Patch 1.1 brings many important changes to the game and metagame. Our thoughts:

Desert Oasis change:
I can't disagree with this change. Expanding quickly in Desert Oasis, although safe by run distance, was also very risky due to how open the expansion is to attack, and how far the natural is from the main.


Protoss Zealot build time increased by 5 seconds, and warpgate cooldown for zealots increased by 5 seconds:

I've heard from a lot of top level Zerg players that 2 gate aggression from Toss is somewhat impossible to deal with properly, as it forces you to make too few drones, and you lose in the midgame. The build time change for Zealots from Gateways seems reasonable.

However, late game zealots will suffer, which is totally uncalled for. Zealots are a very important late-game unit, and were certainly not too powerful in the mid and late game. A more appropriate change, it seems, would have been to increase the build time from gateways, but not increase the cooldown on warp gates.

Perhaps this lategame nerf to zealots is due to the dps nerf to tanks. Because of the damage change for tanks, zealots will be far, far more effective against them.


Terran Reaper build time increased by 5 seconds:

This is the real needed change of the patch, a nerf to the effectiveness of reapers against Zerg. However, it's questionable if build time is really what needed to be changed. An increase in cost, particularly in mineral cost, might have been more fitting. Mass reapers in the early game allow a Terran to safely expand with the excess minerals saved up, and reducing this somewhat may have been a better change.


Terran bunker build time increased by 5 seconds:

This is questionable. Offensive bunkers probably weren't too powerful in any situation, as a good player will usually scout it and be able to destroy the building SCV before it is completed.

Defensive bunkers will now be even more difficult to construct in time to prepare for an incoming attack, which is bad.


Terran siege mode damage nerfed from 50 to 35 (50 to armored):

This is a very fitting change. I remarked just yesterday that siege tanks are a weird unit. Weird simply because of how incredibly (and disproportionately) effective they are for their cost vs. every ground unit in the game. This damage reduction vs. non-armored units will make engaging a Terran army a lot more doable. However, I wonder if their reduced effectiveness against Hydralisks will end poorly for balance.


Terran Battlecruiser ground damage nerfed from 10 to 8:

This is a very odd change. BCs certainly didn't come off as too powerful in any situation to anyone I've talked to. The change isn't necessarily a bad one, as it's true that there is no ground unit which can effectively take down a BC. However, they should have also increased the anti-air damage of BCs somewhat to make up for it.


Ultralisk damage reduced from 15 (40 vs. armored) to 15 (35 vs. armored):

This is a bizarre nerf. Consider what the Ultralisk is strong against: Armored units. Now consider what units are strong against Ultralisks: marauders, tanks, immortals, stalkers, etc. These are all armored units. Essentially, ultras are strong against units which are strong against it. Now, with this change, they will be weaker against those same units. Ultralisks were never too powerful, so this change really makes no sense at all. Zerg seemed to already be at a disadvantage against a late game Terran, especially if the Terran is turtling behind armored structures and units. Now Zerg will have a harder time handling this.


Ultralisk building attack removed:

They say this won't really reduce an ultralisk's dps vs. buildings, and will actually increase the dps against clumps of buildings. Perhaps that's true. I doubt ultralisks will be able to take down planetary fortresses like they used to be able to, though, which is bad.


Overall impressions:

Overall, they had the right idea, but didn't seem to think their changes through very much. The Zealot change is evidence of that: Sure, zealots may have been too strong vs. Zerg early-game, but they were not too strong mid or late game, and yet the change will affect the mid and late game as well.

Not to mention, PvT balance, especially in the early game, could be thrown out of whack with the nerf to zealots.

The nerf to ultras (and maybe BCs as well) also seemed arbitrary and unthoughtful.

Read more for the full patch notes:

I laughed pretty hard at these lyrics. I have no opinion on whether or not T is actually OP, and I'd have to go with "there isn't enough evidence one way or another to really decide", but the raps about it are awesome.

Original post on TL

Today I played a PvT. I secured myself a quick lead by engaging his army when it was vulnerable, and expanding safely and more quickly than him. From there, I continued to out-expand him and was in a seriously huge economic lead.

However, I suddenly hit the 200/200 mark, after playing defensively, not wanting to engage his tanks, and fending off his attempted drops. I went for an attack on his one expansion (his natural), thinking the longer I wait, the more time I waste being supply capped. Although I killed his army with feedbacks, storms, and good positioning, I also lost my entire army. Why? His natural was a planetary fortress, backed up by tanks, missile turrets, and a bio ball. Although my method of engagement was flawless, his defensive position was too strong for an all-in.

