Blizzard reccomends 30 - 60 hours before playing 1v1.

[GRUNT]

While it's true that newbies (especially people new to the RTS genre) shouldn't dive-in head first into multiplayer 1 vs 1, 30-60 hours sounds like a LOT of time! I don't think it needs to be that long, but then again, I've played RTS games all my life. I'm probably a little out of touch with how long it would take someone new to learn :P.

[Hamshank]

You're not going to be able to effectively explore the game by jumping into 1v1. From personal experience I clung to the first really effective strategy I could find and had many unused units even after 2 months of the beta release. While that got me a ton of wins I wasn't able to fully enjoy the game. The ranking system definitely discourages exploration, so it would be nice to have an non-ranked league.

[TwoTimer]

30-60 hours seems about right for BW too, even though the campaign and ai didnt help. All the campaign did was teach you the units and on occasion a spell or two. multiplayer as a whole was just... different.

[Maul]

As long as there are lots of people playing, people who have no idea can play other people who have no idea and still have fun.

This is very true, but I find it somewhat stupid with all the discussion about "will the leagues scare newbies away." Everyone is acting like release will be exactly the same as the beta. If I compare it directly to BW when the ladder was still running, yes, I could play ladder games and get my fancy icon, but I was never forced too. I could still play melee (before TvB - god that was better than trying to remember who was on whose team in 3v3 or 4v4 PUGs,) UMS, custom 1v1s or single player or whatever. Newbies will have every opportunity they had in BW and more.

If they suck at 1v1, yes, there will be others that suck as bad as them and they will enjoy those games. But I do agree with how many hours they need to spend playing the game beforehand but ONLY to get the most excitement out of the one on one experience. And of course they will never have to make that time investment to enjoy the game to their best efforts because playing 1v1 competitively may never be their cup of tea in the first place. There is just so much to do.

[KadajSouba]

I dont know if somebody noticed but he said 60 hours.... 6O FUCKIN HOURS??? ARE YOU FUCKIN KIDDIN ME????? I dont think that he was sober when he said that.

A Final Fantasy game lasts 60 hours. I know the comparison is maybe a lil bit out of place, but in here you only have to contol 3 races... Or one if you want to be good at something. And he says you have to play for 60 hours BEFORE starting to fight another guy????? Is he nuts?????

5. 2nd Zerg Campaign in BW = Probably the best refined incline of difficulty but also probably one that comes a little too late in training the player.

(Where do you think the casual player started using cheats?)

Mea Culpa...

[Hammy]

Game designers always overestimate the game difficulty so much... as always, everyone'll just plow through the campaign.

[SoFool]

Browder is a noob, players who want to play 1v1 seriously SHOULD play 1v1 from day 1 no matter how sucky they are so that they can gain exp along their training (like how to stop bunker rush).

[Norfindel]

Should i read that as "the matchmaking system works like shit", or "it won't be enough low-skilled players in MP to make it work"? By the way, thanks for encouraging players of all skill levels to try MP

[GnaReffotsirk]

Yeah, but he said 30 too. 30 hours was about as good as it gets for a BW player to get the full picture of SC2.

Besides, I guess he was talking to non-RTS gamers in that thing. I mean, I got a bad nose bleed incident watching those review guys play the beta.

Thank God Demo and Gifted came to the rescue.

[Pick]

Yeah, but he said 30 too. 30 hours was about as good as it gets for a BW player to get the full picture of SC2.

Besides, I guess he was talking to non-RTS gamers in that thing. I mean, I got a bad nose bleed incident watching those review guys play the beta.

Thank God Demo and Gifted came to the rescue.

Haha... I remember the first stream I watched, it took two guys about five minutes to figure out that they had to build another supply depot before building more units.

Those are the people that need 30+ hours before playing the copper league.