Diary of a Noob

[partymarty81]

FAF has a minor mental game and your learned "fundamentals" vs AI will be strained under the added fear/pressure from an actual opponent, stop making excuses, its the same as the top marksman in a rifle company not being able to hit anything in a firefight because he's too scared to peak out and aim

biass - I agree with you that real game practice is the only way to truly improve.... I'm akin to the top marksman's fluffer who knows that the gun fires and has a good idea of what I'd like to shoot however cannot pull the trigger as there is a jam I don't know exactly how to fix

Since this been sandboxing and a few AI games just to repeat start BO's and trying to get into some good habbits, have mixed this up with some ladder games also. Been losing however have been closer games with less of the frustrations so in progress

Flynn - Good games last night, play again soon

[partymarty81]

I'VE GOT A FUNNY WARM FEELING.....

No, not like that. Following from previous post - re-practiced and focused on a couple of BO's offline, toyed around with some hotkeys and get back stuck in to some ladder games.... Also after re-watching Heaven's UI mod thread and a replay review (can't remember which, there's so many ) took the power throttle auto pause manage thingy off - I'm now in a bit more control and am in a better place to manage things.....

So I have taken a lot of beatings, some f*!k ups on my part, however I'm now feeling I am having a game.... All that hard work and effort starting to pay off and some things are starting to click. I'm more aware of things and although I know that there is much more work to be done (more scouting, more reclaim, more everything) when I'm losing after watching back replay can see myself where things can be better and itch to get back in again

Happy with:

- Use of transports - engi drops and unit drops are my flavour of the month
- Better building and management of power - Probably overboard in some cases but work in progress

Points to work on:

- Spam factories - I'm making this too complicated, just need to have engi of factory spam and judge better amount needed for map and situation
- Mass management - my main area of stall would always be mass - i can see that when it happens bad, I'm getting too greedy without having the eco in place - a rather embarrassing note is that after I upgrade... In haste of being busy with a million and one other things..... if i have lots of idle engis I quickly select all and assist the upgraded factory.....

So anyway - all good - hopefully I'll start getting some win's and then bump into the next round of issues to learn and deal with

PARTY

[JaggedAppliance]

I found that once the game starts to 'click' with you, you can have some good streaks and gain plenty of rating. Don't worry if you plateau for a while, it's natural to plateau and rise in terms of rating.

[partymarty81]

I found that once the game starts to 'click' with you, you can have some good streaks and gain plenty of rating. Don't worry if you plateau for a while, it's natural to plateau and rise in terms of rating.

Thanks, rating is the last thing on my mind right now, I just want to have fun playing the game. I'm pretty competitive by nature but am putting that to one side until a later date.... It's easier said than done though!

[JoonasTo]

when I'm losing after watching back replay can see myself where things can be better and itch to get back in again

I can't stress how important this is in getting better. If you play nine games but watch only one replay, compared to playing five and watching five replays, the latter is going to give such superior results. As long as you have the energy to do that, you're on a good path.

*thumbs up*

[partymarty81]

OK - so no real progress as such, one big realisation though..... I've been using the eco manager mod and the settings I had meant the computer was deciding what to pause/unpause when eco not there - I've set this now so that I have the click to upgrade however have also switched off the right click to build ring of mexes, I now do this on engi build template instead..... so far so good....

Anyway - have been slipping into some rather annoying habits. On large maps I am tending to do OK at establishing the main base, transport rush, expand fairly quickly - I am not teching up mexes or factories fast enough, staying at T1 for too long. As time is going on the game count is rising, am feeling "less busy" so doing more in terms of manual reclaim etc but I know I need more of a plan to tech up quicker

Rating going backwards - not fussed on this.... just enjoying playing the game when I can keep matching up with coca (who loves his fricking jesters) on ladder games so nice to be playing some regulars.......

SO - just keep teching..... focus more on improving one thing at a time rather than 15 new ideas all badly done....

