I’m looking for a guide or explainer on micro. It’s utterly beyond my control and comprehension to do the micro I see the very good players do. Part of it is I’m not that good of a player, but part of it is I don’t think I know the hot keys.
When I want to select a group, I either double click on one unit (to get all of that type), click and drag around units in an area, or use f2.
I also know that holding the shift key adds units to the selected group.
What else can be done, hot key wise? How on Earth do the pros do the really cool stuff like marine splits and stutter stepping with multiple units?
There are no pros in co-op. I personally have a big problems with accuracy, so more often instead of trying to select units from battlefield, i use F2+ctrl on specific unit type to select them into group (raynor marines for example), or F2+ctrl+shift to exclude some unit like observers, then save other army so they don’t move separatedly. For example when playing karax, i save immortals on 1, then stutterstep with them while other army (colossus observer mirage) goes by A-move. Ofc it’s not most effecient, it’s better to save observer on diff hotkey as well. So ideally it would look like F2+A, then move obs to good position, then micro immortal. I rarely use TAB for abilities because it’s not fast enough and not convenient enough for me. For example if I use vipers, i need them not only to cast, but to get right positioning, which is impossible if i select whole army and use TAB-like thing to cast. If you use diff armies on the map then you probably will just have to save all units from squad into one control group. If you rely on abilities alot, try to think about more efficient order of casting before the game, and when you decided what to do, just practise it so it became like muscle memory. For example my Nova engagement with something that i need to use all abilities for:
1 -tanks, 2 - ravens, 3 liberators
Let’s say i meet the wave, i use siege tank, then raven turrets (2-4), siege lib, def drone, bombardment, some mines from tank to deflect ground units, raven rockets and mix nova snipes into it. I’m not very fast player or smth like that, but using control groups for each unit type, setting my own hotkeys and some practise allowed me to do such combos in reliably fast and useful fashion. Ofc it’s just my experience.
To split some units off AoE you need good accuracy which i personally lack.
Ctrl+left click also selects all units or buildings of that same type (on the screen). That may be easier to do than double clicking on it
Shift+# adds the select units to that control group (I use this A LOT with Abathur to add new Roaches/Mutas to get biomass)
For example, if you have control group 1 as all your Zerglings. You can just select all of your Ultras, press Shift+1, and next time you press 1, all your Lings and Ultras will be selected.
This saves steps over Ctrl+selecting all Ultras, then selecting all your Lings, and then pressing Ctrl+1
I’d beg to differ. If we’re using the definition that “pros” make a living off of it, even that might be a stretch as there are YouTubers who could probably pull that off.
Otherwise, if “pro” means “someone who’s really good”, then we definitely have that in Coop. These guys have gotten all the achievements, can solo Brutal, speed run, and even win “handicap situations”. For example, have them jump into a game where a newbie couldn’t get much going… they’re probably be able to salvage that for a win. Also, these folks can take on most, if not all the Brutations (enemy heroes, Polarity + other nasty mutators, etc. They’re good enough that they can get paired with players who are “so-so”, and still carry them if it means they do at least 70% of effort.
Yeah I was using pro to mean very good players who are capable of the finer micro controls that are seen in pro games. Not literally paid to play co op.
There is no magic, select a part of the group and move them to a side. The issue is precision of selection and the speed of it. If your mouse speed is slow I am not sure this can be done fast enough to get out of storm.
Stutter stepping is simply chaininng move and attack commands. But you probably already understand that.
Practice on train map, select your Marines, A move them, move, A move, move … Stay with the train.
Watch hotkey guide, and watch a gm player, either via video or downloading a ladder game.
Still, gonna explain a little.
Ctrl+#0-9 is what you’re going to use the most, shift and alt keys are for doing something to the group you already have.
Shift+#0-9 will add selected units to the group you pressed.
Alt+#0-9 will prioritize the selected units to the group you pressed. If you have 60 marines on group 1, you select 10 marines and do alt+1, these 10 marines will take over the 60 marines group.
However if you have 60 marines, select 10 and do alt+2, it will take those 10 out of the 60 group, being left with 50 (This is important cuz this is where a setup marine split comes in), so you can have 2 bioballs instead of 1 which will help in making a concave, rest is mouse-micro.
The alt key is also important to take out important units out of the army, say Zeratul void prism flying in front of the army. You can just click on the void prism, alt+2 or 3 and have him on follow command on a imortal or sentry so you can A-move more safelly.
Lastly, if you have multiple types of units or buildings, you can press tab to get to those units. Artanis have this issue if he got both high templar and archons in the same hotkey, as they are different units which doesn’t share the storm. No need to have 3 hotkeys for each Nova production building as well.
you should pick ur favorite commander and develop hotkeys around ur playstyle
1,2,3 should be ur army 4,5,67 buildings f2 f3 f4 for camera . use ctrl + and alt+ and u are good
“High skill” and “professional” aren’t mutually exclusive.
I don’t bother splitting Raynor anymore. All bio… Rines, Mar’s, Medics, and Firebats are control group 1. I used to have Medics on control group 2, but they generally die too quickly/relatively easy to make it worth my while.
I do split up Barracks with Tech Lab, vs. Barracks with Reactors to quickly and accurately queue Marauders/Medics/Firebats and Marines respectively
Overall, I end up doing:
1 = army
2 = army #2
3 - 5 = more army or detectors
5, 6 = upgrades buildings (e.g. Armory, Evo Chamber)
7 = Optional Production buildings #2
8 = Production buildings
9 = exp. town hall
0 = main town hall
4 might be a special building, like Zagara’s Banaling Nest, Stukov’s ICC (Civvy Compound)
5, 6 for Vorazun’s Dark Pylons
You can group all production buildings or upgrade facilities into one number and use tab to cycle between them.
I usually don’t use 7890 because they are too far from my left hand.
1: army
2: 2nd army, support units or truck in Cradle of Death (F2 key is too far)
3: production facilities or support units
4: upgrade/research buildings
5: main base
6: production facilities or reseach buildings.
Because some commanders don’t need a number for production buildings, like artanis who just use the W key or zerg commanders that units are produced by the main base, the number 3 and 6 are more flexible on these commanders.
Support units are usually key units that the commander can use that you don’t want them to move with the army (small worker group for repair or turrets, units that produce powerfield for warp-in, flying detector, omega wurm, queen etc).
In the same topic about hotkeys, which hotkey do you use for each top-bar?
Currently, i use Alt+Q up to Alt+R for the top bar but something is causing conflicting with the Alt+R so i am trying to find a new hotkey.
The number unit group also has minor issue. Sometimes, when i press 1, 2, 3, 4… i was not allocated to the group and it requires me to press the keys many times. Still don’t know why it happened. Usually this occurred when i am in the middle of combat.
Oops I did meant F4 is too far not F2, but anyway number 2 on truck worked excellent for me. I usually will lead the attacks in cradle simply because my truck is more responsive combined with high precision of movements. Pressing F4 in the heat of battle is a struggle but pressing number 2 isn’t.
I do use F2 to add units to control groups, try to have a good habit of NOT using it in battles to improve reaction time.