Posts tagged starcraft 2 guide

Starcraft 2 Strategy Guide for Noobs or Beginners

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If you are a beginner player and looking for a good Starcraft 2 guide for noobs then we have just the right one for you! Shokz Starcraft 2 strategy guide is the best Starcraft 2 guide for noobs. As a newbie or as we call them ‘beginners’ you are completely new to game. You are having a hard time catching up as there is so much to know and learn and you feel that there are players, probably your very good friends who are way ahead of you.

What you need is a good Starcraft 2 strategy guide for noobs. One of my friends who saw some Starcraft 2 videos really liked the game. He wanted to learn more and get ready for this game before it is launched. As I suggested, he bought Shokz starcraft 2 strategy guide and now within very less span of time he has really learn a lot about this game. Shokz guide is one of the most widely used Starcraft 2 guide for beginners. It contains a very good detailed ebook with pictures that help you understand fundamentals of Starcraft 2. It also explains in detail what are the basic and general strategies that could help you to win matches on BattleNet. You also get a full fledged campaign guide once the game is released.

Comparison and Review of Top Starcraft 2 Strategy guide

Like any other Starcraft 2 guide for beginners, as you begin using the Shokz guide, you want to first understand various terms and their meanings. Micro and Macro are two important terms that one should be familiar with. You also need to learn all the keyboard short cuts as the rate at which you use it and play the game is going to be very important when you battle in a player vs player match. Shokz is an expert Diamond level player and having him backing you up is for sure in your best interest! Moreover, they also have a 60 days money back guarantee if you do not like the guide.

Shokz guide will explain you everything precisely along with pictures. It also contains videos and replays for matches played between world class Starcraft 2 players. Remember, “Watch and Learn” is the best trick. If you see these pro players game play and Strategies you will definitely learn a lot. Starcraft 2 is expecting around 5 million sales, as per the latest Wall Street Journal report. Moreover, it is also expected to be in World Cyber Games. You can only imagine the kind of competition that is going to be on foreseeable future.  So what are you waiting for? Go ahead and get your hands on the best Starcraft 2 guide for noobsThe Shokz guide.

Comparison and Review of Top Starcraft 2 Strategy guide

Starcraft 2 Strategy Guide – Advice To Get Good At The Game Quickly!

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In order to become a good Starcraft 2 player the first thing you need is practice. Play as much as you can, the practise and the experience are invaluable. This Starcraft 2 guide will attempt to tell you how you can get good at the game really quickly.

There is no one definitive Starcraft 2 strategy that can serve you in all situations. You will have to figure out what to do in each game. If you find yourself being outwitted by a similar strategy multiple times, take note and work out a counter – this is where experience and practise helps.

It is also very useful to have around you a bunch of good players that you can play with; the competitive environment helps you improve.

Economy is generally first priority, defense second and offense third. This rule isn’t set in stone though, many a Starcraft 2 strategy require that you shake up the order a bit; you need to determine your priorities based on your situation in that particular game.

Victory is essentially a matter of exploiting your opponent’s weaknesses and bringing to bear your strengths. Whoever does this better usually wins. When you play against a particular opponent for the first time you probably won’t have much of an idea about his strategy. In such a situation, a good Starcraft 2 strategy is to build up a robust economy; a solid economy proves helpful in every situation.

Be relaxed when you play; panicking will only hamper your thinking and make things worse. Players often lose because of panic- it is easier to admit defeat than to persevere and continue fighting. See the game through to the end, the result might surprise you. Even if you don’t win, the experience will be useful in later games. Hopefully, this Starcraft 2 guide has set you on the right track to start learning and get better at the game.

A basic Starcraft 2 strategy guide – Introduction to Starcraft 2

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In Starcraft 2, you play as either the Zerg, Protoss or Terran. Zergs can raise an army very fast; Terrans are versatile and flexible; and Protoss are the most technologically superior, with effective but expensive units. This Starcraft 2 guide will tell you about the various aspects of the game that you must take care of once you start the game.

At the start of a game, you pick one of these races or let the computer pick one for you at random. When the game commences, you and your opponent get six Workers and a Main Building at different parts of the map. This is enough to let you set up a rudimentary base and gather some resources but will prove insufficient for any Starcraft 2 strategy beyond that.

Many experienced players often send out Workers to explore the map and gather intelligence on their opponents.

As you gather resources, build more Workers so you may gather resources even faster. The faster your resources collection, the stronger you get. A sturdy economy is crucial to any Starcraft 2 strategy and it should be your primary focus early in the game.

