Starcraft 2 Closed Beta: this month.

[GameHat]

I'm so excited I'm shaking.

Blizzard Entertainment president Michael Morhaime has revealed today that StarCraft II will enter closed beta later this month and is targeted for a mid-2010 release.

"We're slated to begin beta testing later this month. The beta test will be conducted on a global scale including thousands of testers from North America, Europe, Korea, Taiwan Australia, and New Zealand," he said during today's earnings conference call.

"We expect a tremendous response from our players and we're eager to enter this stage of development as we enter the final stretch before release," he continued, right before adding that Blizzard hopes the closed beta will generate "excitement" for the title PC gamers (http://www.destructoid.com/starcraft-ii-to-enter-closed-beta-later-this-month-163237.phtml)

When they announced Starcraft 2 in 2007, I stayed up late just to watch the announcement. When "Marine status: Active" flashed and the Korean crowd roared I stood up and cheered as well.

It's been a brutal wait. And to tell the truth, I went from anxious, to impatient, to angry, to disgusted with the long dev time. But fuck, all those old feelings of joy just came flooding back.

It's coming. God help me if I make it into the beta, I'll weep.

Starcraft 2 is going to be epic

[Left Hand of Dorkness]

Fuck. Yeah.

One of my earliest Internet experiences was posting on Blizzard's messageboard in the leadup to the first Starcraft. I and another guy vied with one another to answer posters' questions with the most interestingly false information we could come up with. It was a lot of fun (and, I hope, entertained more than it irritated).

The long wait time is a given with Blizzard; that doesn't worry me. I'm just thrilled that it's coming out. Games from Blizzard are some of the very few games I'll buy on the day of release. And midyear is perfect for a teacher! :D

[GameHat]

I believe this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUXoekeDIW8) is feed from the proper reveal.

Still gives me a chill.

Also, if any Korean-speaking dopers want to give me a literal translation on the text or what Tychus says (in the English trailer, it's "Hell....it's about time.") I'd appreciate it ;D

[BMada]

can you give the phonetic english of what he said? I could barely make out what the guy said the first part was something like DaelDiOh all echoed and the second part that i could make out meant "it's coming" Ohwelgiwakkum. No idea what DaelDiOh is too muffled and beyond my Korean comprehension.

the female voice said something like Choom Bee, which means "get ready" or "prepare" but making out the whole saying is hard because of the echoed effect.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELhtXtnV3pg&feature=related

english version

[GameHat]

can you give the phonetic english of what he said? I could barely make out what the guy said the first part was something like DaelDiOh all echoed and the second part that i could make out meant "it's coming" Ohwelgiwakkum. No idea what DaelDiOh is too muffled and beyond my Korean comprehension.

the female voice said something like Choom Bee, which means "get ready" or "prepare" but making out the whole saying is hard because of the echoed effect.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELhtXtnV3pg&feature=related

english version

Yeah, I know what they say in the English version. That's all I can speak or understand ;D

It's simply from a linguistic curiousity that I wonder how the Korean version translates.

And for those wondering, "Why Korean?" - SC was big in the US, but it is and was HUGE in Korea. I give props to Blizzard for showing the reveal in Korea. The Koreans deserve it.

This was probably ten years ago, but I remember reading a stat that claimed SC sold more total copies in Korea than it did in the USA.

Particularly impressive when you consider that the US population is like 6x the population of South Korea.

[BMada]

I've heard a couple of Korean translated voice acting for WoW, forgot the boss' name but it's second guy in BWL the big dragon dude. I was impressed by the voice acting in Korean, although I didn't really understand everything he said. I prefer the English voice acting though because, at least i can fully understand what is being said.

The Korean in that SC2 trailer clip is pretty much close translations to the ones they write for in english. They'll use whatever they need to, to make it similar. They'll even use Korean phonetic English. Like zergling, it's ChugLinguh and Hydra they say heedra. Most "new" english words are pretty much translated that way anyways. Phonetic Korean.

[GameHat]

can you give the phonetic english of what he said?

sorry, my earlier post probably seems a bit dismissive.

I simply can't try an English phonetic, I just don't have an ear for the Korean language.

Thanks for your input, what you posted seems very relevant for what might have been said.

[BMada]

it's better to get a phonetic version of what you heard because you have no real bias in what you are hearing. All you hear are sounds and those sounds could help me somewhat, since i try to hear something that really isn't there. Again, I doubt you can hear something more than I can due to the echoed effect that muffles the speech terribly in the Korean version, where as the English version it's so clean and not muffled with computerized effects to make it sound cooler than it already is.

btw my korean isn't uber good. I can make out common sayings and such but if they use words like Hell, which I dont really know the korean word is. I have the old school english to korean dictionaries at hand but I doubt I can get a good translation due to the poor sound quality.

[Chronos]

This is big news. Everyone always talks about how Blizzard releases are always late, but Blizzard knows that, too, and so has the good sense to not actually announce release dates until they're pretty damn sure. All of the "scheduled release dates" that they repeatedly miss just come from the rumor mill, not from Blizzard themselves. The fact that they are in fact actually announcing a date now means that it really is genuinely close, not just rumored to be close.

