I don't have a computer at college, so it's only on special occasions that I get to play some good ol' StarCraft. Since it was Easter weekend, I gorged myself with as much SC as I could, at the expense of many hours, my social life, and bathing. I have recently taught myself some primitive HTML and was bound and determined to write a battle report, come hell or high water. It was a struggle to resist writing about all the crappy games I waded through, but I wanted to make sure I documented a good report.

After several late nights of dull games, I encountered a player by the name of Stinger who beat me mercilessly, and with ease. Our two games together had similar stories...on both occasions, I randomed to Zerg while he randomed to Protoss. That happened twice in a row--imagine that! Anyway, both games, played on the infamous Lost Temple, involved him expanding super fast to his natural. During the first game I applied constant pressure to the expansion with wave after wave of Zerglings, and later with Hydras. However, it seemed I always got there just too late to stop him from re-fortifying. (There's nothing worse that a Protoss player who knows how to use a shield battery :P ) By trying pathetically to break into his expansion, I was allowing myself to be outresourced, as I neglected to expand. He easily crushed me.

If only I had replaced my damn troops more quickly! Dammit! During our after game conversation, he revealed to me something I could have done:

Hmmm…interesting theory. I was grateful for his good sportsmanship in revealing this tidbit and decided to try it the next time it became applicable.

My next game was with a player named BigDaddy69. It resulted in me being called a "damn map hacker" as I destroyed each of his expansions. It is extremely satisfying to watch an enemy worker create a new Nexus/Command Center/Hatchery only to tear the thing down once it's completed, after the opponent can't cancel it. I asked him why the hell he didn't expand with some freaking protection. His respond was to identify me as a "hacker". It was my first time being called a hacker and I took some delight in it, although I fully expected to see the message "Waiting for player: BigDaddy69" to appear. Instead, he offered a rematch and told me the game name and password. I had no intention to play with a whining loser, but I agreed so that he would not spite me by disconnecting. He left the game, giving me a victory. I logged off, went into the bathroom, and took a dump in his name.

Later that night, I was puttering around looking for a game. Just as I was afraid my /, s, q, u, e, l, c and h buttons were going to be permanently worn out, I ran into a friend of mine, BargeAtwil. I've had the pleasure of playing with him on several occasions, and each time is more fun. We are rather balanced opponents, and I looked forward to a game with him. I asked to create the map, and chose Sherwood Forest to battle. It had been a couple of weeks since I last saw Barge, so I was eager to get playing. I had a complete picture of what to expect from him: possible early tank drop, sparse troop attacks, wraiths toward the end of the game, and expansions made not too early and not too late. I knew just how he was going to act, and how to counter him. The game would be mine, thanks to the knowledge I had of Barge's playing style. Unfortunately, he surprised the hell out of me this game. For those of you who have stayed awake, yes, there is a battle report in here. Let's get it started:

Game: Vanilla Starcraft
Map: Sherwood Forest
Players: Spuzz(me)--randomed to Zerg at 3:00 position
BargeAtwil--chose Terran, appeared at 9:00 position

For those who don't know Sherwood Forest, it is a 128x128 size 5 player map with starting positions and expansions littered along the border. Each player's base is contained within walls and has a single choke point.

I began with a bland building order, making a hatchery, then spawning pool, and another hatchery. The map is too big to worry about rushes, and I knew Barge isn't a rusher anyway.

I used to be too slow or afraid of expanding. Now it seems I can't expand fast enough. I got the itch when I sent a Drone named Scooter (Yes, I have the appropriate gayness level to name my scouts) to check out the area. He stopped at the upper right corner starting position (where you see a red spot on the mini map) and made himself comfortable waiting until I was ready to begin an expansion. A second scout wandered to Barge's base and was blown to hell by a bunker located in his choke point.

After services were held for the dead drone, I started a hatchery using Scooter at the upper right corner. Have you ever had those days where it just seems that you can't get your economy going? I was having one of those. The dead period in expansion development when it is between being too expensive and being profitable was taking forever. I was having trouble getting troops ready.