PARTY

[partymarty81]

IT'S GETTING BETTER ALL THE TIME

Of course when you win a few, things always seem better

So anyway, I'm making progress, or at least I feel I am. The changes previously mentioned are taking effect, I now have a different problem (a nicer one) - upscaling my eco spend once I have it.... This is my work in progress for the now - this is going to give me more units to do more damage with

I have also slightly changed how I set out my unit composition, on most maps I now generally use one engi factory, and before now some T1 facs on infinite build.... I have changed a few of these, on expansions to build enough T1 and then plot the transitions straight up the techs..... It may not work but it is a way to make sure I dont waste all my mass on T1 when it is redundant, or I can get an advantage

Expanding - I'm making sure my expanding engis are protected, at the cost of some raiding capability, however finding key engis are not being lost, getting more solid expansion

When losing - have dug out some wins, just by preparing a snipe, when I feel like my opponent is closing me down, have taken 2 wins in last couple of days that should have been losses

Played some nice games with Lateralus (another new guy) who is also eager to learn - going to play more when we can, time difference permitting - hopefully some nice casting material for Heaven replay reviews as I'm sure that there's a lot of things which will help me to next steps

Sometimes I feel like I'm trying too many different ideas at the same time, I'm really trying hard to just focus on a plan.... NOT easy in the heat of the action

BUT - this is now very enjoyable and just feeling totally different.... no more hesitation in searching for a new ladder game, I don't panic if i play much higher rated player, just trying to do my own thing and see how I get on - drops can damage anyone if in the correct spot! Playing mostly ladder, most games are pretty much gg by T2, looking forward to seeing some later game/longer game action

enough rambling until next week.... other than that see you on the ladder!

PARTY

[JoonasTo]

Oh, one thing I don't remember if anyone mentioned here is this:

Sometimes I feel like I'm trying too many different ideas at the same time, I'm really trying hard to just focus on a plan.... NOT easy in the heat of the actionPARTY

It's not rare to see people around that don't have a solid plan at all.

If at the starting screen you decide what you are going to do(maybe plan B for naval maps,) and then just go forth full-steam into it miracles tend to happen. A lot of the time people just play around a general guideline(if even that,) and it leads to inefficiency when compared to focusing on that one exact plan allowing you to dominate them, even if they're doing something that should, in theory, counter your plan.

Once you get to average levels you might want to add a phase 2 into the plan(B). Like Aurora spam into early Mercies or gunships into comdrop or ilshavohs into eco or whatever. Chances are your opponent is so focused on countering what you were doing that he forgot to do anything else.

[partymarty81]

This weeks update, not really much to add.

Played quite a few games (also seem to be playing until 1-2am which is killing ) and went on a winning streak of about 10 1v1's - of that a mix of playing well and winning well, perhaps 4 of them were won against the odds, just putting a snipe of some sort together and taking out the ACU.... these feel like hollow wins in terms of my actual gameplay improvement but it's better to play poor and win than well and lose

Started playing with UEF (some idea after reading balance patch notes that they might be worth trying), didn't really get on with them. Mostly I have stuck with cybran although will admit that I have a lot of fun with the aeon so am going to flick between the two. seraphim i dont really look at and those nomads can wait!

I think my pursuit of improvement has actually been hampered by playing too much (played a horrific 1v1 against zjaguer and another complete fail on ladder with coca) - just awful games where I am more consumed with playing on to gain experience, without thinking what i am doing. I just don't learn like that so will go back to the more measured approach

Also had a couple of messages from people who have read this thread (nice to know not alone in the struggle) so its nice to be sharing the learning experiences with others at early stages

Anyway back to the point; next weeks focus:

- Practice and sandbox BO's on ladder maps.... there are certain maps which I struggle to start on which fucks the game from the off
- eco/tech transition (I don't think this is going to be something that happens within a week or so, been focusing on this for past few weeks or more, I just think this will improve on time with more games played)

PARTY

[zachyattacky]

I actually watched that game on Goodland's againt zjag because I saw it was a 9 minute game and was curious why. You opened with first air, then made an interceptor, engi, then another interceptor... I assume you learned something from that game about energy haha its good too see you being brave enough to try new things though.

Just remember you don't have to do any one thing in a game way better than your opponent, you gotta balance it out and try to do 3 or 4 things just a little bit better than them (eco, unit micro, scouting etc) if you pull ahead in a few different aspects you'll force them to react and this will throw them off their game. Get better at picking engagements this is really important early on.

Remember no matter how far behind you are all you have to do is kill the Commander, if you try to keep an eye on the enemy Com as the game progresses this becomes much easier.

Maybe this week try to use more hotkeys, pick good rally points, and scout (and actually look at what you scout, and react to it). Try to spend more time pushing forward and controlling units, not zoomed in staring at you base. Also, I believe a lot of games are decided by the 3-5 minute mark, if one player gets an advantage that early on it can be really hard for the other to come back from it. Try perfect your starts you'll be much better off.

I remember you started this thread about the same time I started playing, I've read every post, it's been fun watching your progress