Raped

[Flynn]

Okay I am really pissed by this one. This guy has 45 points on me yet he is so much better. I just got completely raped in this game I've tried watching the replay but I am too pissed right now He just has so many more units than I do. I tried to defend and raid as best I could but it wasn't enough. Also at the start the fucking engineer just stops building the line of factories that I told it to build, leaving me wasting mass badly And my engineer on the top right corner is unlucky because he gets destroyed a couple of seconds before my tank arrives I've taken higher rated players so I just don't get how he's so much better than me. Sorry about the conversation at the end of the replay, I was really frustrated! I should have built a wall to stop Manti sneaking around the back, I realise that now. Once my opponent gets the gun upgrade I had no chance.

[ZaphodX]

At 5 minutes in he started building loads of land factories and you wasted tons of mass. Fix your BO and use up all mass.

[ColonelSheppard]

your aurora micro sucks hard, play another faction

[GallantDragon]

Calm down, take a deep breath, and remember:

RATING DOES NOT EQUAL SCORE.

As far as I understand it, rating is basically a measure of how likely the lobby thinks it is that you will win or lose. The greater the difference between two players' ratings, the greater the probability that the one with the higher rating will win. Its entirely likely that the guy you faced off against had just recovered from a bad losing streak, or maybe he just hasn't played very many games. The lobby needs data on how you perform against other players to give you a rating, and the rating it will give you at first tends to be fairly inaccurate. Could be this guy is new to FAF.

[Anaryl]

Most people in this thread have your mistakes wrong.

First mistake was not going for hydro fast enough, and building too many pgens. This costs valueable mass. Hydro is 5x times efficient as a pgen in mass cost.

You had really bad intel, build more scouts and radar. Intel wins games, and hands down is one of the most important aspects of the game.

You ignored a lot of reclaim outside your base when stalling on mass.

Your ACU spent too long in your main. He's worth 2 engys in your base or 20 tanks in the field. Essentially as soon as you can spare 2 engys on construction in your main, move your acu out, usually after 2nd factory on canis but your mileage may vary.

Also, you need to protect expanding engineers. The further an engy is killed from your base, the greater the cost.

You do need to manage the transition from your initial BO to mass t1 production. You've recognised that issue. You do also need to work on your Aurora micro (I wouldn't say it's shit, but you can trust Sheppard to be a useless, unconstructive and insulting twat).

Also, Sesn was able to outmaneuver you, consistently getting mantis around your flanks. This is one of Cybran's strengths, but it means that you are redirecting troops to counter these raids, rather than putting pressure on him. This can quickly create a slippery slope effect where the other player has gotten inside your decision making loop and takes control of the game, forcing you to react to him.

GD is right, rating is only an approximation of how good the lobby thinks you are. Keep in mind as well that you are looking at global score, not 1v1 rating - two different things. His score is actually about 100 points higher in 1v1 rating, which is pretty consistent with the result.

Keep at it mate, isolate the mistakes and work on them. If need be, continually practise your BO in sandbox until you make no errors.

[Flynn]

Great post thank you Anaryl! You are the Aussie master I must admit I do think replays are overrated as a tool for learning. I have a few replay threads up now which are active and it seems I keep making the same mistakes over and over. Even in the replay where I beat a higher ranked player (who, admittedly, did not play very well) apparently I played the same as usual, so the theory of it just being the games that I lose where I play badly goes out of the window

It is a bit frustrating, approaching 350 games and still being slightly worse than average but there is a French guy called roger on FAF who has played 1000+ games and still has a 1000 rating and it doesn't seem to bother him! I agree about intel being so very important. The trouble is, when I don't have radar I don't notice that I don't have it if you see what I mean. It's only when I do have it that I notice what a difference it makes.

It is a problem when an opponent forces you into a reactive position but without additional troops it is hard to break that loop because chances are he will outnumber you 3:2 at that stage of the game. Breaking up your forces therefore is not an option because both groups will then be outnumbered and lost. It's only something that you can prevent against, the reason I have to become reactive in the first place is because I have already lost by that point. Although an effective strat on the smaller maps that I have noticed from watching replays of good players is to go T2 and spam some point defences out which will then secure land due to their long range, but it only works if you have a lot of reclaim available.

I think that covers everything, thanks.

[Ze_PilOt]

Did not looked your replay, but what is your aurora/land scout ratio ?

[Flynn]

I build 1 land scout, 5 Auroras and 2 artillery pieces.

[Zock]

too much arty, with aeon i'd recommend 1:10 arty:tanks as maximum. You need arty only for t1 pds (or if you want to ambush something with many structures), and then 2-4 are enough. You shouldn't have more.

If you manage not to lose your arty (park them somewhere until you see a PD), you don't need to build more and can put them out of the production completly.

[Ze_PilOt]

You should put some AA in your pack too.

Even if it doesn't need to be there, when you micro your auroras to stay behind, the AA will lag a little and will tank some shot.
And it's there when the other guy decide to do the best counter to them

(of course, on map like theta, you probably don't want do to it immediatly).