[Official] Starcraft 2 Strategy & Discussion Thread

Derelict Watcher is a 1v1 map with a comfortable rush distance, and a straightforward third base location. Don’t let this fool you into taking it easy though, as the additional base locations after your third will require that you keep a close eye on the variety of attack paths that become available during the later stages of the game. You can also utilize the terrain to help coordinate your attack and defense tactics by breaking or protecting the rocks and towers near these expansion locations on the North and South sides of the map. Additionally, Xel’Naga Watchtowers overlook the two side paths that lead toward the corners of the map. However, they don’t provide vision of the map's center area, nor the additional attack paths that can be opened up by breaking the destructible rocks found near the twelve and six o’clock expansion locations, so make sure to watch these areas well if you are expanding toward those directions.

Always be prepared for early aggression on this map, as the narrow bridge to the North makes for a very short rush distance. You can make use of the fact that the bridge is very narrow and can be blocked off using structures, but keep in mind that there are still additional attack paths available for use by your opponent. In the mid and later stages of the game, the map will play similar to other macro maps. Just remember to always watch for small groups of enemy forces crossing the bridge throughout the game. There are no Xel’Naga Towers on this map, so you might want to move a few scouting units out to key regions of the map in order to watch for incoming attacks at your defensive locations.

Though Zerus Prime features four starting locations, vertical spawns have been disabled, which means your expansion flow will be similar each game. You can take advantage of the choke point leading into your natural expansion to defend it with some ease, but  keep a close eye on the destructible rocks to the south, which will open a backdoor path to your natural when destroyed. There’s just one very large central attack path toward your opponent’s half of the map, but it is possible to sneak small squads of units around the vision granted by the Xel’Naga Watchtowers, so keep an eye on your far away base locations lest they fall victim to surprise attacks.

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Minor Balance Patch Dec. 4 2012

TERRAN

-Raven seeker missile upgrade removed.
       

ZERG
   

-Infested Terran eggs health down from 100 to 70

-Fungal Growth range down from 9 to 8

1.4.3:

General

-APM values displayed on the Leader Board are now calculated by counting every click and command that has been issued by the player.
-EPM values displayed on the Leader Board are calculated by counting only actual commands issued by the player (Effective Actions Per Minute).

-Zerg Larvae are now displayed in the unit panel of the Leader Board.

Balance

PROTOSS

-Phoenix: A new upgrade has been added to the Fleet Beacon: Anion Pulse-Crystals. This upgrade increases Phoenix weapon range by +2.

TERRAN

-Ghost: Snipe damage changed from 45 to 25 (+25 vs Psionic).

-Orbital Command Center: MULE now always returns 30 minerals per trip, regardless of mineral type.

Bug Fixes

-The “Try the Next Patch” button now properly launches the PTR client when a PTR is available.

-Unread chat notifications no longer reset when entering or leaving a game.

-Map information now loads immediately in the Match History screen after logging onto Battle.net.

-In the Korean version, the Reduced Violence option now remains checked when restoring gameplay defaults.

-Fixed a display issue that could occur when binding certain keys on a French keyboard.

-Fixed a crash that could occur when exiting StarCraft II on systems with Geforce FX 5700 graphics cards.

-Fixed a crash that could occur when saving and loading games between High and Low video settings.

-Fixed an issue that could cause some players to be dropped from custom games after spending an extended time in the lobby.

-Fixed an issue which was causing some players with a full version of SC2 to be stuck in Starter Edition.

-Fixed an issue that could cause ladder matches to sometimes start three seconds late.

-Fixed an issue where overlapping units could sometimes traverse cliff levels.

-Fixed an issue which prevented some players from receiving credit for Top X achievements after Season 3.

-Fixed an issue which caused FFA games to reset the progress of the Team Hot Streak achievement.

-Fixed an issue where the Restart button was incorrectly showing up when loading Vs. AI saved games from previous versions of StarCraft II.

Mac Bug Fixes

-Fixed an issue where the cursor would disappear when using the middle mouse button.
-Fixed an issue which caused performance to drop significantly during large battles.

-Fixed an issue that was causing certain mod maps to crash after loading.

-The Reduce Mouse Lag option now works properly on Macs.

Read all the general strategy pages on in this wiki as well as the race-specific strategies on the left column. Learn to use hotkeys and control groups in Nevaziah's guide.

Learn one or two macro/safe build for each match up and practice it until you have it down perfectly.

Finally watch all these videos:

Quote:

With the release of unranked ladder and global play there is little point in alt accounts and I wouldn't recommend it unless for example you wanted an account per race or your main account is famous and you don't want people to recognize you , but in case anyone still needed a guide to making a Taiwan account i'll leave these here: