Shokz Starcraft 2 Guide Review | Shokz Starcraft 2 Strategy Guide

Archive for the ‘Starcraft 2 Guide Reviews’ Category

Starcraft 2 Secrets is a guide released early August, and to be honest, lots of people are recommending it. It has stirred quite a buzz for being a good starcraft 2 guide, and may e the top guides, Shokzguide and Joanas need to make way for starcraft2secrets.

Now Starcraft 2 Secrets Guide is written by T Dub Sanders, creators of Farmville Secrets & PVP Bible, both top guides for its target game. We review this guide if it has ample info, and how it compares to joanas & Shokz. It’s site says it outlines basic & advanced strategies for multplayer in starcraft 2. Basic strategies for all 3 races, advance strats, links to popular videos, screenshots & step by step walkthroughs of actions.

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In this review, we kept in mind what shokz starcraft 2 guide & Joanas Starcraft 2 guide has to offer. There are less references in this page to shokz & Joanas SC2 guides, but you can learn more on these guides by choosing/clicking the link at the left section of this website, with heading of ‘Best Starcraft 2 Guide Reviews’.

Starcraft2Secrets is a one-time purchase of $37, and after payment a big difference against shokz & Joanas is that this is a Guide for ‘download’. Shokz & Joanas are web-based. You can clearly see each and every update that shokz make through his blog & member’s area. What is curious to me is the ‘Regular Update’ that Starcraft2Secrets promises. (It’s been a few days since I bought starcraft 2 secrets strategy guide, and I haven’t received additional/updated guides). My impression for this strategies guide is that it is a one-time product guide delivery, meaning ‘no regular updates’, but just your first & only downloaded guide, just my opinion for now.

starcraft2secrets-review

Next is the introduction section, with basic stuffs, what’s new in sc2, what are the new units, new marcro abilities, multiplayer infos & basic strategies. For the build orders, it is in 1 section, and that is for all races. Each build order doesn’t also show description on the purpose of each build order. I can identify the purpose of some of the build orders, since I’ve already used them, but for some, this might leave you with a question mark in your head. Like for example :

starcraft2secrets-review-build-order

The #1 indicated above shows a fast production of stalkers. So after producing these 2 stalkers, what then? It doesn’t show how to fully use them, e.g. to send stalkers to your enemy’s mineral place and blink in, destroy workers and command center if possible.

The #2 indicated above shows a fast build to ‘Robotics Facility‘, and its purpose being to warp-in robotic units. This building can produce observers, warp prism, immortals, and colossus(which requires robotics bay). Maybe this build shows to fast tech to Colossus? Since there are no mention of what this build order is intended for , this may be confusing for some.

Well anyways, for most of the strategies in this guide, it contains some build order, so that should be your build order guide.

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Next, it contains more of strategies for each race, and is broken down into sections of :

• Overview

-contains description of the specific strategy

• What You’ll Need

- the units and buildings you need for this specific strategy

• Preparation

- contains build orders, and some other things you should do

• Execution

- when should you attack, how should you attack, or if you should attack. when to counter, how to counter. what abilities to use, when to use it, how to use it.

• Extra Tips

- some other tips

starcraft-2-secrets-review-tableofcontents

Also, from our opinion, Starcraft2Secrets clearly based some of his content from Shokz Guide. How I know it? It’s clear in the pdf file, it left a shokzguide trace!

starcraft-2-secrets-review-shokz

And that’s it! So what you will get is the Starcraft2Secrets pdf download, with 103 pages, filled with each race’s strategies. It contains good info, but Shokz is better.

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Now is Star2Pros Starcraft2 Guide Really Worth It? Is It Good? If you are looking for a straightforward review of star2pros, what I can say is, “I Would not recommend it”. Well, that’s just my opinion, and I am open to contradictions. I’m not questioning Wesley Graber’s SC2 skills(being diamond and played longer with sc2, probably he will beat me in heads-up game), but on the way how this star2pros guide provides info. If you want to know how I came up to this conclusion, then do read below.

