Thursday, April 26, 2007

What I've been working on

Hello everyone.

I've been working on two projects recently. The first is TMATour a league that will be working with the blizzard League Development Kit they have announced. Sorry I've been so inactive lately! Things to look for soon :

TMATour League
www.thelastgosu.com training site.

Friday, April 13, 2007

Exciting News Everyone!

www.thelastgosu.com has been registered!

My site will have several purposes; I do not hope to compete with gosugamers or teamliquid in the coverage of the gaming scene. Instead, I will be providing training services to players of every skill level (up to and exceeding my own). Here's a peek of what's coming up :

Dedicated Hamachi sever with multiple admins who log on and boot inactives several times a day. The main problem with hamachi servers is they get clogged with inactives and there's no room for new players. The great thing is, this isn't a big problem, because even when you kick someone, they will automatically join your network when they log on (if this isn't true them my starcraft hamachi server is amazingly popular, which would be great news but probably not true); all you need is several people with hamachi licenses to log on and boot.

Tournaments with temporary hamachi licenses as the prize! Atlast, tournaments where you can win something of real value. This is just one of the many ways I will be promoting Hamachi in the starcraft scene. Why? Because I really, really love playing games on Hamachi, and I want more opponents.

A complete zerg strategy guide. What am I talking about? I'm talking about all major early game builds, how they generaly play out and how they specifically play out. I'm talking about an encyclopedic amount of knowledge and detail. Further, it will be organized into dynamic sections that qualified individuals can edit later on. For a while, this will all be done by me, but in time others will come to join my starcraft research community. You see, all further changes to the guide will be done only on the basis of scientific evidence. The initial guide, the one I write, will contain inaccuracies and factual errors; this is impossible to avoid in the initial creation of a comprehensive work. Do I really think I can do what no one has ever done before? Provide a complete framework for the study of starcraft theory? Use mathematics and actual timing in the planning of my attacks? Bring science to starcraft? I'm not sure; but I am going to try.

Eventually, the terran and strategy guides will be written, using the framework I developed, by a dedicated terran or protoss user. Perhaps, in time, a better player than I will rewrite the framework, using more accurate methods and calculations. Rather than lament this day I welcome it... a good teacher welcomes the success of the pupil even when it overshadows his own.

So... what does that mean for you? How can you get involved? Well... keep reading! I hope to have the basic site up within a few weeks at most, perhaps much sooner. I have a temporary, workable site in place at the moment basically. It's ugly and template driven but that can be changed later on. I will be publishing the best parts of the strategy guide as I write and rewrite it, so you will be able to see the latest ideas I have been developing as I develop them. I will also write a number of articles on practicing and the development of consistant strategies. Why it's so important to stick to a few builds and learn to do them really well, working on other things aside from strategy (posture, macro, micro, studying from replays, a 'training journal', focusing time spent gaming, Hamachi) is just a partial list. This is stuff that can help you get alot better.

Once we're up and running, you can choose how involved you want to be. Anyway... I'll talk a little bit more about this later. Hopefully the site will speak for itself.

Sunday, April 8, 2007

Two game series vs terror[light]

I recently played a pair of games vs terror[light]. Both games were on the same map (reverse temple) and at the same positions, 6 and 9. In the first game, he opened with a bunker rush and I defended ably with drones; from there I exploited his poverty by going quick 2 hatch lurk/ling and running into his base killing everything in my path.

The second game was a bit of a different story though. My initial overlord betrayed my presence, so my opponent sent an SCV to see what I was building. Early scouting is very important when you're going 14 cc. He found out the great news that I was going 9 pool speedling (pool b4 gas). He frantically placed barracks and a bunker and I killed most of his scvs. Instead of combining this rush with an expo I had opted for 1 hatch tech. I did some harass with my speedlings and once he had that defended I had 3 muta behind his mineral line. July zerg would have been proud...

I harassed for a while, finally expanding 9 minutes into the game (I harassed constantly from minute 6 to minute 8 with muta and harassed basically from minute 4-10 entirely). I dual spired, in order to acheive quicker upgrades, and added a third hatch. I delayed my opponents natural expansion with my highly mobile highly deadly muta force, but made a great tactical error committing to an all in muta battle at his main which his stimmed 1/1 marines won handily. It was a foolish risk, perhaps unneccesary but there is a definite time limit on the effectiveness of an all muta force; the timing could have been right. In future I will attack to keep muta closer together in order to get more kills at once when doing a base invasion with 2 groups+.