Each race has a particular way of increasing their maximum unit count. For Zergs, it’s Overlords; Pylons for Protoss; and Supply Depots for Terrans.

Next, you need military units to protect you and attack the enemy. This requires a different set of buildings – Spawning Pool for Zergs; Barracks for Terrans; and Gateway for Protoss. These buildings let you make one or more military units that you may use as part of your Starcraft 2 strategy.

Next, you may begin raising an army of military units which you can use to strike at the enemy and destroy his buildings, units and economy. The crux of the game now is to have enough forces to defeat the enemy. I will end this Starcraft 2 guide here and advise you to follow it and research a bit more about the game to get really good at it.

Starcraft 2 Hotkeys Guide – Sharpen Your Play by Using Hotkeys

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Written by Evan “FCsTrYKe” Kim , A 700 point Diamond league player

When you don’t have a solid Starcraft 2 hotkey setup, the game can feel clunky and frustrating to play. You’ll end up losing battles you could have won, falling behind in unit production, and worst of all you’ll never reach your true gaming potential.

If you’re not using hotkeys to their fullest, you can start using them today to improve your game. In this guide, we’re going to talk about the two types of hotkeys, decent hotkey setups, and good habits which are guaranteed to improve your game.

The Basics of Hotkeys

If you don’t know anything about the Starcraft 2 hotkey system, I’ll give you a really quick crash course (if you’re already familiar with the hotkey basics, you can probably skip this part).

There are two types of hotkeys:

  1. Number hotkeys
  2. Letter hotkeys

The number keys, in Starcraft 2, are called control groups, and they remember your selections. Let’s say you have 8 marines selected – hit CTRL+4 and any time you hit 4, you’ll reselect that same group. Want to add some marauders to the group? Hit SHIFT+4 and the marauders will be added to the marines.

The letter keys let you access individual skills on your units and buildings. Every spell and command in the game has its own hotkey – for instance, you can build a pylon by hitting B (build) followed by E (build pylon). Using stim on some marines and marauders is activated by hitting T.

Let’s talk about each type in more detail so that you can figure out a system that works for you.

Setting Up the Numbers  in SC2

There are two important things to remember when using the Starcraft 2 number hotkeys.

  1. The best system is the one which is the most comfortable for you
  2. Plan out which numbers are going to hold what and stick with it

While you might be looking for the best hotkey setup, the fact is that there isn’t one. Different pros use different setups because they use whatever they find comfortable – this changes between different people due to hand size, comfort with using the higher numbers, and race.

If you need a solid setup to get you started, here are the ones which work for me at the mid Diamond level of play. I’ve included a sample setup for every race.

Terran Hot Keys:

  • 1: Main Army (General Use)
  • 2: Main Army (Tanks can go in here)
  • 3: Specialty Units (Ravens, Medivacs, Ghosts)
  • 4: Command Centers
  • 5: All Barracks, Factories, and Starports

Protoss Hotkeys:

  • 1: Main Army (Melee Units)
  • 2: Main Army (Ranged Units)
  • 3: Specialty Units (Sentries, Templar)
  • 4: Nexuses
  • 5: All Gateways, Robotics Facilities, and Stargates
  • Note: Once you get warpgate tech, you can remove the gateways from your 5 hotkey. Starcraft 2 gives the warpgates their own special hotkey – “W”

Zerg Hotkeys:

  • 1: Main Army (Melee Units)
  • 2: Main Army (Ranged Units)
  • 3: Specialty Units (Infestors)
  • 4: All Hatcheries
  • 5-0: Queens
  • Note: When you want to inject larvae, double tap the number of the queen, hit V, click on the hatchery, and then double tap the number of the next queen.

Whatever number system you decide to use, you need to force yourself to use the system every time you need to move your army or produce out of a building. While at first, you’ll be tempted to click on your units and buildings to issue commands, resist that temptation.

Eventually you’ll get to the point where you don’t even think about the hotkeys anymore – at that point, the keyboard becomes an extension of your mind, which is something that will smooth out your play.

Working with the Letters

While the number keys let you select your units and buildings, the letter keys let you use their abilities quickly and effectively.

As a rule of thumb, you should never click on something you can hit using the letter hotkeys.

If you want to build a barracks, select your SCV, hit B (for build) followed by B (for barracks).

If you want to cast forcefield, select your sentry, hit F (for forcefield) and click where you want to place it.

Do NOT click on a spell, upgrade, or ability just because you don’t know what the hotkey is. Instead, hover your mouse over the spell and check what hotkey it’s mapped to. Then hit the hotkey for the spell. Over time you’ll naturally remember what the hotkeys are for everything, and you’ll be able to use your abilities on the fly as they’re needed.