Now FIRST, I purchased the star2pros guide. Seamless transaction of course, a digital product, so no need to wait. You’ll gain access to star2pros members area as soon as you purchase. But after my purchase, I didn’t go through over the sales letter, so after purchase, I was prompted to register to star2pros member’s area, and there it was… “I will be charged $27 monthly!”

star2pros-guide-review-subscription

Probably my fault, I didn’t go through some of the fine print… haha… You can see below, price is $27. See the section I numbered below in red, #1 & 2. I Thought this was a one-time fee, but on #3. there it is, a monthly subsciption of $27. Well if this has recurring charge, then I expect this to have very good to great quality in it’s strategies, community, easy-to-read guide, and more.

star2pros-guide-review-sales-letter

Now I register my email above to be able to go to the star2pros members area. After registering, I then instantly received my password in my email, and I hurriedly logged-in to star2pros area, and curious to what’s inside. Inside the member’s area, I scratched my head. See the member’s area welcome screen.

star2pros-guide-review

What the heck. By the way, current date today(current date of this star2pros review) is august 3, 2010.  7 days after sc2 release, and still, somewhat of a blank page on welcome screen? I was expecting something more. More graphics might help, what are the new updates, etc. This actually seems like this has not been updated even before July 27th. “We are excited about the release of Starcraft 2 on July 27th….” -> This seems like the writer is still looking forward to the sc2 release, still prior to the release date. Anyways, that’s just my thought.

star2pros-guide-review-sections

Star2Pros Sections consists of these 3 :

• Zerg 1v1 Guides
• Protoss 1v1 Guides
• Terran 1v1 Guides

What I can further say is, it’s unorganized.  No clear organization of strategies, of build orders, of some other general guides/tips, videos, and more. E.g., on zerg 1v1 guide, it talks about beating protoss. Then next to it, beating terran, then next, back to against protoss again. I’ve already gone through shokz & joanas, and it’s much much more organized(sections organized like general guides, each race’s units strategy/description/infos, each race’s strategies).

star2pros-guide-review-1v1

And oh, still on organization of the strategies, doing a quick browse, I found some 1v1 strategies, requiring to have a partner(so probably for 2v2??). On 1v1 section, it has => “What you Need : A Terran on the other team…. A Zerg(Preferred) or terran partner that will scout for you”. This definitely does not belong here. Proceeding with more browsing of star2pros strategies :

star2pros-guide-review-content-no-pics

Now this is just my opinion, but I can’t find some pictures to help out those newbies to sc2. My top guides reviewed have pictures, so why not this? Pictures do help in making it reader-friendly. So from what I can see, this is geared up for Advanced Players only, and not for noobs. Next, the replays :

star2pros-guide-review-replays

Going through the vidoes/replays, I still am confused, questioning myself, “what does this video show? what strategy is used here? Should I just watch the video, and browse on which strategy it shows?” This clearly has no description. I didn’t want to go through, issued a quick refund.

So my conclusion : I Do Not Recommend Star2Pros. I won’t be offering this guide, and I won’t be offering my bonus/es for star2pros. Browse through my top recommended guides in the left section(sidebar) of this site.

Now check out our Top Starcraft 2 Guides Reviews, and also “Find Out About Our Bonus”!

Starcraft_2_Strategy_Guides_Terran_Protoss_Zerg

There a number of tools out there currently being developed for use on starcraft 2. What I’ll do is if you order now, with instructions further down this page, I’ll email you a Guide on a Very Useful Starcraft 2 Tool & How To Use It To Improve Your Skills!

