Starcraft 2 (Page 1 of 11)

Q: But I don't know if the game will run on my computer.
A:

• 2.6 GHz processor or equivalent

• 1GB RAM for XP, 1.5GB for Vista and 7; (2GB RAM for Mac OS)

• 128MB video card Minimum (Mac/Windows) (512MB video card Recommended (Mac/Windows))

• DirectX version 9.0c or better

• 12GB hard disk space

• Internet connection

And don't worry, the game is very well written and it can run on very old computers (like mine!)

Q: How do I add friends?
A: There are two ways, either by character name (you need the name and 3digit number) or by Real-ID friends by e-mail.

Q: What is my character number?
A: Just hover your mouse cursor over your portrait in the game menu or on http://eu.battle.net/en/

Q: How the ladder works?
A: You will play five placement matches and BN will shove you in a specific league and division.

Q: What leagues?
A: Bronze - for n00bs. Silver - better, but still learning. Gold - you're getting somewhere. Platinum - You're good. Diamond - You're really fucking good. Master League - I bow to you. Grandmaster League - Yes, God?

Q: Ok, I played some matches, but how am I suppose to know what I did wrong.
A: Watch the replays and if you're not to shy, create an account here and give us a link. A group of specialized monkeys will analyze your rep and give you a feedback.

Q: Is there a way for me to learn the game?
A: Besides playing it? Check the ingame challenges (complete them all) and go to this videos: http://day9tv.blip.tv/file/3732340/ http://day9tv.blip.tv/file/4712303/ http://day9tv.blip.tv/file/4890848/ http://day9tv.blip.tv/file/5229698 which will really help you.

Q: I like him! Who is he?
A: Sean "Day9" Plott, a high level commentator and SCII analyzer, here is his yt account, video archive and live stream.

Q: Can I somehow follow more casts?
A: Of course, all thanks to this awesome site: http://sc2casts.com/
A: And here is a replay site: http://www.sc2replayed.com/replays

1) Spend money
Being rich is bad in Starcraft. A L W A Y S. If you have more than 500 minerals it means you're doing smth wrong. If you have a production building and it's not making anything, it's bad. Toss players should remember about warping in units every cooldown cycle and zergies should have a timer to remind them to inject larvae. Remember - spend, spend, spend!

2) Scout
It's the most important thing in this game. Rarely beginner players have the skill to impose a strategy on other players (i.e. by early gas steals or mind tricks). Ergo you should prefer reactive play. If you see your opponent teching up it means you should push if you went for a lot of tier ones. If he's tier1'ing, hardcounter him and counterpush. Vision is EVERYTHING. Root out the tendency in yourself to turtle up and go mass something without scouting.
Additionally the Zerg should always play with creep - it's a legal map hack and it does not cost anything.

3) Be aggressive
Do not be afraid to push. Learn what are timing pushes and use them. Aggressiveness gives you the ability to safely expand and does a shitload of damage to your opponent's mindset (which is one of the most important things in SC2). Even if you loose, always be the aggressor. There will come a time you'll start winning.

4) Dont cheese
As tempting as it is, cheeses shut you in a world of earlygame and leave out to dry in midgame, if your opponent manages to defend. Learn how to macro, when to expand. Micro will come with time. It's not always about winning.

5) Watch your own replays
Forget about APM, build orders and such. Play with your opponent's vision on and see what he does and try to remember what you did and what you could have done to prevent your loss.

THEN

watch replays of others. Why in such order? Answer the question: how can you understand what is another player doing if you do not understand yourself?

6) Gold the challenges
Not for the achievements. For the skill. It gives you a feel of all the races and teaches the basics of micro and macro.

ONLY AFTER MASTERING ALL THAT, should you try and incorporate build orders, other people's strategies and such. Think of it as first learning how to draw and then reproducing monalisas. If you simply copy BOs and try to learn from them it's like learning how to paint by copying that, what you don't understand.

I hope that will help .

2) These are the things you must find out for yourself. I'll give a few examples

Earlygame:
-low workers+no buildings = proxy/cheese/canonrush

vs Zerg (for Terrans)
-scout@10SCVs - zerg has pool = usually 6pool, wall off and pump marines
-@10-15SCVs early gas/2 gas - may indicate 7roach rush or fast one base muta

vs Toss
@10, fast gas may indicate some void cheeses
@13-20, 4gate(or lots of gates) may indicate tier one rush

The Terrans you know .

Mid/late game is reactive play .

Ad 3) If by defensive you mean "I'll attack when I think my army is sufficient", stop being that smile. @3-4min ingame a 6|3 M|M does wonders. Add stimpacks and your a steamroller .

Ad 4) Imho you should know how to play chese and master it to a degree to know how to prevent one. If you know the mechanics of something you know how to stop making it tick .

forgot to mention that .
always buy workers. Never stop.

a good situation is when you got a fully saturated main and natural and then go to the third with your workers from the main.