** Official Star Craft 2 Multiplayer Thread **

[BlahBlahYouToo]

well had to be sure w/the scrolling. a lot of people scroll.

i mean don't hotkey the guys you put on gas? It's not that hard. You can periodically update the "builders" hotkey group. Yes harass might kill them, so then you'll have to do the regular thing. Besides those times, it'll be faster. Also hotkey more than 1 worker, lol. The idea is to have that group be able to cover all of your building needs. Refresh the group after transfers or putting guys on gas or harass or whatever.

boxing is not faster. You have to drag a box over the whole mineral line. how is that faster than moving the mouse to a single worker? Or how would that be faster than drawing a small box over like 3 or 4 guys? Not boxing also means you don't accidentally grab gas workers (what would you do if the gas was in hte middle of the mineral line...); it means that any misclicks dont affect the whole group, etc.

Drawing big boxes is a bad habit; it's slow and imprecise. You want single precise clicks or small boxes over just the local region that you need to control.

don't you usually box 2 (or 3 for zerg) random workers and send to gas?
you would have to check that one of the 3 you boxed was not the hotkeyed one.

then lets say you expand and you box a whole bunch more to send to the expo and that group includes your hotkeyed worker. then when you try to build in your main, your build is slowed down by another 10-20 seconds by the guy running from a far away expo.

i understand a regular refresh of hotkeyed workers but there has to be a more efficient way.
this is just another thing you have to remember to do, and another thing to take your attention away from micro/macro.

i think (and i'm not sure) i watched pro replays where they box workers and let the AI decide which guy is goign to build.

 

[the unknown]

I am not aware of an "easy" automated way.
I send them all back to the minerals and select a few for gas separately..

Fastest way is to use shift+clik method. Shift+click removes a unit from the control group. Highlight ALL of your probes, and send all of them to one of the gasses. Hold shift and click 3 of the workers and then send to your other gas. Then shift+click 3 more workers and send them to the minerals. What this does is say "all of the workers go the gas, then all of the workers but the 3 I excluded mine the second gas, then all of the workers but the 3 I excluded go mine minerals." This way you don't need to box and rebox and send workers individually to the gasses.

 

[the unknown]

i think (and i'm not sure) i watched pro replays where they box workers and let the AI decide which guy is goign to build.

Don't do that... rely on precision. Click on one probe. Don't ever box if you need 1 or 2 units, click on them. It makes your micro that much better when you need to pull single units away to keep them alive in battle.

 

[Cuda1447]

Just got the game. Played a mutliplayer practice league match and... to my surprise I won! I actually destroyed the guy. I played as protoss and had built 4 expansions toward his base by the time he got his 2nd expansion out. I was so far ahead in the tech race that I just built about 6 dark templars and ran them in with my zealots and dragoons (stalkers?). He probably didn't even realize I had clocked units doing the real damage. Poor guy.

 

[Majes]

APM (especially the average APM) is not as important as most people think... 40-50 average APM is more than enough for diamond/master as long as you are able to do ~100-150 APM in a battle etc...

Im currently in a diamond league for 1v1, but I play mostly masters players... Most if not all of the people I play average at least 100 APM a solo game.

When I think about your comment I suppose I could run a single base with decent efficiency off of 40-50 APM. Once you add in expos and armies 40-50 is not adequate.

Keep in mind that an APM of 60 is only a command a second. That sounds like a lot when you talk to someone who doesnt play games, but to a gamer... That is perilously slow...

I also like to compare my SC2 APM to my Warcraft 3. In Warcraft 3 my APM would average as high as 250 in a good solo match. In Starcraft 2 I think Ive averaged 150... I think the reason for this is that I have poor macro APM. I am very deliberate when I create units and manage my base, and I am slow. During battles my APM will spike over 200 easily. Unfortunately, there is not as much to do in a Starcraft battle as there was in a Warcraft 3 battle... Therefore I wont ever reach those APM peaks I did before.

