Hello fellow GBers...... 
 
Well, after my last 4 games ended in loss for me, I thought I would write about my experiences, and ask the question.... Has this ever happened to you? You go into a match with all the best of intentions, and yet you manage to screw up everything. I NEVER, and I mean NEVER expand fast enough, so when I ook at the resource at the end my opponent is pulling in 900+ when im lucky to get 500+. I know this is a huge flaw in my game, but I just dont know what to do. Had a PvP last night, and he canon rushed me... I had a strat to proxy him with a zealot rush, but when I saw him building I turtled.... Wost thing to do as a toss ever... Then his void rays came to get me.... He only threw them in piece mealso I massed stalkers to counter, and just blinked them down the side of the cliff as he had totally blocked the entrance to my base.... So I storm his base, destroy most of it and yet still manage to lose my entire force due to lazy microing..... I mean here is the gist of my story..... IM JUST SO DAMNED INFLEXIBLE when I see a different tactic I just turtle up, and dont know what to do. How do I get out of this mindset? I have been watching plenty of Youtube and all the rest of the commentators (H to the usky Husky comes to mind, TLO ETC) But I think a lack of short term memory may sabotage me... Thoughts?

"  Thoughts? "

" @Lordborg909 said:

"  Thoughts? "

 some people just arent meant to play RTS games.. i used to suck hard at Age of Empires and World in Conflict so i just accepted the fact that i wont be able to enjoy that genre's goodies and stopped trying     "

KEEP ON TRUCKIN'! Just practise some more and you may eventually be able to fix your problems in the RTS genre.

" @Ahmad_Metallic said:

" @Lordborg909 said:

"  Thoughts? "

 some people just arent meant to play RTS games.. i used to suck hard at Age of Empires and World in Conflict so i just accepted the fact that i wont be able to enjoy that genre's goodies and stopped trying     "

What a horrible way to look at things. "

" @Ahmad_Metallic said:

" @Lordborg909 said:

"  Thoughts? "

 some people just arent meant to play RTS games.. i used to suck hard at Age of Empires and World in Conflict so i just accepted the fact that i wont be able to enjoy that genre's goodies and stopped trying     "

What a horrible way to look at things. "

When it comes to RTSs, for me, losing is a way of life. 
 
Losing creatively can help curb the pain.

Sounds like your scared to lose. If I was you I'd just learn to be more aggressive. He's blocked me into my base? Good time to attack. He's got units in my main? Good time to attack. Find out what works and what doesn't and err have fun I suppose.

The only thing I can recommend is, focus on improving one thing each game.  Making mistakes is totally human, what's important is to make a different mistake each time and learn from it.  Don't give up!

Thanks guys all great advice! I will keep it in mind... just silly mistakes that cost me matches, and I guess I kick myself afterwards... Funny thing is, in RTS I have had a ton of experience from AOE all the way up to the likes of... wel... SC2... I think my sense of entitlement might be a problem, just cause i think im good doesnt automatically make me good :p

If the game has replays, look at your opponent's build order.  Spend a game against the computer just copying it sometime, to get a feel for how it works, and then you can explore deviations.

If you insist on not expanding, either because you refuse to expand or because you never think to, you can try playing a more aggressive game to keep your opponent from being able to expand.  A fast expansion is a major investment, and if it goes down you find yourself behind rather than ahead.

Good luck.

" @Lordborg909 said:

"  Thoughts? "

 some people just arent meant to play RTS games.. i used to suck hard at Age of Empires and World in Conflict so i just accepted the fact that i wont be able to enjoy that genre's goodies and stopped trying     "

You're not the only person in this position.  Just keep on learning, as long as you enjoy it.

I wish I could give you advice, but I'm a bronze league player with wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy more losses than wins.  I still manage to have fun with it, just try different builds out, sometimes they work sometimes not.  

" Sounds like your scared to lose. If I was you I'd just learn to be more aggressive. He's blocked me into my base? Good time to attack. He's got units in my main? Good time to attack. Find out what works and what doesn't and err have fun I suppose. "

First of all a losing streak is nothing to be ashamed of. I've had terrible losing streaks, but that's just part of the game. You win some, you lose some.
 
Second of all, you seem to lack confidence when actually playing. You say you're afraid to move out of your base to expand or be agressive. Scouting can help you determine when you should turtle up and when you should expand or be agressive. If you know what your opponent is doing, you generally know how to react.
 
