Learning to play Starcraft
After Bungie/Microsoft took Halo 2 offline on 4/15 (I was one of the last 100 players online after 13 hours of playing on 4/15!
), it was time for me to start playing another game. I have a 360 and Halo 3, but I don't think I'll play it much. I still play WoW some, but not as much as I used to.
People seem to be reluctant to allow my 200-232 geared 80 hunter into the latest ICC 5 mans and raids, so I can skip a few steps of the gearing up process!
So I decided to try Starcraft. I got the Starcraft Battle Chest at a local Gamestop store, and decided to start from the beginning to learn it all. I'm currently doing the 3 phase campaign, starting with the Terran as suggested.
Things I've learned so far:
1. SAVE YOUR PROGRESS!!! I didn't figure this out until I had to rebuild my forces for the 5th time in Terran mission 5. Once you get your forces built up, SAVE your progress so you don't lose it all if you wipe. Sometimes I save every few minutes.
2. The default key bindings are terrible. There's a few preset keys for attack, stop, and move, etc, and lots of things in the book that use Control plus some other key. I don't think I'll use them much. I'm so used to using the WASD keys for WoW that having to slide the keyboard to the left so my left hand can operate the arrow keys is uncomfortable at best. I don't think key bindings were invented yet when this game came out.
3. Read online tutorials before each mission. Thanks to those, I did Terran mission 7 in about a minute, whereas mission 8 is already 3+ hours easily. And not done yet.
I'm going to have to see if I can watch the videos of the Starcraft tournaments from last years Blizzcon. I saw them last year but since I had never even looked at Starcraft at that point, they meant nothing to me.
I'm also going to have to write down on a piece of paper the items that are made from each type of building that the SCVs can build, it'll be a lot easier that way.
Anyone got any tips for me so far?
), it was time for me to start playing another game. I have a 360 and Halo 3, but I don't think I'll play it much. I still play WoW some, but not as much as I used to.People seem to be reluctant to allow my 200-232 geared 80 hunter into the latest ICC 5 mans and raids, so I can skip a few steps of the gearing up process!
So I decided to try Starcraft. I got the Starcraft Battle Chest at a local Gamestop store, and decided to start from the beginning to learn it all. I'm currently doing the 3 phase campaign, starting with the Terran as suggested.
Things I've learned so far:
1. SAVE YOUR PROGRESS!!! I didn't figure this out until I had to rebuild my forces for the 5th time in Terran mission 5. Once you get your forces built up, SAVE your progress so you don't lose it all if you wipe. Sometimes I save every few minutes.
2. The default key bindings are terrible. There's a few preset keys for attack, stop, and move, etc, and lots of things in the book that use Control plus some other key. I don't think I'll use them much. I'm so used to using the WASD keys for WoW that having to slide the keyboard to the left so my left hand can operate the arrow keys is uncomfortable at best. I don't think key bindings were invented yet when this game came out.
3. Read online tutorials before each mission. Thanks to those, I did Terran mission 7 in about a minute, whereas mission 8 is already 3+ hours easily. And not done yet.
I'm going to have to see if I can watch the videos of the Starcraft tournaments from last years Blizzcon. I saw them last year but since I had never even looked at Starcraft at that point, they meant nothing to me.
I'm also going to have to write down on a piece of paper the items that are made from each type of building that the SCVs can build, it'll be a lot easier that way.
Anyone got any tips for me so far?
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Comments
Be Korean.
Some things about the game are good, and some are utterly retarded. Like if I have 10 tanks and goliaths, for example, and I want to move them from point A to point B. Use the mouse to make the box around them, click the Move command, and click where you want them to go.
9 out of 10 will do it, and one will go off in some other completely obscure direction. It's like dealing with a 2 year old. I tell the vehicle going the wrong way "No you stupid simp, go HHHHHEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRREEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!" and have to guide it step by step to get where the other 9 went in the first place.
I almost finished the Terran mission campaign. Got through 9.5 levels. The cloaked attack ships were driving me crazy and were very annoying. On the last try, I loaded a drop ship with Jim Raynor and 5 SCVs to go off and make a new base because I had run out of Vespene gas, but we flew in front of 2 enemy battlecruisers and didn't last long after that.
And what is this thing of only letting you see part of the map and the rest is blacked out and isn't shown until you get a vehicle or person up in that area? I don't like that either.
Next up is the Zerg missions.
blacksheepwall. Because battles are most interesting when both sides know EXACTLY what the other is doing.
You have obviously never played an RTS before now, because this is a very standard mechanism called "Fog of War"
food for thought
black sheep wall
*show me the money
make one wraith, set him on a screen wide patrol in your base.
make 39048203984 more wraiths and set them to follow the patrolling wraith.
send the first wraith into the enemy base and let him die, the following bunched up wraiths will kill everything near them in seconds. Good fun in custom settings games online.
*forgot the money cheat 'til just now =)
if you ever end up playing as zerg and it's one of the unlimited resources maps, build as many hatcheries as you can and start pumping out overlords until your finger gets tired of clicking. At this point the game itself will not allow any more units to be made within the game, essentially allowing you to cut your opponents production to zero. This cuts yours to zero also, but you can queue up 3 units at a time x the # of hatcheries you have, so if you time it right and send some overlords into your opponents defenses then queue some units, you'll be the only one with production in the game. It's more of a joke than an actual strategy, I actually had a friend of mine uninstall the game then reinstall after playing with me 'cause he was confused and thought it was broken.
I went to a GameStop and reserved Starcraft 2, mostly so I could spend only $5 to get into the SC2 beta. I guess the beta used to be invite-only, now it's wide open for all, like what Microsoft did with the Windows 7 beta versions.
That's probably the best way to make the game good, let people test it and learn what needs fixed.
I only played 1 game in SC2 so far, but it's pretty darn good, I'm sure I'll play it more.
I'll play some more original Starcraft too.
One thing I HAVE to change is to get the WASD keys working, instead of having to use the directional arrows! I hate having to slide the keyboard way to the left to play the game, why doesn't Blizzard have the directional keys on WASD from the start like in World of Warcraft?
In the SC2 beta, how do you change the key bindings to do that?
I do need to learn a lot of the new "tricks" in SC2, and what things to look for in an enemy base, especially Protoss, when I send an SCV to scout them out.
I've gotten to the point where I usually beat Zerg, and I'm more or less 50/50 against Terran and Protoss players. I play Terran.
But I still have a lot more to learn, I've never even used stim packs or ghost EMPs yet.