From there, I grabbed 3 expos (my mienral only and the 3 base) and my opponent expanded to his natural and then eventaully his mineral only. He massed sci and m&m and I could not create a standing army to fight his.

I didn't use lurkers, which is usually a big mistake against terran but there is still a great deal of experimenting I need to conduct. I have also learned an amazing truth... that I make far too many drones and that is probably my biggest weakness.

Game of the day vs Moist[x]

Hello everyone! There is alot to this game I would like to analyze over the next couple days. I highly recommend you watch the replay before watching the game! It was very close until the end, in fact at one point, confidant in victory, I commited all my forces against his zealot/archon/cannon defense and came very close to total victory.

It was a war waged on many fronts. I feel my approach towards economy in the early game vs 2 gate was a radical depature from my normal style with great success; I owe the inspiration to a replay of MYM.sen I watched earlier in the day. Normally I think I power far too hard.

Anyway, it was a close game, involving some serious macro on my side :0 and some nice strategic movements by my opponent. Sadly it was a defeat, but in defeat comes knoweldge and with knowledge comes victory.

I opened with 3 hatch speedling (speed before lair) and then lurker ling contain. My contain held him for a very long time due to decent micro and excellent lurker formation on my part as well as my opponent using a somewhat 'weak' build for mid game (inital expo is later which delays mid game troop production; on the other hand he forces me into a more soldier less drone position, so the game is slowed for both of us).

My opponents strategic hold on the island, which survived multiple ling drops (I got guard tech specifically to assault his island but completely forgot about it because he started attacking my bases) allowed him to pull through and at times he made a strategic retreat which allowed him to continue fighting. He also pulled a few critical low budget high damage attacks that won the game; two of them specifically, the dt assault at bottom left and the zealot/dt drop at bottom right. He was able to plan these attacks through reckless use of observers; while I scourged a few in this game I will certainly increase the amount of scourging in future to prevent this sort of scouting. There is alot to counter intelligence i have to learn about...

This game WAS saved with BWLauncher, so you will have to download that program to watch this replay, otherwise you'll just see a bunch of drones running around. You can DL the latest version of BWLauncher at
http://www.bwprogrammers.com/modules.php?name=Downloads&d_op=viewdownloaddetails&lid=14

of course if you already use BWLauncher you won't need to download that :)

and you can download the replay at
http://www.yousendit.com/download/QlVqeEVWaTFoMlUwTVE9PQ

Two unorthodox games vs Fly.cF-

I played two games against the protoss player Fly.Cf-. In the first game I almost got TWO probe kills with just my initial drones but ended up with 1 probe kill and 1 drone kill. Anyway, the probe I killed was at my base, so I abused his lack of scouting (due to dead probe) and made 4 hatches before pool. Then I made 40-50 workers and masssed lurker ling while expanding. He couldn't break the contain and I maxxed pretty quick, then just attack moved lurker ling through his natural and GG.

The second game was a close one... I stuck with mutaling / guard/devourer/ling all game, which most people think doesn't work... maybe if I made lurker instead of muta I would have won but I am really liking this mutaling vs protoss style under certain conditions... it can pack quite a punch. Noteworthy moments :

My initial probe harass with muta is pretty awesome... also a couple times I defeat 4+ archons surrounded by zealot templar with mutaling ^^ I manage to delay expos but eventually the fact that he is trading like 1 - 1.5 or even 1-2 in resources most of the time when we fight catches up to me. There's a cool moment where he's set to grab another 2 expos, bringing him up to 4 to my total of 3 or 4... and he kills my natural... but I hold on, kill both is expo's with guards and his army and almost even the game up. Moral? Don't get muta ling LOL! Also I couldn't get constant upgrades which is a BIG part of this strat (it's all about the lings baby), because he killed my evos. I think with a few more sunks at the right time I might have won...

First game :
http://download.yousendit.com/4B000FE560E5D3E3
http://download.yousendit.com/08A344C9523F234D

Thanks for the game's fly.cf-!

Saturday, April 7, 2007

Zerg Strategy Part I

Hello! First, I feel a manual on zerg combat would be inadequate if not first prepared with an introduction on starcraft theory. Theory in starcraft is often misunderstood or misapplied and it is only through a proper grounding in theory one can hope to acheive success on the battlefield. Too many aspiring generals have failed because of a lack of preparation.

