Starcraft II: Saturation

Hello, my fellow VuTalians (or VuTalites, VuTalities, VuTaleans, VuTalers, or whatever name you go by). This blog will be dedicated more to critique than actual brouhaha, for anyone who actually reads these.

Outnumbered, Again

In this game, it was I, again, on Discord IV, fighting a lopsided 2v2 with myself and a proxy Terran against two Terran players. I can’t say I blame the guy for quitting; I was lagging everyone out at the moment (I blame solar flares), but they eventually petered out enough for a fairly smooth game to exist.

I decided to go marine-tank with medivac support for this game. I’ve heard (and seen) a fair bit against the marine-tank combo, though I see that that applies more so against Zerg players (who can go banelings and mutalisks with terrifying results) and Protoss players (who can go stalkers and colossi for equally devastating results, especially with guardian shield). I do believe that this can apply if both players go marine-tank, as that becomes a brutal game of attrition.

But hey, if I’m going to buff up my marines +3/+3, might as well have some support.

One of my foes was going for a standard marines, marauders and medivac combo, and to his credit he pulled it off fairly well. He consistently had one more barracks than I had, allowing him to pump out more infantry than I could. His only (and fatal) flaw: he neglected to buff his units with an engineering bay. I was constantly trying to increase damage output from my marines with dual bays.

The other player was kind of fooling around, building who knows what with a poor contingent of SCVs at his mineral line–honestly, without some kind of placement system the people that get paired up in custom games is really AWOL. He did try for a nuke in late game, though.

Anyway, from the get-go (see: 10 minutes in), I decided to send a lone marine to scout. Fat load of good that did; my opponents had walled off their bases with supply depots. Besides, I wasn’t even looking at the marine when it died, so I essentially sent that marine to his untimely death.

Later on, with +2/+2 about to finish, I decided to push off with about 30 or so marines, a single tank and two medivacs. The supply wall was a bit effective, but once I put that tank into siege they crumbled quite fast, putting the foe in a momentary supply block. No matter; I opened up some supply for him by slicing through his marines and marauders. I lost the entire army in that engagement, but based on resources and units lost I did more damage. I actually forgot to stim while engaging because I was still fumbling around with the hotkeys.

Then I decided to go for a little poke-and-prod with a pair of banshees with cloak. To some extent, it actually worked; I gutted the slower player’s entire mineral line, and then proceeded to deal some damage to the other player’s line. Thanks to some poor scans, I was able to pick off a few marines and marauders as well; in retaliation, he built a few vikings to drive them off.

After that nonsense was dealt with, I moved out with a bigger army of marines, plus two tanks and two medivacs, with +3/+3. At this point he still did not have any bay upgrades, though he did have stim, combat shield and concussive shell. I must say that he built an excessive amount of marauders by my arrival; the majority of his army was comprised of them.

Against Terran, marauders aren’t too effective in a battle engagement; the only armored ground units Terrans have are marauders, siege tanks and thors. On offense, marauders are more effective because they can do excellent damage to buildings. Concussive shell doesn’t actually affect ranged units a whole lot, especially if their ranges are identical, unless they’re stutter-stepping.

I actually had the smaller army (and I didn’t rally any barracks to the battlefield, so I didn’t reinforce them), but the added engineering bay bonuses cut through the units so devastatingly fast, especially when both armies stim. Tanks rip through stim marines, and deal massive damage to stim marauders, while marines shred EVERYTHING. The other player actually threw in several reapers and ghosts, but they were just too few in number to defeat me. He tried to nuke, but without clock, it’s a little obvious where that deadly red dot is–just look for the standing ghost not firing back.

Game, set, match.

Tips from the Incapable Terran

Yes, I am actually trying to help you. This would be a perfect opportunity for those of you with weak hearts or bladders to leave the room now.

Gone? Okay then.

First of all, know you strategy. If you’re a newbie messing around with a very easy AI, then sure, do a bit of carousing around. But while you’re there, try to solidify a plan of attack from the get-go. If you’re really drawing a blank, try out established strategies like 3rax, 1-1-1, marine-tank, MMM. I actually failed to understand any of the build verbatim, but I was able to make a decent enough build for myself that I could possibly destroy a silver-level player. It’s not going to win you a lot of trophies against gold or higher, but basic strategies like those are supposed to get you settled in, to exploit the flexibility of those builds to customize them. Later, you can try to test drops and harassment techniques from banshees and reapers.

One important skill to know is how to hotkey everything. Obviously, I have failed to master that skill to its fullest extent. Start by understanding the letters that correspond to units. Expand to other important hotkeys such as for upgrades and add-ons. Finally, figure out an established custom hotkey setting. Know which number will dictate your army, your base, your buildings, however you want to set them. This custom setting is what will allow you to multitask with incredible efficiency. It’s not all too swift to continually switch the map between your army and your base when hotkeys can do that in a split second.

Also, get upgrades. Whatever unit you’re predominantly using, build the upgrade building for it. If you’re going massed marines, build an engineering bay. Going full mech? Have an armory. This should be a secondary objective, but an important one nonetheless. If you have an abundance of resources, and no crippling sources of harassment coming your way, get at least the attack upgrade. If you want to go with the defensive upgrades as well, it may accelerate your build to have a second such building, so attack and defense upgrades go hand in hand. Shuttle units such as the medivac have no need for attack upgrades, so if you want to increase their longevity, it may pay to get the defensive upgrades for it.

Expand. Once you have a base up and running, grab the expansion base. Generally, it should be a stone’s throw away, but some maps are a bit more peculiar than others, especially when playing team games. Nevertheless, the extra base will add an immense amount of resource income, allowing you to build more units and buildings. Generally speaking, it’s usually safe to build a second command center early on against Terran players. Beware of bunker rushes, though, they can be quite crippling if they catch you off guard.

Finally, be ready for anything. You don’t know what your opponent will do to you. They may try for a straight-up battle with armies, or they may snoop around to harass your mineral line. They may be heading out to expand, or they may try to deny your expansion. Whatever the case, it would pay to have a few defensive structures here and there. Even a single missile turret near the mineral line will at least deter drops, hopefully enough time for you to retaliate. Also, finding out what your opponent will do means to scout. Send a lone SCV or marine, a fairly inexpensive unit, and poke around. See what units you can, what buildings they’ve erected, whether there are expansions or not. If there is a Xel’naga tower, send a scout and secure it. Its wide line of sight will catch other snooping scouts, as well as give an early warning to any army strutting down the road.

These are really all the tips that I have. Most of them are actually derived from my own inabilities, so I essentially just gave you a cheat sheet to how I play. If you’re an actual pro at this game already (David), then reading this was probably a waste of your time. Nevertheless, these seemingly common-sense tips have often been sent to the wind because in the heat of it all, you just forget. Starcraft II has a VERY steep learning curve.