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Starcraft 2 Beta

damn, this game is looking mighty fine, cant wait for the release of it. Im not going to pay 200$+ to play a beta.
 
Neurofreeze said:
What are you using to counter them? If terran, use Marauders. They get +10 damage to armored, which Roaches are, one Marauder costs 25 more minerals but, in early game mass units vs. mass units, Marauders tend to win the day, cost vs. cost. Their slowing is essential as early game mass units won't be able to surround and pound your fewer, but stronger, units.

Protoss get the bum end of the stick. Stalkers cost 50 more yet only do the same amount of damage to Roaches (16 total vs. armored vs. 16 base with no bonuses on the roach). They do have higher shields + HP but it doesn't offset the increased cost completely. Stalkers are clearly inferior units when it comes to early game ground combat due to part of their unit cost and use being invested into doubling as ground-to-air.

I'd suggest going half zealots, half stalkers with one sentry. Use Guardian Shield. That should tip the battle in your favor. The Zealots, pound for pound, will win vs. a Roach, but the problem is they're melee and tend to get torn down before they even hit their targets. The more zealots you have, the more movement will be required to surround and pound. Cutting down on zealots and adding stalkers to the mix will help. Too many stalkers, and your costs are too high to compete with the Roacher. Too many zealots, and they'll be tripping over themselves before they can kill anything. Guardian Shield is essential.

Even then, the math still favors Zerg. 10 Roaches is 25 minerals more than 3 zealots, 3 stalkers, 1 sentry, and four fewer food. You'll probably still have to play defensively and use Chrono Beacon. The only thing tipping in your favor is that to pump out that many Roaches really fast, he's going to need a Queen. Added to that the higher cost of the spawning pool (effectively 250 with the sacrificed Drone vs. 150 Gateway), you can produce one more Pylon and three more zealots or a couple stalkers and a zealot, which would put you over the top. That's why they increased the build time of the Gateway. Mineral for mineral, you could get two zealots out and attack a zerg base with Chrono Beacon before he even has zerglings before (on the smallest 1v1 maps).

I really wish they'd buff Guardian Shield to increase damage reduction with some type of upgrade, maybe rolled into shield upgrades or ground ranged upgrades, to go up to -5 damage reduction after three upgrades.

If you also play Zerg and don't simply wish to out-produce him, just use a baneling or three and it'll ruin his day. Just make sure he's firing on your roaches first before moving in banelings.

If it's a really heavy Roach masser, I play defensively and by mid-game I tech up to Hellions to flank the mass while Marauders go in first. If Protoss, I play very defensively and whip out a couple warp rays ASAP to take out their base. That usually forces them to stop rushing and change strats (generally too late). The majority of Roach rushers I've seen will panic and stop attacking with their mass while I take out their base, whereas if they just pushed with all they had it's possible they could overrun my defenses (although if they have absolutely no anti-air, which tends to be the case with a mass roacher, they wouldn't be fast enough to raze all my buildings before I razed theirs because warp rays, once on a roll, do hilarious damage).
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Yup, Sentries are invaluable, always keep one in a group of Stalkers. When you're up against Roaches with your Stalkers, throwing up the Guardian Shield can make all the difference even when outnumbered. If I see that someone is going Roaches I also go Robotics Bay ASAP; Observers are invaluable for those that burrow. I've won a few games now where someone thought they were going to burrow harass me and I just wiped them out because I had an observer with me.

I honestly haven't had that big a problem with Roaches, my bigger issue right now are Terrans. Marine+Marauders were always a fast build, ditto Reapers (ugh, HATE Reaper Rush) and now the recent decrease in Barracks build time has buffed their early game bigtime now, huge pain.
 
In other news, the Terran buff from Friday is a REAL pain in the ass. Decreased Barracks build time plus increased Gateway build time sucks. Oh well, this is what balancing is for. :)
 
Yeah, I'm sure everything will flip flop a tiny bit before they're finished.
 
TheResidentEvil said:
ai v5.1 is out. Its getting close to good.
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Yeah, it is at least an enjoyable experience. I don't care if I get into the beta now since I dislike MP in most games nowadays.

Now looks like v5.5 came out. :)
 
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Alright, I'm giving up on watching replays...I'm going to give the AI a whirl when I get a chance just to see how it runs on my computer.

Where's the instructions/best place to download the current AI again?
 
Neurofreeze said:
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you post made me so happy to read. I havent done anything but stream a few replays but I'm so cranked for this. Hearing some good old "starcraft math" and strategy discussions...damage per units and costs etc. etc. makes me so excited. Keeps faith that its a different game with the same balance to come in due time. cant wait for a beta key and/or the game to release....

so cranked...
 
I don't think Blizzard has ever done a public beta for their RTS games? I could be wrong.

Anyways -- I went on a huge losing streak, from 9-1 now I'm 13-7 LOL. Still in platinum though, playing against people better than me is helping me improve a lot.

Also, as a protoss player.. has anyone ever encountered the Zerg turtle lings and fast muta's strat? What is the counter to muta's that can take them down fast? Phoenix's?
 
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refraxion said:
Also, as a protoss player.. has anyone ever encountered the Zerg turtle lings and fast muta's strat? What is the counter to muta's that can take them down fast? Phoenix's?
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From what I've seen/heard (commentaries/replays) Protoss are pretty weak in AA, the Phoenix apparently isn't anything fantastic (so says Husky), Void Rays are crap against weak enemies...you could try Carriers but they take forever to build.

