Starcraft 2 - Which race for a newbie?

Was doing some thinking and came to this conclusion - If you are a newbie starting off in Starcraft 2 and have absolutely no preference for race and just want to start playing the game, pick PROTOSS.

Let me explain why. (you can read on or just watch this video)
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8WnFMaoBEA]

A brief examination of the different races shows why Protoss is the easiest race for a new player to pick up. This is NOT the same as saying that Protoss is the easiest race to play - at the highest level, it's really quite different, and there are differing opinions as to which race is the so-called 'easiest' to play. But I'm talking about at the newbie level, at the basic level - Protoss is the easiest.

Let's first look at what I believe is the most difficult race : Zerg.

Why is Zerg the most difficult to pick up? In most scenarios, if you were to play a proper drawn out game (no cheese, all-ins), a Zerg player needs to go a fast -expand build to sustain his (weaker) army (weaker in terms of supply-wise - e.g. 200 vs 200 army) and economy. It is very macro heavy which may be hard for newbies to pick up.
In addition, getting a fast-expansion will mean learning HOW to defend it, which poses additional difficulties.
Most of all, it requires a delicate understanding of when to get Drones, and when to get an army. It also  has the most crucial 'economy mechanic' of Inject Larva - If you miss it too often, you can't get a good economy AND army up. (I'll explain why it's not so crucial for the other races below)
On top of a more difficult macro style to master, zerg engagements require good flanking and positioning, whereas the other 2 races generally can engage in a ball (of course, avoiding chokes etc, is impt)
Of course, this does not even include other mechanics like spreading Creep Tumors, when to get Overlords, etc (since it takes up larva too)


How about Terran? Well, as mentioned before, its economy mechanic of MULE/Scans are much easier to handle than Zerg - even if you miss a few MULEs, you can always drop 3-4 at once, or even use the energy for scans. It doesn't help you get more resources (just FASTER minerals) and is probably only crucial in clutch situations (perhaps after losing a base, and trying to catch up) so having some energy stocked up is good (for scanning cloaked units, for instance)
Why I deem it harder than Protoss is because it has much more different production buildings - 3 types in total for a typical game (e.g. a newbie friendly build like MMM), whereas Protoss typically only uses 2 (warpgates and  stargate/robo)
(Be clear that I'm talking for new players here - of course higher level players mix up their units more)

In addition, the whole 'queuing' up of units is something that new players will struggle with - It is common knowledge to more experienced players that you shouldn't queue up 2 many units at once, and while Toss don't face this problem with Warpgates, Terran have to handle multiple Barracks/Factories/Starports well.
Also, choice of addons? How many to get? Which addons? Protoss have no such headaches.

And while Terran armies generally can fight in a ball, there are many occasions where you'll WANT to spread out your army in an engagement, such as against Banelings, Colussus, etc, which are very very typical responses against a Terran army. This requires more micro and more skill and harder to learn too. (Which drives players to do a mech build which is newbie friendly but very gas intensive and needs multiple bases to handle, etc)


Now let's look at Protoss and their 'economy mechanic' of Chronoboost. You generally shouldn't miss too many chronoboosts in the early game even if you're new as there's nothing much happening- thus you will get your harvestors up and easily outnumber other races since you can produce them faster at the start.
As the game drags on, even if you  miss them it's ok, you can use them to chronoboost out units and upgrades! Which is what you WILL be using them for in the mid-late game anyway.

Production? Warpgates make production easy as pie. There's no need to even rally units, just warp warp warp warp. At the bronze-silver levels, I can easily win all games with just gateway-robo units. No problems at all.
Micro? Just move in a tight ball, and engage as such (of course general rules like Zealots in front, sentries away from fire, should be adhered to as much as possible, but this isn't that hard to manage) And with the gay unit Sentry, you can just spam Forcefields to cut the other army in half at chokes, etc. Not that hard to learn, but crazily effective.

It's so easy to play Protoss! Gosh. I still love my Zerg though.

Not convinced? Leave a comment below or a tag on the tagboard and I'll reply as soon as  I see it.

A M S 6 - Fire

Once upon a time, there lived a little boy named Timmy. He lived in the edge of the woods in a place far far away, all alone with his father. They relied on hunting to survive.

Timmy was only five, so he was naturally fascinated about everything. One day, his father decided to show him how to start a fire. After all, when you survive in the wilderness, fire is the most important thing you need to get by.

Dad: "It's simple Timmy, you first put a bunch of dry leaves and branches in a small pile. Then you just take this flint and strike it against this other metal piece. This generates sparks which if your bunch of dry stuff catches it, will immediately start a fire. Then you have to add in bigger pieces of wood to keep it going."

Timmy: "Wow Dad, that sounds like alot of work just for a little fire!"

