Starcraft 2 Game Guide 

There are three playable races in the latest edition of StarCraft, the Terrans, the Protoss and the Zerg. Each of the races are unique, with their own units and buildings. However, despite this uniqueness, there are also many similarities between the three races, and this Starcraft 2 game guide will attempt to explain some of the basic concepts that apply to all of them. An example of this similarity can be seen in the respective worker units for each race; Probes (Protoss), SCV’s (Terran) and Drones (Zerg) all perform pretty much identical tasks.

The basic goal for any StarCraft 2 battle is to destroy all of your enemy’s buildings. During a battle, there are two things that you are able to build and manipulate: Units and buildings.

Units and Buildings: The Basics

Your units are your men and vehicles, such as siege tanks and marines; these are your forces that you use to defeat your enemy. They can be ordered to move around the game map, and do many other things. For example, you can order your units to attack enemies and try to destroy them. You will also notice that many of your units have special abilities, and these can be used to do other things, such as preventing enemy units from moving, or even take them over so that you can control them yourself.

Three of the most important units are the workers for each race. These units are vital as they are used to collect resources that you will need to be able to construct your buildings.

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Big and mostly immobile, your buildings have many uses, from constructing more units to researching new technologies and even unlocking newer buildings that you can use to develop newer still technologies (this is called moving along the tech tree). Each building is different, and performs unique tasks. For example, a Gateway building is used to build stalkers, zealots and sentries, amongst other things. Meanwhile a Forge building doesn’t build any units as such, but what it does is allows you to develop Photon Cannons, a kind of defensive building that is very difficult for your enemies to penetrate.

For battle purposes, both units and buildings have a hit point value. Whenever one of your buildings or units comes under attack, its hit point value will diminish, until it hits zero at which point the unit is dead.

Resources

In order to succeed in StarCraft 2, you will need to harvest the resources that you need in order to build new units and buildings. There are three main resources in StarCraft 2, and each one is acquired differently.

The most basic of resources are minerals. Minerals are acquired by getting your worker units to mine them from the patches of minerals that you can see in the game’s landscape. Workers gather as many minerals as they can hold, then return to the Nexus building to deposit them, before returning to the mineral patches once more. All of your units, buildings and upgrades need minerals, so it’s important that you always have workers collecting them!

The next resource is called Vespene Gas, and it is used for both upgrades and for the construction of more advanced buildings and units. The more exotic and powerful a unit is, the more Vespene Gas it needs. Air units such as Carriers need a lot of gas in their construction, so it’s important you get as much as possible. Vespene Gas is obtained by constructing a special building called an Assimilator over a Vespene geyser. As soon as the building is finished, you can send workers there to harvest the gas.

The final resource is food. This works differently from the other two resources, in that you need it to keep building more units for your forces. All of your units require food, and in order to obtain it you will have to build special Pylons. You can also get food from Nexuses, but this is really a perk, as they have far more important uses.

There are other resources in Starcraft 2 as well, such as Production Cycles, APM and Time, but they are a lot more complicated so we won’t worry about them in this guide.

Fundamentals of the Game

In order to be successful with StarCraft 2, you will need to get to grips with the fundamentals of the game quickly. The fundamentals are the things that you need to be constantly doing while playing the game, in order to keep your armed forces expanding and running perfectly.

StarCraft 2 is all about multi tasking, and you’ll need to be able to do this well if you want to compete with the best. While playing StarCraft 2, there are three basic tasks that you will always need to keep on top of: Spending resources, Obtaining and Controlling Information and maintaining your food supplies. Failing to do one of these basic fundamentals properly will see your campaign end in disaster!

Spending Resources

The investment of your resources in StarCraft 2 can result in returns that are exponential, therefore you will need to do this very wisely and not get left behind by your opponent. However, it needs to be done with great care. You can spend your resources on three things; the Economy, the Army and Technology. In most cases, it is best to spread your investments in all three categories, however the timing of your investments is also crucial and a key part of the game.

Economy

By choosing to invest in the economy, you’ll be gaining access to more resources later on, so it’s a wise investment. Investing in your economy can be done by constructing more worker units, or else by expanding. You’ll find out soon enough that the production of workers in particular is something that you should constantly be doing!

Army

As well as your economy, you will need to be continually building up your armed forces, things like Stalkers and Zealots. Your army is essential to both the defence of your base and any attacks you want to carry out. Production of combat units is limited however, by the resources you can spare and by production cycles. For instance, a Stalker unit takes 42 game seconds to build, and you can only build one at a time with each Gateway building you have. If you construct another Gateway building, you’ll be able to build two Stalker units every 42 seconds, which works out to be one Stalker unit after every 21 seconds of game time. Therefore, you can see that having more Gateways shortens your production cycle greatly. The more buildings you have, the faster you can build up your forces. One of the keys to success in StarCraft is maintaining the perfect balance between building units and production buildings.

Technology

The final option for investing your resources is in technological development. Known as ‘Tech’, this is very important because without a high tech level you won’t be able to develop any of the new and advanced units and buildings that are vital to your success. Technology also allows you to gain access to more abilities for Spellcaster units, as well as research for more upgrades for your current units. Investment in your technology is a very important factor in StarCraft 2, because if you lag behind your rival you will soon find your army units and defensive buildings to be completely ineffective against his newer, more powerful weapons!

 Just starting out with Starcraft 2 and want the key aspects for competitive play, then read our brief Starcraft 2 Beginners Guide

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