You'll probably have the most luck with Stalkers. You might try Psionic Storm (not necessarily a great tactic...I "believe" it hits air units). I'm sure there's a better tactic, I haven't seen it yet. I watched...someone (Husky or HD) go mass Mutalisks in an FFA and it came down to him and a pretty good Protoss player (Protoss took out the other two opponents by himself with ease) and Husky throttled 'em pretty easily. The guy had Colossi, Void Rays, Zealots, and a few Stalkers but none help against mass air units.
 
yeah, I find protoss weak in the AA department :(. But I've been thinking psi storm too, I'll give that a try.
 
man if blizzard is reading this. i will eat 2 large onions to get in the beta. and i will take pictures of it. just to get in this beta or i will do something like starberry jelly on 2 large onions and eat it and take pictures. or ill eat something crazy to get in to the beta
 
refraxion said:
Anyways -- I went on a huge losing streak, from 9-1 now I'm 13-7 LOL. Still in platinum though, playing against people better than me is helping me improve a lot.
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A proper matchmaking system means you'll end up 50/50 in win/loss. If you win more than you lose, you're probably in the wrong division.
 
They need to start sending out more waves of beta invites if they plan to have the beta wrapped up in 3 months... Come on blizzard, I'm waiting....
 
refraxion said:
yeah, I find protoss weak in the AA department :(. But I've been thinking psi storm too, I'll give that a try.
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It's just tough. The big problem is, yes, psi storm and possibly some phoenix support can destroy muta strats, however you have to micro individual units on a very crowded screen while the muta player simply has to attack-move and let bouncing glaive worms do all the work.

It's just not fair that having to do precise and quick micro to barely overcome noob mass attack-move tactics.

Another thing you may want to try if your opponent is overconfident is to rush two void rays and strategically take out his spire while he sends his first muta wave at you. If you're lucky you'll hit his base during his attack and he'll have no AA long enough for you to take out the spire and set back his strat long enough for you to keep up the pressure.

But again, retarded that you have to rely on luck and strategic planning while the other guy simply uses a cookie-cut build order.

Yes, Plat is highest division.
 
@ Neurofreeze - I totally agree with what you're saying. Muta's are seriously a HUGE pain in the behind and just a control group of muta's can give you a big headache :/. As for the void rays.. I've tried that before too, but they usually have a few muta's in their base that just pop out.. so dumb :(.
 
Anyone know how to get this to run 800*600 in Windowed Mode? It keeps snapping back to 1280x800 when I try to manually re-size and when I edit the Variables.txt it start out in 800x600 and then snaps into 1280x800 as soon the replay starts.
 
AceCR42 said:
A proper matchmaking system means you'll end up 50/50 in win/loss. If you win more than you lose, you're probably in the wrong division.
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Unless you are the one, the single greatest starcraft player in the entire world, where there is no other human being on this earth that can match you. God among insects.


I will never be that guy. I love starcraft, and am sure I will like the second version, but I know there will be plenty of little 12 year olds that will drop me to the ground.
 
Ritorix said:
re: AI's, starcrack, etc

I'm not sure where the line is here, but I'm pretty sure we are walking it. Sure the beta was put up for download on fileshack but lets not get the thread locked or people banned talking about the wrong things. Public beta will be here eventually and in the meantime there are always replays and streaming.
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Well, the AI isn't off limits, as the API is freely available in the beta client, and it isn't even coded by Blizzard, it was coded (pretty shoddily IMO) by some sc2 fans.
 
kabob983 said:
From what I've seen/heard (commentaries/replays) Protoss are pretty weak in AA, the Phoenix apparently isn't anything fantastic (so says Husky), Void Rays are crap against weak enemies...you could try Carriers but they take forever to build.

You'll probably have the most luck with Stalkers. You might try Psionic Storm (not necessarily a great tactic...I "believe" it hits air units). I'm sure there's a better tactic, I haven't seen it yet. I watched...someone (Husky or HD) go mass Mutalisks in an FFA and it came down to him and a pretty good Protoss player (Protoss took out the other two opponents by himself with ease) and Husky throttled 'em pretty easily. The guy had Colossi, Void Rays, Zealots, and a few Stalkers but none help against mass air units.
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A mass of Stalkers backed up by some Sentries seem to be the best anti-air bet that the Protoss have right now. I'm not a huge fan of the Pheonix, and as you said the Carriers take too long to build. Its pretty easy to get a mass of Stalkers going though, no problem. Get the Sentry Guardian Shield up, and mixed with Colossus/Void Ray/Zealots you've got a pretty decent force.
 
I know this is a long shot, but if there are any WoW players out there with an extra key, I'll trade 30k g for one :D
 
refraxion said:
Platinum is the highest division though..? :confused:
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For now, since they haven't implemented the Pro division yet. Whether or not its reserved for actual professional gamers I'm not sure, but there is atleast one more division higher than Platinum.
 
AceCR42 said:
Exactly. Since you lost 6 and won 4 since the placement matches, it's close enough to 50% and it looks like you're in the right spot.
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I don't think you get placed simply based on your win:loss ratio, it also places you based on other metrics (APM, etc). It wouldn't surprise me since the game tracks everything you do. I was 6-4 and got placed in bronze, other friends of mine had similar win:loss ratios (50%-70% win) and got placed into bronze or silver.

I gotta say that my placement matches were pretty easy. Refraxion must have had some tough games to get into platinum on a 6-4 record.
 
I'm pretty sure the placement matches scale in difficulty depending on your record

ie you start off with a bronze level match and if you win, you move up a level and if you lose you stay play another bronze level match. if you keep winning, you'll eventually get a platinum level match in the placement matches.
 
Udgnim said:
I'm pretty sure the placement matches scale in difficulty depending on your record

ie you start off with a bronze level match and if you win, you move up a level and if you lose you stay play another bronze level match. if you keep winning, you'll eventually get a platinum level match in the placement matches.
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That also makes sense. Also note that the bottom level league is Copper, not Bronze. I wonder which one they start you at in the placement matches.
 
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