Zerg sucks in Team Games

Okay, it is not like StarCraft II is balanced for team games in any way. It never has been and Blizzard seems to prioritize carebear team games over balance. Nothing new.

And Zerg has always been the worst race for team games. Traditionally it has mostly been a map design issue. The shared bases with an easy-to-block entrace removes the threat of early pressure. That sucks and make games less dynamic.

But the newest patches since blizzcon has removed any illusion of Zerg being viable in a team game. I kinda like the new battlecruiser, but team games allows you to mass them making the late game air-show even more ridiculous than it has been before.

So team games is Terran and Protoss only until next patch.

2v2 Frenzy

So I finally finalized the code that makes the Danish 2v2 ladder list work. That motivated me to take up team games again. Not permanently, but just to get my own name a little bit higher up the list. Anything else is too embarrassing.

So AiurAdun and I set out to play a truly epic series of games yesterday. And we lost. A lot.

We lost to people in lower leagues and won against teams in our own. Totally unpredictable. Maybe our race combination is a bit off. At least it seems to me that the early Marauder/Roach combination has become extremely dangerous after the last patch. Maybe we just suck. I feel so embarrassed by our expectation of rising quickly through the ranks, when in fact we did nothing like that.

Recommended VODs while SC2 on hiatus

There really isn’t that much to write about while we are waiting for us being able to play Starcraft II again.

I watched Husky and HDStarcraft’s 2v2 commentaries here. I’m normally not that excited about the stuff they do, cause I think they are to colorful and not analytical enough, but those games are not that serious anyways.

We are the Champions

At least until tomorrow. I formed a 2v2 team with TS-Buzz (aka Qvist) this afternoon and we went undefeated through the placement matches. This is quite common and you end up in platinum league. Here it usually gets tough, but not so today. Probably because TS-Buzz is quite good and probably because we both have gotten quite a bit better since we got into the beta. At least we ended up as the top team of our platinum division after 23 games.
Notice the team at the place just below us. A dual Zerg team (which is just as imbalanced as in Brood War). We even played them on Twilight Fortress and lost to mass roaches and mutalisks. You basically have to go all out to counter one of those builds and they then hit you with the other.
Oh well, we were chatting over Skype admiring our  lead position when I suddenly had to refresh the list.
Apparently the bastards had gone on playing and had now overtaken. I really wanted to go to bed with a lead position, but  we both had a cold and were more coughing that talking. It made getting into another game less attractive than just relaxing a bit.
I refreshed the list again and now we were in the lead again.
It seems that I have discovered that staying cool and letting the other players lose their position on the ladder is an equally valid strategy to that of playing!

I’m all mined out

I want to report about some impressive 1v1 feat, but to be honest I have experienced two kind of 1v1 games lately: The ones where I get run over in a very embarrassing fashion and those where I do the same to another. Not really worth taking about.

Talking about 2v2 seems more interesting right now. My team still suck so bad, but we are approaching C-. I say that now, because I am absolutely confident that we can make it that far.

For instance: Yesterday we played a 2v2 that turned out to be more than an hour long. The matchup was PTvTT on Python. I was the Protoss. None of the Terrans seemed to have any idea how the TvT matchup should be played so it was all defensive mode for a really long time. From time to time we switched ownership of the bases in the corners, but eventually we had it all mined out. Then it came down to an elimination match with what we had left. And a lot of tanks in siege mode.

It was absurd and hilarious.

Learning 2v2

I haven’t figured out how to study and become better at 2v2. I don’t think that it is as much a question of timings and build orders as in 1v1, but on the other hand it is. At least in the beginning where you have to know how to defeat a dual-Zerg-5 pool-rush (not even sure that it is possible to counter that).

Part of the problem that either your ally should be very good or at least have the same attitude towards learning the game. A team can’t significantly improve by one of the players getting better. The weakest link is what defines the overall quality of the team.

Lately I think playing 2v2 is about as satisfying as the parking tickets I got Friday, Tuesday and Wednesday.

I want the satisfaction of playing with someone as well as the satisfaction of the 1v1. I don’t know how to get that? The closest I can come is hanging out in the chat taking breaks with your friends while you all try to do some 1v1s. I don’t know that many people who are up for that.

If that is not possible then I would like to improve my 2v2. Are there any resources available on the net to do that? Most seem focused on 1v1s.

The Epic Failcall

I have been experimenting with recall harassment in late Terran vs Protoss and with some success. Vulnerable expansions and the place where the Terran keeps his factories (and armories) are the prime targets. It does not always work as intended. Usually because I have a wrong estimate of the number of turrets and units.

Yesterday for instance in a 2v2 with Darkan (replay) I did such a recall in to the mineral line on the east most expansion on Gaia. In less than 2 seconds I went from having an arbiter and a ton of units to having blue goo in another players base. It was epic and probably what lost us the game.

Gaia is, by the way, becoming one of my favorite 2v2 maps. In a way it is just another variation over the Lost Temple/Python template, but it is still very cool.

And the game taught me that PPvTT is even more unfair than PvT already is. Late game there are so many tanks and vultures that there really is nothing that the two Protoss players can do.

Zerg in 2v2 on Python

Why do zergs fast expand on this map in 2v2? If I and my partner did not suck so much, it should be fairly easy to punish any zerg for doing that. We have tried and rarely succeed, but I would imagine that other teams do.

Can a mixed team even beat a team of two zergs? If they 5 pool it looks impossible to even block the ramps against two that attacks at the same time. Even if they split up and rush both me and my ally separately it seems hard. Normally I have no problem defeating one zerg 5-pooling me, but having to prepare for two simultaneously attacks is harder. Preparing to help out my ally if he is the unlucky target is even harder.

Playing 2v2s

Due to my extremly bad iccup season, I’ve been playing a lot of 2v2s on battle.net. I feel bad about it, but since I suck, I assume that is one thing that I can be kinda good at.

A 2v2 is something completely different from a 1v1: It is a cheesy rush game and it is a lot more about being coordinated with your ally. When you get in that “we do things in synch”-mode with your ally it is great and when you don’t, you wish you were playing 1v1 and losing on iccup instead.

Games:

Color	Player	Race
W	duel_raptor	Protoss
B	Drummer_RelaX	Terran
Y	TS-Buzz.	Terran
R	FafnerX	Protoss

Download link.

Color	Player	Race
B	hi_hf_gl_ff_GO	Zerg
P	eZ-Dragon	Terran
G	TS-Buzz.	Terran
W	FafnerX	Protoss

Download link.

TS-Buzz. is a regular Starcraft-buddy of mine and we are at about the same level. Our games work out well together. Often I play with another guy called Darkan, and he is slightly worse.

This game is bad. I am annihilated early and now Darkan faces the Orange opponent on his own. Doom seems inevitable, but we talk on Skype and I guide him through the game. At then end I am called n00b and Darkan is praised. We both laughed about it.

Color	Player	Race
R	duel_raptor	Zerg
O	JULEK12	Terran
B	Darkan	Terran
P	FafnerX	Protoss

Download link.