[GameHat]

Sweet Jesus, beta just went live. Check your battle.net account to see if you got in.

I didn't.

:(

But I'm still excited!

:D

[Chronos]

Any word yet on what the sysreqs will be? I'm about due to buy a new computer anyway, and of course I'll want to make sure it's compatible.

[Palooka]

The beta minimum:

* Windows XP SP3/Vista SP1/Windows 7
* 2.2 Ghz Pentium IV or equivalent AMD Athlon processor
* 1 GB system RAM/1.5 GB for Vista and Windows 7
* 128 MB NVidia GeForce 6600 GT/ATI Radeon 9800 PRO video card
* 1024x768 minimum display resolution
* 4 GB free hard space (Beta)
* Broadband connection

So, basically a top-end machine from six years ago.

[GameHat]

The beta minimum:

* Windows XP SP3/Vista SP1/Windows 7
* 2.2 Ghz Pentium IV or equivalent AMD Athlon processor
* 1 GB system RAM/1.5 GB for Vista and Windows 7
* 128 MB NVidia GeForce 6600 GT/ATI Radeon 9800 PRO video card
* 1024x768 minimum display resolution
* 4 GB free hard space (Beta)
* Broadband connection

So, basically a top-end machine from six years ago.

heh.

Blizzard has always pushed its art department to do better rather than push gamers to upgrade their hardware. The crazy-low specs are a testament to this philosophy.

Hell, WoW still looks pretty good and it's what, six years old now? I'll take good art direction over envelope-pushing effects any day.

[BMada]

I'll take good art direction over envelope-pushing effects any day.

more like I'll take uber awesome gameplay over anything else.

[Chronos]

What's the source for that? I'm more interested in the Mac requirements. Still, the fact that the Windows requirements are that low is encouraging.

Ideally, I want to get something that'll also support Diablo III, but I'll almost certainly be buying before the requirements for that are known, so I'll have to cross my fingers there.

[Palooka]

Source: Blizzard's support site (http://us.blizzard.com/support/article.xml?locale=en_US&articleId=26242&parentCategoryId&pageNumber=1&categoryId=3633)

What hardware do you run right now?

[Chronos]

My desktop (where I am right now) is a dual 867 MHz G4 with 512 Megs of RAM. My laptop is also a G4, with IIRC a single 1.2 GHz processor and 512 Megs. I wouldn't really expect either of them to run it, but like I say, I'm about due for a new one anyway.

[GameHat]

God, I'm checking my email and Battle.net account every 15 minutes.

I so want in on this beta. I know the odds, and they aren't good.

But I've waited so long (/cry)

I need this game. Starcraft was the defining game of my life from release until about 2002.

[Chronos]

Correction: 768 Megs on the laptop.

[Palooka]

Apparently someone has figured out how to hack the beta so non-beta folks can watch replays with the client. That's almost like playing it.

[Jragon]

I'm in the Beta and there's a post on the forums saying we're not barred from saying anything. So... ask away!

[BMada]

Is there a single player campaign worth playing? or is it more a testing of Battle.net capabilities.

How is the gameplay like? Something similar to twitch reflexes like SC1? I thought I read somewhere that SC2 is supposed to be more strategic and less Actions per minute (apm) reflexes that pro-gamers from Korea have. That'll be awesome for the aging gamer with slower reaction times.

Are the graphics as good as the replays show? I saw some terran units dancing with a /dance command. Do toss and zerg dance too?

Damn you're so lucky.

[Palooka]

I'm in the Beta and there's a post on the forums saying we're not barred from saying anything. So... ask away!What's your Battle.net username and password?

Serious: what's your rank/league?

[Autolycus]

How's the balance seem so far? I'm also curious about the tempo. Are the games still fast-paced?

[Jragon]

Is there a single player campaign worth playing? or is it more a testing of Battle.net capabilities.

It's Battle.net only. There's a sort of beta ladder right now, ranks go from Practice (which you can opt out of) to bronze, copper... etc, to Platinum rank. You can play against computer players, but right now there only seems to be very easy level available, though that may be because I'm in the practice bracket, I'll check again when I "graduate."

Very Easy is, indeed, very freaking easy. Like, the enemy doesn't seem to tech past tier 2, sometimes tier 1.5. I've never seen them build an air unit.

How is the gameplay like? Something similar to twitch reflexes like SC1? I thought I read somewhere that SC2 is supposed to be more strategic and less Actions per minute (apm) reflexes that pro-gamers from Korea have. That'll be awesome for the aging gamer with slower reaction times.

Well, obviously there's still that bit of twitch that's inherent in any RTS, simply because the faster you can place a building the faster you can get units. It actually seems sped up a tad. That's not to say it's not strategic, but for a given game speed setting units seem to both build faster and die faster. Build orders are very important.

Unit management-wise it seems to have balanced Starcraft (almost all macro) with Warcraft (almost all micro), almost every unit has an ability, but not to an insane degree. Most of the abilities are either autocast or toggle (think Siege Tank Deploy), except the usual "tech" units like the Ghost.

