How to Win at StarCraft

Thanks very much to Mucky for constructing this guide - it was posted several years ago on the Samods forum but most of the advice is still applicable to strategies in StarCraft.

It was tidied up a little by Magic and Taeradun.

The original forum post is still active here.

Overview

Various people from Firebat Friday have been asking this from me for a while now, and I don't want to come off as a jerk just because I feel more inclined to practice with people that are on my level. Therefore, I am writing this.

This post is aimed towards players of poor to mediocre skill level (i.e. people from Firebat Friday) that wish to improve their understanding of the fundamentals of this game. There are a lot of mechanics in this game as any decent player should know, but if you don't even know the counters to unit combinations, then it doesn't matter how solid your mechanical skills are. First and foremost:

I. Perspective

This is an important factor, but difficult to learn. Anything you learn from this post you can learn on your own by practicing and experimenting. Remember that the purpose of practice games are not to win, but to improve. Whether or not you win is irrelevant. I've noticed people in Firebat Friday have defeatist attitudes. This is never a good thing. If you're not determined and are not willing to accept occasional defeat, you will not learn from your losses, and you will not improve.

Most importantly, you must have fun improving your gameplay. While it requires a serious pursuit to improve substantially, if you're not having fun getting better and being able to do things you could only dream of a week before, save yourself the time, and don't even start.

II. Introduction

Everything I state in this post applies towards one on one games and not much else. Keep this in mind so you don't mistake my information as something that would work in a two on two or free-for-all and get yourself killed. Flexibility and adaptation are very important factors of playing Starcraft effectively, but I will describe those another time.

A. The Units

As I stated above, most people from Firebat Friday do not even know what units counter other units, so before I get into other concepts, I'm going to attempt to explain the purpose of every unit, and when/how they should be used. Remember that no matter how far a game has progressed, no single unit becomes useless. Every unit has a different purpose. This is one reason why I like Starcraft so much. Starting off with Terran:

Terran

Marine

Against a Protoss or Terran, you should avoid building these. This is because marines simply cannot stand up to these two races, especially Terran. If you don't believe me, try it sometime. More on this later. Against Zerg in early game, where you only have a small amount of Marines, Zerglings tend to overpower these fragile units. However, as Medics, Firebats, and more Marines come into play, Zerglings become more of a support unit with whatever other units the Zerg is using than a main attack unit. Against Zerg, these are the staple unit, and you should never be without these unless you are using Goliaths. In that case you should avoid mixing these two units together because this just doesn't work in Brood War (not sure how well it fares in Vanilla). It goes without saying that if you are using these as your main attack unit, stimpack is mandatory.

Firebat

Specialist unit obviously designed to fight clusters of melee units, with that said these should never be your main attack unit. Just three or four of these are invaluable against Zerglings and Zealots. Against ranged units, however, these units tend to die horribly, especially because they deal concussive damage.

Medic

An important unit meant to work with marines and firebats, there is never a reason to not use these with your marines. There's not much to be said, other than don't bother researching their spells as their purposes are rather arbitrary and their energy would probably be much better invested in healing. It would be nice if Optical Flare had an area of effect rather than it being single-target, as all the blinded unit would need is another unit to spot for it, and you will have wasted 75 energy. The only thing I can think of for Restoration is to get rid of Parasites, but Zergs don't normally use that so it's not a big issue. Don't bother using it to cure Ensnare because you're going to be doing hell of a lot of restoring and all it takes is another 75 energy from the Queen and all of your units are ensnared again.

Ghost

These units should be used sparingly. Their main purpose should be to lockdown high-end units like Battlecruisers and Carriers, but then you have the infamous Nuke. To be honest, Nukes aren't all that dangerous as they are made out to be as long as you have detection and you know where they are nuking. Likewise, if can spare the resources, you can occasionally catch someone off guard with a Nuke, to which they will usually panic, not knowing where it's aimed at. However, even if they can't kill the Ghost, all they have to do is move their units away and they will receive minimal damage, which is why Nukes aren't all that great. They have the least chance of success against a Terran because of Comsat, followed by Zerg if they use their Overlords well.

Vulture

In a Terran versus Protoss game, these units are very useful. The idea should be obvious: Mines. With Mines researched, Vultures are what cause the damage in a fast Tank push. Also, since they are so fast, they can also be used to run past an opponent's defenses and hit their worker line, and even lay mines for when they send their units to chase you away. In small numbers of Vultures versus Dragoons, the Vultures can be used to surround and lay mines, usually killing off the entire group. Beware, however, as carelessness can cause you to lose your own units to badly placed mines, and people tend to use suicide units to abuse this. Don't try laying mines around large groups of Dragoons because you will just get slaughtered.

Siege Tank

The staple unit of the Terran race, the Siege Tank is useful in every matchup. While their siege mode is very powerful, their tank mode is often underused. Versus a Protoss, sieging all of your Tanks is not always a good idea as the there's always the threat of splash damage and Zealots. Versus a Zerg, Tanks in tank mode outrange burrowed Lurkers, and they still do plenty of damage, so you don't have to sacrifice mobility at every battle. Nevertheless, Tanks are extremely useful and anyone who isn't using them is either a) fooling around or b) stupid.

Goliath

An unfavored unit by many because of its amazing ability to get stuck in disagreeable places whenever the opportunity rises. Its ground attack is also quite weak; don't ever expect them to hold their own against Dragoons or Tanks. These units work much better when supported by a few Tanks. Against a Terran, Goliaths are used quite often because of Wraiths and also because going all Tanks tends to leave you with a lot of minerals and no gas. Against a Protoss, however, you will be serviced much better by Vultures not only because of Mines but because of the fact that they cost no gas allows you to make more Tanks. Obviously, this only applies until the Protoss starts getting Carriers.

