disregard

Had a really fun win in ZvZ just now. I ****ed up early and was way behind the entire game. My opponent went mass mutas and I couldn't keep up the hydra count since he kept raping my overlords and drones. I eventually got 3 infestors out and managed to fungal catch like 40 mutas clumped up together killing ovies. I just fungaled 4 times in a row to kill them all and just pushed his nat w/ a couple roaches+hydras and he couldn't hold =)

just seems much easier to me when you don't have to remember things on your own and the game tells you when your warpgates are ready. i really don't understand why warpgates are the only thing that get that little pop up.

The only thing pissing me off about this game right now, on the PTR, is that I feel like some people are throwing their placement matches to try and get into a super low division for their skill level.

I just got matched up against the same guy twice, Zerg, and there was just nothing I could do. First was on Steppes and he 6pool zergling/drone rushed me. No way to stop it. Next match on Metalopolis, I prepare with cannons and he fast expands, I go void rays, he scouts it with his overlord, goes mutas, harasses the **** out of my base. Eventually I just attacked with everything I had and then to be a dick, I took 1 probe and went around the map placing pylons and then waited until he destroyed everything to make the game end.

However, I only lost like 1 or 2 points each time. It's pretty nice to gain +40 for a win and lose -1 or -2 for a loss. I've been beating the people who are absolutely worse than me and losing to everyone who is better/slightly better. I think I'm #13 in my division though!!!! Gotta let newbs feel like they are good!!!

PTR is good practice. I'm slowly developing my build orders more efficiently, scouting is getting better. Just need to learn how to continue macro-ing into the later game, and how to expand and not get all f'd up.

You get an alert when a unit is made for all races right? How is that any different? Are you upset with the "w" hotkey?

Regardless, what does that have to do with easier macro? Z can spam zzzzzz to make a ton of zerglings. Protoss has to click each individual unit such that it's in a powerfield and doesn't overlap with other units/buildings. And they can't do it while in battle without looking back.

Also, suppose you want to continuously produce units but your warp gates aren't perfectly synced up. You can't wait until a unit is 90% done then queue up another. So unless you have literally perfect timing you lose time between units. But as Terran you can wait until the marine is almost done then queue up another so as to waste no time between production cycles.

I don't agree that Toss macro is easier, sorry. At least not when considering straight up production Warpgates vs Rax/Robo vs Larva styles.

I thought about doing this out of boredom.

didn't you talk about doing this somewhere in this thread?

Umm...I can't say if I did or didn't. Somewhere in the back of my mind I'm thinking I made a joke, but I can't remember the context of it. I'm pretty sure I wasn't serious if I actually did say it. If I did, then it was more out of just a hypothetical idea, and I doubt I even knew that a PTR existed.

@IFX
Bronze PTR has pretty good players trying goofy stuff in my limited experience. Just play normal ladder and work on your mechanics of doing things quickly and efficiently with lots of games under your belt. I went 20-50 to start while learning and quickly got my Win/Loss to over 50% and never looked back. Now my MMR is sitting me vs diamond players and not too long ago I was bronze.

You need to play a lot of games in a short period of time and not worry about the results, I mean in the end they are god damn brownie points anyways below diamond. Scouting/macro/strategy are all integral parts of the game even at beginner levels, if you just build "units and probes" that is not enough IMO even at some of the lower leagues. Any fool can get a banshee out quickly and if you didnt run up the ramp with your first stalker to see the naked rax and handful of marines then you will probably lose a lot.

My advice as a fellow protoss user is just do a safe defensive opening because almost everyone I encounter including low diamonds 1 base hard so all you need to do is get a second base up and running safely and you will win way more than your fair share. Defensive means knowing what can kill you and playing accordingly. If I run up his ramp with my first stalker and I see a marauder all I need to do is prepare for a 3 rax, it doesnt matter if it actually is a 3rax or not thats all that I need to worry about to get my expo up and win via my expo. I almost never initiate attacks in any of my matchups, I simply get my safe expo crush whatever push they come out with and take my natural of its late my third and/or kill their natural! It almost always ends up with a massive food advantage in your favor which makes it hard to a lose a battle particularly if you never engage them but rather force them to engage you at a favorable position. For simplicities sake just have one safe expo build per matchup:

