Loophole's Journal

Introduction:
My name's Loophole, and I'm trying to get better at starcraft. I bought the game about a week after it came out. I was working at a Best Buy at the time. A friend of mine bought the game and had me come over one day to check it out, because he thought it was so cool. I watched him play a few games and tried the single player missions, and was addicted immediately.

I played starcraft every night that I could sneak into the computer room late at night without waking my parents. I would play for 8 - 10 hours straight sometimes, just to get good enough to beat a few newbies. I didn't really have anyone to help me out. When the sun came out, I knew it was time to go to bed. My dad would often catch me in the computer room late at night, get mad, and tell me to go to bed. I couldn't help it though, it was like an addiction.

What I really needed was a computer of my own so that I wasn't in peoples way, and so that I could play in my room without my dad finding out. I wanted a computer of my own anyway, because I was getting into programming heavily and I hated having to go to the computer lab at school to code. My main reason was Starcraft though. Feed the addiction.

I got a job at an ISP doing tech support, and was making some pretty decent money, so I saved for a few weeks and got enough together to spend about $1,100 on a machine. I spent about 2 months researching all the components because I didn't really know anything about hardware. In the process I got really into hardware, and even ran a hardware review website for a few months. I still love hardware to this day, and it makes my computer knowledge much more rounded. I can honestly say that I have Starcraft to thank for a lot of my computer knowledge, and therefor my job and lifestyle.

I got my screaming machine built, overclocked it as far as it would go with an alpha, and proceeded to play starcraft on it every night. I played like that for about a year. I recently got back into starcraft just before the 1.08 patch, and my skills are pretty much non existant. Not that they have eroded, I just never got very good, even with all I played. It's the first strategy game I have ever played, so I guess it just took me longer than most.

So now I'm working on really improving my game. I need to understand starcraft technically, I need to learn to be creative and think outside the lines. I need to learn to micro well. I need to understand my opponents better. I need to come up with something to beat a tank push (Damn tanks!!)! What I hope to do here is give you a good idea of what's going on in my head as I improve and become a better player, so that hopefully it will help you out too.

Journal Entry #1: 7/7/2001
I just finished doing some cleaning around the house. I cleaned the bunny cage (nasty bunny) and took care of Cleo's litter box (good kitty!). My fiancee is visiting south florida right now, so I can clean up the place without worrying about someone else messing it up. This also means I have unlimited Starcraft time this weekend. Not that she doesn't like me to play Starcraft, she actually plays too, but when she's here I like to spend time with her. My heart and my wang are the enemies of my Starcraft addiction. But you can't blame it on the wang baby!

Before I get going in some games, I'm going to take a look through the manual again. Yes, I have read it, but that was a long time ago. I need to get a clearer understanding of damage. I know about how many hit points each unit has, and the way they attack, and from experience I know that some units just suck against others. What I don't know is what type of damage the different units do, and how that damage affects small, medium, and large units. I'm just gonna hop into channel c real quick on bnet to hang while I read.

Ack, my sorry ass DVD drive keeps having problems readin cd's lately. I keep having to pop it out and back in. Chillin in channel c now. Not much goin on. Murphy's law would of course dictate that my SC manuals are at the very bottom of the big box I keep them in. Hmm, Can't find the BW manual, just the SC manual. Guess I'll have to find that info on the web.

Ok, the info I'm looking for isn't actually in the manual. Here's the unit info: http://www.scmillennium.com/unitstats.shtml. Now I just need to find an explanation of how damage types affect different unit types. Hey, I found a tank push counter article too: http://www.scmillennium.com/community/1.shtml. Now where's the damn damage explanation... Here we go: http://www.gamersx.com/starcraft/damage.asp.

Ok, so the jist is that normal damage does full damage to any size unit, concusive damage does full damage to small units, and explosive damage does full damage to large units. Ok, time to play some games.


Game #1:
Oye, played a 4:50 game with a guy who lagged like hell and disced. Try again.

Game #2:
Kept trying to find a game without laggers, got in a 1v1, and he immediately left the game. Argh.