Wraith

These units are not meant to be used as a direct attack unit, but rather harassment. In other words, when you send your Wraiths at your opponent, you usually want to hit their worker line unless it's defended with anti-air. When his units come to attack your Wraiths, run and hit a different area. Against a Zerg, however, you'll probably want to attack his Overlords as you'll kill them much faster than anything else and it forces the Zerg to waste minerals on extra Overlords. Wraiths are expensive, and having a lot of these is not going to do you much good unless there's capitol ships flying around. Other than that, there's not much reason to make these units rather than Tanks. The less Wraiths you use to accomplish whatever you're trying to do, the better off you are.

Dropship

Invaluable, just two of these can cause massive damage when used correctly. There are dozens of ways this unit can be used, I cannot possibly list them all. Against Zerg, just one of these can be used to ferry your marines/medics into an undefended area of their base, usually done outside of their field of vision. This is just one example to give you an idea of how powerful these can be.

Science Vessel

Another incredibly versatile unit. Not only do they make sturdy mobile detection, their spells can be used in just about any situation. Defensive matrix allows your Tanks to make a push that they normally wouldn't be able to do (i.e. Tanks versus Tanks). They are absolutely deadly against Zerg. Irradiate will fry clusters of Mutalisks, as well as keep Lurkers in check when there's more than your ground force can handle. Their use is limited against Terran and Protoss (Terran especially), however.

Valkyrie

Limited in use, as well as expensive. Avoid using these.

Battlecruiser

These units are so expensive and so far up the tech tree that you almost never see these units in action. However, a few of these supporting your Tanks can work very well. Don't bother going for these if you don't have at least three active geysers because the gas could be better spent in Tanks.

Protoss

Moving onto Protoss:

Zealot

Useful in every matchup, these should never be neglected. In early game, these units are probably the most powerful for rushing. With upgrades and leg enhancements, these units can only become more useful. There are several Protoss versus Zerg strategies that involve an early weapon upgrade, as +1 weapon Zealots will kill Zerglings in two hits rather than three. Against a Terran, Zealots can be used as suicide units to attract splash damage from their Tanks and Mines, as well as forcing Tanks in siege mode to unsiege (remember when I said it's not always a good idea to siege all of your tanks?).

Dragoon

Also quite useful, Dragoons are cost-effective against Tanks (before Zealots get their speed upgrade), Lurkers, Mutalisks, and most likely a bunch of other units. Pure Dragoons are a common early-to-mid game strategy against Terran and Protoss. Against Zerg, however, they will need some other unit to support them, or else Zerglings will eat them. They can be Probes for all I care. If you're using more than three of these (and most of the time you will), get the range upgrade.

High Templar

Used mainly against Zerg, without these, Protoss are helpless to fight the huge masses that Zergs tend to build up. Pre-1.08, Psionic Storm did 16x8 damage, rather than 16x7, which could kill Lurkers and Mutalisks in one storm. Since then, Protoss players have compensated by getting the +50 energy upgrade. There is not much practical use for Hallucination (keyword: practical; I realize you can come up with a bunch of theories where it can work well, but it just doesn't).

Archon

Used mainly to fight Zerglings and Mutalisks. If you're Terran/Protoss, laugh whenever you see this unit.

Dark Templar

Specialist unit much like the Firebat, they are used most often to punish their opponent for their lack of detection. However, if they do have detection, these units are quite weak. For that reason, do not make more than two or three because it is a waste of resources. They are quite useful in shutting down unguarded expansions and protecting against drops.

Dark Archon

Underused, and with good reason; there's not much use for these. Expensive and impractical, its strong point is using Feedback on spellcasters. Psionic Storm is much better than Maelstrom overall, and Mind Control is too long a wait, not to mention that its payoffs are often minimal. Used most often in long, dragged out games.

Shittle

See "Dropship".

Reaver

Often a risky unit to use, these require good unit control in conjunction with a Shuttle to be effective. To rush for a Shuttle and Reaver is usually a do-or-die strategy. If the Protoss is not able to deal damage equal to the damage suffered simply from rushing for a Reaver, then the strategy has failed.

Observer

Useful in every matchup. Against a Protoss, people tend to use their first Observer for the purpose of killing their opponent's. Against Terran, the first Observer should go directly to their main base, because it is critical that you know what the Terran is doing. The rest should be used to kill Mines with Dragoons. If you're getting Observers versus a Zerg it's usually because he has you contained with Lurkers. You're going to need more than one in that case because they're obviously going to make an effort to kill your Observer. The speed upgrade is not always needed, but the sight range upgrade should always be considered as Observer movement is often restricted by Turrets and Overlords.

Scout

Used by no one because it is impossible for this piece of crap to make up for getting the damn thing in the first place. Without upgrades it is slow, it is very weak against ground, and on top of all this it's expensive. Brood War took away whatever use this unit had with the much more efficient Corsair.

Corsair

Used most often to hunt Overlords and fight Mutalisks. If you have a lot of these, they can be used in conjunction with Reavers and Disruption Web to form something that no amount of Hydralisks can kill. Not many Zergs are used to fighting this. Other than that, there's not much use for this unit because it costs a lot of money to get Disruption Web, not to mention that 125 energy is a long wait.

Carrier

Yes, these infamous units do have a purpose. Just because newbies like to mass these units doesn't mean they're useless in every aspect. Combined with Corsairs and Reavers, they force a Zerg to use Devourers along with their Hydralisks. Against a Terran, Carriers can be a big suprise when the Terran is still going Vultures and Tanks. Other than what was stated above, these units are mainly used as taunting victory fleets for when the Protoss has a much stronger economy than his opponent's. Do not neglect using Dragoons and Templars instead.

Arbiters

Underused, but only because it's so expensive and far up the tech tree. There are strategies against a Terran that revolve around an early Arbiter to recall a bunch of Dragoons in their undefended main. There are also some very creative ways to use Stasis Field, such as stasising units on a bridge/ramp to block out a much superior force. It goes without saying that its cloaking field is helpful in every situation.

Zerg:

Last, but not least, the Zerg:

Zergling

Limited use against Terran because of Marines and Firebats, however they are invaluable versus Zerg or Protoss. Their upgrades turn them into killing machines that are useful in just about every situation. As anyone should know, these units tend to eat static defense in a matter of seconds. Against a Protoss, you should beware of the weapon upgrade for Zealots as I stated above, and you'll need an armor upgrade to counter it.

Hydralisk

Easily the most versatile unit, but by no means the strongest. Pure Hydralisks are probably the easiest thing for any race to beat, with the exception of pure Zerglings versus a Terran.

Lurker

There are many uses for this unit that I can't possibly list them all. They are the staple unit of Zerg versus Terran, and a Zerg needs Lurkers just as much as a Terran needs Tanks. Against Protoss, they are used often to contain (notice how you don't do that versus a Terran because of Tanks). Lurker drops on worker lines is always a good idea, as well as using them to protect new expansions.

Overlord

Supply, transportation, and detection all in one unit. Once its speed and transport upgrades are researched, Zerg instantly gains an unlimited amount of transports to use at any given time. Moreover, rather than shoving them in the back of your base or whatever, they should be put all over the map, so you always know where your opponent is moving, and you're always able to respond accordingly. Don't bother with the sight range upgrade since there's almost never a point in getting it.

Mutalisk

Used mainly to harass an opponent. Do not use these to directly attack an enemy. I see this done far too much. Mutalisks are weak and fragile, and I don't ever recommend massing these units for the same reasons I recommend you not mass Wraiths. With its great mobility, Mutalisks can run around hitting weak spots in an enemy base as well as cut off reinforcements if your opponent has moved out to attack. Combined with Zerglings, they are the staple of Zerg versus Zerg games.

Scourge

Versatile and cost-effective. Used most often on Science Vessels, Observers, Corsairs, Mutalisks as well as a bunch of other units. Can also be used to patrol around bases in case of a drop. Don't use them on Battlecruisers (at least, not by themselves) because they kill Scourge in one shot. Strong Zerg versus Zerg play revolves around strong Scourge control.

Guardian

Often overlooked, used mainly to attack while hovering over a cliff or simply when the opponent has far too strong of an anti-ground force (i.e. tons of Tanks)

Devourer

Used mainly to fight Corsair/Reaver when your Hydralisks are having trouble with it. Avoid using these because they're really expensive.

Queen

Underused. Ensnare and Parasite can be helpful at times, but usually it will just detract from other things unless you have a huge economy. Broodling is far too long of a wait for it to be practical. Against Protoss, you can expect them to suicide parasited units.

Ultralisk

A powerful unit that eats bacon and ham sandwiches. Used mainly in conjunction with dozens of other Ultralisks to instantly win games.

Defiler

Underused. These delicate creatures are the bane of Terran and Protoss. If I ever bother going for these, I will usually make six or eight because people will actively try to kill these units above all others. There's not much to say about this unit other than that its spells are very powerful and should never be neglected.

Infested Terran

A unit designed to embarrass your opponent. Obviously, when the going gets tough, I recommend you infest a Command Center, make ten million of these, put them in Overlords, drop them all over a base to instantly raze it and claim victory.

B. Micromanagement

What is micro?

Micro, short for micromanagement, is a term used to describe unit control. In short, any action that involves giving an order to a unit is micromanagement. However, there is more to micromanagement than this.

How can it be used?

Here are some basic ideas that I will describe using examples. Imagine this: you have eight Marines that are about to engage eight Zerglings. Since Zerglings are melee units and they can only attack units in the front, the idea here is to move the Marines under attack towards the back, so that the Zerglings will switch to attacking healthy Marines. This usually results in all eight Zerglings dying while you will have lost perhaps one or two Marines. This is called dancing.

Another example: You have twelve Marines and four Medics. Four Lurkers are charging at you. It doesn't take a brain surgeon to know that Lurkers slaughter tightly packed Marines, so the answer is to stim your Marines, hit the Lurkers as they burrow and run. You will most likely kill one of the Lurkers, and when they unburrow to advance their push you rinse and repeat. This is the most basic tactic used to fight Lurkers with Marines. Later on, you can try spreading them out to minimalize damage taken and to attack the Lurkers directly. However, this is very difficult to do and you should probably wait a while until you try that kind of advanced unit control.

Yet another example: You have eight Hydralisks. Five Zealots are coming at you. Assume no upgrades on either side. Rather than letting the Hydralisks shoot random Zealots, take all eight of them and tell them to attack one Zealot. That Zealot should die shortly. Rinse and repeat for the other Zealots. This is focus firing, and it's used because having 10 moderately injured Zealots are better than having 4-5 healthy ones, because a Zealot with 1 HP deals as much damage as a Zealot with full health. In other words, as individual units are dying, potential firepower is lost.

