Platinum Terran: Initial Impression Over 70 Games

Just to let you guys know where I am coming from: I started out fairly high in the gold league in 1v1, winning roughly 50% of my games. However, as I fine tuned my strategy I began winning 90% of my games and predict a move up to platinum soon. So, I can say that while I may not be as good as David Kim or Artosis, I have a pretty good understanding of game mechanics. So, here are my impressions.

This game, graphically and musically, is quite amazing. It feels very smooth and the gameplay itself is far superior to Warcraft 3. It is a return to the roots of Starcraft with the removal of town portals and the return of split armies and two front attacks. Strategically, this game is far superior to any of its predecessors. Macro/micro wise? Actually, these things are easier due to the implementation of new tech like MBS. However, that doesn't really devalue the game for me, as I believe strategy should be more important than your clicks per minute. This is real time strategy, after all.

Scouting is as important as ever, and luckily for terran, we are unscoutable by conventional means once we wall off our ramp. Unfortunately, scouting early doesn't do us a whole lot of good in the metagame. Most zerg and protoss do pretty much the same thing every game. Zerg fast expand, protoss get observers and stalkers quickly and build whatever it takes to counter you. Terran unfortunately do not have the early game power to stop fast tech or fast expand. Building a core only allows one to produce more marines, which is probably the weakest of all tier 1 units before stim pack. Marauders build too slowly to counter chrono boost or queens. Terran simply cannot outproduce the other two races early game.

Note here however that I am not saying terran is underpowered and can't beat these races. What I am saying is that there is only one viable strategy to beat them: Tech. And the terran technology tree is quite amazing. In my opinion terran probably have the best air options besides mutalisks, and siege tanks are still quite good for games focused on controlling the map. Banshees are an excellent early game punisher on people that don't bother to get anti air early on (see: roach massing zerg).

My honest opinion here is that blizzard should double the cost of a tech lab but allow it to produce 2x the units. I don't like that the thing that allows us to match chrono boost/queen production rates early game forces us to make weak marines. I honestly don't see much point in using a core over a tech lab because I dislike that it limits the units I can build. It's better in the long run to make tech labs and just build additional barracks.

Funnily enough, the only race that a massive tier 1 rush will work against... is mirror match. Mirror matches are probably the most fun match terran has right now, since nearly any strategy can work. Every terran mirror I play is different, while most tvz and tvp are quite similar.

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