[Nemo]

That's very goo MrFool. You might not know all of ZvP yet but you still have all the knowledge that is extremely good.

I haven't seen the replay but I'm surprised player didn't make roach. They are very standard in ZvP. Cheap, easy to use and very efficient. Hydras are very good vs Stalkers and Immortals combo since they both target armored units and Hydras are light. When you begin to have templar, Archons, you need T3, Broodlords or Ultralisks.

[PulseSPR]

Hello, here I am again with TvP replay :P

This time, it was 31 minutes game, and I think I have done quite well,

but still lost. T.T

I lost the last engagement and I'm looking for help to how to beat that deadly Protoss army >.<

p.s. I've really appreciated your analysis, MrFool! I have tried to improve on what you said I should have done and what I shouldn't have!




btw its the same guy again lol

[PulseSPR]

Originally Posted by PulseSPR

Hello, here I am again with TvP replay :P

This time, it was 31 minutes game, and I think I have done quite well,

but still lost. T.T

I lost the last engagement and I'm looking for help to how to beat that deadly Protoss army >.<

p.s. I've really appreciated your analysis, MrFool! I have tried to improve on what you said I should have done and what I shouldn't have!




btw its the same guy again lol

Did my post just get burrowed under the creep T.T

[Nemo]

Originally Posted by PulseSPR

Did my post just get burrowed under the creep T.T

Apth does the replays. It's my job (and now also MrFool ) to do . I have been busy with Ghost replays yesterday so I couldn't do yours, sorry.

If it has not been done until tonight for me (in 10 hours), I will do it tonight.

[Apth]

Cheers to Nemo for being a baller and sticking around while I was having my torrid affair with Skyrim.

Y'all are welcome to send me PMs if I don't get to your replay's quickly enough. Not today though. Today I am tired and hung over.

Quick Comments

Nemo:

Apth is back ! Welcome back, mate :)

[ZiggyD]

Heya! Love the thread, I'll be keeping an eye out for reps that I may be able to help out with.

It's rare that I get a game where I don't know why I lost, especially PvT. But this one is a bit of a puzzle.

I suspect I just traded poorly but it felt like a really close game.

I know that I didn't get Thermal lance and micro'd my Colossus poorly but perhaps you guys may be able to point out if there are any other explanations for why this game ended the way it did.

Thanks in advance!

[phoney]

Hi to all,

Please help to analyse this particular game, for the most part I couldn't feel I did anything wrong but any extra pointers would be very helpful. Thanks in advance!

[Apth]

Originally Posted by phoney

Hi to all,

Please help to analyse this particular game, for the most part I couldn't feel I did anything wrong but any extra pointers would be very helpful. Thanks in advance!

Phoney vs Dan, ZvT

Expansion vs Aggression
You were on 2base vs 2base for too long, and your third base went up around the same time his did. This wouldn't be a bad thing if you were playing aggressively, but you were on the back foot for most of the game.

Decide what kind of lead you want on your opponent - an economic lead via expansions, or an aggressive lead via harassment/pokes/prods, and then follow through with it. Doing neither allows your opponent to take whatever lead he feels like taking.

Keeping the initiative is important. This doesn't necessarily mean being aggressive or active with your units; it means forcing your opponent to react to what you're doing.

Positioning
This killed you.

Your first engagement at 16 minutes came from a single angle into a fortified position. For a squishy unit comp like Muta/Ling - not good.



When engaging Marine/Tank with Muta/Ling:

• Wait for him to unsiege
• Come from two angles
• Preferably both

The second and final engagement was the same story - single angle, fortified position, and through a choke this time.



Summary
Both engagements resulted in a hugely cost inefficient trade. Add that to the reasonable parity in economy you had with your opponent, and I'd say with fair certainty that positioning is what lost you the game.

The good news is that there wern't any gaping holes in your gameplay aside from that - you reacted to the initial Hellion/Marauder shenanigans well, and your macro didn't fall apart at any point that I saw.

Possible Improvements
Before you attack, take a second to think about where your opponent is, and where your units are going to be going. Consider splitting your lings into two control groups - if you don't have enough hotkeys to do this, bind your hatches to W or your ~ key to control group 0.