After making about 16 Zerglings, I sent them to Barge's choke to check it out. They got shot full of holes so I retreated and let them rejuvenate at home. Two Zerglings were ordered to patrol my choke and warn me of incoming intruders. What followed was a brief building period in which we both got our bases under control and pointed to the direction that we wanted to go. I was planning to use Mutas with Defilers and Hydras. I was a bit slow in the troop production, however :P

Suddenly, a pack of cloaked Wraiths attacked from the south, heading straight for my workers. I had too few Spore Colonies to hold the Wraiths off; the Colonies were destroyed. My Hydras clumsily plodded to the rear and finally spit the Wraiths down, with minimal losses to my drones or Hydras.

Barge, what the hell are you doing? You've never tried that before!

At this time I decided that according to my BargeAtwil clock, he should be expanding about now. I sent a Queen to check the map, when suddenly a huge cluster of marines and firebats swarmed into my base. I was totally caught with my pants down. The soldiers stimmed and started wreaking havoc. My Hydras fought well by focusing fire on one Terran at a time, but they were finally destroyed and I could not produce more quickly enough. The base was going to shit. In utter despair and disbelief, I sadly typed "gg" to grievously admit defeat; the battle was totally out of my hands. I was helpless; Barge was going to clean up easily, and all I could do was watch in horror.

However, Barge made a fatal error. The fighting had lasted about 30 seconds, and he had continued to stim his soldiers throughout the battle. By the time my Hydras were dead, his warriors were so drugged out that two freshly made Sunkens were enough to kill every last Terran. I had barely managed to survive--there was a short period where I had absolutely no mobile units in my base; it looked like a ghost town. If he had attacked during this time with even just four freaking firebats, the game would have been over. I slowly replaced the Hydras, Zerglings and Drones.

Barge, Barge, Barge…what the hell are you doing? I can't cope with this new style from you!

As I rebuilt my army, the Queen I had sent out earlier found a couple of the most useless, stupid, annoying units in StarCraft--the gay Bengalass. That's right, I willingly commit blasphemy in saying that Bengalasses freaking suck and are nothing but a rectal wart on StarCraft's ass. However, if you are a Zerg player, the Bengalass can actually be useful ;) My Queen parasited several of the critters. Queenie then came to the upper left starting position and found a single SCV sitting there with both thumbs, hell both fists, up his ass. She parasited him and flew south, where she was used for target practice by a group of Wraiths.

Following the death of my Queen, I suffered another attack on my main base. This wave was smaller than the first, and I managed to hold it off somewhat easily. I noticed that I had yet to see a tank come in Barge's attacks, which is very unlike him. The difference was made up in additional infantry. Fortunately I was upraded a bit more than he was at the time, so my available forces were adequate. I decided I needed more money (I didn't even have a Spire yet) so I decided to send a Drone to the 12:00 position, to begin another expansion.

The Drone got there, but forgot about him when I became distracted by a long red line on my minimap. (*I always press Alt and Tab when I begin playing StarCraft. Doing so colors all enemies red on the minimap, and allies and all neutral things, such as Bengalasses, yellow. It makes it much easier for me to keep an eye on the minimap.)
What did I see but a line of marines and firebats and a large pack of Wraiths heading straight for my expansion, recon courtesy of Mr. Bengalass the spy. Good work, Bengalass! You're not useless after all! With this info I hustled some Hydras and a Defiler to the expansion through a Nydus Canal. I also morphed several Sunkens and Spore Colonies to help. The plan was to have Defiler plague the troops, then cast Dark Swarm to allow the Hydras to attack the Wraiths safely. Meanwhile the Sunkens and occasional Zerglings could handle the plagued soldiers. It was almost too easy...

The attack began with an infantry drop from the south side of my expansion via dropships. (He walked the soldiers up to the expansion so he could load them up and drop them?) Defiler accomplished a perfectly executed plague on the creep that the Terrans had been standing on ten seconds earlier. Suddenly Wraiths mobbed the little base. Dark Swarm supplied cover for the Hydras, despite the presence of firebats, who wreaked havoc on the guys inside the Swarm. Eventually Barge was overpowered, but it was the second close call I had. My main was nearly dry, and I hadn't expanded at 12:00 yet. If this expansion had gone down, I would have been royally screwed; the loss of resource time would have guaranteed my demise. Not to mention the only reason I had prepared for the attack was because I happened to catch a glimpse of his troops marching up to my base thanks to a parasited Bengalass.

