Team 1
254SpiderPig
moshthepitt
Tyikki

Team 2
ZonkDragonel
254PsykoFero
rizeo

Team 3
Pserjtaba
McVeigh
Tel3tubby

Team 4
Musa254
hybrid209
babashuge

Players should take the time before the tourney starts to gel as a team and to practice team work and playing in the Twisted Treeline map.

Additionally, it would be good to come up with team names!

More here: StarCraft 2 tutorials by dApollo

The event did not exactly go to schedule and was played from last Friday to Wednesday (yesterday) but did nonetheless produce some very hotly contested and exciting matches! We wish to congratulate everyone who took part and encourage those who did not to show up next time.

A word of thanks to our sponsors
We would like to take this opportunity to wholeheartedly thank your sponsors: The Naivasha Jaza Resort and DukaPress without whom this tournament would not have been possible. Please take a moment to thank our sponsors: write to them, tweet about them, etc to show your appreciation for their support towards StarCraft in Kenya.

The Winners

• First Place: PsykoFero – wins $10 and tickets for two for two days at the Naivasha Jaza Resort
• Second Place: mosh – wins $5 and tickets for two for two days at the Naivasha Jaza Resort
• Third Place: EldHawke – wins Gaming Mouse Mat and tickets for two for two days at the Naivasha Jaza Resort
• Fourth Place: Xelleo – wins original StarCraft 2 EU CD Key and tickets for two for two days at the Naivasha Jaza Resort
• Fifth Place: COMMA – wins Gaming Mouse Mat and tickets for two for two days at the Naivasha Jaza Resort

Thanks, once again, go out to all the competitors for their effort and skill! Replays and match reviews shall be coming soon!

What was your favourite match of the tournament?

As a new player in the Starcraft community you will get over run with information, build orders, statistics, cheeses and the horrible shouts of imbalance towards certain races. While there is a lot of good information available, for a beginner to start to make sense of all this information is near impossible. In this; the first chapter, of what will be a series of basic explanatory posts, I will try to break down the basics of the fundamentals required to make effective use of all the other information available online.

Starcraft is a very complex game, it requires strategy, understanding of basic game fundamentals, it requires psychology and good mechanics(mouse movement, hotkeys etc.) in order to succeed. By mastering one of the above a player can get a pretty high rank if he adapts his play style to play to his strong points. Mastering the required APM(action per minute) to be a top-tier Starcraft player takes years of practice, and is generally not something a coach can help with. On the other hand, a good coach will always be able to rationally explain how to interpret scouting information and how to maximize efficiency off 1 base, 2 base plays.

The fundamentals(each of these segments will be followed up by a more detailed post later on):

Gameplay:
The major issue for most of the players still fighting in the lower leagues is their obsession about the main picture frame of the game. The professional players spend less than 15% of their in-game time looking at the centre area. The below screen shot explain some most of the higher tier players move their eyes when playing, and it is a big help to incorporate into your own game. There are different systems, but the one explained underneath is most used.

Your eyes should follow the numbers below, constantly throughout the entire game. This is very difficult to implement. Do not be disheartened if you find yourself staring at a battle for too long, or needing to see the barracks to produce from them. Just remembering and trying to implement the instruction underneath will help a lot.

What to look at

1. Glance at mini map:
• Do I see any movement from my enemy
• Do you have enough map control
• Do you see any drops/harass incoming
2. Look at your resources
• What can I afford to build with my current minerals and gas
• Did my glance at the mini map indicate I need defensive units, offensive units or economy/infrastructure units
3. Production (cycle through hotkeys)
• Execute your production through hotkeys
• Make units based on the information obtained in step 1 and 2
4. Micro your units
5. You have now obtained information about the strategic situation(1), the economic situation(2), your infrastructure/production in the near future(3), so what is left now is to use that information and execute the appropriate steps(this is a slightly more complicated part of Starcraft and will be the thoroughly analysed in a later post.

Scouting:
Knowledge is power, and so also in Starcraft. And knowing what the opponent can do, and maybe even more importantly what your opponent can’t do, will give you an edge that you can take advantage of. You might have watched streams where the professional players scout and instantly can deduce which exact strategy the opponent is using. This happens because at the very top-tier of Starcraft the differences between players are very small and their builds needs to have as good mineral and gas timings as possible. However at anything below masters scouting is trickier.

As help for scouting in lower leagues you will get very far by doing a reverse scouting. This means that we don’t need to scout exactly what our opponent can be doing, but mentally removing the threats he cannot possibly do. As examples I can list

If a Protoss starts off by placing a pylon in his natural, this means that we can eliminate any sort of major aggression the first 7-8 minutes at least.

If a Zerg makes an early pool, but takes no gas, this means we can eliminate speedlings, baneling-bust or roaches for the beginning of the game.

If Terran goes gas before barracks, you can eliminate any very early marine aggression.

