Xel'Newbie Watchtower

Sabre0001

I'm sure (hopeful) that there are other beginners out there like me. Maybe this thread could be used for quick-and-easy Q&As...Maybe it will be used by me once and then will die away


I tried out Zerg as a distraction from study but there was too much going on. And they seem to rely on micro which is not good for me as I'm only getting started with Starcraft. I've gone with Protoss; they seem interesting, have some handy units and tech, and look cool - the last part is all that matters though really isn't it!

Trying to learn some builds (and the basic functions, combinations, etc) and doing hotkeys as much as possible - might as well learn correctly. Haven't played online - will probably stick to co-operative matches with another beginner friend / maybe other beginners for a while.

Questions:
Is there such a thing as too many worker units?

How do you know if a mineral field is "saturated" or whether you should get more workers?....or perhaps even expand.

APM - Somewhat important I suppose. Anyone can spam between two hotkeys (as I have proven in recent replays )...but how do you keep it high while actually being productive with it?

Daenad

The answer to the first question is yes, which is why you may notice some pro players suiciding their workers in the late game. For low league players though you shouldn't have to worry about that as with forgetting to make workers continuously and other bad macro it is unlikely this will become a problem.

As for worker saturation if theres more than 3 on a patch its saturated, expand whenever its safe to do so and heres a pretty graph for you.

As for APM don't worry about it, it will increase as your skill increases. The optimal APM is whatever gets you to do what you need to do when you do it. At the start my APM is 10-20, in battle it can be 150-180, both allow me to do what I have to do at those times.
The answer to improving is practice, so that your hands do it without thinking. I use the grid setup so I don't have to move my hand as much and also am less likely to mis-key (I still do though).

Yurple

wow this thread has helped me so much! before reading this i just pumped out workers like there was no tomorrow.. i even had over 10 per gas building.. i realised only 3 is enough now and they are just as fast as 10!!!!!

thank you!

Sabre0001

And after that loss, I have learned that I need to study other tech trees hard! It's one thing scouting....it's another knowing what you see / are scouting for.

And also, use scouts that are unseen - Had observers in good positions but didn't really check in on them.

My final lesson was - if I am going to spend the 100min on a pylon in his base, I should be ruthless enough to just port in and storm the place

Need to get better at the see-and-react element rather than just working away - i.e. see lots of marines, build proper counter - see him going for expansion, threaten it / expand.



Also, I do like pretty graphs! Need to print out tech trees and write down what the requirements (min/gas) are for each thing.

Grimebox

When building workers for your expo's...

I always have each nexus rallied to its nearest mineral field unless its mined out in which case I will have it rallied to the next nearest field. All nexus are binded to 4 or whatever so I can quickly build multiple probes if needed. One thing I noticed when watching this video though: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5jhYCWnj1k&feature=sub

If you skip to 10:50, he has all his nexus rallied to the gold, is this bad? I think so but he seems to know what he's talking about. I would prefer to transfer probes at appropriate times them have them all rallied to a single expo. Am I wrong?

seraphimvc

it depends. what usually you do is whenever you do an expo is that you transfer some workers(usually 5-10, again this is depends on what phase the game is at) to the expo and you start to make some workers to resaturate both bases.

sometimes you do a mass workers transfer to an expo due to you were busy in the battle or like your main is mined out or like you were forced to play one base but you keep making workers thus the main is oversaturated(which can happens so easily if you are toss).

edit:after i watched hd's video.
it makes sense - why he did that all rally to gold. he intended to let the main slowly mine out(only leaving a few probes behind), he probably make a few probes to resaturate the nat(to compensate the transfer) and he wanna saturate the gold asap. bare in mind HD's main race is zerg and his way of worker transfer is kinda 'zerg-like'. from my experience playing toss (i main zerg btw), i always saturate the main before i expo so i always mass transfer probes to the new expo when it is done. and xelnaga's gold has a nice distance between the nat and main can have some influence too(i wouldnt rally to a far gold unless in late game).

Sabre0001

As I said in another thread, I hotkey key Pylons so I can flick to them...but how do I get the camera to alternate between them?

i.e. I hit 8,8 to see the last Pylon added to group (likely mid battlefield) but my base is being attacked - is there a way to view the one that is closest (besides spacebar...this may not have been the best example!)

Jonny7

Sabre0001 wrote: »

As I said in another thread, I hotkey key Pylons so I can flick to them...but how do I get the camera to alternate between them?

i.e. I hit 8,8 to see the last Pylon added to group (likely mid battlefield) but my base is being attacked - is there a way to view the one that is closest (besides spacebar...this may not have been the best example!)

Try backspace.. hard to reach though, so I bind a button on my mouse to backspace, use that to flick between zerg hatcheries fast for injection, haven't tried it with pylons yet.

Next patch should have bindable custom keys.. mmm so nice

B0X

Jonny7 wrote: »

Try backspace.. hard to reach though, so I bind a button on my mouse to backspace, use that to flick between zerg hatcheries fast for injection, haven't tried it with pylons yet.

Next patch should have bindable custom keys.. mmm so nice

When doing the inject larva you can just click on the general area of your hatch on the mini map, I think it's faster than looking at each one while doing it.

e.g. : I set all my queens to number 2 and just spam "2 v v v v etc" on the map. It's handy enough for keeping an eye on a battle but still getting the macro stuff done.

Sabre0001

Jonny7 wrote: »

Try backspace.. hard to reach though, so I bind a button on my mouse to backspace, use that to flick between zerg hatcheries fast for injection, haven't tried it with pylons yet.

Next patch should have bindable custom keys.. mmm so nice

Unfortunately Backspace only works for Command Centres, Nexus and Hatcheries. Was worth a go though

Ramza

Sabre0001 wrote: »

As I said in another thread, I hotkey key Pylons so I can flick to them...but how do I get the camera to alternate between them?

i.e. I hit 8,8 to see the last Pylon added to group (likely mid battlefield) but my base is being attacked - is there a way to view the one that is closest (besides spacebar...this may not have been the best example!)

You cannot as far as I know, when multiple buildings or whatever are binded to one hotkey, upon double clicking the game centres to the last one added.

Also, why are you hotkeying pylons? :pac:

You should be only hotkeying your Nexus(s), and gateways (at least until getting warp gate research, then you can press W) and army(s)

If you want to go back to your base if its getting attack just double click the hotkey for it or just click it on the map.

As far as pylons go, you can see them on the minimap too

Decerto

Ramza wrote: »

You cannot as far as I know, when multiple buildings or whatever are binded to one hotkey, upon double clicking the game centres to the last one added.

Also, why are you hotkeying pylons? :pac:

You should be only hotkeying your Nexus(s), and gateways (at least until getting warp gate research, then you can press W) and army(s)

If you want to go back to your base if its getting attack just double click the hotkey for it or just click it on the map.

As far as pylons go, you can see them on the minimap too

Hotkeying a pylon is quite common early game to get excess of 400apm:D, but it can be practical when pushing, if you hotkey ur proxy pylon to quickly switch back and forth between your army to warp stuff in

Sabre0001

Decerto wrote: »

if you hotkey ur proxy pylon to quickly switch back and forth between your army to warp stuff in

That's the one

Decerto

Sabre0001 wrote: »

That's the one

If you have any toss related questions btw for build orders or what to do when you see x in your opponents base or just general tips too, id happily answer them, im fairly new too but i did a fair bit of research and mechanics practice v the the v.easy computer:D and managed to get diamond in 60 games so i could help a bit

http://www.sc2ranks.com/eu/1416920/Shaunn is my account

Ramza

Ahh ok, my bad ^^