Are the graphics as good as the replays show? I saw some terran units dancing with a /dance command. Do toss and zerg dance too?

The graphics are quite good. I did not know there were slash commands, I'll have to check that. Thanks for the heads up.

Some other miscellaneous things:

I'm not sure what's been balanced out and what's simply not finished. For instance, the Protoss mothership, as of now, is an Arbiter for all intents and purposes. Literally, it has every ability that an arbiter has, the same slow weak attack and none of the cool reality-bending stuff we saw in the preview.

Terran seem... squishy for some reason, things die faster in this game in general but Terran are very, very hit and run. Almost any unit that's not a Thor will not stand up to any extended damage. I'm not very good so I can't really comment on balance right now, but Terran seem like a race you'll need to micro a lot more than the others. That's not to say they're poor, I just got my ass handed to me by the Terran, they just don't seem to play too easily for me.

Terran in general seem weaker somehow. Nukes are still in, but they're quite downplayed. They still incinerate units to an absurd degree, but buildings shrug off nukes pretty well, usually only taking around 1/4th HP damage. Of course, remember this is all still being balanced, I'm just commenting on now. On the other hand, Terran shine at splash even more now, a tight group of units will not get past a moderate sized Terran force.

One cool thing is that there's a "build order" tab after a battle now, so you can see exactly what your enemy built and when, compared to you. It seems a little buggy unless there are already hacks somehow. For instance, I just played my first multi match after dicking around to see units vs computer and when I attacked the enemy's base with my army of zealots, stalkers, and immortals he already had 3 Thors out, I didn't even really see any Tier 3 buildings on the build order, nor did I see any unit past marine on it. It was presumably done in the gap where it doesn't report him doing anything for 6 minutes.

Serious: what's your rank/league?

I just found it today, logging into Bnet. It showed the SCII Beta under "My Games" and I just kind of said "oh... that's kinda awesome." I'm still in the practice league. I never was very good at Starcraft, so if you're looking for in-depth analysis of the evolving metagame I'd be happy to tell you the scuttlebutt on the forums, but I'm not the person for up-to-the-minute strategy info.

How's the balance seem so far? I'm also curious about the tempo. Are the games still fast-paced?

Tempo answered a few quotes above. Balance is fine from what I can tell on the forums. It seems that right now most people play Protoss/Zerg but Terran aren't "down and out," sort of a rotation of the SC1 concept of "Zerg and Terran, then Protoss."

Edit: Oh, and rushing, while effective, isn't QUITE so much anymore. It's mostly agreed that until you have one or two T1.5 units (Roaches for Zerg for instance) that a rush will most likely get trampled by any player who knows what he's doing. Protoss are the exception, not that in a Zealot rush is effective, but rather that Protoss tech slightly faster and can get Immortals (T2) faster, whereas Stalkers are considered nice, but not good enough auxiliary support for a full raid.

[BMada]

If you guys are trying to find a site to scratch the SC2 itch, Youtube HuskyStarcraft uploads and commentates SC2 matches.

http://www.youtube.com/user/HuskyStarcraft

[Jragon]

Oh man, I just watched my first replay. I was close. If I hadn't waited for my second immortal I would have won, he got his Thors the second I got to his base.

[Commander Keen]

I think I might have mentioned him on the forums before, but one of my best friends from college is a competitive Starcraft player. It actually wouldn't be an exaggeration to say he's one of the best players in North America--he represented the US at the World Cyber Games multiple times, and I believe he won the WGC Pan-American championships at least one of the years that we were in college. Anyway, his knowledge of the game's mechanics and strategy are beyond anything I've ever seen. Although I've played it a bunch, my knowledge of Starcraft doesn't go much beyond attack/move, but I spent hours discussing the game and watching replays with him, and it's entertaining as hell.

Anyway he's been doing a live cast of professional Starcraft games with his commentary for the past several months, and recently he's been doing commentary on SC2 replays, along the lines of what BMada posted (I'm not sure how much Day9 and HuskyStarcraft differ in style or in what they focus on, not having watched the latter at all). It might be cool to check out if you want to see some opinions from a very competitive, strategy-focused viewpoint. Here's the index where you can watch saved casts: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=104154 (Starcraft 2 stuff is mostly since mid-February)

[Tabby_Cat]

Your friend. Is Day9.



envy

[Jragon]

Okay, I'm 1 for 8 today. Did I mention I'm not very good? From what I can tell both from my own experience and that on the forums is that Zerg are a tad bit overpowered through their versatility right now. Specifically a hydralisk army (which requires 2 buildings, 3 if you add in an unrelated one most Zerg players would probably build) embarrasses almost anything. The Protoss counter seems to be Zealots with charge (Zealots are T1, but charge is T2 at least, and most Protoss will opt for immortals thereby wasting resources before then), and if you don't want to get ripped apart, Colossi as well. Colossi are T3. Terran apparently means you need a crap load of marines, preferable with the healing transport and possibly a Raven.