About not knowing what to do. Just do something and say to yourself that it's the best thing to do. Even if it turns out to be terrible afterwards. Starcraft is moslty a game about decision making, so when faced with a decision, decide on a course of action quickly, even if you have some lingering doubts about it. Ignore those doubts for a while and just play.  If you lose the game, you can always analyse the replay and say to yourself. I lost because I made the wrong decision at this time, 
Even if you lose, you've learned a valuable lesson, which'll make you a better player. If you win, you can say that you've made a quick, yet good decision, which helped you win the game. You can use that experience in your following gamed when your facing a similar situation. Thanks to your previous experience, you now know how to react.
 
Good luck.

 About not knowing what to do. Just do something and say to yourself that it's the best thing to do. Even if it turns out to be terrible afterwards. Starcraft is moslty a game about decision making, so when faced with a decision, decide on a course of action quickly, even if you have some lingering doubts about it. Ignore those doubts for a while and just play.  If you lose the game, you can always analyse the replay and say to yourself. I lost because I made the wrong decision at this time,  Even if you lose, you've learned a valuable lesson, which'll make you a better player. If you win, you can say that you've made a quick, yet good decision, which helped you win the game. You can use that experience in your following gamed when your facing a similar situation. Thanks to your previous experience, you now know how to react.  Good luck. "

You can win physiologically. Make every person work hard for there win. Maybe you'll get lucky and they'll rage quit.

" @Thule said:

 About not knowing what to do. Just do something and say to yourself that it's the best thing to do. Even if it turns out to be terrible afterwards. Starcraft is moslty a game about decision making, so when faced with a decision, decide on a course of action quickly, even if you have some lingering doubts about it. Ignore those doubts for a while and just play.  If you lose the game, you can always analyse the replay and say to yourself. I lost because I made the wrong decision at this time,  Even if you lose, you've learned a valuable lesson, which'll make you a better player. If you win, you can say that you've made a quick, yet good decision, which helped you win the game. You can use that experience in your following gamed when your facing a similar situation. Thanks to your previous experience, you now know how to react.  Good luck. "

This is SO true... Many a time I have stared at the comp screen thinking "What should I do? Should I rush, expand, turtle...." Then his army wipes me out lol while Im dithering around "

DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  
 
Have a plan before the match, stick to the plan, make sure your expanding at opportune times, and learn how to deal with the stupid cheese. This really is everything you need to do at the low levels. MACRO MACRO MACRO. If you are macroing effectively, you will destroy most people all the way up through gold.

I know this sounds ridiculously obvious, but just focus on having fun. I suck at pretty much any online game I've ever played, but whatever. People get so caught up in the competition part of gaming that they forget that it's supposed to be all for a laugh. Hang in there, and if we ever cross paths I can almost guarantee you'll end up kicking my ass. :)

One of the problems I ran into early with Warcraft 3 was people not realizing that, when you get matched against people on your level, you lose more.  They'd go back to level 1 and start over against fresh opponents.

Don't let your win/loss record bother you, especially if you're in a higher league (diamond).

One thing I forgot to mention before was that, when you copy an opponent's strategy and play with it yourself, you get to see where it was and is weak.  If you play it online against other people in practice, you can see where other people take it apart and how.  Then you know how to do it yourself.

" @Ahmad_Metallic said:

" @Lordborg909 said:

"  Thoughts? "

 some people just arent meant to play RTS games.. i used to suck hard at Age of Empires and World in Conflict so i just accepted the fact that i wont be able to enjoy that genre's goodies and stopped trying     "

What a horrible way to look at things. "

this has happened to me a couple of times before too and i think it has or at least will happen to everyone. The fact it you are going to go on losing streaks and in my opinion this is both a good and bad thing. It is a good thing because learning happens in between games so watch the replays and BE HARD ON YOUR SELF! you have to. Always measure your self to perfect  it is the best way to get perfect. if you get supply blocked once be critical about that so that it wont happen in the future. 
 
But i think the best thing to do if you are on a losing streak like this you should take a break and i don't mean watch the replays just don't play for the rest of the day or maybe even the next. This way you will come back with a fresh look at thing and will be ready to start wining again.

" this has happened to me a couple of times before too and i think it has or at least will happen to everyone. The fact it you are going to go on losing streaks and in my opinion this is both a good and bad thing. It is a good thing because learning happens in between games so watch the replays and BE HARD ON YOUR SELF! you have to. Always measure your self to perfect  it is the best way to get perfect. if you get supply blocked once be critical about that so that it wont happen in the future.   But i think the best thing to do if you are on a losing streak like this you should take a break and i don't mean watch the replays just don't play for the rest of the day or maybe even the next. This way you will come back with a fresh look at thing and will be ready to start wining again. "

 It's the patented Kaos/Ahmad way of life. 
Join now and get a free car!