Dad: "It may start little, but it can grow till REALLY really big! Don't underestimate fire!"

So Timmy's father let him try his hand at starting a fire. After numerous attempts, Timmy finally managed to get it going.

Timmy: "Wow!! Dad!! Look look! The fire is really strong!"

Dad: "That's right, when it first starts off, it's going to be really strong and big. But quick! Add more wood, or it will die off quickly!"

Timmy does as his father says, tossing it pieces of lumber. However, he tosses it a piece of wet one, and the fire sizzles.
PSSTTT.

Dad: "Careful Timmy!" and pulls back Timmy back as the sparks fly and the fire dances and threatens to go out. "Be careful what you throw into the fire Timmy! You throw the wrong thing and it will go out! Worst of all, you may get hurt!"

Timmy nods as his father steps in and quickly adds some pieces of dry wood to get the fire going.

Dad: "You may see the fire sputter and flicker, but that's just part of it. As long as you keep adding wood, it will keep going."

Timmy: "I really like the fire Dad!! It looks really nice!"

Dad: "That's right, fire is one of the most powerful things in nature. You must be careful with it though."

Timmy's father went off to do some hunting while Timmy stared and admired the fire. He also diligently added pieces of lumber to it, and if he forgot to, the fire would start simmering down and sputter and he immediately remembered.

After some time, Timmy's father came back with a dead deer for dinner, but found Timmy playing with stones instead.

Dad: "What's the matter Timmy? Don't like the fire anymore?"

Timmy: "Yea it got boring! After it burns for so long, it seems to be getting smaller too!"

Dad: "Yea, as the original source of lumber gets used up, the fire may become smaller. Weren't you very interested and excited about it earlier?"

Timmy: "Yes I was Dad, but now I don't seem to see why it was so fascinating anymore! It doesn't seem very interesting now..."

Dad: "Well Timmy, if you want it to go out, you can just stop adding firewood to it, and it will burn out rather quickly if noone adds anything to it. But remember, we NEED fire, especially to cook this deer!"

Timmy went off to fetch some water to boil the deer meat in, and when he came back, he noticed the fire was burning brighter than before.

Timmy: "Hey look Dad! It looks the same as when it started off now!! Wow!"

Dad: "So you like it now? " -scratches head-

Timmy: "Yea! It is dancing and flickering like when I first got it started! That's what got me excited in the first place! Can I add more firewood Dad?"

Dad: "Sure you can Timmy. Remember Timmy, don't neglect it, or it will die out."

Timmy: "Yes Dad! I will! But I hope it remains as cool as it is now!"

And Timmy learns the importance of fire, and grows up to be a fine huntsman, and they live happily ever after.
Until a fire one day burns down their house and they all die ktnxbai.

effort

I'm trying to get back into the blogging groove so I'll try to make one blog entry a week (minimum) !!

If I could create an ideal world, I would enforce equity throughout.the world, in terms of education. Yes, I'm a firm supporter of meritocracy, I believe effort is what should count, not how many As you manage to get. That will be my mantra for my kids anyway. Do your best, put in your best effort, and noone can fault you.

(Just to loosely define some things in case people don't understand, meritocracy = getting rewards based on your effort, and equity = things are distributed fairly according to what you deserve.  In this case, good results)

So anyway, one of my pet peeves, on top of bad breath and smelly ______s, is people who get good(or better) results but work less than me.

My work ethic is as such - work first, play later. I finish what I have to do, then I'll slack and play whatever. I like to draw up study schedules so that I can plan my work accordingly and finish them ahead of time. I HATE doing last minute work it's just so ... frustrating and stressful.

As such, I'm often finishing my readings and supposed 'studying' way ahead of time, as compared to people around me. I don't know what is it about the culture around me but uni people seem to like to do things last minute, including readings. I know people who study like 3-4 chapters in the last 3-4 days before a test (whereas I typically cover 3-4 chapters over 3-4 weeks)

And the worse part of all? They do better than me.

Like what's the point of my working so hard? What's the point of doing readings on time and still not doing much better than them? (or even just slightly better)

It really gets on my nerves when I know of people who study like just the day before, and when results come out, they COMPLAIN that their results aren't good enough. 'Why didn't i score higher? oh noes. I put in so much effort you know!'

WTF? Effort? Last minute study is effort? I guess staying up late till 3AM (or later) the night before an exam quantifies as significant effort for these people.

What about me? I end up scoring lower, or at most 1-2 marks more than them, when I studied waaay in advance.

What's the point of studying so hard like that? Why can't my memory be as awesome and I can also cram just the day before the exam and score as well as them? Why do I have to read waay in advance and revise several times before I can truly encode everything? Zzz.


And a side topic, ok nevermind I shall write that side topic on realFASS blog. thanks for reading this rant if you really did. bye.