The mistake I made was a good lesson: Attack with a clear goal and withdraw when that goal isn't possible.

If you are in the lead, remember that what's keeping you safe is your superior army. If you waste that, even if you have the income to replace it, you might not be able to replace it fast enough, and the enemy could actually turn the game around on you.

This is why Zerg end-game armies are sometimes thrown away by high level players in a seemingly inefficient manner: he can replace it almost instantaneously, after doing significant damage to the enemy T or P army. Then he can push again with another 200/200 army to secure the victory, while the enemy is 100 supply short from the last engagement.

When you're being "cured" of doing something you enjoy, you know something is wrong.

South Korean psychiatrists claim to have successfully reduced video game addiction by plying the addicts with antidepressant drug Bupropion.

The study was conducted by Han, Hwang and Renshaw from the Department of Psychiatry at Chung Ang University, College of Medicine.

Eleven participants had been categorised as having "Internet Game Addiction", because they played Starcraft on average for at least four hours per day, which actually seems quite modest. However, six of them had been absent from school for more than two months because of their dirty little habit, while two of them had actually been divorced because they played so much.

The group was given Bupropion, an antidepressant and smoking cessation aid for six weeks. After the trial period, their group’s cravings to play Starcraft apparently decreased by 23.6 percent and total playing time decreased by 35.5 percent.

They also performed some MRI scans and discovered that the addicts’ brains responded to pictures of Zerglings – the six-limbed raptor popular in Starcraft -- less strongly after taking the drug.

Buddhist and I played 2's for several hours today. After much deliberation, frustration, experimentation, and innovation, we are proud to offer you the following advice:

don't both 1 gate fast expand into carriers it's not a good idea.

IdrA showed this technique at the 2010 IEM grand finals in Cologne, Germany, against Tarson's thors, and handily took the win. There's nothing new about the technique IdrA used. In fact, the technique has been known since early beta. However, it is certainly underutilized by even the best zerg players.

The method is this:
Select your mutalisks, and have them move to a location so that they are all together, but allow them to spread out evenly as they naturally do.

When you are ready to engage enemy thors, click to move your mutalisks over the Thors. Do not click to attack the thors, and do not A-move. Once the Mutalisks are directly over the thors, press s or h or a-move so that the mutalisks begin to attack. Now the mutalisks will attack but stay spread out, so that the thor aoe does very little damage to the mutalisks.

Remember that thors are still and effective counter against mutalisks when they are in good numbers and have marine or viking support. This micro technique alone will not win you the battle, but can do a lot to help.

Here's a demonstration of the technique, courtesy of Psystarcraft:

This method can obviously also be used to engage any terran who you know to be using hunter seeker missiles, just the same.

Source

http://tv.esl.eu/de/esltv_stream/

NaDa vs. TLO showmatch later today, to be casted by Day[9]. For those of you who don't know, within SC BW:

"Statistically, Nada is the best player in history, having achieved the highest Top-1 KeSPA score of any player after it was re-scaled. He also holds the record for lo...ngest stay in the Top 30 KeSPA Rankings, a streak that started in March, 2002. He was the first player ever to win 3 OSLs, thus earning a Golden Mouse (other Golden Mouse recipients are July and Jaedong). NaDa’s reported earnings in 2005 was $200,000 USD. In terms of achievements, periods of dominance, and staying power, Nada is easily the most accomplished Starcraft player of all time."

Considering he hasn't been seen on the SC2 scene, I think TheLittleOne might actually destroy him. Then again, TLO isn't exactly the best SC2 player atm, so the matches should be extremely interesting. NOT ONLY THAT BUT THEY'RE GOING TO BE CASTED BY DAY[9] FUCK YEAH.

An unsuspecting Protoss player is struck by an unseen strategy.

This is pretty hilarious. If I could read Swedish, I might look more into it.

The election to the Riksdag (parliament) is closing in, and an for many young voters, it is important that the politicians understand and prioritise their recreational pursuits. An oft-neglected form of culture is computer games. The Pirate Party, in order to highlight this, challenges the swedish political blocs in a duel of Starcraft II.

There is a lot of talk going around about this MU being imbalanced, that it's Terran favored. Idra, Sheth, Dimaga, MasterAsia, and other top Zerg players have all commented on the imbalance of the match-up at their level.

I doubt there's real game imbalance.

To understand my reasoning, first you have to understand the difference between imbalance at the top level and "high" level, that popularity isn't the same as strength, and what imbalance even means.