To further illustrate the value of APM, I played a 4v4 game last night where one of my partners was killed simply because I chose to fast expo and couldnt help... After his base was downed I had 6 gate rolling and a few colossi out. While I hit their bases I was expanding, upgrading, and building probes. I was flying with my APM around 150 steady. The other team could not fight me straight up, but while I was two of them up top at their bases, one of the other players used hellions to try to kill my probes...

Now reacting to this my micro was solid. I warped in stalkers with blink and chased down the hellions while winning the fight up top. He took out one group of probes with each group of hellions. Instead of reacting which is comfortable to me, I should have been using my APM and extra minerals to cannon each of my expo's. an extra 20 APM would have been sufficient, but I didnt have it. We lost the game eventually...

 

[Rhezuss]

I love the Dawn of War series (1 and 2)...
I played Starcraft back in the days but never multiplayer.

Is it worth it just for the singleplayer campaign?

 

[onza]

I love the Dawn of War series (1 and 2)...
I played Starcraft back in the days but never multiplayer.

Is it worth it just for the singleplayer campaign?

For 40-50bucks you only get the Terran campaign.

I think multiplayer is where the game shines.. You could play custom map games which I find fun but kind of worthless for me (time wise).

 

[Schfifty Five]

I love the Dawn of War series (1 and 2)...
I played Starcraft back in the days but never multiplayer.

Is it worth it just for the singleplayer campaign?

absolutely.

 

[Juddog]

I love the Dawn of War series (1 and 2)...
I played Starcraft back in the days but never multiplayer.

Is it worth it just for the singleplayer campaign?

If you think you'll at least play some custom maps, then it would be worth it. Personally my SCII profile shows me as a total noob but I chiefly play custom maps. I literally haven't played a single regular game against other players, I've stuck to all custom maps. There are some really awesome custom maps out there with a huge amount of strategy, such as Star Battle, tons of TD games, etc..

 

[eLiu]

I love the Dawn of War series (1 and 2)...
I played Starcraft back in the days but never multiplayer.

Is it worth it just for the singleplayer campaign?

If you don't want to play any multiplayer at all, I would wait till the price comes down. The campaign is really fun and I've spent many hours on it, but I'm not sure I would've paid $50 or $60 or whatever it was for just the campaign.

As others have said, there are a lot of custom games that are fun and enjoyable out there too. And if you don't like 1v1 multiplayer games there's always team based games, or co-op vs ai, and so on.

 

[HomerX]

Im currently in a diamond league for 1v1, but I play mostly masters players... Most if not all of the people I play average at least 100 APM a solo game.

When I think about your comment I suppose I could run a single base with decent efficiency off of 40-50 APM. Once you add in expos and armies 40-50 is not adequate.

Keep in mind that an APM of 60 is only a command a second. That sounds like a lot when you talk to someone who doesnt play games, but to a gamer... That is perilously slow...

a command a second should be more than enough as long as it is a good command... most people with a high apm give each command 2-3 times...

move command? right cklick 2-3 times...
ralley point? click 2-3 times....
nothing to do or waiting for a unit to finish? cycle through all your production building 3-4 times etc...

watch a replay and try to find a usefull decision for every second of the game...

sure in a fight or during intense moments (fighting micro + building units the same time etc) you should be able to spike to ~150 apm... but over a 10 minute game this is probably during 1-2min...

i watched the final match between naniwa and kiwikaki yesterday an what happened? despite 300-400 apm kiwikaki simply forgot to build a pylon and was supply blocked during a critical moment in the game...
having only 100apm during the game and building this single pylon would have improved his game drastically...
1 single right decision more >> 200 average apm extra...

if you are fast and the rapid clicking will not hinder your thought process then go for the high apm.... but if you have trouble in the silver league you will improve more by improving your strategies/tactics instead of increasing the average apm from 50 to 100 by simply doubling each command....