I can't comment too well on Terran, but for Protoss this is difficult. You're essentially teching to T3 to counter a T1 (1.5?). It also doesn't help that if the Zerg are allowed to establish their economy at all, it will probably be near impossible to win, since their universal unit system allows them to build a good 18 or so of them at once (and yes, many Zerg do indeed build that many lairs). Of course, the counter if you're really, really dilligant with your colossi is to simply build a spire and build mutalisks when they've beaten your army. By that point the Protoss player have probably teched so specifically and poured so many resources in the aforementioned units to counter the hydras it would be incredibly prohibitive to switch to anti-air, while the Zerg can do it with a single building.

That's not to say PvZ or TvZ is impossible by any means, but hydralisks are a wee bit strong right now it seems.

[Spectralist]

You can play against computer players, but right now there only seems to be very easy level available, though that may be because I'm in the practice bracket, I'll check again when I "graduate."
It's only got very easy throughout. I vaguely recall Blizzard saying something about not wanting to rewrite the AI after every change so they're waiting till it's more stable.


Terran in general seem weaker somehow. Nukes are still in, but they're quite downplayed. They still incinerate units to an absurd degree, but buildings shrug off nukes pretty well, usually only taking around 1/4th HP damage.

The only unit with that much health is a Hive. Any non main building will fall in 2 nukes, the main buildings other than Lair will be so low the ghosts can finish them off after 2, a Lair will fall in 3, and a Hive can be finished in a few seconds of ghost fire after 3 nukes.

I love ghosts. :) The ability to get nukes without needing a special add on for your CC is great and them not taking a load of food and resources is even better. The ghosts are more pricey than the nukes now.

[Spectralist]

Hydras are Tier 2 now. Hydra Den requires a Lair. And they take 2 food now. They also no longer have a move speed upgrade. Terran can destroy them utterly with Hellions with preigniter upgrade. Siege tanks are also very useful on them and Thors deal enough damage to one shot a Hydra that is not significantly more upgraded than itself.

I usually go DTs against Hydras as Protoss. Overlords aren't detectors anymore, they have to be individually upgraded to Overseers, and most Zerg players just don't expect DTs. Plus Archons do bonus damage to organic so if they do get a detector you can quickly switch to Archons. Though Archons splash radius has been decreased greatly. And, of course, Psi Storm from the High Templars is also very effective. Especially if you have some Sentries, and you should, to use Force Field to funnel/block the Hydras. Other than that Zealots and Sentries(with the damage reduction spell, cant remember what it's called) can do fairly well and is cheap on gas so you can make some Void Rays to harass their base from behind.

[Mekhazzio]

Hydras are indeed a nicely versatile unit now that they've been bumped up to tier 2, but there's nothing they particularly excel at, either. Marines and zealots just by themselves can more than hold their own against hydras until, like every other long-ranged unit, the hydras reach their critical mass where every incoming attacker is instantly killed by the focused fire. The catch to that is that without their SC1 speed, hydras have barely any ability to cope with the AOE from tanks, storm, colossi or even fungal growth. They mainly appeal because every race has an early, potent air to ground flier now, not just zerg.

So far it seems a decent enough game, but I have to admit some surprise at how much of a retread it is. I realize that Starcraft is a sacred cow that they don't dare to alter much, but this is practically the same game with an only slightly less crude UI. It's more like a Gold update than a real sequel. Aside from the extremely solid technical backend (the engine, pathfinding & networking are all excellent) this game would not have been out of place in 1999. The RTS genre has branched out in a lot of ways since then and all of that has been ignored. Blizzard isn't usually this iterative.

[Jragon]

Hydras are Tier 2 now. Hydra Den requires a Lair. And they take 2 food now. They also no longer have a move speed upgrade. Terran can destroy them utterly with Hellions with preigniter upgrade. Siege tanks are also very useful on them and Thors deal enough damage to one shot a Hydra that is not significantly more upgraded than itself.

I usually go DTs against Hydras as Protoss. Overlords aren't detectors anymore, they have to be individually upgraded to Overseers, and most Zerg players just don't expect DTs.
I did not know that.

MWAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Plus Archons do bonus damage to organic so if they do get a detector you can quickly switch to Archons. Though Archons splash radius has been decreased greatly. And, of course, Psi Storm from the High Templars is also very effective. Especially if you have some Sentries, and you should, to use Force Field to funnel/block the Hydras. Other than that Zealots and Sentries(with the damage reduction spell, cant remember what it's called) can do fairly well and is cheap on gas so you can make some Void Rays to harass their base from behind.

The problem I have with the HT counter is that you have to get the archives and then still research Psi Storm (which takes more than a few seconds, even with boost). And the problem is that you can never be sure the Zerg is going mass Hydra, if they have a lot of roaches that strategy doesn't necessarily work as well.

[Jragon]

I did not know that.

MWAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Let me rephrase that, I thought of the DT counter, but I did not know that only overseers had detection.