GG man.

Quick Comments

Nemo:

[aLtMrFool]

Originally Posted by phoney

Hi to all,

Please help to analyse this particular game, for the most part I couldn't feel I did anything wrong but any extra pointers would be very helpful. Thanks in advance!

PulseSPR vs Ghost

League: Unknown
Map: TDA
Length: 32:01
Version: 1.4.2

Replay Analysis

Overview of the game

You both speak korean again :\

You go for 1 rax gasless FE and he goes for 1 gate FE and transitions into 3 gate robo.

He pokes you with a stalker and you position your marines nicely to deny the poking.

You transition into 3 rax with gases and goes for a marine poke for cross map TDA

Fortunately for you, his stalker is not near your base and he did not control any watch tower.

Using only marines, you killed a ton of stalkers. GOOD!

He gears up for a quick expo after going up to 5 gates with minimal production while you go for 5 rax medivac.

This time, you see double forge + a good sized army and decides to pull back , wise decision considering your own upgrades are not done yet.

No engagement and you go for a third while he techs up for a DT + zealot drop harrassment.

You both max out at almost the same time!

First huge engagement and you turned out ahead!

He finally goes for a forth!

You engage with him again at his ramp and turn out ahead again!

You're ahead by nearly 100 food all the time but does not engage and let him re-max with a colossus transition!

You engage at one of the worst places possible and is forced to tap out:\

You gg and the game is over!

Now, let us analyse what could have been improved and the major mistakes that costed you the game.

4:33 You do an Ebay block but you cancelled it at 146 hp, you should cancel it at as low as 20 hp, every second counts in SC2



7:16 You poke with 13 marines up his ramp but... wait... you have not even scouted up the ramp with anything! Very risky although you did turn out ahead because his micro with his stalkers werent stellar.



11:54 You saw THIS with your marine and decides to turn back but... you needed to see this ( in the 2nd photo) Turning back is good because your upgrades were not all done and you have shown him some forces, he might be pressured to make more units instead of econ hard.





13:21 Bad rally points cause you to rally SCVs to the middle of the map



14:26 This moment tells you how much of map control you have! What you see (minimap) vs what he sees! This is good





14:29 You still have not seen this base! Did you assume it was there?



15:05 You are on 4 bases while he's on three... like I always say, having more bases may give you the illusion that you have an enormous lead in mining but... look at this oversaturation and undersaturation respectively! And finally, the number of workers vs the mining rate!





21:38 First engagement at max out supply, you're so far ahead it blows my mind but you could have done ALOT better, watch the replay yourself and watch it at normal speed. You stimmed your army and right-clicked them instead of doing a stutter step movement. A bio-centric army requires you to get every single volley off esp when your army is marauder-heavy! That landslide of a resources lost could have been an avalanche!



22:07 All these oversaturation is hurting you alot



23:36 You have not seen the 3rd and 4th, dont assume they're there, you need to know





24:02 173 supply to 112 supply, so ahead after another engagement where you crush his army! He warps in an insane amount of zealots and your army being predominantly marauders, that is actually a very bad position to be engaging and why there? You don't have to keep attacking the main base and try to end the game, go for the 4th base and 3rd base and turn it into a long term management game and starve him out if possible instead of trying to go for the throat at a position not favourable to you. I'll explain below why this is not a favourable position for your army composition.



25:15 Mine-d out + idle SCVs





25:43 You have 9 orbital commands and you have 87 SCVs, you don't actually need that many SCVs and that is actually eating into your army size at this point, stop making SCVs too



27:05 Colossus in the making omg! You need to be prepared for a tech switch!



29:15 You made the same mistake as with the previous engagement trying to go for the throat and its a GG!



Strong point

• Good macro, again

• Againt, good decision to attack / back off with scouting before attacking

• Decent Simcity

• Aggressive expanding

What could be improved

• More scouting! You need to scout more in order to make better decisions!

• Your sttuter step micro really needs some practise!