Before we begin, I cannot stress the importance of the following :
Physical and Mental Fitness. If you wish to be great at anything in life but certainly in starcraft, you must begin by taking care of your body and your mind. This means exercising several times a day, living an active lifestyle and reading heavily. It also means a job; a job doesn't have to mean you work for someone. There are alot of legitimate ways to make enough money to live doing basically anything you want from home but failing that, it's fairly easy to get a good job. Just go to university and get out there. For mental fitness avoiding television in any dose larger than 15 minutes and reading several times daily (speed reading especially, but make sure to mix up the material you read). The important thing is to focus your time, have a to-do list, make sure you're not sitting around doing nothing. Improve yourself! Why not?

Anyway... theory.

One principle of warfare that is evidant in starcraft theory is the supremacy of large numbers. It is a simple concept; if you take 10 marines and fight another 10 marines, assuming no micro (or equal micro levels) there will probably be a victor of 2-4 marines. If you take 10 marines and fight 1 marine 10 times, you may lose 1 or 2 marines, if any at all. This means if you engage a very small force with a very large force you will make a good 'trade' in terms of units lost. It is important to look at everythig in starcraft as a trade. When you rush, you trade economy, that is eventual units, for military threat, that is immediate units. When you tech, you trade higher units for the capability to make even higher units or an improved capability to current units. And you trade lings for drones... there is a direct trade there. The more drones early, the more lings later, the fewer drones early, the fewer lings later. Your economy growth and 'mineral soldiers' are basically on an inverse ratio. It is important to seperate mineral soliders, vespean soldiers and mixed soldiers because it will allow for a better analysis of expansion positions.

Can you calculate what zerg force is needed to beat 17 +1 speed zealots 9 minutes into the game? It is my belief that we can, through proper application of theory.

race wars is lame! LOL

So I got terran... which is awesome, but I got the 2 in the 2v3v3... my ally got hurt early by toss (reaver I think?) and then I tried to expo in the middle which the protoss players aren't big fans of... not much I can do after I mine out my main, I guess more tanks and bunkers in the middle.

First Game of The Day

My opponent tried to build gateways in my base, I defeated those easily with sunkens... from there his economy was ruined... he attempted 3 gate no tech build, but I made some sunks and lings and teched muta. He actually left before I attacked... I was ahead by almost double his resources, very early into the game.

Hopefully next match will be a little closer... the main reason for my advantage was his risky early game build; if it had suceeded I would definitely have lost the game.

Announcing The Last Gosu Zerg Strategy Guide!

Hello ladies and gentlemen of my blog.

Today I am starting a 100 part process called the 'Zerg Strategy Guide Experiment". Through my blog I will start examining some of the strategies and tactics you can use to increase your chance of victory in a game of starcraft. As part of this experiment I will be including replays and battle reports included within the strategy guide to best allow for the easiest learning experience.

I welcome new and old players alike to check and recheck this blog, I will be guarenteeing ATLEAST 1 new strategy article a day and more often you will see 3 or 4. All will be on strictly zerg strategies and all will be brand new material, not the same tired advice availible on most starcraft websites. I will look at all the different build orders possible as well as mathematical analysis of various build orders and how they interact (between you and your opponent).

Stay tuned, it's going to be an exciting couple months here.

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Friday, April 6, 2007

TMA

I quickly 2-0'd Abba's team just now... with noobie allies. I'm probably the best TMA player in the world.

Lost again t.t

ZvsRT he did 1 rax expo, my inital 4 ling probe did no damage and then he broke my 2 sunk barrier right before muta hatch. I suspect he hacks.

1pm and I'm back in x17

Lost ZvsRandom P by Target... he did nexus first without scouting for an early advantage, which is weak if I pooled first but I did 12 / 11. I lost my natural early at the same time I took my close expo in exchange for his army but it was a poor trade.

Got rocked again ZvsT

I opened up lurker, instead of muta, which is strange but it went ok at the start I guess. Not sure exactly what happened but I lost my natural before I got defiler and my expo was completely undefended.

fake.sexy

Lost a ZvsT vs fake.sexy... I'm going to review the game it was fairly close he was only a few k ahead of me in resources at the very end of the 26 minute game... probably poor micro on my part that lost it, although I did use defilers ^_^ and got 3/3/3 ups. He opened gollie then switched to M&M&sci which sort of messed me up.

Coffee and lungs brewing it's time to dominate

I smoke alot of marijuana. Is it a crime? Maybe. Is it immoral? I don't really think so. Am I repentant? Apologetic? For what? Am I somehow worse than the man who drinks? Why does society feel they have the right to tell me what I can and cannot smoke?