[Mekhazzio]

The problem I have with the HT counter is that you have to get the archives and then still research Psi Storm (which takes more than a few seconds, even with boost). And the problem is that you can never be sure the Zerg is going mass Hydra, if they have a lot of roaches that strategy doesn't necessarily work as well.You "can never be sure"? The templar archive is so far down the tech tree that you'll have had ample opportunity to check out what your opponent is doing by then, and probably rather a lot of combat with them to boot. You will know what they've invested in before you've built HT capability, and it doesn't much matter what they switch to afterward, because the templar is useful against almost everything Zerg, including roaches -- not that anybody in their right mind would even touch roaches in tier 3 against Protoss in the first place. The problem with the templar vs zerg is not that they're not effective, it's that you're already going down the robotics route for observers and the threat of immortals & colossi, leaving templar with not much of a niche left to fill.

This is brushing against one of the weaknesses, as I see it, of Starcraft. There's so much to the game that's unintuitive to beginning players, from the huge worker counts needed to reach full efficiency to the potency of any and every unchecked attack that most players never actually get to the level of play where the details actually affect the game, like what roles are served by which units and how that changes with the way they're controlled by the player. These details wind up being red herrings, generating questions about, say, "how to deal with mass hydra" when the actual hurdle is scouting and matching economy and army placement. The entire bottom three brackets of the ladder are sorted out based mostly by who makes more workers, spends the the largest percentage of their income, and attacks first. The bits that make the game Starcraft don't even come into play.

[Jragon]

You "can never be sure"? The templar archive is so far down the tech tree that you'll have had ample opportunity to check out what your opponent is doing by then, and probably rather a lot of combat with them to boot. You will know what they've invested in before you've built HT capability, and it doesn't much matter what they switch to afterward, because the templar is useful against almost everything Zerg, including roaches -- not that anybody in their right mind would even touch roaches in tier 3 against Protoss in the first place. The problem with the templar vs zerg is not that they're not effective, it's that you're already going down the robotics route for observers and the threat of immortals & colossi, leaving templar with not much of a niche left to fill.

This is brushing against one of the weaknesses, as I see it, of Starcraft. There's so much to the game that's unintuitive to beginning players, from the huge worker counts needed to reach full efficiency to the potency of any and every unchecked attack that most players never actually get to the level of play where the details actually affect the game, like what roles are served by which units and how that changes with the way they're controlled by the player. These details wind up being red herrings, generating questions about, say, "how to deal with mass hydra" when the actual hurdle is scouting and matching economy and army placement. The entire bottom three brackets of the ladder are sorted out based mostly by who makes more workers, spends the the largest percentage of their income, and attacks first. The bits that make the game Starcraft don't even come into play.

And this is why I never play multiplayer in games that's not co-op. Ever. Not FPSs or RTSs or anything else, because I can never grok these things. I hear what people are saying in these threads but I have no idea how to execute them. I've literally never played a ladder or random match in Starcraft of WCIII (well, I did a couple times in WCIII, but by that time every "new" player was a pro who made a new account to dick around with the level 1s). I don't even know basic build orders, nor do I know how to scout with Protoss (whenever I build an observer I never have enough for more combat units and get stomped from being crippled JUST by not having that one extra unit or so). I didn't know until last night that you could even have more than one probe on a single mineral node. In SCI I never even beat an easy computer player without cheats.

[BMada]

And this is why I never play multiplayer in games that's not co-op. Ever. Not FPSs or RTSs or anything else, because I can never grok these things. I hear what people are saying in these threads but I have no idea how to execute them. I've literally never played a ladder or random match in Starcraft of WCIII (well, I did a couple times in WCIII, but by that time every "new" player was a pro who made a new account to dick around with the level 1s). I don't even know basic build orders, nor do I know how to scout with Protoss (whenever I build an observer I never have enough for more combat units and get stomped from being crippled JUST by not having that one extra unit or so). I didn't know until last night that you could even have more than one probe on a single mineral node. In SCI I never even beat an easy computer player without cheats.

and they give you a Beta key? lol, j/k

I used to be ranked in the earlier days of SC1 ladder when the games were forced to be at "fast" speed and not "fastest". Hearing how this game is nothing revolutionary in terms of new gameplay kinda makes me a bit sad. There's nothing wrong with a better version of SC1, but I had higher hopes of greater things.

[Jragon]

and they give you a Beta key? lol, j/k

I'd give it to use if it wasn't against the TOS, I only play Blizzard RTS games for the custom maps and campaigns, and even then, if custom maps get too meta (DOTA) I won't play them because I simply cannot play anything that has a metagame.

[Jragon]

Okay, here's a link to my latest replay: http://www.mediafire.com/file/2t2tynumwm1/PvZ%20Jsor.SC2Replay

(Sorry, I'm not a good enough RTS cameraman to make a video for you non-having people)

I think I'm getting better, maybe. At least I won this time. I'm Protoss, of course.

[Jragon]

Or not, here's my new last one vs Terran. I had no idea what he was doing, even after scouting, so I lost. http://www.mediafire.com/file/1jyom1twwj1/PvT%20Jsor.SC2Replay

[Mekhazzio]

I'm a replay junkie, so I checked those out.