Standard Hotkeys vs. Grid HotKeys

If you go into your options, you’ll notice that in the Starcraft 2 hotkeys section you have the option of changing your hotkey setup. The two setups we’re concerned with are the Standard and Grid hotkeys setup.

The standard keys are the ones which you’ve been using since the beginning. While some of the hotkeys don’t make too much sense (pylon is mapped to E), all of the hotkeys prioritize your middle and pointer fingers, making them very easy to hit.

If you haven’t heard of grid Hotkeys, they basically take the box in the lower right hand corner and map every icon to a grid on your keyboard. Explaining this system is a bit difficult, but becomes really obvious with a photo. In Starcraft 2 Grid Hotkeys are also referred to as GridKeys.

Some people prefer gridkeys over the standard keys because they’re very easy to learn – all you have to do is see where the hotkey you want to press is and then press the corresponding key on the keyboard. I don’t personally like them because you end up using your pinkie and ring fingers to hit a lot of the hotkeys, and since my pointer and middle fingers are more dexterous, I prefer the standard keys.

That said you should probably try out both systems and see which one works better for you – you’ll never know until you try it!

Combining the Number and Letter Hotkeys

If you’ve followed the guide this far, you have:

  1. A number hotkey system that’s comfortable for you, and
  2. You know that you should be using the letter keys to access every skill

All that’s left is to combine the numbers and letters together so you can perform actions quickly, easily, and without even thinking about them.

The process is actually very simple.

Step 1: Hit the number hotkey holding the unit/building you want to use

Step 2: Tab to the group of units/buildings you want to use

Step 3: Hit the letter key of the ability you want to use

Let’s go through some examples so you can get a good idea of how high level players handle their Starcraft 2 hotkeys.

Example 1: Using Chronoboost on your Gateway

If you play Protoss, you’ll need to chronoboost things all the time.

You’ll naturally be tempted to click on your Nexus and then chronoboost the building you want to chronoboost. Even if you’re chronoboosting the Nexus itself, avoid that temptation.

Instead hit your Nexus hotkey (if you’re following my sample setup, it’s on 4), hit the chronoboost hotkey (on standard keys, it’s C), and then click on the building you want to chronoboost.

Anytime you want to chronoboost anything, your fingers should automatically hit 4-C-click.

Example 2: Producing Units out of Barracks, Factories, and Starports

If you’re Terran, you need an efficient way to make units from all of your buildings. If you’re following my sample setup, all of your barracks, factories, and starports should be bound to 5.

When you need to make units:

  1. Hit 5 to select your buildings
  2. Build units from your barracks (A = Marine, D = Marauder, R = Reaper, G = Ghost)
  3. Hit TAB to select your factories
  4. Build units from your factories (E = Hellion, S = Siege Tank, T = Thor)
  5. Hit TAB to select your starports
  6. Build units from your starports (V = Viking, D = Medivac, E = Banshee, R = Raven, B = Battlecruiser)

If you only need to make units from your starports:

  1. Hit 5 to select your buildings
  2. Hit TAB twice to select your starports
  3. Build units from your starports

Example 3: Casting Force Field and Psionic Storm in Battle

If you have sentries and high templar on the same hotkey, the templar will always come first and the sentries will come second. The same thing applies to every unit for every race – units will always group in the same order no matter when they were added to the group.

When you need to cast force fields AND storm:

  1. Hit 3 to select your spellcasters (if you’re using my sample setup)
  2. Hold “T” and click wherever you want the storms to be cast (you can keep clicking as long as your high templar have energy)
  3. Hit TAB to select your sentries
  4. Hold “F” and click wherever you want the forcefields to be cast (you can keep clicking as long as your sentries have energy)

When you ONLY need to cast force fields but you have both high templar and sentries:

  1. Hit 3 to select your spellcasters
  2. Hit TAB to select your sentries
  3. Cast the forcefields

If you can master both the number and letter keys, you’ll see definite improvements in your play – go out there, try these new hotkeys, and let me know how it goes in the comments!

About the Author:

Evan “FCsTrYKe” Kim is a 700 point Diamond Random player and writes about Starcraft 2 Strategy at his blog. Follow him on Twitter for free Starcraft 2 updates!

Starcraft 2 Guide – What You Can Expect Online

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In Starcraft 2, simple things like map size and opponent’s race can provide you with a lot of information, allowing you to pre-empt almost any Starcraft 2 strategy. Therefore if you read your signs right, you enjoy a significant advantage in the game. This Starcraft 2 guide will show you how you can spot signs and use them to your advantage. (more…)

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