This tool will help you by having :

• Graphical or Chart View of You and Your Opponents APM - Now this is useful because you can gauge on how you perform against your enemy. This will show you overall APM(actions per minute), as well as you and your enemy’s APM for each second/frame of the game(when you had click activities the most, when you lag, when you were inactive)
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• Graphical or Chart View of You and Your Opponents Hotkeys - You will be able to see on how you performed on assigning your hotkeys, and also on selecting those hotkeys. This applies to your opponent too. So you will see the specific hotkeys and grouping your enemy used during your game.
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• Graphical or Chart View of You and Your Opponents Build/Tech - You can have graphics view of your builds/build order, view training of units, view how often you train workers(scv, drone, probe), view when you researched, view upgrades. This also applies to your enemies build/tech. Now this is very useful for you to learn from replay.
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Here are the instructions you need to take in order to receive this useful guide & Info :

1. Get Shokz or Joanas Guide Through Our Link. Choose a guide in our ‘Best Starcraft 2 Guides Reviews’ Section in the upper left part of this page. Click the Facebook ‘Like’ button at the start of the post. Get the guide you chose by following the links on our specific guide review.

2. Go through the 100% secure transaction Purchase.

3. Once you are done, forward your receipt to dennis@shokzstarcraft2guidereview.com. You will receive your receipt number with email like “Receipt for your ClickBank Order #XXXXXXX”.

4. I will then email you this bonus.

*Note:  This bonus is not affiliated in any way with shokzguide or Joanas.

Starcraft_2_Strategy_Guides_Terran_Protoss_Zerg

You may have heard of Joana from his fame as a World of Warcraft player. He is most famous for breaking a leveling speed run a few years ago. After breaking the record, so many people asked him how it was done that he created a best selling leveling guide. Once Starcraft 2 was announced, he turned his sights on the game. From the first day of beta, he was playing non-stop for six months. He rose the ranks and reached diamond in all the brackets that he played in. Based on what he learned, he wrote one of the best guides available. Here is a Joana’s Starcraft 2 Strategy Guide review.

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After my purchase of Joanas starcraft 2, I was instantly given access to it’s members area. Here’s how it looks like :

Joanas-Starcraft-2-guide-review-welcome-screen

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1. New Updates Location. Now Joanas mentions that there will be regular update, but from their current members area format, I can’t seem to find any link where new contents are added. Unlike shokz, where a blog is provided for you to know the new starcraft 2 contents he adds to his shokzguide. How do we know when new content is added in Joanas?

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2. Scrollability. Ok, I am using Google Chrome, and it seems like there is a problem with using the vertical scrolling when clicking/holding it with the left-click mouse button. I did scrolling through the mouse scrolling button, but it took too long to go to a specific section of the page. I tried it with mozilla firefox, and it’s ok.

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-scrolling-not-working

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3. Going back to the menu. Each of the page you have access are quite long, so when going and clicking through the strategies, it leads to the the middle or bottom part of the page for each race(1 long page for each race, contains the strategies, & stuffs for that specific race). Now it is a pain to go to the menu again. I have to scroll back to the beginning of each page to access the menu. Wish Joanas could fix this and make the menu go with the scrolling.

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-hard-to-go-to-menu

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4. Advertisements. Well, it depends on you, but for me it’s better not to have other advertisements in the members area.

joanas-starcraft2-guide-review-advertisements

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Now Joanas Starcraft 2 Members area contains these sections :

• Joanas Starcraft 2 Guide – Basics
• Terran Guide Menu
• Zerg Guide Menu
• Protoss Guide Menu
• Coming Soon -> Single Player Campaign Guide

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In the ‘Basics’ Section, obviously this discusses about sc2 information, like :

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1. How you can compare sc2 with warcraft III. Warcraft players will know on the key differences of sc2.

-> Also know the 5 points that Joanas talks about, to shift your gaming mindset to be better at starcraft II.

joanas-starcraft2-guide-review-vs-warcraft3

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2. About Microing & Macroing

-> Basically, Macroing is the combination of your gaming skills like gathering minerals/gas and then using them to create more and more buildings/structures, producing mass units, upgrading, and many more. This is basically the “strategic” part of the game. This can be a deciding factor since this can decide what units you can have, what army you can have, or what upgrades you can afford.