Game #3:
I played a 2v2 on a stupid money map. Remind me not to do that again. Turtles win on those maps. My partner refused to ally at first, and then he didn't build anything. Just sat in his base. So I assumed they were going to 3v1 me. I reacted by going lots of gateways and almost killed the first guy. he got his probes out, I should have killed them off, because later he was able to get units. My teammate was totally useless. I think he created 1 group of zealots the whole game. I think in this game I should have dropped reavers as quick as I could have on the zerg guy once the protoss guy was disabled. Instead I waited to long and he had like 50 gaurdians the whole freaking game. I'm playin a normal map now.

replay: 7-7-01-1

Game #4:
Well, I created a 1v1 on Temple. I was toss, he was terran. I got rushed with M&M&F. Poof, dead.

replay: 7-7-01-2

Game #5:
God I suck, I just lost to the most noob of newbies in a pvp on temple. I let him expand because I was playing lazy, and, god i suck...

replay: 7-7-01-3

Game #6:
Ok, so I made another game and the same guy joined again, and I was thinking, ok now I'll set things straight. pvp again on temple. Well, it turns out that the noob wasn't really a noob, because I watched the map and kept him in check, but he still managed to get out and expand and wup me pretty bad.

replay: 7-7-01-4

Game #7:
I guess his rec is so bad (like 6-118) because he gives up wins or leaves when he's won a game or something. Anyway, I'm meeting him in channel akaz and we'll go one more time. This time I'll go zerg. I gotta keep him from expanding early and watch every fricken mineral patch.

It was ZvZ this time. Well, I kept a pretty good eye on things around the map. He got his natural and I couldn't get in to take it away. I did catch him trying to expand in another main, and destroyed it, but throughout the game i couldn't keep my attention on everything, and I kept loosing massive amounts of units to burrowed lurkers because I didn't bring detection, or to lings covered in dark swarm because i didn't pay close enough attention to move my hydras out of it. I also could have lost less guys taking out his expansion if I had caught it before he had his sunkens up. I need to develop a better scouting network.

replay (long): 7-7-01-5

Game #8:

I played a PvP on BGH (ugh) with a dude who was teching fast to dark templars. I put up three gates and went hard zealots. I caught him before he had much, and was able to take out his nexus along with a couple other buildings. He got his DT's though, and I had to retreat to my base, where I started putting up some cannons. I should have thought of it earlier though, because his DT's came in and destroyed them. I managed to get a couple cannons up since I had a lot of min, but he got my nexus. from there I could just wreak havoc on his base with my two groups of zealots, which I did, and he gave up. Pretty good game, but I still missed a bunch of things.

replay: 7-7-01-6

Game #9:

I played a PvT on temple, which is normaly my worst matchup. I got 4 zealots in his base early, no blockade... I guess he's a newb. so I went in and killed a couple marines and managed to take out his academy. then i retreated to the ramp to hold it, and started sending zealots and goons. We went back and forth a few times, and his M&M eventually kicked me out of the base. I had bought myself a lot of time though, and I had a couple expansions. I kept a Z at his natural to keep an eye out, and was scouting with another. I eventually got 3 expansions, while keeping him from expanding at his natural. He expanded to the island instead. I took sairs and 12 Z's in a shuttle, webbed the turrets, and took out the expansion with the Z's. Then I found a couple stray drop ships which I killed with sairs. He had a last ditch attack effort, took out my undefended natural, and I defended with goons and carriers. Caught a couple tanks wandering around, chased them with the carriers, and that's when he disced. GG. My recon is getting better I think.

replay: 7-7-01-7

Game #10:
I lost a 2v2 on temple, but I got a lot of practice using dweb, and I was wrecking the terran player with it. Too bad my teammate went out early. The odds were overwhelming.

replay: 7-7-01-8

Game #11:
Won a 3v3 on bgh, really 3v2 because a guy on the other team dropped out from lag. Easy win. Got to have some fun with corsairs though.

replay: 7-7-01-9

Game #12:
Played a 2v2 on Temple. Got Zealot rushed, dead fast.

replay: 7-7-01-10

Conclusion:

I gotta get something to eat. Cya.