There's really just one reason you lost that matchup versus Terran - you got outproduced. You never saw his base on the high-yield minerals way down southwest. Even your small initial force could've wiped it out at virtually any point, because he was just sitting his army inside his main base for most of the game. This gave him a decided resource advantage, which was made worse because you didn't spend your own resources. When you surrendered, you still had over 4000 minerals in the bank. That is an awfully large potential army. However, even that late in the game, and as behind as you were, because he was focusing on an almost entirely pure bio force, since you'd already gotten the two colossi out, simply using those minerals to crank out a pile of zealots to block for the colossi would've almost certainly been able to wipe him out completely. The fat lady had not sung for you yet. He was no stronger of a player than you were, and like the zerg player before him, his gambit of swarming basic units could backfire spectacularly. He just pushed buttons a little more than you did.

At the starter level you really just have two goals. First, get a lot of income, which means 2 workers per mineral cluster, 3 per gas extractor, and probably an early expansion (doubling your worker count) since everyone in the lower brackets plays passively and will rarely find or attack it. Second, spend every single bit of your income. Your goal is to be at zero minerals and zero gas at all times. What you spend it on almost doesn't even matter. Simply spending it and making a move with your huge pile of units is the key.

[ProfessorX]

Or not, here's my new last one vs Terran. I had no idea what he was doing, even after scouting, so I lost. http://www.mediafire.com/file/1jyom1twwj1/PvT%20Jsor.SC2Replay

Nice man, thanks for posting these. Always love to see people outside of the video game sphere playing. I think it gives me a better understanding of how I'm going to play the game.

[Jragon]

Nice man, thanks for posting these. Always love to see people outside of the video game sphere playing. I think it gives me a better understanding of how I'm going to play the game.

I'm not outside the video game sphere, I'm out of the competitive ladder sphere.

[Mekhazzio]

I'm not outside the video game sphere, I'm out of the competitive ladder sphere.The beauty of the new system they've got going for SC2's battle.net is that the ladder is fully populated with everything from the crazy Korean pro to the guy who's just starting multiplayer RTS games. It seems to do a pretty good job at giving people even matchups to play....a lot more so than Warcraft 3 did. I'm not too impressed by SC2's gameplay but the backend they've got looks really good.

[Windwalker]

So does anyone ever play this game at a slow speed? I think that's the only possible way I could enjoy multiplayer...

[Spectralist]

So does anyone ever play this game at a slow speed? I think that's the only possible way I could enjoy multiplayer...

Nope. All ladder games are at Faster speed and there isn't much in the way of non ladder games going on at the moment. Some commentators comment on the "Fast" speed. But I think that's just because it's the default for the replay viewer. No one plays on that speed. Outside of the 5 newbie games you can play before your placement matches anyway. Those games are only on Fast.

According to the dev chat (http://forums.battle.net/thread.html?topicId=23767157319&sid=3000) released yesterday the editor might see the light of day in April. Yay. Now if only we could get some info on the model format/editor/converter/however the hell they're going to make it so we can import our custom graphics so I could get started making some graphics for the maps I want to make. Hopefully it'll be a simple plugin for Max like in wc3. Or just a converter from a common model format or something like that.

[Palooka]

So does anyone ever play this game at a slow speed? I think that's the only possible way I could enjoy multiplayer...The main goal of the new Battle.net system is to make multiplayer fun for people at your level by matching you against other people at your level.

[GameHat]

Wow.

Just wow.

I was infuriated when Gamestop began handing out beta keys. I had already pre-ordered from Amazon!

I went to bed disgusted.

Woke up, brushed my teeth, took a shower, went to work. Everything seemed a dull shade of gray.

I glumly logged into my personal e-mail.

Hm? A message from Amazon?

What's that in the subject line?

Your Beta Access Code for Pre-ordering "StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty" at Amazon.com

:eek:

:eek:

:eek:

Holy fucking God, I'm in. Along with thousands of others, I'm sure. But I still feel special.

It's installing now. I'm twitchy just watching the torrent.

It's on, fools.

:D

[Palooka]

The EB guy told me that they ran out of keys.

[Spectralist]

Yay. The editor came out yesterday. It's rather awkward to use though.

[GameHat]

We've got a release date!

7.27.2010 (http://us.blizzard.com/en-us/company/press/pressreleases.html?100503)

Get ready guys, the beta so far has been great fun. The SC1 feel is still very much there but games are even more fast and fluid. They can turn on a dime.

Don't worry about this being a SC1 rehash, it's not. I'd say for any of the three races maybe 20%-30% feels familiar, the rest is very new.

Even the beta so far is polished to a mirror shine, I can't wait to see what they've done with single player.

It's going to be good. Very good.

[Palooka]

I got into the beta this weekend and I'm so bad. I haven't played an RTS since the concepts for macro and micro were invented.

I should probably just do my placement matches, but I keep doing macro practice against the AI. :\

[GameHat]

I got into the beta this weekend and I'm so bad. I haven't played an RTS since the concepts for macro and micro were invented.

I should probably just do my placement matches, but I keep doing macro practice against the AI. :\

Only play the AI until you learn the basics of whatever race you want to play. The compy AI is limited to "Very Easy" in the beta so they will pretty much just sit back and wait for you to roll them. You won't learn anything.