• You need to be able to count your saturation at bases quickly and make decisions for movement of SCVs / amount of SCVs better

• At one point of the game, it was basically havoc and everything's happening and you couldn't keep up, keep note of this moment and try to remember what you missed and do what you missed the next time you encounter this

• When you're ahead, keep ahead and don't try to end the game when you cannot, this of course comes with experience

Major points that costed you the game (aka when the game started to go in favour of protoss or when you did not maximise/keep your advantage)

• You did not succesfully scout at alot of points in the game

. You did not see the third, it was a very important piece of information! Cross-refrence with previous analysis, that third is actually a very good position for attack considering you killed his observer and he could not have known you are going there and he will be out of position, consider denying it!
. You did not scout the colossus transition :\
. You did not scout the 4th until quite late either!

• At multiple occasions, you attacked in disfavourable position!

. If your army is so marauder heavy, you should understand that marauder heavy armies count on their ability to stim-kite stutter step with their concussive shells and they generally work better in a not-so-wide area with space to stim-kite stutter step.
. You engaged a few times at his natural and that is actually a place that is not-so-wide (have decent chokes) but does not have any area for you to do that stim-kite stutter step that a marauder-centric army requires! You could've done alot better if you deny his 4th+3rd / 4th and turn the game into a long-term management game instead of trying to go for the throat at his natural constantly.

• You could've maximised your advantage at the first 200/200 engagement

. From above, watch the replay yourself and think about how many marauder volleys those were and how much more ahead you could have potentially been if you did good micro!
. You need to stutter step more and do it comfortably, I find that you are able to either macro well or stutter step well but is unable to do both, practise hard and you'll be able to do it!

Generally, really decent play and it's really good!

Hope this helps and give me some feedback Really tired right now, haven't been sleeping well for about 3 days but hopefully this analysis is not that bad.

Quick Comments

	Apth:	Nice man. Dat knowledge.
	|Erasmus|:	very sexy analysis there ;)

[xGKingdelete]

Originally Posted by ZiggyD

Heya! Love the thread, I'll be keeping an eye out for reps that I may be able to help out with.

It's rare that I get a game where I don't know why I lost, especially PvT. But this one is a bit of a puzzle.

I suspect I just traded poorly but it felt like a really close game.

I know that I didn't get Thermal lance and micro'd my Colossus poorly but perhaps you guys may be able to point out if there are any other explanations for why this game ended the way it did.

Thanks in advance!

shotty this one

[xGKingdelete]

Originally Posted by ZiggyD

Heya! Love the thread, I'll be keeping an eye out for reps that I may be able to help out with.

It's rare that I get a game where I don't know why I lost, especially PvT. But this one is a bit of a puzzle.

I suspect I just traded poorly but it felt like a really close game.

I know that I didn't get Thermal lance and micro'd my Colossus poorly but perhaps you guys may be able to point out if there are any other explanations for why this game ended the way it did.

Thanks in advance!

Game Summary
He opens with one rax expand into 4rax, taking his extra gas early (I think this is a bad build order by him, but that's not important). You respond with a 1gate pressure into your own expand. The pressure doesn't do significant damage, and you both move on to the mid-game.
He snipes your observer and moves out at around 10:30. At the same time, you drop a few zealots into his main, killing a couple of scvs, delaying buildings, delaying mining time, and being annoying in general. He snipes your nexus and runs away. You double expand. He becomes defensive and techs up to medivacs (but I don't think he ended up building any)
He moves out again at 13:30. He snipes the nexus again and runs away. You chase him all the way home and attack his natural. He manages to hold, but loses half of his scvs in the process. You retake your natural.
He attacks again at 17:00. He forces a cancel of your natural, then trades his army for some of yours and some probes and does some damage. You eventually hold it off.
He immediately attacks again at 19:00, bringing 19 scvs. You manage to hold, and now he has 15 scvs.
He ralleys in as many units as he can and hits you again at 21:00. He manages to pretty much kill everything, and is a little bad mannered. You gg and leave (props to you for this, you're a good player).

Game Analysis and Tips
It was a very close game, but as you recognised yourself, you lost because he traded better than you. You lost a lot more units and nexi than you should have because he caught your army out of position multiple times. Almost everything else was good, but your main problem was positioning.


First issue: scouting. You did a good response to his 1rax expand, but it was a blind response. You scouted that he had a barracks and a supply depo. For all you know, he could have been going double starport banshees, or he could have been killing his own CC.