There are alot of different ways to smoke weed; the habitual smoker often develops more efficient means of getting high. Instead of rolling joints, which burn alot of smoke into the air, they will smoke 'lungs' or 'poppers'. Lungs are a contraption that are a little difficult to visualize if you haven't seen before. They are a 2L pop bottom that has the bottom half cut off and a plastic bag attached. This is fills with smoke, via a 'bowl' attached to the top that you light, and then you remove the bowl and breath in the smoke. Since there's no where for the smoke to dissipate too, you are thought to waste less of the marijuana.

Poppers are a level of technology higher alogether. It has been a topic of debate amongst the couch people for many months as to how exactly the poppers work. Allow me to explain. Until about a month ago I did not smoke poppers and now they are my primary smoking routine. There is a danger to poppers... they are overwhelming at times but they are also a source of great creativity. I recommend only careful experimentation with them. Here's what you do :

Take a normal bong, and where you would attach the bowl shaft you attach a particular metal shaft that is short and thick. You fill the bottom with tobacco (often by putting it in the top and packing it down with a cigarette) and then put marijuana on top of that. Then you light the marijuana until it is completely burnt and do not light the tobacco (you do this by lightly softly). Once all the pot is done you suck very hard and achieve a popping effect.

Welll... anyway, I'm out of smokes and trying to quit smoking cigarettes, so I'm on lungs today. I'm blazed and ready to dominate. I hope my next opponent is terran.

Another protoss slain

Another ZvsP... this time I opened with lurker contain and dual expo at mineral and mineral + gas (as well as my natural). From there I went 5/3 ultra and crax with defiler. Extremely heavy $$$ build up for a while until ultra and non stop lings were the basis of the strategy. He opened 2 gate at expo... it was a long macro based game with alot of fighting, but I won. Upgrades are key.

"I don't have time... u r loser"

LOL!

R-ng)Oki or something like that challenges me to 1v1. It's a very close ZvsT. I have more basis but he's doing more damage... eventually my defilers are turning the tide of the battle. I've got 5 gas pumping and alot of minerals and alot of hatchory and he says

"I don't have time... u r loser" and leaves! LOL! I guess he took the final plague a little too seriously.

Current record vs Op Tot) 2-1

Round II Fight

The nice thing about Op Tot) is you can get a game pretty quick, although most of the players who scoop up 1:1 challenges aren't that good.

Get taken down quickly ZvsT on Longinus, quick tank destroys my sunken lines and my expo is down. It was a strong opening, although speedlings would have hurt his early marine offensive and better mutalisk usage could have prevented his reinforcement.

Op Tot)

Current Record vs Op Tot) 1-0

First game, ZvsP. My opponent oppens 2 gate proxy, I 12/11 after scouting (I'm not too concerned about 2 gate zealot rush, perhaps 12 pool 11/hatch no drones would have been best opening? I was just gonna lay 2 sunks immediately). Anyway he left as soon as he scouted my hatch, weird.

Thursday, April 5, 2007

2:53 AM 4/6/2007

Is it late or early? I slept a few hours and am now quite wide awake. Luckily the world of starcraft never sleeps. Another ZvsP... I open muta ling and continue it well into the mid game with early fast ups. The strategy needs a little fine tuning but it was going great until his second round of massed sairs. I'll review the rep and comment in a little more detail it was a pretty good battle and he was very good at not letting his expos get harassed.

Of course mutaling vs protoss has numerous weaknesses (archon and sair fundamentally I guess) but it's strengths (mobility and the great effect upgrades especially addrenal have on lings as well as pretty much max number of lings while spending gas) really work well with the map I was playing peaks of beadku. I didn't make any lurkers the whole game which is probably a bad idea...

Onwards and upwards, x17 is basically dead so I'm going to visit west or Euro.

Well, I ended up in west playing ZvsP vs some TG2SPI or some weird name. After a 25 minute game he disconnected... it was pretty even although I did have an advantage I feel. I hit 3/3 cracklings early and used them to good effect, had 4 mining bases and well diversified vs his troops unit structure. I guess we'll never know...

Coming soon... www.thelastgosu.com

You heard it here first folks! I'll have the website up soon... here are a few of the things you will be seeing :

The Last Gosu strategy guide.
The Last Gosu replay pack!
The Last Gosu T-shirts!

As well as reviews of all the top ladders and gaming channels and much, much more. I'll be keeping this blog updated with sections of the strategy guide as I write it of course!

