Plateau or ceiling? Can't move up Master ranks any farther!

[jaxxinjr]

Alvendor et all,

Thanks for sharing some of your time to review my replay and comments. I took the advice to read viva fringe's Guide to outwitter math, which I have not seen before and found extremely helpful. In my play I've had a sense that I am missing some key points about the balance of power and wits, but couldn't put my finger on them exactly. So that guide makes a number of these matters much more clear.

In light of the guide, I would critique my play in the posted replay as follows:

1. In general (in all matches), I undervalue the power of wits and the import of holding wit spaces. Many times I will leave a wit space in the hands of the opponent for a couple of turns or so, thinking that I could better use my current wits in an ongoing strike operation or some other strategy. Over a few turns this can become a dangerous advantage to the opponent.

2. In this game specifically I saw in an early turn that he spent most of his wits on thorns. I am still learning how to play against bramble, but at that point I thought he would be underpowered due to spending six or eight wits on Thorns. So I attempted a lightning strike, but as viva fringes guide makes clear I chose a bad path, straight at the heart of his spawn spots and defense. He was able to fend me off and kill a few key units while spawning even more units. I had attacked on a whim and the lack of coherent strategy carried on the rest of the game. I still ALMOST managed to squeak the win, but probably wouldn't have deserved it...

3. In general again, I probably don't keep aware of my opponents "outwitters math" as closely as needed. In this match, once he had such an advantage my only hope would be to spawn some serious units as fast as possible and hope he makes some mistakes. Because I wasn't following his math closely, I was somewhat nonchalant in spawning runners and trying little nuisance runs and other piecemeal tactics here and there.


Please, any rebuttals, further critiques, further reading recommendations greatly appreciated! Any tips on devising a high level strategy? and then adapting it in play?

Thanks again!