-> Microing is basically controlling your army, in scouting, moving, and in engaging your enemy. You can select specific units to micro concentrate fire on a single enemy unit, then use the shift+click, to proceed to the next target enemy unit when your current target enemy unit is destroyed. Or doing kiting, where you as a ranged unit attacks a melee unit, then just running when that enemy melee unit gets close, then hitting it again when in safe range.

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3. Starcraft II Lingo & Terms

-> When in conversation with other sc2 players, watching a video about specific sc2 strategies, searching google, or browsing/participating in sc2 forums, you should know what people are talking about, especially what they mean like when they speak about AoE(Area of effect, splash damage), harass(basically doing damage to your enemy’s resource gatherer’s – protoss’ probes, zerg’s drones, terran’s scvs).

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4. Some Unit & Building abbreviations - just some abbreviations

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Now how do this basic section fare against the general guides of shokz, well, it’s ok, but shokz is much more better. Shokz guide has more of the following :

• micro videos
• about map controls
• some general tricks n tips
• more hotkeys

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For each of Joanas ‘race guide menus’, It is also divided into :

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-terran-guide-menu

1. The race units and its strategies. This section has the unit & that specific units strategy guide is merged into one. In shokz, these are separated.

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-> For the units, here is the layout :

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a. for each race, it shows :

->super weak against, weak against, okay against, & strong against

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-unit-guide-table-description

-> unit description. Just some unit’s description, where to build, etc.

-> note-worthy skills. This also shows some starcraft II ability tips.

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-skills

-> how the specific unit fare against each of the races(including it’s own race)

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-versus-race

-> specific strategies for the specific race unit

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-unit-strategy-guide

b. The specific race against Protoss

c. The specific race vs Zerg

d. The specific race vs Terran

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-> Now for the specific race vs ‘race’ above, this contains 3 parts :

1. Opening Strategy -> What strategies are good at early game? What Rushes?

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-opening-strategy

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2. Mid-Game Strategy -> What units and strategies are good during mid-game. what t2 units?

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-mid-game-strategy

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3. Late Game strategy -> Go for those huge units? What enemy units to look out for when game drags on.

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-late-game-strategy

These opening, mid and late game sections give you options for each progress of the game.

e. The race’s FFA Strategy – Fighting each other? How to build up your base accordingly, etc. What strategies you should use, and strategies are not recommended when you have multiple enemies.

joanas-starcraft-2-guide-review-ffa-strategy

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6. Working with a Team for each race -> for 2×2, 3×3, or 4×4. What to focus on, what strategies? Should you rush? What works best?

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shokz-starcraft-2-guide-review

First of all, Shokz guide is a Starcraft 2 Guide made by Shokz, a gamer who reached Diamond during Blizzards Starcraft 2 Beta. If you’re one of those who played at beta, then good for you! You’ve already got your hands playing sc2 before millions of players do. Really nice.

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Now Shokz guide is not just a starcraft 2 guide, it builds a community of sc2 players worldwide, an active community, and you can expect each and every member to have the goal to improve a lot their gameplay. Know that Shokz is committed to keep this community updated with the latest strategies, newest tips, and great resources for you to feast on.

shokzguide-membersarea

As you can see in the members area of Shokz, it is arranged in a very readable layout. You will know of new updates with the shokz guide through the blog tab in the upper left corner of the screen. Guides are organized this way at the sidebar :

• General Guides – Here are where you learn the basics, and also not so basic concepts, like getting your fundamentals correct.
• Specific Strategies of each Race.
• Specific Unit Guide of each race.
• Team Guides.
• Galaxy Editor Guides.

I’ve also played starcraft original, brood war, and just some games on sc2 beta, and I consider myself to be somewhat an intermediate player. But I can say that shokz guide is really good for all players, be it for starcraft newbies(who haven’t played starcraft yet), those who have played starcraft(sc & brood war’s somewhat intermediate, to advanced players), and those who have played sc2 beta.