It's scary, but just jump into ladder matches. Yep, you'll lose. A lot. But after every game watch the replay, check the economic graph and check out the guy's build order. That way you can see how you got beat. You'll learn very quickly this way. SC2 is great for giving you a ton of info after every match; take advantage of it.

[Palooka]

I see how fast I can get to like 150 and then 1a2a3a the AI.

It's so hard to keep my minerals low, not miss an SCV, not miss a supply depot, transfer my SCVs when I expand. Nevermind scouting, harassing, microing, and countering.

[magnusblitz]

I wish they could just release it on 7/30 instead. After the bar exam.

[GameHat]

I see how fast I can get to like 150 and then 1a2a3a the AI.

It's so hard to keep my minerals low, not miss an SCV, not miss a supply depot, transfer my SCVs when I expand. Nevermind scouting, harassing, microing, and countering.

Take 1 SCV early to scout. Hit all the possible bases. All you want to see is what buildings are being constructed (Roach Warren? Three early Gateways? An early Factory?) These give you hints as to what you'll be facing.

As for transferring SCVs, I'm certainly no pro but my games tend to follow this pattern for economy:


Get near the supply limit early
Start building early unit-constructing buildings
Continue supplementing SCVs (or probes, or drones) at main base
Maybe midway take the natural expo
Build all workers for natural expo from natural expo, supplementing from main base


Usually for me it's only when my original base is running empty (and I mean down to a few crystal patches) that I take a third expo. And then transferring is easy - just select 'em all and go. I usually don't sweat leaving a few hundred crystal on the ground.

As for supply depots, I'm way behind optimal. I tend to build in bursts. First when I hit that first supply limit, then whenever I'm getting near the limit.

Of course, as Terran you can always block your choke with depots without much of a downside (God Bless their new ability to hide underground). This usually prompts you to build more than you need early and as a plus is a reasonable defense to early lings and zealots.

[Palooka]

TLQ's Chill told everyone that first you need to worry about making a lot of stuff. After you get that down, you should focus on making the right stuff for what you're facing.

I've been doing the wall-in stuff so far. I was busy tonight but tomorrow I'll run my placement matches and report back. Based on this low-level community tournament I've been watching, I have to be at least silver already.

[Phatlewt]

Any doper players interested in some unofficial matches? The more I lose to better players, the better I'll become. :) Same goes for you, if I happen to be better than you.

(I ain't very good. Around rank 50 in my bronze 1v1 ladder.)

[Gukumatz]

Dunno if it's an open fact, but there's a release date for SC2 now - 27th of July. And man am I looking forward to it!

(If it's old news, please forgive. I broke my leg a few weeks ago and have effectively been isolated from the web.)

[Mr. Excellent]

I wish they could just release it on 7/30 instead. After the bar exam.

Slight hijack, but - good luck, magnusblitz!

And, for what it's worth - I'd actually recommend taking it relatively easy a few days before the exam. No harm in taking the day before you head to New York (or wherever your bar is) to play some Starcraft. You're going to be spending the whole summer prepping, after all.

-Mr. Excellent, Esq.

[Palooka]

What is Blizzard doing to this game? The core is solid enough, but all of the ancillary parts like Battle.net are getting worse with every patch.

[Phatlewt]

Every time they add a new feature, it makes it more likely to have problems. I'm bummed to not be playing now, but that's life in a beta.

[Hamadryad]

I'm just glad I'm not the only one who can't get in tonight and is feeling whiny about it. "It's Beta, this is what Beta is for." I know, I know!

[Palooka]

I didn't so much mean the server problems as how ridiculous the friends list is.

[Mekhazzio]

I didn't so much mean the server problems as how ridiculous the friends list is.Yeah, this part is baffling. The design for the new battle.net is incredible in its total lack of usability. As of this current version, you cannot do anything at all in the game with anybody not on your friends list outside of the random match system. There are currently only three ways to add someone to your friends list: use their email address with their real name and other immense amount of information the "Real ID" system gives to everyone, use the facebook friends list to perform the same function, or to encounter them inside the game in some way like being in a random match, or being in the same ladder division as you. This last method is currently the only way to NOT open up RealID.

This means that unless you're willing to give out your battle.net account email address and all the attendant privacy issues of the RealID system, it is near on impossible to communicate with or play the game with someone. Their 'social' system is as effective as a brick wall at letting you socialize. It really does appear that the design team involved with this has never come within fifty miles of an online multiplayer game for the last two decades because this focus on RealID and a little walled-off experience restricted to your circle of RL friends is pretty much exactly the opposite of why anybody plays anything online.

SC2 the game is fine and dandy, and even the bnet matchmaking system is of superior quality, but when you find out how many hoops you have to jump through just to play someone you know, your jaw hits the floor. If it goes live like this they are going to be roasted.

[Chronos]

Their 'social' system is as effective as a brick wall at letting you socialize.So, Pyramus and Thisbe will have no trouble, then?

[Left Hand of Dorkness]

Yeah, but Pyramus is a Bottom-ranked player.

[Mekhazzio]

That's because he gg's at the first sign of trouble.

[Phatlewt]

Beta extended 7 days (http://www.destructoid.com/starcraft-ii-beta-close-date-bumped-back-a-week-174864.phtml)

Yay!

