by Ars Nova » 07 Jul 2017, 02:20
The quote is kinda empty on calories. It doesn't mean anything. Anyone could say it. "You lost because your commander exploded. Stop doing that."
But I've watched a lot of new guys get into the game, and there's a bit of an order to the learning process.
Your Build Order
The first of it is always power stalling, and I'm surprised sometimes how long some players will maintain a build order that power stalls. I think they get used to stalling and take it as a natural part of the game. A common healthy convention is to build a factory first, then your power structures, and if you go land you build two power and if you go air you build three power. This works on maps where power reclaim is available, but a more safe, consistent way to open is factory, then three power generators if land and four generators if air. Make those your first four to five structures. The engies leaving the factory will build the mass extractors.
Mass is easier to get than power, but a power stall hurts you in a lot of ways. It reduces mass income, slows general production, shuts down intel - when you power stall in the early game, it can deceptively put you behind by minutes in the long run, and the impact won't be directly visible to you. Your engies aren't getting out as fast, nor is anything else. The enemy will have troops while you're still trying to build infrastructure. As you practice, you can experiment with the build order and go more lean because you can predict where a power stall will hit, but starting off, always go safe and always invest in having consistent power income. Build a little extra power starting off, and then set your earliest engies to build a power grid.
Reclaim
Next - reclaim. Always dispatch engineers to reclaim mass with your starting build order. Mass extractors are the backbone of your income, and reclaim is your meat, or maybe your vitamins. It depends on the map, but a player who actively reclaims mass will have more troops, and getting reclaim early means a faster game. For simplicity to minimize headache, it can be useful to build one factory and set it to produce a constant stream of engineers. Set up a patrol path from the factory to somewhere on the other side of the map, and for the most part you'll be able to forget about it. Aside from collecting reclaim with your brain off, you'll always have spare engies running around somewhere, which is handy and important. As you get better at the game you'll find more efficient ways to manage reclaim, but for starting off this is a no-fuss way to do things and it'll let you focus on the harder stuff.
Intel
The next issue is intel. A radar doesn't have to go up immediately, but soon is good. The easiest way to prevent a Cybran run-by is to see it coming on your map ahead of time. Additionally, you'll want to include land scouts with your normal build order. It's useful for all factions and mandatory for Aeon, who rely on superior range and micro to keep ahead. Other factions give a leg up to their artillery by seeing enemies from further out, and having the blips show up ahead of time gives you just a little more opportunity to maneuver. Radar is passive and land scouts travel with your army, but you'll want air scouts too so that you can see where your opponent is and understand what they're doing economically. If you fly a scout to their base and see an early T2 factory, that's your signal to attack, because the early tech investment will have slowed him down. Passivity is death, and consistent intel is how you avoid passivity in a clever fashion. Unfortuantely nothing can teach you what to do with intel short of experience, but do make a habit of always looking at the enemy base. If you ever find yourself with a stockpile of multiple scout planes, it usually doesn't mean you're building too many scouts, it means you're not scouting actively enough.
Stationary Defenses
To some extent I see players trying to rely on point defenses where they shouldn't. While useful at a choke, it's important to think of them as fallback structures. If you find yourself slightly overwhelmed, you can retreat to a PD and slow down the enemy. The PD will force them to bring artillery to the front, and when they do so you can use your proper tanks to attack the artillery. PDs are not a passive defense, they are an active stationary defense. They can do nothing by sitting alone, but with support they can be difficult to get past. When you're forced to abandon a PD, it will be destroyed, usually at minimal cost to the enemy.
Until T2, AA defenses are mainly to prevent your opponent from flying his interceptors into your base. Mobile AA and stationary AA don't have too much oomph, and they won't stop bombers unless they're arranged ahead of the bomber's target. Stopping bombers is what map awareness and interceptors are for. If your opponent is leaning more heavily into air than you are, it's to be expected that your opponent will also have more interceptors. Without ground-based AA, that means the enemy can fly directly into your base, shoot your air force, then bomb your infrastructure with impunity. Stationary AA discourages that. At T2, flak and shields can shut down most air completely, then at T3 it becomes a problem again as players need to invest heavily into T3 fighters.
Transitioning to T2
Transitioning into T2 can be tricky. A common behavior now is to build a high quantity of factories, since the gap between T2 and T1 isn't so large that quantity can't trump quality right away. As you upgrade your economy, the factories will produce units more rapidly, and this presents a safe buffer to smoothly move in to T2. It is possible to operate on fewer factories, but then you need to tech earlier and more rapidly, assisting with engies, and the transition is a vulnerable time since upgrading one factory removes a meaningful fraction of your production and the rush has a higher flow cost. Factory spam is the safer option, and a good idea for newer players. Factory spam also ensures that high reclaim quantities will be put to use, so if you find yourself sucking up a lot of mass at once none of it is wasted.
TMDs and Reclaiming Power
Finally, once you reach T2, built Tactical Missile Defenses. Players often insist that you should do this as your first action, and it's a fine habit to develop, but you may find through scouting that you've reached T2 earlier than your opponent. If you're certain the enemy can't start building tactical missile defenses, you can build T2 power first - but take the scouting seriously because if you're wrong you can pay. The advantage to going power first is that you can reclaim your T1 power generators after the T2 generator is build. The reclaim makes building your next projects faster. It's nice. If you feel like your scouting and map awareness is inefficient, then do start with TMDs. When in doubt, always build TMDs first.
On that note, if you build a Tactical Missile Launcher and see the enemy has built TMDs, don't forget you can reclaim your building. If you feel it's of no use, it's better to have the mass for other things. As for stationary artillery, it's a niche option and something most people recommend against. The high expense, low firing rate, and frailty means it's liable not to do much, but it does have solid reach and once it's established it can keep firing. Stationary artillery can be acceptable for making pressure - but expect the enemy to respond to that pressure by moving to the artillery so they can destroy it. If you sacrifice a suitable military in order to maker artillery, you'll almost always provoke a counter-attack and you'll lose.
Transitioning to T3
Transitioning to T3 is one of the more fluid parts of the game. Many players like to rush it because T3 units pack so much power, but the exact timing gets fuzzy depending on a lot of factors, so learning to reach T3 takes experience. Sometimes you should focus on eco first, other times on reinforcing a forward position, building fire bases, exploiting bombing targets before shields cover them. There's no hard and fast rule in a general game.
The Map and Game
Finally, there are some different trends depending on the map and the quantity of players. You'll find players who exclusively play on Setons to have a slightly different perspective than people who mostly ladder 1v1. This is because team strategies and tactics do change the flow of the game. If you play on those maps, they all have very specific metas. That doesn't make them bad to play on, since occupying a role gives a person less to think about at once and can help you get intimate with specific aspects of the game. Air players often learn to nail down eco management from playing their position, for example. It can also teach bad habits, but if you're having fun then you're having fun.
, I found this quote and thought I'd share it;