For me, this really gave me better understanding on :
1. Getting my gameplay fundamentals correct, through the general guides section, like microing & macroing, how to get the pro mentality(setting your mindset, winning & loosing), controlling the map, and many many more. Plus many many many more upcoming.

shokzguide-mentalityofapro

Above is a section of the ‘Mentality of a Pro’ Guide. Some info is somewhat like what you should do after each game, what about expansions/expanding, what to do when you’re in advantage, and more. Great Infos by the way.

2. specific race unit guides. The layout of Shokz for the terran, protoss & zerg unit guides are well-formed, and layed out in a very good manner. It explains in a table for a unit :

• what units this specific unit are strong against(your enemy’s units it can counter)
• what units this specific unit is okay against
• what units this specific unit is weak against(your enemy’s units that you should stay away from when you have this specific unit)

And the above are for each of the races UNITS.

thorguide-shokz

Above is a page for Thor, showing point 2 above(weak against, okay against, strong against for each race), and point 3 below(skills & strategies).

3. The units skills and strategies. Shokz gives you a broad summary of its skills. And then he shows you what strategies to use with the specific unit.

4. specific race unit guides and how it fares against each of the races(not by unit, but by the overall race). Like for example :

• how each unit fares against protoss, against zerg, and against terran. E.g :
  Thor is not that great against protoss, good against terran, and great against zerg.
• when to use each unit when going against a specific race. For example :
  If going for a heavy Thor build, back them up with a couple of Hellions so they can take out any anti-Thors like zerglings.

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Below is an image of this section in shokz guide.

against-other-races

5. Each specific race’s Strategies. Shokz also did a good job of what strategies to include for each race, useful strategies. For example :

• Walling off Minerals as Terran. For starcraft original and brood war, walling of minerals includes building specific structures around the command center and minerals, sealing it off. Now in starcraft 2, you can still make use of this strategy, but with a twist. haha. You won’t need to keep lifting up your barrack or other building that you use to wall off your minerals. Below is a page of the ‘walling of minerals as Terran’ section.

walling-off-minerals

Now the Points above are for all the three races, so there’s a number of great content in Shokz.

And here’s more :
1. There’s also a ‘request feature’ option for each and every member, so Shokz knows on what guides he should focus on, on what his members wants.

request-a-feature

You can see above, APM guide(actions per minute – although not totally a measure of your game skill, this will also gauge your speed), best maps for each race, & marauder & ranged unit kiting. These guides will be worked on by Shokz.

2. Member Tournaments. Shokz has teamed up with starcraft2forums.org to launch the first members tournament. Registration starts July 27th to the first 128 users who sign up from Shokz Guide & Starcraft2Forms.org. Registration is expected to fill quickly.

starcraft-2-shokz-member-tournament

The first prize will be a gaming computer with the following built:

Intel i7 processor and 1066 slot motherboard
Nvidia GTX460
8 GB Patriot DDR3 RAM
ASUS VH242 1080p Monitor
Antec DF-45 case
850W Antec Power Supply

That is a good gaming pc! (I only understood 2 lines above, i7 processor & 8 gig DDR3 RAM, and I’m sure these specs are great!) Now this shows Shokz dedication for the community. Consolation prizes will also being given out.

In conclusion, Shokz Starcraft 2 Mastery Guide is a great guide, and it has really opened my eyes to some of the best concepts & strategies of starcraft 2. By concepts I mean, somewhat like starcraft 2 lingo, or like APM(actions per minute), etc. This game involves building your skill, getting a pro mindset(focus), familiarize sc2 units & strategies, and speed as well.

Shokz guide will definitely speed up your sc2 learning curve, and will help you a very good, if not great sc2 player. So, you should certainly get Shokz Starcraft 2 Guide Now.

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