1861

Nope, but I have a T-shirt that says that! Actually if I was going to use a sports figure as a password it’d be plunkett2. :)

Yep, that’s exactly what I did. My serial number is now safely written down, so if this happens again, at least I can remove the authenticator. My house cleaner lady moved the authenticator. I will tell her not to touch stuff on my computer desk (for the third time).

1862

For those looking for a nice zerg build that isn’t all-in. I present the 5 roach rush. I have been using it (I didn’t develop it) and it works really nicely as it starts with early roaches and then switches to speedlings after significant damage has been done to the opponents econ.

Looking into other early options for zerg, I’ve come up with a very good opening against both terran and protoss: the 5 roach rush! It’s capable of breaking into your opponents’ base early on without going all-in. If it fails, one injection-round of drones and you’re usually leading in the worker count.

Banelings are great, but way too expensive to use every game. Taking down a supply depot or pylon costs 250/125, and you have to have fighting units on top of that! With the 5RR, the roaches pull double duty by destroying the depot/pylon and still being around after it’s gone. Not to mention they are fantastic against early zealots/marines.

Pros:

Does significant damage or even wins outright vs some openings. The good thing is that it’s strong against openings that we hate to see: stargate, 1-1-1, reaper, and hellion openings.
Can get around the stupid wall-ins
Doesn’t wreck your economy. When the roaches are leaving your base, many times you’re ahead in workers as well as putting your expansion down.
If you break into their base, you can just rally and send more guys as your next round of larvae have popped.
Crushes a 2-gate**
Allows you to set up a hellion contain if you get there early enough
Forces the game into certain channels: 4-gate, marauders/thor.

Cons:

Completely fails against some openings (marauders, stalkers). I’m saying don’t even attack type of fail because you’ll insta-lose.
If your opponent is opening with marauders or stalkers, you have to back-tech to zerglings ASAP or you’ll often die outright.
If your opponent opens with stalkers/marauders, you’ll be behind economically than if you didn’t rush.
Forces the game into certain channels: 4-gate, marauders/thor.

Build Order

9 Overlord
13 Spawning Pool
13 Extractor
15 Overlord
Zergling
Queen
Drone
Drone
Roach Warren (latest you should start is when queen is halfway done)
Zergling speed when you have 100 gas
Drone
Overlord when queen pops, inject larvae
Drone
Take drones off gas once you have 125
Re-inject
5 Roaches (Warren, OL, and injection should all pop very close to each other)
Overlord (31/34 food)
Drone
Expansion when your roaches are walking to the enemy
Re-inject
Zerglings as you get the minerals, rallied to your opponent’s base
Queen

1863

In the second replay provided by that guy the terran player gets hilarious with his trash talk. Can you really say someone is just casual and will never be good when you are both in diamond league and the other guy just dominated you? Also he was 3Rax proxying, assuming it would work because Zerg always expand early I guess and anyone that doesn’t early expand and then lose to his marine rush proxy cheese is clearly a noob. Also his proxy was within view of a Xel’naga watchtower.

1864

So, um, 62 pages in, would you all bear with me if I ask if you feel the multiplayer has held up for those of you that are more casual? I really, really want a new RTS to play!

1865

Not for me, FWIW. I just wasn’t enjoying losing all the time.

1866

fhtagn?

1867

Three barracks closer to the enemy base than your own. Somewhat “hidden” to prevent their detection as long as possible.

1868

I find it less stressful if you play 2x2 or 3x3; 1x1 gets old, losing all the time. If you are playing with friends losing 2x2 can still be fun and lets you try out different builds and tactics.

1869

I was completely new to Starcraft when I picked it up. I played about ten missions in the campaign, which did absolutely nothing for me (to me it felt like watching paint of ludicrously high quality dry - it’s more expensive and beautiful than lesser paint, but still…), and then dived head first into the multiplayer qualifying.

I won 2 of my 5 qualifying matches: 1 legitimately, 1 when the other player’s computer failed to load after a few minutes and he must have reset it. Since then, I’ve played 17 matches, 7 of which I have won. I’m still terrible at the game, but the matchmaking seems to pit me against equally terrible players. I’m completely enchanted with it at the moment and I think I’ll be playing it for considerably more time.

The players have also been mostly polite and friendly, though obviously matches are a bit fast paced to get a conversation going. I’ve only met one jerk - in the last game I played, actually. We started out nicely. I wished him good luck, he replied “U2”, which I took to mean that someone in the room with him had asked him what was his favourite band and he’d gotten confused. We had played for about ten minutes when he attacked me with a small number of Zerg units, which my much larger Terran force managed to see off before they could break through the barrier of my barracks and depots. I was hesitating, ready to attack but wondering if that was his intent - lure me out so that I lower the barrier and he can swarm me like another player did. He suddenly said, and I paraphrase, “Terrans are a noobian race”.

I wasn’t sure if he was being racist or stupid, but his spelling was far less clear than I’ve presented so I said, “I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you mean”. While I was typing he continued, “Just healers and swarm”. I had one medic ship.