When you scout, you don't want to be fighting scvs. You can harass the scv building the barracks, but if the barracks is about to complete, or if he pulls another scv to engage the probe, you don't want to fight. Your main purpose is to scout, not to kill scvs. So resist the temptation to harass and use your probe to scout around the base.

Now, when you scout, you want to check the whole base, incase there is a semi-hidden barracks. But the main thing you want to see is gas.
0 gas: 1 rax expand, or scv marine all in
Most of the time it will be a 1rax expand.
If you check back later and see a tonne of marines and no CC, you should start getting worried and try to get units out to defend as soon as possible. If you check back and see a CC, then you can breathe a sigh of relief and play greedy.
1 gas: 2rax pressure into expand, or possibly a 1-1-1.
If you check back later and see a bunker at the ramp, it's probably going to be a 1-1-1 or a marine tank all in. If you check back later and see a marauder or two, or a tech lab on the rax, then it's almost definitely going to be a 2rax pressure into expand.
2 gas: You're most likely versing someone insane. Cloaked banshees, every sort of tech you can imagine will be available to the terran. Or, he might be playing miind games and playing standard.

Your opponent tried to play mind games with you by building a refinery without mining from it, and building a CC after your probe left. Fortunately, or unfortunately, I'm not sure which, you didn't scout his refinery. You did a good response to it, but it was blind, and next time you should scout before you make the decision to expand off one gateway.




You shouldn't have attacked here, two zealots and a stalker isn't enough to break a bunker, especially if it's repaired. I find that terrans who 1rax expand have their bunker up in time no matter what I try, so I build the nexus before any units.



You do good damage here. But you are over-microing your units, and your money is building up, and you don't spot the attack headed your way on the minimap. The fact that your harass has been going on for 20 seconds and his army hasn't returned to deal with the zealots should also tip you off that he is about to attack you.



His attack catches you by surprise. Your army is out of position. When you aren't attacking, you should have your army positioned defensively. In this case, you should have spread your army in a concave, zealots in front. Because they were out of position, he picks off a sentry and two zealots before the fight even begins. You lose the nexus, which puts you behind.

A thing to consider in situations like this is a counter attack. He sacrificed his army to deal economic damage, but doesn't do much damage to your army. So your army is way stronger than his (and half of his units were pretty much stimmed to death). You probably could have killed a lot of scvs or even the CC if you counter attacked with a proxy pylon.

However, the double expand you did was also a good option. I like that



He moves out again, and this time you are paying attention and see it moving out past the watchtower. Your army was in a good position, but you decided to move it to the right side of your natural. He attacks the left side, and your army is out of position to defend.

I think you needed an observer to be sure of which side he would attack.


In the future, you might want to consider putting an observer or a probe outside your base so you can spot the attacks, and prepare for them accordingly. Around where the green squares are.




Your zealots charge into the fray before the rest of your army arrives at his base. Let your army regroup before you push into his base. You really needed the sentries for guardian shield, and the collosus for damage.


This was a good move by you. Just saying


This is why you need to regroup and get into position before attacking. All your zealots attack into that small choke and die without the sentries' guardian shield. And your collosus ends up attacking a supply depo, which is never good. The 5 shots on the supply depo was enough to kill his entire army, since he didnt bother spreading his units. However, he rushes forward, snipes the collosus, and the rest of your army falls.



Out of position again. You couldn't afford to lose that nexus again.

He decides to engage your army there (not pictured) and yeah, as you mentioned, extended thermal lance for the collosus would have helped a lot.

From there, because you lost those two collosus, there wasn't really anything you could do to come back into the game. Marine marauder crushes protoss in small-middle sized armies.

In Summary
Your macro is good, you know how to make probes, take expansions, and tech up.
However, you didn't spot the attacks while he moved out, and hence your army wasn't in a good position when he attacked. Those engagements lost you the game.
To fix this:
- try having an observer or two around the main attack paths, or even a probe, so you get a notification when the probe dies.
- pre-spread and position your army defensively, so even if the attack catches you by surprise, you'll be able to deal with it without losing your nexus

Quick Comments

	Nemo:	Awesome analysis !
	ZiggyD:	Fantastic analysis! See my comment below :)
	nirvAnA:	fantastic!