-2 gate robo vs terran
-3 gate robo vs protoss (one base a bit longer bc of 4gate)
-3 gate vs zerg

I think this is a great way to learn how to beat bad players (ie anyone below diamond) theres no need to take chances against bad players so when you lose its usually very very clear what was wrong like hmm I guess I need detection faster, or I guess I cant run up a terran ramp with a lot of tanks with just gateways units etc. Wow he never attacked me and Im 20 food behind, I need to macro more efficiently etc.

because you cant queue up a list of units in a warpgate like you can in other production buildings

well maybe you have a point about terran macro being easier but A. queuing is supposed to be bad right? and B. of course they can queue up another marine right before the last one is finished, but there's no pop up warning them "marine 95% complete". and w/ zerg, units finishing really has nothing to do with when you can larva inject. i guess i could look for the larva being completed but larva is constantly being produced and its mixed in with all the other completed stuff like units/upgrades where as the warpgates are on their own. i dunno maybe i'll try looking for the larva pop up.

also i'm not upset with anything. i'm just saying that that w hotkey and the little notice of when your warpgates are ready make things easier. is it not odd that the only production units w/ their own hotkey are warpgates? again i'm not upset i just don't see why its there.

and for the last time, the hard part about macro is not how much you have to click. its actually remembering to larva inject/chronoboost/warp in/mule/make units. if there's any argument for protoss/terran macro being harder its that you guys have to constantly make workers from your nexus/cc instead of being able to make a bunch at once.

brag: just won my first tournament game
beat: had lost in the first round in my other two attempts at tourneys
variance: first round was bye, second round was vs bronze protoss.

Just played a TvP on Steppes of War where the toss FE'd, then got a mothership, then started start getting a ton of carriers. My polt timing attack hit just as his 1st carrier popped. Unfortunately I am an idiot and always sac my raven by a-moving my army into his army so I couldn't see all of his cloaked units/buildings. Fortunately I did a decent amount of damage and was able to retreat and expand myself. I just went mass marines with a few medivacs and absolutely demolished him even though he had 3 bases saturated and about 10-12 carriers+mothership. The intercepters on carriers are so weak that marines just tear through them faster than he can reproduce them.

My point was that you can artificially not remember as T. You can wait til something is almost done and then queue something up thereby losing no time in a production cycle. You will always lose time as P by sheer virtue of being human.

Having to click each individual unit and place it in a new spot in a power field away from where you are currently looking is absolutely more difficult than holding down a button.

Whatever, this bores me.

I started playing SC2 as P because they were my most played race in SC1.

I quickly learned about 4gate prior to purchasing the game thanks to youtube.
The more I played the more openings I learned about - 3gate robo, 1gate robo, 1gate FE, phoenix play, blink stalkers, etc.

Now that I know all of these, I feel like I have no idea what the hell I'm doing.

get on vent bitches

I would... but no one else is on... so meh.

im there

Confirmed.

this. i'm actually pissed he doesn't do more zerg stuff.

my friend and i are on our worst downswing in 2v2s...ugh...so annoying. we've lost like 7 of our last 12 matches. we have a lifetime win rate of like 67% or something...this has been annoying as ****.

me and my 2v2 partner were at one point ranked in the top 30 or so on the NA server. At one point we lost 9 in a row and were getting matched up against scrubby platinums. It was insanely embarrassing. On more than one occasion we would win a game only to see "POINTS EARNED: 0" for our efforts.

vent is boring without rtsraffy imo

Your MMR spikes really hard on winstreaks. It keeps matching you against tougher opponents until it detects you're matched against an appropriate level. Eventually everyone gets ~50%, so 67% simply means your MMR hadn't reached your true skill level for a while, and now it spiked a bit too high. Soon you'll be at ~50% wins (from that point on) and staying there. Sustaining 67% is impossible unless you're one of the best teams in the world so there's simply no playerfield you'll win 50% against out there.

and isnt losing 7 out of 12 just losing 3ish more games than normal? doesnt seem like a very bad downswing at all :P

I've won 14 out of my last 15 1v1 matches and know that a huge losing streak is just around the corner. Everyone I am playing now is "slightly favored" but I still have a slight edge on all of them. I think me having a huge amount of 1v1 games played (~1k) has made it so that it takes a ton of wins to move my mmr up.