This is my first battle report, so go easy on me, yada yada… you’ve heard it before. I came to the realization a couple of weeks ago that I really suck at SC, so I’ve decided to try to start a career as a mediocre BR writer. I dedicate this, my first effort, to my lovely girlfriend, who once feigned interest for a full hour as I tried to explain to her just why StarCraft is so cool.
The game starts with me joining a 1v1 on Lost Temple (at least it wasn’t BGH, OK?), and asking to observe. The noble Cerebrate dog_doo (hereafter referred to as Dog) graciously allowed me to stick around, and opened another slot. A slightly clueless Executor named sir-SCORPON (hereafter referred to as Scorp) joined shortly thereafter, and with a "gl" the game was started.
You’ve all seen the Lost Temple before, so I won’t insult you by reproducing a map here.
Dog
– white Zerg, 6:00
Scorp
– teal Protoss, 12:00
Scorp
went with a quick tech build, going gate-forge-zealot-core-assimilator.
Dog
, the daring type, went for an early expansion to his natural, followed by a pool and a second hatch at his main. Had either of these players rushed, the game would have been over quickly; fortunately for me, they were both content to stay at home for a while.
Dog
’s first scouting overlord found Scorp’s base, and was promptly pelted with photon cannon fire. It was at about this time that Scorp decided he didn’t trust me, and stopped sharing vision. The overlord veered off to the left, chased by a newly warped dragoon. It just barely escaped; the goon danced around and wished for a better range, but the lord was safe to flee to the top left corner, where it stayed unmolested for the remainder of the game.
I will henceforth be adding little stupid dialogue bubbles to all my pictures.
Dog
was not idle during this time; he had fortified his natural with a sunken and a few assorted troops. He had also added a hydralisk den; a little later, he upgraded to a lair and morphed two evolution chambers. I wish I could tell you what Scorp was doing at this time. So much so, that I started floating my command center toward his base to get a peek.
A long zergling scampered into the base to have a look around, but his sightseeing was cut short by a dragoon who needed to work through some aggression issues….
I was chased off by that same dragoon, obviously still cranky at his inability to pop the overlord early. Abandoning all hope of seeing what Scorp was doing, I retreated my command center to be repaired by the one SCV that I hadn’t managed to kill, and settled down to watch the game from Dog’s point of view.
At about the same time that my command center was nosing around, a column of hydralisks was making its way up to the Protoss encampment.
The lisks sauntered into the base, and decided that recon was more important than a battle at this point. They ran around the outskirts, taking heavy fire from photon cannons and dragoons the entire time, and fired a few volleys of spines before being annihilated. Not a very cost-effective attack, but I suppose they gained some useful tech information out of it… um, right?
Yet more hydralisks were gathering outside the ramp, hoping to prevent Scorp from expanding. Unfortunately, they weren’t backed up by an overlord, and a blurry figure began slicing them in half. Apparently those templar archives weren’t just decorative; the hydralisks slithered as quickly as they could back to their base, greatly in fear of their lives.
They soon returned with overlord support. One of the lisks moseyed up the ramp just in time to see a probe scrambling out; it buried a few spines in the probe’s metallic butt, but the robotic wonder made it out, and began warping in a pylon and nexus at the natural.
This didn’t last long. Survivors: the probe, hidden behind the minerals.
Heartened by their victory, the hydralisks began gathering outside the base, followed by an overlord or two to keep an eye out for those damn dark templar.
One wandering hydralisk found that probe hiding behind the minerals. The probe let out a battle "beep" and charged.
It died gloriously.
The full force roared into the base….
Unfortunately, high templar had come into play at this point as well, and the crackle of psionic storm filled the sky. The entire attack force was reduced to chunky kibble fairly quickly.
Dog
started his second expansion at this time; note that Scorp still had only his main, and was fairly effectively contained by the hydralisks that were rallying to just under the ramp.
Dog
’s third and final attack was successful. A mob of hydralisks, whipped into a frenzy, charged the ramp and proceeded to raze the base.
And that’s all he wrote.
Lessons learned:
- If your hydra strategy fails miserably the first two times… try it again!
- Bad micro is more than balanced by good macro.
- Failing to ally with the observer is bad luck.
- Hydra > probe.
Final score:
Thank you to both of these fine players for letting me write this report; I hope everyone had a heckuva lot more fun reading it than I did writing it. I have new respect for everyone who churns out the really kickass reports… this stuff is HARD. J
By the way, I know this game in and of itself wasn’t that exciting, but I did what I could with what I had…. I’ll try to BR a longer game next time, I promise.
Happy NoHunting!
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