If you have 10 Zealots attacking someone, and one is in the red, take that one Zealot, move it in the back, and send it back in. That nearly dead Zealot will get a few more shots off rather than just dying and not getting any shots off. This is what I am getting at. With good unit control, you can increase the life expectancy of units and gain an advantage in future battles.

C. Macromanagement

What is macro?

Macromanagement is the spending of resources. I've noticed that people tend to think that having a lot of money in the stockpile is a good thing. This is true in a way, but generally you don't want that to be happening.

How can it be used?

Imagine: You have no units. 50 Zerglings are killing your base. You have 3000 minerals and 1000 gas. Wouldn't you think it would be better to have 300 minerals and 100 gas, while having a substantial force that would crush his Zerglings? That being said, you should always try to keep your money spent. It's better to have an army right then and there rather than marveling at how much money you have. You generally don't want to have more than 300 minerals unless you're about to expand. For beginners, try staying below 600-800 minerals. If you don't know what to spend your resources on, build random things, get upgrades, get whatever. The idea is simply to keep your money spent. It helps in some ways.

D. Multi-tasking

This is basically putting micro and macro together. Let's say you're in the middle of a battle. Your superior unit control wins you the battle. However, while you were busy managing your units, your resource stockpile has built up substantially. Rather than watching the battle, you'd want to check back at your base to keep your factories producing.

On the other hand, let's say you're watching your base and your army is somewhere else. Your army gets slaughtered. While your resources are spent, your new units will have no existing army to support them, and most of the time all it will have taken was a few commands to save your entire army. Multi-tasking is an important factor, and it must be practiced.

I'm going to stop here. This is more than enough to get anyone started and going for quite a while. I didn't even realize how long this post has become until now. I'd like to get some feedback on this post first before diving into more specific concepts.

E. Glossary

There's many slang terms for pretty much every unit and are used by all of Battle.net including myself. I wouldn't be suprised if you knew some of these. If not, it's best to learn the terms now or else you'll have trouble understanding routine chat. Similarly, nobody wants to take the time to write out "Cybernetics Core" in the middle of a game when "core" would achieve the same effect because that will just slow them down.

The format goes as (full name) - (shortened version).

Marine - 'rine'
Firebat - 'bat'
Medic - 'med'
Vulture - 'vult'
Spider Mine - 'mine'
Siege Tank - 'tank'
Goliath - 'gol'
Science Vessel - 'vessel' or 'sci'
Valkyrie - 'valk'
Battlecruiser - 'bc'

Command Center - 'cc'
Supply Depot - 'supply' or 'depot'
Barracks - 'rax'
Bunker - 'bunk'
Academy - 'acad'
Engineering Bay - 'ebay' or 'bay'
Factory - 'fact'
Starport - 'port'
Science Facility - 'sci fac'

Zealot - 'zeal' or 'lot'
Dragoon - 'goon'
High Templar - 'temp' or 'ht'
Archon - 'arch' or 'chon'
Dark Templar - 'dtemp' or 'dt'
Dark Archon - 'darch' or 'da'
Reaver - 'reav'
Observer - 'ob'
Scout - 'plane' or 'those crappy units that nobody uses'
Corsair - 'cor' or 'sair'
Carrier - 'carr', 'car' or 'underwater flying harem'
Arbiter - 'arb'

Gateway - 'gate'
Shield Battery - 'batt' or 'battery'
Cybernetics Core - 'core'
Robotics Facility - 'robo'
Citadel of Adun - 'citadel'
Templar Archives - 'temp', 'arch' or 'archive' (since temp and arch are both used for different things I use archive)

Zergling - 'ling'
Hydralisk - 'hydra'
Lurker - 'lurk'
Overlord - 'ovie' or 'lord'
Mutalisk - 'muta' or 'mut'
Guardian - 'guard'
Devourer - 'dev'
Queen - 'snot blower'
Ultralisk - 'ultra' or 'ult'
Defiler - 'def'

Hatchery - 'hat' or 'hatch'
Creep Colony - 'creep'
Spawning Pool - 'pool'
Sunken Colony - 'sunk'
Evolution Chamber - 'evo'
Spore Colony - 'spore'
Hydralisk Den - 'den'
Nydus Canal - 'nydus' or 'canal'

As you can see, most unit names are shortened down to one syllable or under 4 letters, whichever comes first. Not every unit is on this list, which is because they have no short name ('ghost' remains the same since it's one syllable, and typing it as 'gost' will just make you look like an ass) or their short name is painfully obvious and certain units are assumed by the mention of other units (e.g. telling someone to get queens indirectly implies to get a queen's nest). If you ask me, all of these terms are very sensible and it doesn't make you look stupid to use them. I myself find it pointless to do this on a forum, however it wouldn't be entirely unreasonable if I did.

Miscellaneous Terms, format (term) - (explanation):

'expo' - Expansion, empty or otherwise
'gas' - Refinery/Assimilator/Extractor
'worker' or 'peon' - SCV/Probe/Drone
Probably more than that, I'll be adding onto this.

F. Fundamentals

General ideas that apply to most other RTS games. Once you get these down, you could probably play an RTS you've never heard of and play reasonably well.

