May 2008

Smasher wrote: »

Man, great OP. Haven't read the strategy section yet but judging from the length I'm looking forward to it.

Do you often judge by length?

RAAWR oh man TSL is gonna be craaazy. Brat_OK for the win tomorrow!

Drag · May 2008

Hooray new thread

musanman · May 2008

C- Op like your iccup game

yeah I said it

Drag · May 2008

PP what do you even do these days?

musanman · May 2008

Drag wrote: »

PP what do you even do these days?

I teach and then come home and dick around the house. Sometimes I play my guitar, sometimes I watch my gigantic tv and play xbox.

Summer is soon.

Dangerisk · May 2008

musanman wrote: »

C- Op like your iccup game

yeah I said it

Excuse me but I am a C+ Zerg now, making A+ threads.

Drag · May 2008

you are also a c+ physical chemistry student

Oh ho ho ho ho

Battle Jesus · May 2008

That strategy section is excellent.

Dangerisk · May 2008

Maybe if I hit B- on iccup I'll do better in chemistry.

What do you think?

Drag · May 2008

Wouldn't playing more starcraft theoretically lead to a further decline in your grades

you know, like it already has?

Dangerisk · May 2008

Hey, hey. I haven't been playing much at all recently.

We should fix that.

Raslin · May 2008

But, this thread doesn't even address the most important thing

is starcraft fun?

Dangerisk · May 2008

No it sucks don't play it and ignore the 5,000 word love letter to Starcraft above.

I'M ON ICCUP GET ON.

Capuano · May 2008

Man, that OP is bad.

And by bad, I mean good.

Dangerisk · May 2008

Hi Cap how are you!

Please read Starcraft guide then play Starcraft!!!

Capuano · May 2008

I read it. I need to find my CDs. I got a laptop for my high school graduation/burfday, so I have to reinstall.

Bruce Forsyth · May 2008

Wait a minute! Razer TeamLiquid Starleague... Why is it called the TSL?! It's obviously the Razer TLS!

But anyway, is anyone else preparing for a lonely and awesome fucking TSLSLSL party this weekend? I've got nachos and I'm watching this video on a loop just to get angry and extreme enough for this sort of starcrafting.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJvXM4KXQnU

P.S. You can tell Mondragon is ace because he doesn't spam click at the beginning of games.
http://www.fighterreplays.com/starcraft/replays/7e7f3b

Dangerisk · May 2008

TeamLiquid StarLeague

TSL?

pyromaniac221 · May 2008

I haven't played Brood War in so long...I'd be happy to play with anyone here, as long as they don't mind having to put up with my pathetic noob skills.

randombattle · May 2008

Man I love SC but I'm just so horrible at it. No matter what I do in multiplayer games I'm always just sort of sitting in the corner with a pathetic number of troops and buildings while I get steamrolled by a SCV rush..

Kris_xK · May 2008

Ohhhh I'll definetly play some SC. I periodically play it but I hate going onto B.net only to find koreans who completly fucking school me in 4 minutes.

Dangerisk · May 2008

Hey dudes what's with this bad attitude. Just get on.

We're playing right noww on ICCup. We have a wide range of skill levels so for sure you can find a game that matches your level, and plenty of players to give you feedback to improve.

Bruce Forsyth · May 2008

TeamLiquid StarLeague?

Our wide variety of skill levels ranges from Danger playing Terran to Danger playing Zerg.

Dangerisk · May 2008

Hey come on my Terran is still a D+ or C-.

Drag · May 2008

i will also go on ze iccup

Bruce Forsyth · May 2008

Gentlemen, I believe I've found the woman I'm going to marry.

It's what I always hoped to find playing starcraft.

Dangerisk · May 2008

I still like how every girl on the internet is 16/F/California.

Did you beat her in Starcraft?

Oh and for eddi and aarnog:
Eddi your early game build order was pretty good, but you have to do something with those lings. Usually Zergs use that BO when they think Protoss will fast expand. You have to pressure and harass the Protoss player or else it puts you behind economically since you've invested so much in them at such an early stage in the game. When I use that build I usually take drones off gas when I have about ~100 gas. This let's you get a 2nd hatchery faster while still upgrading a fast zergling speed. You should also build your second hatchery right at your expansion. Try to position your sunkens better so they cover your base more.

Aarnog you also have to use your zealots to pressure the Zerg. Typically if you do such a build and don't pressure you will be behind as your opponent is free to expand. Usually a zerg fast expands so you have a good chance to kill his expansion or atleast put him behind economically, while your economy is growing at home. Depending on how much damage your attack does you can follow it up appropriately, either expanding or finishing out the game on pure zealot atack.

I know I just told both of you to basically attack each other but both your build orders are meant for early game pressure. The thing is is that you don't know what your opponent is doing unless you get good scouting in. There is a bit of luck involved. In most games, if the two players did those same builds then the Protoss would be at advantage since his build is a solid counter to fast zerglings, even if the Protoss didn't know that the Zerg was rushing. Risky builds have great reward, like Eddi's fast zerglings. Aarnog's build was a relatively safe build in comparison. The two gate build order is specifically for applying early game pressure.

randombattle · May 2008

Dangerisk wrote: »

I still like how every girl on the internet is 16/F/California.

Did you beat her in Starcraft?

Every girl? I think you mean every MAN is 16/F/Cali...

Bruce Forsyth · May 2008

I have yet to make contact with her. She is far too intimidating!

Smasher · May 2008

Dangerisk wrote: »

Smasher wrote: »

Man, great OP. Haven't read the strategy section yet but judging from the length I'm looking forward to it.

Do you often judge by length?

RAAWR oh man TSL is gonna be craaazy. Brat_OK for the win tomorrow!

Always :winky:

Dangerisk · May 2008

randombattle wrote: »

Dangerisk wrote: »

I still like how every girl on the internet is 16/F/California.

Did you beat her in Starcraft?

Every girl? I think you mean every MAN is 16/F/Cali...

Yeah that was kind of the joke.

eddizhere · May 2008

Thanks for the advice, risk. Should I just stick with a 12 hatch unless I expect a rush?

Raslin · May 2008

Everyone says their horrible.

Except for me, I say I'm decent. Then I get steamrolled by the "horrible" people.

Dangerisk · May 2008

eddizhere wrote: »

Thanks for the advice, risk. Should I just stick with a 12 hatch unless I expect a rush?

I 12hatch vs Terran like 99% of the time. Protoss is a bit tricky and you have a couple options. 12hatch, 12pool, overpool speedling, and 9pool speedling are all viable options.

The reason people do overpool/9pool speedling these days is to pressure Protoss since they fast expand almost every time now. Making these speedlings you can either kill him outright, do a lot of damage to his economy or atleast pressure him into making cannons instead of his nexus (again hurting is economy).

12hatch is an economy build but if he does 2 gate zealots you might be in trouble.
12pool will allow you to pressure him to make cannons and deny scouting, but its doubtful you can do any damage.
Overpool/9pool speedling forces him to make cannons and pull probes to defend or else he is dead.

If you do either speedling rush keep in mind that if he goes 2 gate instead of FE and your rush doesn't do much damage you are in big trouble in terms of economy.

Basil · May 2008

This thread brought back fond memories of an addiction I had thought defeated.

Smasher · May 2008

Where the hell do you find all these videos?

Wait, "Gilmore Girls DVD extra"? That explains a lot.

SkutSkut · May 2008

Tagging, I havn't played SC since I beat the campaign earlier lol.

iowa · May 2008

i heard there are zerg in this game is this true

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