Starcraft 2 Forum Beta Coverage: Seradin

http://social.bioware.com/bazaar



So ive decided this week to start going after the more wierd and holarious tactics that can achieve victory in StarCraft II, one of which is the Cannon Rush which i know was present in the original StarCraft but thanks to the Cliff Sight ability it is much more lucrative.


The Cannon Rush was the Protoss Races staple annoyance trick in StarCraft: Brood War, Basically how it goes down is the Protoss player builds a pylon somewhere in there enemy base and starts flooding them with Cannons which they can do nothing to stop, if you catch them early on with enough surprise there is little they can do against this strategy.

In StarCraft II however the strategy had gotten a little tweaking, because of the games speed it is more difficult to sneak the probe in there because by the time you get over to the enemies base they made have build up a wall or something to see your probe and stop it. But there is a way to keep rushing, your basically going to jump your cannon up the cliff. Start off by building your pylon close but not too close to there cliff side in there secondary base. Then build a cannon directly next to the pylon right up against the cliff. Then send your little probe up the cliff and if you did it correctly you'll see your cannon start to attack there defenses or units trying to defend against it, Start building more pylons and more cannons with in the radius of the first cannon slowly extending the range of your defenses. If you've done this right they wont be able to attack your cannons in progress without alerting the other cannons.


I found this strategy to be most lucrative against another toss player as they usually stick to the gateway zealot rush strategy and are unprepared for the cannons, although Terran are more difficult because they do block there base well if you can destroy there front base there pretty much screwed. And you can always stop rushing any time to start building your force because chances are they are weakened anyways. Zerg are probably the most difficult simply because you cant build on creep and if they stretch there creep out your hosed. But you can surround there base with cannons and then work on getting warp in with stalkers to finish them off.

I hope this tactic finds you well, ill keep testing it out to stretch its limit, hopefully i wont cause a cannon nerf..







StarCraft 2 boasts an amazing collection of visuals including all the effects and models that make up the game. In the game you will be thrusted into lush surroundings that feel very much like you are in an alien environment seeing epic battles across vast amounts of space. Each environment piece is designed to enhance the experience but still keep it tight and polished and even though this is the Beta, Blizzard does an amazing job at creating the environments will be playing for the next 10 years.

There has been a whole lot of controversy about the graphics, as they are not StarCraft-ey enough for people. But let me tell you, the visuals make you feel like your playing the original, especially as Terran which i feel, feel the most like there race. This could be because they've had the most work done on them being there the focus of the first installment, but any who the game feels very polished, and very StarCraft-ey its very hard to focus on your units when you want to just stare at the environments, usually i just pop in some replays and leisurely check out the visuals.

Cleanliness on the battlefield is very important to Blizzard as they have done several steps to clean and polish the games unit and effect models. Each explosion is tight knit, everything feels perfect and for a beta this is an amazing feat, really the only thing blizzard has to work on right now is Balance, Balance, Balance and of course single player, i cannot wait to see how the single player plays out.






Two patches in a two day time span, i do not think we've seen this development team move so quickly xD, well its gonna be a wild ride if this is how its going to be for the next few months, a fun one thats for sure. Well a lot of debuffs to my race so currently i am not happy, though the mothership ones i can see the chrono boost idk, i thought the gateway debuff was a significant enough to deter zealot rushing, i had difficulties myself doing it, now chrono boost is really something you got to stay on top of and i hope they meet somewhere in the middle between 20 and 30 for the right number.

The Terran on the other hand are getting quite a bit a buffs, almost every one of there buildings building time being lowered? thats a huge upgrade and will see if that makes them more feasible and i think it just might. It should be interesting to see how long these changes stay in the game.

Oh and guys if you have any questions related to virtually anything about the game or just want to ask me how i am doing, check out my Beta Question Thread on the boards and post away, ill be happy to answer any questions you have if i can.

I'm going to try to set up some sort of battle report system going on, taking a movie from my stream and commentating what i did through text as i'm not sure i have the time to record my actual voice hehe, i find it easier to type anyways basically ill just be looking at the aspects of what happened during the game and explain and tell you what i was thinking and such.

So keep an eye out for that and good day to you all.

StarCraft II Beta - Patch 1 (version 0.3.0.14093)

A lot of good things came with this patch, the decrease in the reapers damage was a great idea, they seemed like they were pushed to the maximum as far as damage it took way to short a time for a group of reapers to destroy a base, coupled with there jet packs there incredibly deadly, and still are with there increased attack speed it'll be interesting to see how they manipulate this unit further.

For the 2v2 scene it seems that chrono boosts, a protoss players ticket to a win is now limited to them selfs only, now i have not played very much 2v2 because quite honestly i suck at them and cant get a good partner but i presume everyone pretty much had a protoss player on there team because of this and i really cant wait until 3v3 and 4v4 games are made available as i would love to test those out.

Another unit that got alot of attention was the Mothership, now ive only used this unit in competitive play a couple of times but it seemed to have some very powerful abilities coupled with some not so powerful and slightly useless ones like Wormhole Transit, this ability would teleport you to one of your own buildings and since most people used this unit to attack rather to defend i found the adding of recall really enhanced the unit, now i have not gotten to play with this build of the game yet as i am being increasingly distracted with my own social issues such as a crazy ex girlfriend throwing scrambled eggs at my car and creating a resume and preparing for college, sorry for my lack of updates ill try to keep you guys as updated as possibly and get some more time with the game.

EDIT: Though dont worry im still getting my time in with the game, just having trouble writing about the game and playing it, as when i start to write about it, i get drawn to play it, im gonna try to set a goal and update this every day and keep recording videos for you as you guys are what matters and you deserve the information.

First Impressions:

First id like to say Blizzard has done some amazing things with this game, Ive played it for several hours already and i cant get enough, the graphic quality, and just overall polish of the game you really feel like its a finished product, and its only beta. Blizzard starts you off online with some easy matches putting you into maps against foes that are easier then others allowing you to get a feel for the game, all of these maps place barriers on the entrances to your main/secondary bases forcing your foe to destroy these rocks before you, giving you a lot more time to prepare for the oncoming attack. I breezed through these fairly quickly having played Starcraft 2 at Blizzcon and having played lots of Starcraft before that. But after this it drops you into the placement maps which are just like what you would see in normal competitive Starcraft, no longer having the barriers to protect you blizzard judges how well you do in these matches placing you into a ladder with members of similar skill levels to you, so far this has worked very well me, you win some, and you lose some but theres always room for improvement.

Statistics:

Blizzard encourages improvement a lot through features implemented in Battle.net you can literally view everything that has happened in previous games through replays and statistics, allowing you to see the down to the second build order of yourself and your opponents as well as many other features including how much they are spending at a specific time, Blizzard hopes that through these systems you can easily learn from your mistakes and improve your skills to advance through your league and into the next one. And i think they have done a hell of a job, i am very impressed with the sheer amount of information at your finger tips and i have already put it to use watching and learning from my enemies and my own mistakes.

Replay System:

The replay system blizzard offers is amazing it lets you fast forward, slow down, jump to and improve your skill by feeding you real time statistics as your game replays itself. I have used this system after some of my online matches to figure out what i did wrong, what i could have done and what exactly did my enemy do to beat me. This is a incredibly useful tool and if you really want to improve your skills id recommend using it, it really gives you a insight into the game, and lets you get some pretty sweet screenshots as well!