How to beat the noobs??

[Corgon]

Alright, so I used to be top silver rank, but after a long hiatus I have been dropped town to 72nd. I am being forced to play against bronze and low level silver. The problem is, I cannot seem to get past their silly rushes, proxies, and freakin giant mass of cannons around their base. I used to have the skills to beat them with my noob tactics a while back, but I have grown to love the 9 pylon 2 gate build, even the invincible zealot build. But still this is no match for noobish ways. Please, can someone tell me how to counter all this stuff?

[ooZer0]

Alright, so I used to be top silver rank, but after a long hiatus I have been dropped town to 72nd. I am being forced to play against bronze and low level silver. The problem is, I cannot seem to get past their silly rushes, proxies, and freakin giant mass of cannons around their base. I used to have the skills to beat them with my noob tactics a while back, but I have grown to love the 9 pylon 2 gate build, even the invincible zealot build. But still this is no match for noobish ways. Please, can someone tell me how to counter all this stuff?

Most of that is solved by good early game awareness and scouting.

If your on Scrap Station, or any other small-ish, walking distance between mains, sending the probe that builds your first pylon out to scout what he is doing is a good idea. Just make sure that you know what you are looking for when you get there, otherwise even seeing into his base wont help you. Depending on the match up, things you need to look for are:

Where is his 1st or 2nd pylon? (If you can't find the pylon in his base, you might be a good idea to take a peek at the dark corners of your base, or on the cliffs just below your main)

How many workers does he have mining? (If a zerg player only has 6 or 7 drones by the time your early scout hits his base... you can probably guess whats up, let alone seeing the nearly done spawning pool)

What is he mining? (If hes got a geyser either nearly complete, or with workers in it by the time the early scout gets there, expect a teching build, or some early push that requires a lot of gas)

Whats his tech? (Is he going 2 gate? Or 1 gate cyber? Is it a fast 1 gate-cyber-robo? Was his first building a forge?)

Scouting is vital in the early-mid game. In the mid-late game you can usually predict what your opponent is doing simply by what they have been throwing at you all game long. However, since the early game sets up everything else, knowing what he is doing at all points before hitting tier 2, or even @ tier 2, will greatly help against everything. Fast rushes and proxies are easily countered by appropriate scouting. Its the surprise factor that these strategies rely on to force wins.

The 2n'd most vital trait you have to remember to counter these things, is to just stay cool. Is that 6 pool knocking on your door as your first zealot is 1/2-3/4 done? Just run your probes around your base until its done, then lead with the zealot and use the probes to swing the odds. Is he not chasing the probes but going after the pylon? Use your probes to keep it from getting surrounded. I can guarantee that if 6 lings are getting attacked by 15 probes, they wont just mindlessly whack at a pylon. They will either run, or fight back. If they fight back, depending on the positioning (aka they can't all attack your probes at once) kill em, or kite some more. Either way, time is the crucial factor. The longer the game goes on, the less likely the cheese/rush is going to work. So stay cool, don't freak out because he isn't doing something "normal" and make good decisions.

Edit: And if he is mass turtling with cannons or lots of tanks/bunkers or spine crawlers... he is forfeiting map control to you. Take an expo or two and crush him later. Really what is he going to do? If you are facing a turtling terran and you are watching his front door, what are the things that can kill you when he is one basing? Cloaked banshees or mass drop. For zerg, it would likely nydus worms or mutalisk. Protoss would be DT's or some hard void ray play. When your opponent turtles, there is very little they actually can do to you. So based upon your early scouting, you can eliminate what he wouldn't be able to do and thus be able to predict what he will do with greater accuracy. If you have map control for a long period of time, you basically win. You will have more production and be able to win in the long run. Even if he does a big doom push against you (doubt somebody could actually make a doom push off of 1 or 2 bases anyway...), so what if you sac one expo? You have two more! Just don't take unnecessary losses and beat him back with overwhelming numbers and tech. I personally grin whenever I see a terran rush tank tech and sit on two bases. Turtling is never dangerous, you don't even need units to break it, just take expos until you feel comfortable to poke at him.

[Corgon]

Awesome, thanks so much. This was really helpful. I shall try this out today.

[evillesh]

proper scouting is the key.

And if terran is turtling, just go mass void rays with flux veins, they're just imba even after patch

[SaZun]

I agree in voids still being IMBA. I've been mixing 2-4 in with a pair of collosai and gateway units. just have them engage after your warpgate units do and its amazing the havoc they wreak.

[Gradius]

What ooZer0 said is basically spot-on. Couple other points:

If you're a Protoss player you're lucky because you have a really good turtle-breaking unit: the Colossus. They outrange photon cannons, spine crawlers, and bunkers. When someone is turtling I usually expand and tech to Colossi asap. What you do is you park your army right out of range and hit hold-position while using a separate control group of Colossi to attack.

On Steppes of War you have to do a specific forge-first build to stop 6-pool. Even 10-gating doesn't get the zealot out fast enough on that map. Never forget to look inside your base as well for bunkers or cannons, especially on Steppes.

Another good tip is to have a control group of 3-4 probes that you use for attacking Zerglings or proxy-buildings.

[Dalarsco]

There is no one way to beat a turtle. The way to do it is to get map control. After that you have 4 expansions you can use any build you want. For instance, if I'm playing Terran and my opponent turtles I always do air, because I enjoy humming "Ride of the Valkyries" while Banshees, Vikings, a pair of Ravens, and possibly a few BCs just smoothly wipe out my opponent's base.