Still seeking 1:1

Of course while I'm writing my last rant some guy finally messaged me for 1:1... how poetic. Get a game vs smi. someone, they 0pen 1 gate gas? fast templar - forge expo? I do some hydra/lurk and fail to gain any early game advantage and lose the mid game. Guess I didn't expo fast enough?

Newer grounds

The skill level seems pretty weak so far... I am going to op tl-west and trying to find stronger opponents. I spam for 1:1 for a while but no one is biting. I could go back to East but I hate running back and forth between servers. Op Tot) usually isn't active at this time and I've been dodging Abyss for a while... hmm Abyss.... or hamachi. Ohh hamachi!

TushaR send me a message around 38 minutes ago asking for a game. The one thing about hamachi is the communication lag between games. Still the incredible performance you get out of a no latency situation more than makes up for superficial problems like that. Ok, let's check TL-West.

Anyway... apparently my name was copied from someone and so some people hate me. This wouldn't bother me if it weren't for the fact that no one will play me 1v1 now. Oh well! Back to x17 for me I guess. Atleast the people in Tot) aren't as idiotic and hostile.

I'd like to make an announcement to the various sMi members who were insulting me earlier. I do not know you friend LastGosu and don't care about him... I made this name because it sounds cool and I like it. Further more, all words are (of course) copied from somewhere else... it doesn't matter how directly or indirectly. Anyway, I don't really care what you think, but stop interfering with my ability to get a 1:1 game. I don't care about what you think but leave me alone.

Thank you!

So many idiots on the internet...
Matchup is ZvsP vs Wellstar... an unknown with a 10-17 record, probably not going to pose much of a threat. I'm going to go for a quick win with 3 hatch muta, unless something crazy happens. Well I went lurker instead and basically just constantly expanded while pressuring and getting to max with upgrades... gave was over in 26 minutes i mined 70k resources

ZvsR (T) 40YearsOldVirgin

Map is Gaia... 40's spawns random terran at 6 and I'm chosen zerg at 7. He manages to find my base after a very long struggle lol but his scv dies to the sunken I have erected for the purpose of preventing my base from being scouted. I open surprise muta and he tries a fast tank. I raid his economy with mutalisks and he kills my natural with tanks (he expo'd as well). I kill his army and then take his natural out (and some depots) at which point he leaves, about 13 minutes in.

BWLauncher

I think I'll start writing out the games in more detail now, so I've started using BWLauncher again for the autoreplay function. I don't really like BWL because it crashes SC every now and then... c'est la vie. I went to play in a private tourney... but the host wouldn't respond when I asked him if he signed me up because he was too busy asking other people if they wanted to play so I say fuck it and go back to x17.

Basically... vs terran the safe opening is muta and vs protoss the safe opening is lurker. I maintain economic pressure by slowly outexpanding. Generally I expand a little later than most pros, something I will try to work on. My macro is improving alot...

No games in x17 so I load up Hamachi and take a look around. It's tough to find good opponents on Hamachi... but then again it's tough to find good opponents anywhere.

Find a micro tourney game... but BWLauncher crashes when it loads. Sigh... onwards and upwards.

Another win

ZvsT guy has like a 150-12-8 record lol... he tries quick drop, but my muta hatch in time to deal with it... from there I harass my way to an easy victory.

First loss

Loss ZvsP... I opened mutalisks ZvsT caused minimal damage. Poor game in general.

Part II

I continue in x17 in a search for a challenger. I play a variety of styles, generally favouring economy heavy, upgrade quick and units when needed, while maintaining direct tech time lines. I enjoy creative early game builds but only when effective.

I play vs Pure)ses but he says "yo I have to go" after I thwart a few mineral only expo attempts and take my mineral only. I was far ahead in terms of unit economy and tech so I call it a clear win. 4-0!

Thursday, April 05, 2007

It is almost noon and I am ready for battle. I am a zerg player. Clan x17 should have some gamers so I will go there first.

I 3-0'd my first challenger. ZvsP all matches, on longilus, gaia and tau. The first game was on longilus and I took two expos in addition to my natural while massing lurker ling and upgrading. He slowly expanded and I harassed / destroyed his expansions. At one point I took three additional bases, which he killed, but they were undefended and I had 4 slow mining bases and he had only 1 active. I destroyed that then killed his army.

The second game he left as soon as my muta hit his mineral lines.

The third game I played the old out expand and concentrate drop harass. I slow dismantled him, constantly having 3+ mining bases on him.