Starcraft noob -- I suck, lol, need help

[zelachang]

If you want to play online I'd suggest you first play through the campaigns. You should play them anyways since the single player is actually pretty good. Once you get a good idea of which units complement which units and what units counter which units you can move on to learning builds and such for multiplayer.

If you do want some tips for beating the AI in tvt though here are some:
-Send out an scv early on to run around your enemies base to see if he's teching or pumping marines and defend appropriately.
-An early 2 factory build with vultures can help you get map control. Vulture speed and mines make them great for harassing and containing. Mines at your enemy nat will prevent him from expanding and killing enemy scv's will give you an econ edge.
-Expand when you have map control. SC is about as much about micro as it is about macro.
-Dropping tanks on the cliff above his main can net a gg if he has inadequate defenses.

Overall as a terran player you need to get down the backbone of a terran army, either marines&medic or mech. M&M is a bit more difficult to control than mech which is just a-move so it might be easier trying mech first. Practice slow pushing into your enemies base with tanks and vultures. A lifted engineering bay or barracks is useful for getting vision for your sieged tanks. If the opponent has a significant air force add goliaths to the mix or build turrets all around your tanks. Eventually you will want a few sci vessels for EMP against toss or irradiate against zerg, and d-matrix is always useful for units being focused. Leap frog the tanks in the back to the front and slowly steamroll your way to victory while sending additional forces to your ball.

Just practice more and eventually you will get the hang of it . Once you get the basics down you can try using ghosts for lock down or dropships for harass or wraithplay for more fun stuff.

for a pretty good tvt watch this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EIuY0WNLzk

 

[JTsyo]

don't worry about APM at this point, it doesn't really matter if you're just clicking the map to keep your APM high.

Like others have said, play the campaign.
Play with the expansion so that terran have access to medics
For terran find a build order that works for what you want to do.
-start with a few scvs (I find having 150% of scvs on crystal is a good ratio. 6crystal =9 scvs + 3 on gas)
- get a barracks up, 2nd barracks is a good idea once you have enough resources to build marines and have a surplus.
-get a bunker up at a chokepoint (if there's no choke point place it to cover your resources and use buildings to create a choke.
-Need the academy for medics and upgrade for marine range
-factory + attachment for tanks
-crank out marines and tanks
-if you have a natural expansion grab it (AI tends to attack when you try to expand [it can always see you, no Fog of War for it])
-3 bunkers + 4 tanks at a choke point should be able to hold any ground assault. Terran AI with setup siege tanks though.

Another AI trait to exploit is that it will chase whatever shoots it. So if you lose most of your guys when the AI comes to your base, you can shoot with a marine and then run him around the map while you rebuild.

 

[OVerLoRDI]

If you are playing terran a solid basic strategy is seige tanks and marines. If you have the battle chest install broodwar, there isn't a reason not to play broodwar. Broodwar will give you medics which make using tanks and marines a lot easier.