[ZiggyD]

That's a fantastic analysis. I hope you don't mind but I plan on linking it in my Tumblr for people to come and check out. ^^

The advice on positioning is very sound. I felt very unsure of where to position my army in this game possibly as this was my first game on this map (I started late this season). I usually like to Prepare for a flank, which I tried to do by having my army to the right, so I could catch it without him running off again. But as you suggested having them in a concave there would have been better and I would have saved the Nexus and traded better.

The suggestion to counter-attack in that instance is very good, I will be trying to do that more often.

I need to work on my early game scouting with my Probe. I can usually scout most things with the Zealot Stalker poke but as I learned in this game I did not know he was expanding so fast. Attacking the bunker then was dumb, I wasn't sure whether I could pop it or not. It was close but it still would not have been a good trade (100 minerals for 2 Zealots). Thanks for the tips on scouting.

It was hard to lose this game, more so than many other games I have played lately, because I knew I had such a strong economic advantage (especially after killing nearly all of his SCVs). But after this I can see where I went wrong. Im glad to know that the main thing was the poor trades that I had. I can actively work on this and I actually enjoy working on positioning etc. It's my favourite part of playing Protoss. ^^

It was a fun game even with my opponents BM during and afterwards, I felt like it was very close game. It's good to be shaken up by losing such a hard game every now and then

Thanks heaps for the awesome analyis. The screenshots etc are great ^^. I'll give you some rep when I can (it's telling me that I can't because I have to share it around XD), you earned it

Quick Comments

xGKingdelete:

thank you, glad to help :)

[aLtMrFool]

Saw so much more than myself when I watched the replay thanks nemo nemo! Now I feel like I played horribadly against mafia though ^_^ gonna play more work hard! Once again, thanks!

[Nemo]

You're welcome MrFool. You didn't played bad at all, you're very good. I look sometimes harsh just for pedagogic purposes, to stress the points you need working. But I'm deeply impressed by why you are able to do.

I fact I don't really see more than you, just different things. I can see in your analysis that there are many things on SC2 you know I don't. I just try to give another point of view with my own analytical qualities and I'm happy that it does helps.

Thanks guys for the feedback.

[aLtMrFool]

Sorry pulse and nemo lol, just got a new cat in da house and it's making me too busy to even play much so it's hard for me to be doing replay analysis now! Maybe in like 2 days if you can wait cause i gotta go back to camp for NS in a few hours :P

Quick Comments

ROOTPetraeus:

Kittyyyyyyyyyyyyy!

[Nemo]

Originally Posted by aLtMrFool

Sorry pulse and nemo lol, just got a new cat in da house and it's making me too busy to even play much so it's hard for me to be doing replay analysis now! Maybe in like 2 days if you can wait cause i gotta go back to camp for NS in a few hours :P

Haha, no pb, I will do it.

[Rockstar]

Sup, just need some help with general feedback on my game please

I played 5 games today and although I won 4 of them, I know I suck... I can easily analyse other peoples games when I watch them but I'm too in my own head when I watch my own... sooooo

here they are.

Please tell me when where and why I suck.

p.s. I am terribad @ terran I know, they are my least favoured race because A) I hate them and B) I've never solely played them and probably have sub 50 games played with them ever.

Replays:
http://terranimba.com/replay/HGWktWoxf
http://terranimba.com/replay/AOtkHa247KlD3
http://terranimba.com/replay/NP53kSqlzQrr5tgau
http://terranimba.com/replay/2V3SzOySoT7O
http://terranimba.com/replay/1MLRWqfy0xT1sqmdBIn

cheers dewdz

edit: no need for super indepth stuff just a few pointers etc. would be sweet. cheers

[Apth]

Originally Posted by Rockstar

Replays:
http://terranimba.com/replay/HGWktWoxf
http://terranimba.com/replay/AOtkHa247KlD3
http://terranimba.com/replay/2V3SzOySoT7O

I'm gonna leave the two Terran replays to Nemo.

