If you want to learn to play multiplayer, play the campaign to become familiar with the units (they usually introduced them one by one so you can get more of a feel for them).

Then learn a couple of build orders and early game strats. Practicing them may make your multiplayer games seems a bit boring (either your early attack wins or it loses), but it will get you into the habit of understanding how good macro/micro feels like. Always building, keeping supply up, multi-tasking, etc. From there you can start getting more familiar with the meta-game and responding to your opponent.

 

This. I picked up SC2 again after about a year-long hiatus of actually playing multiplayer (playing the in-game Mafia does not count) and I'm pretty much cheesing my opponents.

The strategy I follow is from a guy's Youtube playlist. Essentially, I focus on getting 50 SCV's by 10 minutes, and I get my natural expansion at 3:45. I push at 10 minutes, and I've won quite a few games doing that. I've lost some, too, like when the push failed against a protoss and he built colossi to counter my only-marines play.

Keep in mind that I'm still in bronze league, and, just from watching ahead, the guy starts changing up the play as soon as he gets into Silver.

 

Quite a good set of tutorial's (at least in my eyes) are by a guy called dApollo, possibly just Apollo now as I'm not sure if he signed with Dignitas again.

The only problem is some of his earlier tutorials (notably Zerg and Protoss) are fairly dated now so they might not be that useful in terms of strategies but the mechanics/tips are still the same I imagine. Look him up on Youtube, can probably just search 'Apollo X race tutorial.'

He generally does 4 video's by making a new account and playing his way up from Bronze (he leaves his placement matches to get put in Bronze) generally through to Gold and talks about/shows you the general basics from keybindings, supply you should be at etc.

 

Yeah, his zerg one is actually quite new though. Definitely up to date with the current meta game.

His new zerg one that is.

Other than that, the new HOTS AI seems to be absolutely fantastic for learning how to play the game. In fact, the hots AI will be really really useful for me, to practice agfainst rarely seen build types, like a 4 gate or 7 gate push.

http://www.reddit.com/r/starcraft/comments/17kc5o/the_ai_in_hots_is_an_amazing_training_tool_for/

This should give you an idea of what it can accomplish. It's stupidly good.

 

Wow that looks seriously awesome!

 

I've watched dApollo's zerg guides on YouTube and also some of day9's stuff for noobs.

However I have this huge problem where I'm Zerg on 2 bases and they are protoss or terran on 1. However they get a bigger army count than me and I cant stop then because they full on turtle will a wall-in untIl they attack. Any tips?

 

If they turtle it should be fairly easy to expand to a third. That plus a macro hatch in your main should give you sufficient larva and income to get a bigger army.

 

If they're turtling on one base then it has to be an all in or certainly something ballsy/expensive. I don't play but I'd imagine sacrificing an overlord to see what's coming or making an Overseer might help.

Another option is if you think you cane poke/disrupt the push later is to expand, get a 3rd. That said, if they're out-macroing you on 1 base I imagine you're either not scouting & over-droning, or missing a lot of injects with your Queens? Just a thought, I don't play but watch enough of the pro-scene to have an idea of how things are lately.

Probably best to take advice from Zennith or someone who still plays though.

 

Honestly, it depends on what they are making. The best way to think of it is, if they are on 1 base, and you are on two ,you basically double their income. As long as they don't have an expansion, you can just tech up, and make sure your army is the right composition to deal with it.

Baneling speed, roach burrow movement, mutas, infestors are all good tools to use. It all depends what's coming. Basically, the longer the game goes on, the better position you will be in. Just delay delay delay, then crush an army.

A lot of the time i'll just get a fucking shit ton of lings. On of the pushes I do early on against terran is a fully saturated main, about 8 drones at my nat ,then just nonstop lings.

Just go for overwheling force. The good thing about it, is that you will have a surplus of minerals, which basically means, gogo third base. And when you have 50ish lings on the map in the early game, they just can't move out, or you'll swarm them.

Don't take fights you can't win, never engage protoss in a choke.

Can you describe their specific army compositions?

 

Usually it's something like medivac marine marauder drops with Vikings and tanks in their main.

I probably do overdrone and it doesn't help that I always forget to make hydralisks so my anti air consists of queens and mutalisks.

 

If you know roughly the route the medivacs are going to take then you could put a burrowed ling on the path to help you spot any incoming, or overlords kind of near your base, to give you those extra couple of seconds to react and get your lings back to defend.
A spore crawler or two also helps.

 

Well hey guys, if anyone wants any help, hit me up. I'm masters as Zerg and Toss, and coaching is fun!

 

I don't really play often any more but what rank are you at zennith? Kinda curious where I'd stack. 1v1 strictly, never found a group I could continue with.

 

Well, last season I was 1300 points masters, I play gms pretty regularly on ladder (just beat one today in fact)!

 

All you need, are lings where the drop is going to land.

You should never get hydras unless you actually know what you are doing, spores/queens are good enough anti air.

Edit: Hey Zennith, are you playing HOTS beta at all atm? I haven't played WOL since I got it. I'm also playing terran for the first time in years.

 

So anyone hyped for GSL? The Group selection last night was pretty hilarious.


Also pretty excited for IPL. During IPL5 I got third place in their betting contest and grabbed an awesome headset. They ripped me off and changed the prize last second, but it's still a good pair.

 

I'm more meaning, if your having trouble at a low level, hydra's just aren't going to help you out.

If your plat/dia/masters, you can probably figure it out quite easily.

GSL... meh. Im disappointed that Stephano didn't advance. Especially playing ZVT. I want to see Life just win everything though, that kids fucking amazing. I'll watch it though.

IPL 6 should be fantastic, if it can at least equal IPL5.

Mostly, I'm looking forward to HOTS, I feel that WOL is a bit stale right now.

 

GSL owns, and despite the severe lack of Protoss, this one still owns. So far, anyways. If it winds up being (nearly) all ZvZs in the later rounds, that would suck.

Still, I think Parting and MC both have a serious shot at first place, so I'm really excited.

 

The Soul Train is too strong. Parting is going to ride it all the way to finals.

Where he'll lose to DongRaeGu.

 

Hmm droning less did help me a lot vs Terran along with doing tech switch from roach to muta.

I've been having problems with Protoss building only void rays and rushing me with like 20 of them. Do I just make a lot of corrupters cause my mutas die so fast against void rays?

For the GSL I want to see Life win in the R16. His round of 7 vs DRG in the Iron Squid 2 was fantastic and I want to see more of that.