To further illustrate the value of APM, I played a 4v4 game last night where one of my partners was killed simply because I chose to fast expo and couldnt help... After his base was downed I had 6 gate rolling and a few colossi out. While I hit their bases I was expanding, upgrading, and building probes. I was flying with my APM around 150 steady. The other team could not fight me straight up, but while I was two of them up top at their bases, one of the other players used hellions to try to kill my probes...

Now reacting to this my micro was solid. I warped in stalkers with blink and chased down the hellions while winning the fight up top. He took out one group of probes with each group of hellions. Instead of reacting which is comfortable to me, I should have been using my APM and extra minerals to cannon each of my expo's. an extra 20 APM would have been sufficient, but I didnt have it. We lost the game eventually...

and my argument is that if you made another decision in the beginning of the game (e.g. not fast expanding) your team would probably have won, even if your average apm was only ~50...

instead of having 20 extra APM in order to build some cannons you could reduce the amount of micro for your army or you could have delayed the attack 5 seconds while building your defense...

Sure having 20 extra apm and making the rigth decisions is even better...

 

[Dumac]

Im currently in a diamond league for 1v1, but I play mostly masters players... Most if not all of the people I play average at least 100 APM a solo game.

When I think about your comment I suppose I could run a single base with decent efficiency off of 40-50 APM. Once you add in expos and armies 40-50 is not adequate.

Keep in mind that an APM of 60 is only a command a second. That sounds like a lot when you talk to someone who doesnt play games, but to a gamer... That is perilously slow...

I also like to compare my SC2 APM to my Warcraft 3. In Warcraft 3 my APM would average as high as 250 in a good solo match. In Starcraft 2 I think Ive averaged 150... I think the reason for this is that I have poor macro APM. I am very deliberate when I create units and manage my base, and I am slow. During battles my APM will spike over 200 easily. Unfortunately, there is not as much to do in a Starcraft battle as there was in a Warcraft 3 battle... Therefore I wont ever reach those APM peaks I did before.

To further illustrate the value of APM, I played a 4v4 game last night where one of my partners was killed simply because I chose to fast expo and couldnt help... After his base was downed I had 6 gate rolling and a few colossi out. While I hit their bases I was expanding, upgrading, and building probes. I was flying with my APM around 150 steady. The other team could not fight me straight up, but while I was two of them up top at their bases, one of the other players used hellions to try to kill my probes...

Now reacting to this my micro was solid. I warped in stalkers with blink and chased down the hellions while winning the fight up top. He took out one group of probes with each group of hellions. Instead of reacting which is comfortable to me, I should have been using my APM and extra minerals to cannon each of my expo's. an extra 20 APM would have been sufficient, but I didnt have it. We lost the game eventually...

I got to Masters with average APMS of 50-60 for Protoss, 70 for Terran, and around 130 for Zerg

I think APM really depends on what you are doing. I've seem some master terrans with only 40 or so APM. Zerg usually don't go below 80 though...

 

[Majes]

Ive played a great number of masters players and regardless of race still have not seen a one below 90 APM for a game...

I dont see how you can compete with an APM lower than that... It's a well known fact that if you dont sustain a high APM throughout the course of the game then you cant just light it up when you need it... Not with any success...

If you are scouting at even a decent level, and then just sitting in your base you should be well over 60 APM. Once you start moving your army around the APM should jump up over 100 easily.

The thing that most people dont understand about APM is this... When I spoke about building my cannons instead of reacting to the hellions I didnt have a minute to build 20 cannons. I had around 5 seconds... I was fighting in 2 places on the map while trying to macro 3 expansions, 6 gate, and 2 robo-bay. I needed to be able to build 20 cannons in 5 seconds, not just add a simple 20 commands to the course of a minute. Also... NEWSFLASH!!! It's not just 20 commands... I have to move to the base, select the builder, move the builder, enter the hotkeys to bring up the cannon, use shift click to place 4-5 then go to the next base and repeat. Can I do this in 5 seconds? Yes, but my APM will be up around 300 while I do that...