[Spectralist]

SC2 the game is fine and dandy, and even the bnet matchmaking system is of superior quality, but when you find out how many hoops you have to jump through just to play someone you know, your jaw hits the floor. If it goes live like this they are going to be roasted.

Agreed. Though dropping the identifier was a giant leap in the right direction. Unfortunately I've seen some posters claim that's only temporary. But none of them come up with links for where they heard it so I'm hoping they're just making it up.

[Mekhazzio]

The identifier served the useful purpose of making usernames unique while letting the "common" name be non-unique. I didn't see any problem with it, myself. It's certainly preferable to the alternatives, which are either unique short names, or the system currently in place, which is a total inability to refer to anyone by name at all.

Not that I, personally, have a problem with my desired name being already taken :D but my friends Phoenix and donut do.

[GameHat]

I believe this is the last weekend for the beta.

They reset the ladder last night.

I went 4-1 on my "new" placement matches.

Woooohoooo, Gold League!

It's gonna be a long 2.5 months from beta end till the proper release, this game is so great.

[Spectralist]

Aren't they reopening the beta a week or two before release?

Seems an odd time to end the beta with the bug where many ladder games just don't count for no discernible reason is still here. That's one I'd think they'd want to get rid off and test thoroughly since it'll piss off a lot of people come release.

[GameHat]

Hope this doesn't count as a zombie thread, but -

The beta is back open as of 7.8.2010! Proper AI opponents have been added!

...

Though, after playing a bit (all vs. AI) I'm a bit disappointed. The AI is good in direct combat, but it sucks in exploration and mounting a proper offense.

I just quit a solo Lost Temple 2v2, GameHat+AI vs. AI+AI (all AI "hard")

The AI did a handy job wiping out my partner. I held for a bit but they overwhelmed my main base and expo.

But I had shuttled an SCV to one of the corner expos. I held that expo easily with nothing but missile turrets, one battle cruiser, one viking and two ravens for at least 20 minutes.

The AI would launch sporadic weak forays, these were easily beaten back.

Sure, I would have eventually lost when the corner resources ran out. But I couldn't expand, couldn't rebuild, and any decent human player or team could have easily overwhelmed me. The stupid "hard" AI just kept throwing a few units at a time against my island fortress. Waste of time. After about 30 minutes I got bored and just surrendered.

I hope the AI gets a bit better before release (just 3 weeks!) Sure, it's not the main draw but I felt deeply disappointed that Blizzard quality couldn't produce an AI opponent that could just root me out of my fortified corner. And I was only two difficulty levels below the hardest!

Aren't they reopening the beta a week or two before release?

Seems an odd time to end the beta with the bug where many ladder games just don't count for no discernible reason is still here. That's one I'd think they'd want to get rid off and test thoroughly since it'll piss off a lot of people come release.

[Left Hand of Dorkness]

Hmm...I remember with Starcraft, I could handily beat two AI opponents by myself, but I never got good enough to beat 3 at a time. If this has the same level of difficulty for AIs, I'd be okay with that.

[Chronos]

Hmm...I remember with Starcraft, I could handily beat two AI opponents by myself, but I never got good enough to beat 3 at a time. If this has the same level of difficulty for AIs, I'd be okay with that.I never got to where I could do 1 vs. 3, but a buddy of mine and I did get to where were could more often than not beat 2 vs. 6, at least on defensively-laid-out maps.

And I've never understood why AIs have the problem that GameHat describes. It seems like pretty basic tactics to say "if a force of size X failed to win a battle, next time build up to a force of size X+Y before attacking".

You know what would be really cool? If the game were released with a modular AI, and tools for users to create or modify their own AI routines. Then, you could have tournaments between the AIs, or even enter them into the same tournaments as the human players, and every so often release a patch to make the best AIs available to everyone.

[Iubaris]

You know what would be really cool? If the game were released with a modular AI, and tools for users to create or modify their own AI routines. Then, you could have tournaments between the AIs, or even enter them into the same tournaments as the human players, and every so often release a patch to make the best AIs available to everyone.

While the beta was down, there were several AIs made by players that were actually half-decent, I hear. I believe GreenTea was one of them.

[Mekhazzio]

The AI isn't as incompetent as SC1's, but it obviously wasn't a serious point of development. The "Very Hard" does a passable job of early/mid game offense in that it'll fairly efficiently crank out a sizable force and push with it, making it reasonably useful for testing a build against that very thing. As long as you don't exploit its its vulnerability to rushes or its eagerness to fling itself against impenetrable defenses, it can teach some useful lessons in developing an economy into the midgame. The micro is inhumanly good, of course, but it falls apart on strategy and will never deviate from its pre-ordained build, making it a bit of a trap in teaching complacency.

That said, when the bnet matchmaking is as good as it is, I can't much blame them for not worrying too much about AI. Not even the hobbyists can invest enough time to make one really competitive with even mid-level human players. The AI fills its niche of basic mechanics play well enough, but all the real play should and easily can be done against other players.

[Phatlewt]

I haven't noticed the Very Hard AI really microing at all, other than general attack/retreat.