Then he replied to me: “It’s for noobs”. I pointed out that I was in the bronze league, which unquestionably made me a “noob” by definition. At this point, he impugned my mother’s amatory skills and surrendered. As it happened, he hadn’t built any other units at all, and had squandered resources setting up a second base. I don’t think his strategy makes any sense, though perhaps an experienced player could enlighten me as to what on Earth he was trying to do.

The only other strategy game I’ve played more than once or twice online was Demigod, so I don’t really have any transferable skills from other games, though I have played skirmishes versus the AI in plenty of RTS games. Basically, I’m as completely new to this kind of thing as anyone posting on a gaming message board is likely to be. I’m certainly not good at the game, but there are plenty of players at about my level and I’m improving the more I play. Each match lasts between about 10 minutes and half an hour, so it’s easy to pick up for a couple of matches in the evening.

As I said, I’m really enjoying it and I plan to keep playing for a while.

1870

I think so, especially if you’re a fan of RTS’s. Aside from reading this thread and picking up some strategies from some of our more proficient players, I have spent very little time studying the game/watching replays. You don’t have to commit yourself as much some people may have you believe. It took me a little time to figure out efficient build orders and how to best manage the pace of the game, but once you do, the game is a lot of fun. Right now I’m beating bronze and silver players pretty consistently.

1871

It’s a common zerg strat to expand on 16 supply. You need a 2nd hatch to produce units efficiently and a hatch only costs 300 minerals, so it may as well be beside your natural mineral expansion. The fact that he stonewalled his zerglings into your wall is unfortunate, generally those zerglings are for map control/keeping you in your base early on and then you move on to roaches/banelings to deal with actual armies of marines.

EDIT: Lots of people like to bitch about how OP terran is, I don’t really see it. Maybe it only comes into play at higher levels? My housemate plays terran and he is always bitching about how overpowered and nooby protoss is (I play protoss predominantly) which kind of upsets me seeing as his basis for that statement is the sole fact that probes can warp in buildings and then go do other stuff. WOOO One more worker harvesting, nevermind the fact that terrans get MULEs, clearly I am at an unfair advantage.

1872

Thank you. I’ve read about Zerg expanding early, but I need to play some matches as them to figure out how they work. Following the replay, he was maxed out at about 50 something supply when I was at just under 100. He’d already found my base, as one of his workers wandered in about the time I’d built my 1st marine, so it seemed to me that he must know I was walling myself in. I don’t understand what he hoped to achieve by attacking with so small a force, relatively far into the game. My guess is he was an inexperienced player trying to execute the strategy you describe but not quite getting it right.

It’s really helpful being able to see the build orders, etc.

1873

Take balance statements from anyone not playing at the highest levels with a giant grain of salt. ZvT currently is somewhat favored for Terran, but this really only matters at the highest level. At lower levels “imbalanced” means “this beats me and I don’t like it”.

At anywhere from bronze - platinum, the only main criteria of balance should be, “do I have enough fun options with my race at this level that work reasonably well?” That is my only real problem with Zerg at this point. Needs a little more fun factor. Spreading creep is a good part of it, the spawn larvae doesnt do it for me and the roach in particular still isn’t interesting enough.

1874

I mostly love the players in Starcraft II. Even the angry can be oddly endearing. I always type “Hey there” or “Hello” when I start a game. One time, I did this and the guy typed “You’re a jerk” and shortly thereafter “Jerk!!!”. I think there was even an “I hate you!”. And this was before I’d even built my spawning pool and sent my first batch of zerglings to his base. I imagined some pre-adolescent kid doing the equivalent of getting his game face on.

My favorite is in those rare moments where everything comes together and I manage to use my race – usually the zerg – to their fullest, eliciting some race specific comment. I finally managed to wrangle a pretty simple baneling bust against a dude’s supply depot walll (protip: send the banelings in first, rather than behind a wall of eager zerglings…). As my zerglings swarmed through the gap, ran past his two marines, and started savaging his SCVs, he typed “fucking zerg” and quit.

  -Tom

P.S. I hate you!!! Jerk!

1875

One of the guys on TL always responds to anything people say with “sorry couldn’t see that, mature language filter”, no matter what people say, which makes them try to phrase it again with different words and is hilarious.

1876

Americans sure are a mouthy bunch. Southeast Asian games tend to be silent affairs in furious clicking with the prerequisite “gl hf” and “gg”. We don’t even get the keke anymore. There are even times when we stop to discuss strat as his army is mopping up my base.

“so immortals murder Marquette huh?”
“kinda. The sentries with the force field helped.”
“play again?”
“sure”

1877

That’s a great line, and expresses my feelings exactly.

1878

Well said and so true. The campaign felt like a total chore, I don’t think I’ve ever cared less about a story in a game.

Absolutely! I’m still puttering around in bronze since I only play a few games a night and I’m having a great time with it. The ladder system really is great for keeping you matched with the right people.

1879

We hate you! Jerk.

P.S. Fucking zerg.

1880

I actually like the campaign. I may never even play skirmish or multiplayer. That seems to be a minority opinion for most games here at qt3, though, not just Starcraft 2. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.