While playing against the computer won't help you learn to defend crazy harasses or other unique attacks, it can help you learn how to expand effectively.  The biggest problem I have against the high levels of AI is how they seem to have unlimited resources because the comp macros so effectively. 
 
If you can learn to expand effectively against Very Hard AI, you will have a decent macro game against Gold-level play.

Well there is a happy ending for this story, broke my losing streak with 2 quite awesome wins! 1 involved a proxy rax in the enemies base in 2v2, he never got off the ground. I build a bunker next to his CC, while his SCVs merrily ignored me :) The next game I 3 raxed in the expansion spot next door to the enemies natural, then just pumped out MM till he GGd and left :) Meanwhile my Zerg buddy was pounding his position with Hydras and roaches, so at my natural I was building tanks while fending off a void ray rush with turrets... ahhhh, the simple joy of destroying a enemy base.... oh and building a CC near my 3 rax helped no end! Awesome!

" DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES  DAY NINE DAILIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   Have a plan before the match, stick to the plan, make sure your expanding at opportune times, and learn how to deal with the stupid cheese. This really is everything you need to do at the low levels. MACRO MACRO MACRO. If you are macroing effectively, you will destroy most people all the way up through gold. "

" @Lordborg909: Congrats, you fluked your way to 2 easy wins. Anybody can do cheeses and succeed. The real challenge in RTS's is to able to perform in macro intensive games. "

Ugh, I hate MMM. But I don't subscribe to this "oh wahhh cheese is bad" mentality. Just learn to adapt to it.
 
BUT I still struggle with MMM. Tips on how a zerg player can learn to spot it while scouting and then counter it?

You stop when it stops being fun. This is the nature of popular multiplayer games. Certain people, let's say, "care too much", and they're autistic ferver kind of deflates the experience for everyday players looking for a good time.

i've been on a bad loosing streak recently. And its not really fun anymore. what im doing is going on to another game (FFXIV beta) and will probably go back to SC2 later.

" @Lordborg909: You dont get it. Cheese= All-in build that relies on not being properly scouted. You're basically crossing fingers that your opponent is not doing a safe build when you do a cheese build. Because yes, you may have won some games by doing this, but you're not actually getting better when you do this. You improved your record, yes, but when a match comes where the other person actually knows what he's doing, you'll be fucked, because you wont know how to follow up in the mid and late game if your early rush fails. A cheese build is like going all-in on the first hand in poker, it might work, but even if you win, you didnt proved anything in terms of skill. But hey, if its what it takes to make you stop whining about loss streaks on the internet then go ahead.  "

" @Lordborg909: You dont get it. Cheese= All-in build that relies on not being properly scouted. You're basically crossing fingers that your opponent is not doing a safe build when you do a cheese build. Because yes, you may have won some games by doing this, but you're not actually getting better when you do this. You improved your record, yes, but when a match comes where the other person actually knows what he's doing, you'll be fucked, because you wont know how to follow up in the mid and late game if your early rush fails. A cheese build is like going all-in on the first hand in poker, it might work, but even if you win, you didnt proved anything in terms of skill. But hey, if its what it takes to make you stop whining about loss streaks on the internet then go ahead.  "

You are matched against opponents of your skill level.  Getting better won't make it any easier to win.
 
The point is just to have to fun.  If you are, keep playing.  Otherwise, don't.

" You are matched against opponents of your skill level.  Getting better won't make it any easier to win.  The point is just to have to fun.  If you are, keep playing.  Otherwise, don't. "

winning is for losers.

Happens all the time, I had lose-streaks of like 7 losses and burned nearly 100points in diamond in no time... But I'm working my way back up! So... KEEP HWAITING! 
 
Watch some streams, some replays, browse some TeamLiquid

" @Flooko: I know, I NEVER SAID CHEESES WERE FUNDAMENTALLY WRONG. But at his level of play, cheeses are irrevelant and nothing to be proud of. They are a waste of time for all players involved. The only thing he should worry about is not to win but to improve, but he cant improve by doing cheeses. Again, if you wanna play poker and go all-in every single time, then you will never learn the mind games and skills necessary to play at a higher level. "