Constant Worker Pumping

Think about it. It takes 4 seconds to extract the minerals from a patch, and another 4 seconds to return them and go back to mine. In other words, each mineral patch will ideally support two workers each. However, in real games workers will waste time moving around, and mineral patches end up not being mined for a few seconds. Three workers each is the saturation point, which means there is no idle time. Until then, every worker you build will pay for itself at least three times over. Even at point of saturation, you should continue making workers until you have 60-80, because when you expand you can transfer a bunch of them to your new expansion and you will immediately profit from it.

As Terran/Protoss, the only reason you would not be producing workers would be to start gateway/barracks faster for a rush, which if fails will put you at a disadvantage. Zerg, however, do not need to do this and infact they shouldn't as it will actually hurt them. Later on, I will explain why.

Scouting

Obvious, but not done enough. As your first depot/pylon/overlord are building, you should send a worker out to find your opponent and see what he is going for. Scouting should be done very often so that you can assess the situation. It can be done on every occasion; for example when moving out with marines, you could keep one out ahead of the rest to spot for lurkers. Patrol single units through empty expansions to make sure your opponent isn't getting away with free money.

Overall, you should be sending some sort of unit to your opponent's base every now and then to see what units he has and how many. In order to beat an opponent's strategy, you must first find out what it is. As your experience grows, your intuition will become stronger and you can predict what your opponent is doing with less scouting. This is why good players are often accused of hacking.

Combining Different Units

Also obvious, and most people already know of this. A single unit has a certain role. No matter how many of this unit you have, they still only fill that same role. I remember someone from these forums telling me that medics are a waste even if you're using a lot of marines. In my opinion this is exactly the opposite; it's a waste having so many marines without any medics supporting them. There's tons of units that will kill marines in no time flat whereas even the presence of one medic will turn the tables (unless you have 100 marines or something; a reasonable ratio would be 4:1 marine:medic). Against two sunken colonies, two medics and two marines is better than twenty marines and no medics.

That's just one example, but this applies to pretty much every unit in the game, and it's such an important factor that even Bart Farkas's strategy guide includes info regarding this.

Supply

There's not much to say about this. You should build your depot/pylon/overlord as your supply is starting to reach its limit, rather than when it hits the limit. When you have a lot of unit production, you should always have 1-2 building to keep up.

Avoid Building Static Defense

This isn't to say you shouldn't build them at all. However, when it comes to defense, the purpose of static defense should be to buy time for your mobile force to get there, never to fend off the attack themselves.

Proper Building Placement

This is hard to describe in words. Placing barracks, gateways, etc. in a straight line helps as it prevents big units from getting stuck. If your base falls under attack, building placement can be used to your advantage especially if you have ranged units. Also, one defensive structure would be placed where it would be able to cover the entire base (or at least a critical part of it).


This depicts how bad building placement can harm


Good building placement: No units have a risk of getting stuck, placed right at choke so they're immediately able to defend and move out


Placing routine structures in a matter such that it seals off angles of attack and turns a losing battle into a winning one

G. Race Vs. Race

These are summaries of how each matchup is normally played. Keep in mind that everyone has their own style, however if you don't know how to play well enough, you should probably follow this until you get a good enough of an idea on how to play, and then you'll be able to incorporate your own style. That is exactly how I learned to play.

I'll probably be getting into much more detailed descriptions of every matchup, however that will take a lot of writing (probably as much as this post per matchup), and keep in mind everything I type here applies only to one on one games. Other game types require their own post to explain. Also, while none of you probably play Battle.net enough to have noticed, but Lost Temple is (sadly) considered the default map. In other words, if you want someone to give you info on a different map, you'd have to specify.

Terran vs. Protoss

Most games start off with the Terran walling in (building barracks and depot at your choke point to block off units) and going for factory-based units. If you have no choke, build it around your main (refer to "Proper Building Placement") and perhaps get a bunker. This is because if the Protoss is able to rush with zealots, your marines are going to get assraped and you'll need to either build a bunker or pull off SCVs. For those who have never seen a wall in their lives:



As you can see, with this wall, marines will be able to easily hold off zealots because they have to attack the depots first. If you see the Protoss trying to zealot rush, you can laugh, bring some SCVs to repair and watch as he hopelessly tries to break your wall.

Here is what I am getting at: Why would you risk yourself to getting rushed like this when you could make marines out of two barracks and fend off his rush like that? This is because marines are very weak against a Protoss in general. Even though marines tend to kill zealots and dragoons once they have medics and stim (even then it's pretty difficult), the Protoss has a ton of unit choices to make, all of which slay marines effortlessly. Reavers and templars both cleave large groups of marines, and dark templars not only kill marines in one hit, the Terran must constantly scan just to attack them. On top of this, it's not entirely inconvenient for them to tech for such units. It's very easy for Protoss to adjust to mass marines.

With that said, Terran's ground force will usually consist of tanks and vultures. Don't bother making any goliaths unless you see air units. Tanks and vultures complement eachother very well; dragoons have the dilemma of hitting tanks and getting overpowered, or attempting to move close to them and getting killed by mines. When assaulting a Protoss army, you should always have some tanks sieged and have vultures lay mines. If you don't, the Protoss will win the battle with little losses. If you do, you'll win the battle with little losses.

Tank pushing is a common method of attack. Tank pushes are where the Terran sieges the tanks infront, moves the other tanks in from the back and repeats the process. Since the tank has such high range, this forces the Protoss to engage the Terran on his terms. When laying mines, for God's sake, don't tell 12 vultures to all lay mines at one spot. This causes them to ram into eachother and mabye 1 or 2 will actually lay a mine down, and if this is in the middle of a battle you're going to get killed.