Now, lets say you're a master macro player who never scouts the enemy. Can you sit in your base, just macro, and then attack move to end the game with only an APM of 40-50? Yes, you can... Could I get into platinum doing this? Yes. Could I get diamond? I'm honestly not sure... Masters? I dont believe it is possible. The people I play in masters are darn good players... They dont just sit around conserving APM. I am constantly scouted each and every game, and everyone currently seems to expo very quickly...

There are reasons that the pros have such high APM. Some of it is Spam, yes. But most of it is excellent unit control and scouting. Do they make mistakes? Heck yes! But that does not mean they would be better off slowing their APM down to 40-50 and making sure every command they entered was correct. They would get destroyed every single time.

 

[Molondo]

isn't it Action per 44 seconds in sc2? its not a full minute.

 

[MikeyLSU]

Majes, there is no doubt higher APM for the same player is better. I don't think anyone should be arguing that fact.

But how necessary is it? Like I said, I go from 50-70 depending on the game and have been a diamond player since the beginning.

I just played a guy who had double my APM and killed him. Point is, you need to be able to play well first, then get your APM up.

I'm sure there are not many masters players whithout a minimum of 100 APM, but we have been talking about plat/diam players mostly.

 

[Dumac]

It's a well known fact that if you dont sustain a high APM throughout the course of the game then you cant just light it up when you need it... Not with any success...

I do it all the time.

APM is nice, but it is just icing on the cake. There are a lot more important things than APM if at least have a basic APM of 50 or 60.

I've been kids with 200 APM all the time, because their decision making sucks.

Sure, if you know what to do with that APM, that great, but knowing what to do is more important in my opinion, and that is where I've focused on. It's done me well so far.

APM also just increases naturally with time, as you get used to what youve been doing and start thinking of more things to do. My average used to be 30, and now sometimes the average can get up to 150 or so, although that is rare.

 

[HomerX]

The thing that most people dont understand about APM is this... When I spoke about building my cannons instead of reacting to the hellions I didnt have a minute to build 20 cannons. I had around 5 seconds... I was fighting in 2 places on the map while trying to macro 3 expansions, 6 gate, and 2 robo-bay. I needed to be able to build 20 cannons in 5 seconds, not just add a simple 20 commands to the course of a minute.

Yes in your situation you need the high apm... my point ist that you should aim to prevent such situations from happening...
Analyse why you were in this bad situation instead of accepting it and blaming your apm when you loose..

APM ist nothing bad, as long as you are not "overmicroing" or forgetting important things while pushing your APM... but the strategies/tactics/decisions are more important...

APM also just increases naturally with time, as you get used to what youve been doing and start thinking of more things to do. My average used to be 30, and now sometimes the average can get up to 150 or so, although that is rare.

qft! your apm will increase over time... there is no real reason to "train" your apm... try to improve your tactics and game sense.

If you are scouting at even a decent level, and then just sitting in your base you should be well over 60 APM. Once you start moving your army around the APM should jump up over 100 easily.

yes sure, building stuff in your base and moving your army + scouting at the same time, you need 100+ apm... but after you warped in your units, moved your army etc there are 10-15 seconds where you only need ~20-30apm... then it spinkes up to 100+ again for 10 sec etc...
like i said you must be able to do 100-150+ apm when it matters... but on average 50-60 should be enough...

 

[Majes]

Yes in your situation you need the high apm... my point ist that you should aim to prevent such situations from happening...
Analyse why you were in this bad situation instead of accepting it and blaming your apm when you loose..

APM ist nothing bad, as long as you are not "overmicroing" or forgetting important things while pushing your APM... but the strategies/tactics/decisions are more important...



qft! your apm will increase over time... there is no real reason to "train" your apm... try to improve your tactics and game sense.



yes sure, building stuff in your base and moving your army + scouting at the same time, you need 100+ apm... but after you warped in your units, moved your army etc there are 10-15 seconds where you only need ~20-30apm... then it spinkes up to 100+ again for 10 sec etc...
like i said you must be able to do 100-150+ apm when it matters... but on average 50-60 should be enough...

