"This better be good..."

When it comes to playing 1v1 there is one important question that every aspiring gamer must answer; "which race shall I play?"

In other words will I conquer the galaxy with Terran, bend the light with Protoss, harness the swarm of Zerg or play all 3?

In Starcraft 2 this is a very important question to answer. There may only be 3 races but they do not play the same. You can argue that maybe two of them are kind of the same, but that is only because the third race is so completely different. There are similarities for the sake of balance, mainly that they:

• have the same UI and controls,
  
• use gatherer units to get minerals,
  
• build military units to attack with,
  
• upgrade armor and weapons
  
• use the same resources: supply, minerals and vespine gas.

Looking at that list you may think that if you master one race you can master them all. This is simply not true. The thing about Starcraft 2 is it has depth, there are so many potential strategies and tactics that each race can use and when you get to the higher levels the depth only increases. Something as simple as getting a warp gate at 10 supply instead of 12 can change the whole way you play that race! Timings become all important and you need to know exactly when you can do something and more importantly, when you should do something.

Its not enough to simply say I'm going to make roaches this game. You need to know when are you going to take a gas. If you should expand before or after getting a pool. Should you go pure roach or start of with lings? Do you forgo ling speed in favor of earlier roaches. And these are just the possibilities me as a noob can think of.

It is possible to learn everything about all the races and play random, but it is no easy task and if you can do it then you have my respect. But as Day9 says, if you can master 1 strategy then you are a master level player if you are OK with all the races and all strategies then you are only an OK player. Depth beats breadth in Starcraft 2. I doubt I can get the depth needed to be a good player by playing all 3 races.

So with that in mind I will pick one race to play. But we are back to that all important question, which one?

I have played all 3 races a lot in 4v4 so I have a good place to start in picking which race I should learn. With Terran I do well with MMM (Marine, Marauder, Medivac) massing. Stim packs and siege tanks are powerful and walling in saves me from many a rush.

With Protoss I love that I can warp in units quickly wherever I want, their units are strong and the Protoss death ball has got to be the best with colossi who have great range, attack power and mobility. Not to mention I can use chrono boost to help speed up whatever tech or units I want. Oh and how could I forget Dark Templar's! Those things kick ass! What can be more annoying then a unit that one hit kills workers and is invisible to boot. Protoss truly have a lot going for them.

Sounds like the choice is obvious then and it would be if it were not for the Zerg. The Zerg play a little differently from the other two. Unlike Protoss or Terran all their units come from the same place and cost lava and every time you build something you have to sacrifice a drone to do so. In a lot of situations with Zerg you either make an army or build your economy. Unlike the other two races you can't really do both. It may sound like they are at a big disadvantage there, but they aren't called the swarm for nothing. Out of all three the Zerg have the ability to mass lots of units very quickly and keep massing. When a Zerg army dies, you just build another one, provided you have the minerals of course.

This I like. I like a big horde of fast moving zerglings swarming over my enemies and over whelming them. I like that the Zerg look and feel different from the other two races, that they are truly Alien. I love exploding bannelings all over marines and watching them melt, burrowing with infestors and popping up to spew acid all over my enemies. Most of all the ability Zerg has to take control of the map with fast moving units and creep spread fits my play style well. I am not good sitting back and waiting for the other guy to make his move. I have to be aggressive and control how the game plays out, not wall up and react to my opponents moves. Mostly though, I just have fun playing as Zerg.

So there it is. After a lot of thought I have gone with my gut instinct and will play the race I enjoy the most. Zerg.

All I can do now is get cracking on learning Zerg vs X strats and hope I have made the right decision. To echo the sentiments of the Marine "This better be good..."