Barge, what the hell? I'm not used to being on the defensive so much with you!

At this point, I had a serious reality check. So far Barge was in total control of the entire game. I had yet to attack him even once, and his attacks were constantly crippling my defenses. I had been hanging by a freaking thread the whole game.

At this time I checked the SCV that had been parasited earlier. The little bastard was making a Command Center in the upper left corner. This surprised me--Barge had always been very cautious about parasited units. This was an extremely late expansion for him, too. Well, I certainly had to stop it…I couldn't allow him to continue these damn attacks. I quickly sent some Hydras to this expansion. They got there by walking from my main. Like an idiot, I completely neglected bringing any Overlords. When the Hydras arrived, I noticed a few Wraiths hanging out. I hoped that Barge's attention would be elsewhere, and if my Hydras were fast enough, they could destroy the Wraiths before he had a chance to cloak them.

As my guys advanced, though, the Wraiths cloaked and raced towards them. I was forced to burrow the Hydras and wait for an Overlord with upgraded speed to get there from my upper-right expansion.

Barge

began building a ComSat station on the Command Center, presumably to detect the burrowed Hydras. (Why he didn't build a Turret is beyond me.) While waiting for detection, I finally began the 12:00 expansion. When the single Overlord arrived at last, I unburrowed and attacked the Wraiths. Of course, with only one Overlord the detection sure didn't last long, but I took a down a few and decided the hell with it, those Hydras were going all balls out. I was able to kill all of the SCV's working there, but not one single Hydra walked out of there either, and his Command Center had survived. During the scuffle I rubbed my two brain cells together really hard and managed to use Stinger's trick of making units through use of building hotkeys. I immediately had a second force of Hydras ready, and sent them with four or five Overlords.

The Hydras arrived to find more damn Wraiths waiting, but with detection I was able to get rid of all but one before the Overlords were popped like huge, pulsating goobers. The Hydras had a field day destroying each and every SCV and finally the Command Center as it tried to get away. I wish I had a Queen handy to infest it, but all the Queens were sitting at my base eating bon-bons and watching "When Pets Attack". After the Command Center was gone, I was saddened to receive a message from Barge, saying I had won. I questioned him and was told that he did not have enough money to continue. It was a bit of a disappointment that the game would end this way, but he had decided that it would not be realistic to keep trying to win, and I respect his decision. Victory was mine!

Scores:

Notes:

• I guess the main point I wanted to make in this BattleReport is not to get set in your expectations of how a player will act. I was vulnerable throughout the game because I trusted the history of my previous games with Barge over good old-fashioned recon. Let's be honest here, I had no right to win this game; nothing short of dumb luck saved me several times. Anyway, I learned a lesson...maybe a reader will learn it too!


• Another point I hope I made was the effectiveness of parasites. Bengalasses are a good target for parasites, as most players don't consider them at all during the game. The only reason I was able to (barely) withstand the attack on my expansion was because I noticed the units coming. (By the way, once the Terran threat was gone, each and every Bengalass present was slaughtered so that the Zerg could extract DNA and assimilate them.)


• One of the biggest reasons why I was always low on cash was that I was constantly getting upgrades that I didn't need. For example, I upgraded Zerglings' adrenal glands, but didn't really use them. It's nice to have this upgrade when you need it, but I did not have any extensive plans to use Zerglings.

Well, at any rate, I would appreciate any feedback. Obviously Barge and I aren't stellar players, but we have fun, dammit! What should I have done to play better in this game (I know there is a long-ass list)? What improvements do you suggest for this BattleReport? Please comment.


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I'm sorry; it's stupid, but it's just somehting I felt like doing :)

PS...I originally had this against a black background with white font, but when I previewed it the background was white! Can someone tell me how to fix this?