I agree with a lot of what you guys are saying, but I just feel like we're arguing correlation vs causation. Basically high APM has a correlation with being a good player. It is not the cause of being a good player. This means that the higher the APM you have, the more likely you are to be a better player. I think we can all agree that it is a factor in performance. We're just discussing the degree.

I also wanted to give you examples of why APM is important. I played the first master's player ive seen last night whose APM was below 90. He actually played the first 5-6 minutes of the game with 40-50 APM. When I 4-gated into his base his APM was around 150, and he finished the game averaging 80 or so. If the game had gone longer than 10 minutes he probably would have had around 100 APM.

When I finished the game my first thought was "That guy wasnt very good". I thought this simply because of his marauder control. I was able to outfight his marauders with my stalkers when we got into an early game battle. This dictated the terms of our engagement and lead to me pushing 4 gate into his base to end it. I could tell that he didnt have the APM to control his units to the best of their ability and I took advantage of it.

There are different types of players in Starcraft 2. It's part of what makes the game great. There are Macro oriented players who out-mass their opponents. There are Micro oriented players who focus on constant pressure and out-fighting their opponents, and there are combinations of those two to different degrees. You guys are arguing from a macro player's perspective, and I agree with you. APM isnt as important when all you are worried about is either out-massing or getting a high tier unit out before your opponent. APM is much more important when you are either a player applying constant pressure throughout the match, or a player trying to deal with constant pressure.

But yeah, APM is not the biggest factor in SC2 success. Perhaps it is even an overrated factor. I used to think so... But I realize now the benefit of being able to constantly average 100 or more APM. You will be a better player if you train yourself to complete actions quicker and to scout more. It's as simple as that...

 

[Dumac]

If you had enough APM you could do this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXUOWXidcY0&feature=related

 

[Cuda1447]

Alright, so I have a noob question that I'm trying to figure out. Can't seem to find the answer anywhere. I've only played as Protoss so far and I know 4-gating is a good maneuver. Question I have is, when I turn them into warp gates and press w to select them all, is there anyway to create 4 zerglings/sentries/whatever all at the same time instead of having to click/place, click/place. I have found that I can press z then place then z then place, but I just want to press z one time and place all 4. It seems like in replays others do this, but I can't figure it out?

 

[the unknown]

Alright, so I have a noob question that I'm trying to figure out. Can't seem to find the answer anywhere. I've only played as Protoss so far and I know 4-gating is a good maneuver. Question I have is, when I turn them into warp gates and press w to select them all, is there anyway to create 4 zerglings/sentries/whatever all at the same time instead of having to click/place, click/place. I have found that I can press z then place then z then place, but I just want to press z one time and place all 4. It seems like in replays others do this, but I can't figure it out?

Hold Shift. Basically any cool move involves holding shift . Cool blink stalker command ? Hold shift, right click before the edge, b, left click below the edge, let go of shift. Move and siege? Same thing. Use a banshee to only target probes and go back to macro-ing? Hold shift and right click and many probes as possible.

 

[the unknown]

Question I have is, when I turn them into warp gates and press w to select them all, is there anyway to create 4 zerglings/sentries/whatever

Gonna let that slide...

 

[GoSharks]

Alright, so I have a noob question that I'm trying to figure out. Can't seem to find the answer anywhere. I've only played as Protoss so far and I know 4-gating is a good maneuver. Question I have is, when I turn them into warp gates and press w to select them all, is there anyway to create 4 zerglings/sentries/whatever all at the same time instead of having to click/place, click/place. I have found that I can press z then place then z then place, but I just want to press z one time and place all 4. It seems like in replays others do this, but I can't figure it out?

I just hold the key down. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

[Cuda1447]

Gonna let that slide...

Whoops, yea Zealots. My bad haha.

 

[SlitheryDee]

If you had enough APM you could do this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXUOWXidcY0&feature=related

My god that's sick.