Terran vs. Zerg

Marines are actually the desirable unit to have in this matchup. Marines and medics are able to fight zerglings, hydralisks, mutalisks and sometimes even guardians (but not always). However, there is the one problem that's on every Terran's mind, good player or not: Lurkers. This is probably the most micro-based matchup in the game, since without that no Terran can win against a Zerg. I've said it before, but I'll repeat here: Every Terran player will try to attack the lurkers as they are burrowing, and then run. By doing this, they can pick lurkers off one by one while suffering minimal losses. Range helps with this, but stim is mandatory; if you don't have stim, don't even bother trying this, just run. This, however, is not normally an issue since if you're going for marines and medics, you should be starting the stimpack upgrade immediately or at least very soon, followed with the range upgrade. When marines have the range upgrade, their range is equal to that of the lurker.

Pretty soon, you'll want to build a factory so you can get tanks. One factory is enough for now; without an expansion you'll only be able to afford one. If you find that you are infact able to produce out of more than one factory, you are not spending your resources well enough. Meanwhile, you have the choice of expanding and then getting vessels or getting vessels and then expanding. Both of these, however, are important.

Metal is doable against a Zerg, however it has many weaknesses. While easier to control, it removes the option of rushing, meaning Zerg is able to make tons of drones while skimping on defense. Goliaths and tanks are a weaker combo in general because hydralisks and mutalisks have an advantage, whereas neither of these units can touch marines/medics.

Terran vs. Terran

There's a few openings you can make. Goliaths and tanks, vultures with mines switching into goliaths and tanks, or wraith rush. All of these have their own advantages and disadvantages, it depends on your style. Goliaths/tanks are the most standard in this matchup, even if neither side has air. The problem with pure tanks is that mines might damage them a bit, their high gas cost will leave you with no gas and a ton of minerals, and the obvious vulnerability to air. Goliaths balance out the resources better and removes the threat of air. Mines can be killed by Goliaths simply by attack moving; once goliaths come into play vultures are worthless.

Wraith rushing has its own benefits. Cloak gives you a free expansion since the only thing your opponent will have to attack you at this time is a comsat. When he scans your wraiths, you run away and come back when the scan has expired. Eventually he will run out of energy and be forced to move back. Science vessels are not an issue because they cost as much gas as two tanks and 1/4 and can be killed relatively easy.

Marines are simply not a viable option. Any factory-based unit slaughters marines instantly. You should not wall against Terran for two reasons. One, there is no threat of an early attack like there is with a Protoss and two, the depots risk being killed by a tank push.

Protoss vs. Terran

As you may have gleaned from the reverse side of this, zealots and dragoons are the staple combo. You should only be making zealots, however, once you have their speed upgrade, otherwise they will get killed before they can even attack anything. Upgrading dragoon range is a must, since you're going to be using these units the most and the extra range makes them a lot more powerful. Observers are needed to spot mines, which otherwise will kill all of your units. Dragoons can't stop mines like goliaths can because their attack doesn't hit immediately, unlike the goliath. You should try to have at least more than one base than the Terran has. If the Protoss tries to operate with the same economic strength as the Terran, he loses. Avoid engaging the Terran when he has tanks sieged and mines layed; wait for him to move out and hit him while he's unsieged.

If the Terran has more tanks than any ground force you muster up can handle, carriers may work on occasion, however it depends on the map. If there are cliffs, keep your carriers over them, and his goliaths will have a very hard time with them. If there are no cliffs, you're probably going to have to keep the carriers with your ground force. If the Terran is still using tanks/vultures and does not see the carriers coming, you've probably won the game. Obviously, you should have a substantial economy before attempting to get carriers (enough money to produce them out of at least 3 stargates).

Protoss vs. Protoss

Most games open with either zealot rushing or teching for dragoons. Zealot rushes work sometimes since people who tech quickly tend to be underpowered and unable to handle your zealots, especially if you are close to him. Otherwise, if you are teching for dragoons, you should get the range upgrade as well. Against someone who's rushing zealots, you need to control your dragoons. Move your dragoons away, and attack once you gain enough distance. This should be easy because dragoons are faster than zealots when they don't have speed. If you're not rushing with them, you should again only make zealots once you have the speed upgrade for them. You'll want to get observers so you can scout his base/forces and provide mobile detection for dark templars. You can try throwing reavers into the mix, however they are very hard to control as well as expensive (shuttle + reaver = 400/100)

Protoss vs. Zerg

Zealots are your ideal unit here. They're strong against zerglings early on and do very well against hydralisks once they have speed. Most Protoss will go straight for templars, making dragoons only if there are lurkers or mutalisks. If the former, make less zealots and more dragoons, don't merge templars, and get observers. If the latter, get a few dragoons but keep making zealots and merge your templars. Out of any unit in the game, archons are probably the best unit to counter mutalisks. If the zerg continues to make only zerglings and hydralisks, zealots and templars should be all you need. If the zerg has more bases than you, this does not necessarily mean you are losing. Infact, if the zerg has the same number of bases as you, that usually means you are winning. Protoss/Terran economy is far stronger than Zerg economy.

Zerg vs. Terran

Before I go on, I'd like to mention that Zerg is not meant to be played like the other two races. Whereas a Terran/Protoss will be pumping units out of a CC/Nexus and 2 barracks/gateways, the Zerg will have 2-3 (more often only 2) hatcheries and they must choose between troops and workers. Balancing these two out is one of the hardest things to learn. Note what I said above, "Protoss/Terran economy is far stronger than Zerg economy". If a Protoss/Terran were to mine resources equal to the Zerg, there is very little chance that the Zerg will win. Zerg armies are far weaker and their strength lies mostly in mass and mobility. Typically, a Zerg will have 1-2 bases against a Protoss/Terran's 1 base, 3-4 against 2, 5+ against 3.