ZvZ vs Product
Scouting
12 minutes into the game, you still hadn't scouted any of his tech, or his third, and then took your own third without any knowledge of what your opponent was doing. Sac Overlords, send scouting lings, send changelings, Overseers, whatever. Scout.

Macro
Consider making a macro hatch. At the end of the game when he killed all your mutas, you had 1k/1k banked. That would have easily won the game for you.


ZvT vs Owlah
Scouting Again
You took your third without scouting your opponent again, and had no idea what tech path he was taking. Sacing an OL into a Terran base at around 6-7min usually gives you a good idea what tech path he's going.

Banelings Kill Marines
Ling/Baneling against pure Marine usually goes heavily in the Zerg player's favour. If you come up against opponents who just make Marines, don't be afraid to engage.


ZvZ vs Klint
Lair Timing
You didn't start your Spire until almost two minutes after your Lair was done. Your Lair is means to an end, not the end itself.

Try not to think 'I should get a Lair now', try to think 'I should get a Spire soon, so I should get a Lair now.'

Scouting Again
You know the drill.

Muta Aggression
Be aggressive with your Mutas. You spent money on them, don't leave them just sitting around.

Aggression isn't necessarily killing anything. Pokes and prods forces your opponent to make spores, remake queens, pull his units back, and spend his APM on things he doesn't want to spend it on. Muta harass is all about being an annoying dickhead, not killing your opponent.

Upgrades
I noticed this in this game and the other ZvZ - you were very on the ball with your Muta upgrades. This is awesome. Upgrades are awesome. You are a more awesome person for getting upgrades early and often. Nice work yo.

Summary
IMO, scouting is the biggest hole in your gameplay at the moment. Focus on being aware - aware of the map, aware of where your opponents units are, aware of what tech path he's going, aware of how many bases he has. It doesn't matter if you know what the correct decision is if you don't have any information to base your decision making process on.

GG yo.

[Nemo]

Originally Posted by Rockstar

Sup, just need some help with general feedback on my game please

I played 5 games today and although I won 4 of them, I know I suck... I can easily analyse other peoples games when I watch them but I'm too in my own head when I watch my own... sooooo

here they are.

Please tell me when where and why I suck.

p.s. I am terribad @ terran I know, they are my least favoured race because A) I hate them and B) I've never solely played them and probably have sub 50 games played with them ever.

Replays:
http://terranimba.com/replay/HGWktWoxf
http://terranimba.com/replay/AOtkHa247KlD3
http://terranimba.com/replay/NP53kSqlzQrr5tgau
http://terranimba.com/replay/2V3SzOySoT7O
http://terranimba.com/replay/1MLRWqfy0xT1sqmdBIn

cheers dewdz

edit: no need for super indepth stuff just a few pointers etc. would be sweet. cheers

The game on Emtombed Valley have been analysed there : http://www.twitch.tv/nemoulysses/b/305007852

I hope my voice is understandable. I'm still quite noob with Xsplit, sorry.

Most important thing. Make a valid build order. First for the moment don't gaz first. Just make 4 reactor hellions and then Marine tanks. It will be the best for you to learn how works.

The second game your opponent is not good enough to be a real test. Only post game you loose.
Don't make that gaz first though anyway and battle for the Xel'Nagas.

[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by Nemo

The game on Emtombed Valley have been analysed there : http://www.twitch.tv/nemoulysses/b/305007852

I hope my voice is understandable. I'm still quite noob with Xsplit, sorry.

Most important thing. Make a valid build order. First for the moment don't gaz first. Just make 4 reactor hellions and then Marine tanks. It will be the best for you to learn how works.

The second game your opponent is not good enough to be a real test. Only post game you loose.
Don't make that gaz first though anyway and battle for the Xel'Nagas.

Thanks heaps Nemo appreciate it Yeah I'm terribad with Terran, but believe it or not that was a platinum zerg I was playing... I don't really do a build order with them because I don't know any, and I just basically do things like "get stim and push" then just do whatever I feel the need to do... That game I wanted to go rauder heavy because banes just shred marines and I didn't want to get tanks straight away..

I can understand your shock and horror at my complete and utter lack of doing anything normal hahaha. Thanks once again I'll open reactor with 4 hellions then go marine tank from now on. Thanks