Anyway, as you hatch your overlord, there will be a period of time where you're basically sitting there watching your drones collect minerals. Once your overlord hatches, morph 2 or 3 more drones. At around 200 minerals (give or take a bit, depending on the distance), send a drone out to your natural expansion (the empty expansion next to your main, most maps designed for 1on1 have this). By the time the drone arrives, you should have 300 minerals and you can morph the drone into a hatchery. Don't hatch any more drones yet, wait for your next 200 to morph a pool. After that, start making drones again, and get gas as soon as possible. After you morph your third drone, start saving larva for zerglings.

As your hatchery is nearly done (3/4-way), send like 4 drones over. Your hatchery and pool should finish at the same time and you should have a total of 4 larva. Morph 3 of these into zerglings and the last into a drone. If your opponent doesn't try to attack you very early, you can just send your zerglings over near his base for scouting purposes. Send one zergling into his choke, and maintain another one just outside. Have the other four patrolling around so to spot for any rushes.

At this point, you should have enough gas for a lair. Make sure to continuously scout your opponent to see how many marines he has. If he has around 10-12, you're going to need to morph 4-5 drones into creep colonies soon. Once you do this, keep them as creep colonies until your patrolling zerglings see that he's moving out. Your colonies should have enough time to morph to sunkens when he moves out. This is just a simple money saver. Mass zerglings usually aren't a good idea, because you're losing 11-13 larva which could've all been drones, and if the terran has stimpack (and the only time they wouldn't is if they forgot it or something) your zerglings are very likely to get waxed. Once your lair is halfway done, get a hydralisk den. The lair and den will finish at the same time, and you should immediately start lurker research. Later on, you'll want a spire so you can get scourge for dropships and vessels.

Zerg vs. Protoss

In the beginning, pretty much the same procedure as above. If he's zealot rushing, make two creep colonies at your natural expansion. If he attacks one of them, cancel that one before it finishes because it's not going to live to become a sunken. During any time he's rushing, do not make even a single drone. Many people underestimate zealots, trying to mix in drones with zerglings and then wonder why they get killed. After you chase his zealots away, you're safe to make drones for a while, but keep an eye on how many zealots he has. If you do choose to make drones and you find he's making more zealots intending to attack again, it's probably more convenient to morph 2 more sunkens than to make more zerglings, although you should have zerglings around to back up your sunkens. Once your lurkers are done, you can move up to his choke to contain him and map control will switch over to you. If you see a corsair, keep a few hydralisks around and get overlord speed. Infact, you should get overlord speed anyway because it would suck if a dark templar started attacking your containing force and all of your overlords were on the other side of the map.

Zerg vs. Zerg

For this matchup, don't morph a hatchery first, but instead get a pool and gas first. Expanding so early is suicide vs. Zerg. This matchup is hard for me to explain. Basically, it's a race to mutalisks, with extra minerals being put into zerglings. However, the one who gets mutalisks is not always the one that wins. If you scout their base early enough, you can mirror their build order. In other words, if you see him make 3 drones, you make 3 drones, or if he makes 6 zerglings, you make 6 zerglings. You can keep overlords in a zerg's base for quite some time, and I myself keep one in their base even when I see the spire is finished to see if he makes scourges or mutalisks.

If your spire is 70-100 HP behind theirs, you are fine, however you should make some scourges to help you catch up. This is where good control is needed. You should have 2 scourges maximum going for a single mutalisk, and you should be constantly checking their health. For example, if you have 2 scourge going after a mutalisk that has 10 HP, you can take one scourge off and send it after a different mutalisk or whatever. Only in extreme circumstances (like his spire is at 500 HP while yours hasn't started yet) should you need to respond with spore colonies or hydralisks, otherwise you should avoid getting either of these.

Make sure not to forget the ground war; even though you might have a few more mutalisks than your opponent, he could have 18 zerglings while you have hardly any, and since mutalisks would take forever to kill 18 zerglings, you would only be able to kill them after they've destroyed some important building (spire, pool, hatchery). Zerglings are much better at killing buildings than mutalisks are, and they can be used to kill spore colonies when your mutalisks can't handle them. Also, you can attack one area with mutalisks to serve as distraction while zerglings go attack some other place. For this reason, you should only try to expand when one of two things happen:

1. Your main minerals start running low
2. Your opponent expands and you can't shut them down (having only 1 geyser while the other guy has 2 is bad)

You guys will probably try to debate using hydralisks in Zerg vs. Zerg, and that's completely understandable. Hydralisks are typically very good at killing mutalisks, and just a couple lurkers dramatically decrease the effectiveness of zerglings. Along with this, since both mutalisks and zerglings have low attack damage, armor upgrades can really turn the tables provided he doesn't get upgrades himself. This is what I think of hydralisks:

It can work on occasion in low-level to mid-level play. Since it's such an uncommon strategy these days, most people have no idea what to do against it. However, hydralisks are far slower moving units than zerglings or mutalisks, and the mutalisk user has obvious air superiority. This allows the mutalisk user to expand freely, while the hydralisk user cannot expand because he simply cannot stretch his defenses out like that and still hold off any attacks. Later on, the mutalisk user is going to have 4 bases, with sufficient mobility to defend them all, and the hydralisk user can only have 2. On top of all this, the mutalisk user's superior mobility allows them to choose to fight the battles wherever they like. Hydralisks work well on people that don't know what to do against them, otherwise to go for them rather than mutalisks is pretty much shooting yourself in the foot.


And that's all matchups in a nutshell. If you're playing vs. someone who goes random, just scout earlier and play conservatively until you find out their race. You'd be in bad shape if you made two barracks and then found out your opponent is Protoss.

Oh, and as for the scouts: They're better at killing capitol ships than templars. Capitol ships have a ton of HP and can run away from storm, but they can't run away from scouts. However, that is all scouts have going for them. Pretty much all of the uses of a scout have been usurped by the much cheaper corsair. Its ground attack is so weak that it makes it an inflexible unit, whereas templars are very flexible and can be used in every situation. Also, 2 scouts = 1 carrier with 8 interceptors. When it comes to harassment, I'd be hell of a lot more afraid of carriers than scouts, despite their slow movement, because all the scouts have are these little pee shooters with range that's shorter than their pee shooters.

H. Build Orders

Starting Build Order

You can try this for splitting:

First, queue a worker at your building
Order all 4 workers to a patch
Shift-deselect 2, order those 2 at another patch
Shift-deselect 1, order that to another patch
Take one of the first 2 workers you ordered and send it at another patch

Basically, it's just to help your early economy go more smoothly. You should be afford to queue another worker right after another doing this.

That reminds me of another thing. You can, for example, order 10 ghosts to lockdown one battlecruiser, shift-deselecting them one by one and repeating. This works a lot better than telling them to lockdown on the spot because it gives them less time to kill you. Obviously, give yourself some distance to cushion this, and if you think your ghosts will reach them before you finish with all of them, just tell them to move and then lockdown normally to avoid wasting mana.

Then you have money-saving things. If you know a building in construction is going to die before it's completed, cancel it and you'll get like 3/4 of the money back. If you let them kill it, you don't get the money back.

If you're researching something only to find that the upgrade's going to be useless (i.e. you're researching lurkers and then find he's making an early dropship), you can cancel the upgrade so you can get the proper counter up faster.

If you have a transport full of units and it's about to die, unload them all you save the units that would otherwise die with the transport. If you have a reaver with scarabs in queue and it's about to die, cancelling the scarabs can give you a bit of money back. These are all just little bits and pieces that can sometimes be the winning factor of a game (cancelling an upgrade in order to counter something else being an especially important point).

There's plenty of "standard build orders" for every matchup, however I don't want to bring those up because I think introducing build orders creates inflexible play in those who don't know the reasoning behind them. I want to emphasize the important of being able to adapt as gameplay changes. I guess it can't really be avoided.

Sample Build Orders

Ok, here it comes: the infamous build orders.

8 pylon
10 gateway
12 gateway
13 zealot
16 pylon

You probably have no idea what this is. This is a double gateway zealot rush build order.

Basically, the numbers preceding the unit is what your supply count would be when building that unit. Workers are not included in these things since they're implied anyway and dropping them out makes this build order seem a lot more simple. A detailed interpretation of this build order is as follows:

• Build up workers until you have 8. Here, you should have around 100 minerals, and you can place a pylon
• Build 2 more workers. Here, you should have around 100 minerals again. Send your probe out to place the gateway, and by the time it reaches there you should have 150 minerals.
• Build another 2 workers. Same procedure with the next gateway. Your first gateway should not be done yet. If your first gateway finishes before you start your second gateway, you're doing something wrong.
• Build another worker. Your first gateway should be done soon. Start your first zealot.
• Build another worker. You should have around 100 minerals, and since you won't be able to make more zealots you should place your next pylon.

From there on, it's just a matter of keeping your two gateways and nexus active. Obviously, you're going to be adding on more things as the game goes on; this build order only covers the beginning of the game. For them to extend beyond this point in the game is sheer inflexibility and unwillingness to react to game circumstances.

What's the point of following a build order, anyway? It's favorable in most situations because it allows you to execute whatever strategy you want. Infact, a build order is the prelude to a game strategy. This build order in particular allows you to pressure early with zealots while keeping probe production going. In other words, the only economy you sacrifice in this are the zealots you lose needlessly. Since constantly producing workers as a Terran/Protoss is an important fundamental, this build order is very suited for beginners as well as anyone on any skill level.

I've seen beginning players start off by building their first depot, and then after it finishes, they start another. This is a waste. The only thing you can produce is SCVs. If you were to make one depot, then start a barracks while producing SCVs, the barracks should finish and you'll still have some supply free. If you were teching for something, building a second depot so quickly is going to delay that for no reason. Following a build order, while in my opinion can produce inflexible play, can also help you understand how the early game flows.

However, since you only have one build order, you can only do one thing, right? Obviously, there's a ton more build orders but if you're just starting out, you won't be able to use them as effectively. Here's another build order to fill up one possible hole:

8 pylon
10 gateway
12 assimilator
358-tuy3b cybernetics core
abrupt ending because I don't play Protoss and I have no idea what the hell comes next

This build order is a fast tech build, which is more favorable for when playing a Terran, since if the Terran walls a zealot rush isn't going to do you any good. If you're playing on a map with close positions or one that doesn't allow for a wall, then you can try it. Otherwise, you're only hurting yourself if you go double gate and gamble that the Terran doesn't wall. Only do it if you can scout that the Terran chose not to make a wall in time to make such a decision.