Try to scout at the exact same time every time you scout. The standard is after supply depot for Terran, after the 9-pylon for protoss and overlord or the 10th drone for zerg (based on map)

Scouting at the same time every match will greatly increase your awareness to deviations to the norm. Typically, he has far too many barracks, or he has far too few buildings. Both of which are vital information to stop an early all-inn and eliminate cheese.

Also: Your drone scout is only an indication of when you next scout should be sent, but we will come back to this in a dedicated segment on scouting later on.

Economy:
Under this subject I feel it’s important to split this up, as Protoss and Terran are pretty similar, where Zergs need to act slightly different.

As this is the initial basic post of this round of Starcraft lectures, I will only keep to the bare minimum of information. Hang along for the later articles if you wish to learn more.

Most bases have 8 mineral patches and 2 gasses. When the base is saturated you should have 3 workers per gas, and 2-3 workers per mineral patch. A fully saturated base is 3 workers per mineral field, but if you can, it’s more economical to expand and try to stay at 2 workers per mineral. Going from 2-3 workers should increase the mineral count by 50%, but because of the delay you get for having 3 workers per mineral, the change is far smaller. A base with 8 mineral patches will yield ~672 minerals/min with 16 workers, or ~816 minerals with 24 workers. Any extra workers beyond 3 per mineral field will not increase the income at all.

Until you hit Diamond league the main advice I can give to P and T is to constantly make workers. There shouldn’t ever be a time when your CC or Nexus does not produce workers. For Z early map control is very important. As a Z you only want to make attacking units when you have to. If you have good map control, vision, a ling outside their ramp and the xel’Naga towers, you should be fine to just making drones until you see the enemy moves out. Then see what army he has, and make the appropriate counter units.

Now, you don’t need to worry, I will not force you to start counting your workers on every base, since we know 16 is optimal on minerals, and 6 is optimal on gas, you simply need to box you workers with your mouse and look at the bottom on the screen. A good saturated base should have 2 full lines and 4 on the third line, like this (this only shows 20 workers, but that is because 2 workers are always inside a gas and won’t be counted):

Optimal saturation

But it still applies to all 3 races, never stop producing workers.

The next chapter in this series will look at Infrastructure and army composition. If you have any questions please feel free to send me a mail at Shiva[at]z33k.com and I will try to answer you all as soon as possible. I have also talked to Mosh about community practices for you guys, so let him know if you would be interested in this.

Shiva

First, the ….first round matches (obviously):

• mosh Vs EldHawke – mosh of course is the “forever second” in Kenyan StarCraft and thus he is expected to do well (but not actually win ). His opponent is an unknown quantity. The only thing we know about him is that he plays Protoss and was A StarCraft: Brood Wars (StarCraft 1) player. we do not know what to expect, really. Let us hope that the two players are as evenly matched as possible and that we subsequently get a riveting game of StarCraft.
• jampa_56 Vs rizeo – both these players are new to StarCraft 2 and so there is a high chance we might see a silly 50minute game (kidding!). Seriously speaking, we do hope to see an enjoyable match from two players new to StarCraft.
• COMMA Vs Raegiskain – Raegiskain was a past Kenyan champion and once qualified to represent Kenya in the WCG. His challenger is another unknown quantity (and is actually EldHawke’s brother) who was a pretty good player of StarCraft 1. Expect a tough and exciting match!
• Psyko Fero Vs xelleo – these two have of course faced off before in a previous Kenyan StarCraft competition where Psyko outplayed his opponent. For those who do not know, Psyko is the current reigning king of StarCraft in Kenya. There’s a good chance of this turning into a one-sided affair but we do hope that Xelleo will put up the fight of his life!
• noobmoja Vs chucknorris – first, a round of applause for noobmoja who is the only female player in this tournament (and the only Kenyan female StarCraft player we have ever even heard of). Needless to say, we’re rooting hard for noobmoja and we do hope she manages to defeat her opponent. These players are both new to the game and we hope to see a good albeit unusual game.

Other Stuff
There are no zerg players in this tournament. How sad.

Both mosh and Xelleo usually play as Zerg. Xelleo will be playing through a Starter Edition and so he cannot play as Zerg but mosh….seems to have changed to Terran. We do hope this helps him out with his “forever-second” problems.

The absence of Zerg means that there’s going to be a lot of PvP (Protoss Vs Protoss), PvT (Protoss Vs Terran) and TvT (Terran vs Terran). Let us take a look at these:

• PvP – The Protoss vs Protoss match-up is the most static match-up in all of Starcraft 2. There is very little variation in builds and most matches will go the same way simply because one build outshines the rest and a player cannot afford too much variation lest he shall lose.
• PvT – this is a very volatile matchup in which the Terran player usually can be more aggressive in the early game at which time the Protoss often has to be defensive relying on their ForceFields. However, out of all the match-ups, Terran players typically have the hardest time dealing with Protoss players, especially in the late game. This means that we can expect to see a great variety of extremely exciting games.
• TvT – in the current StarCraft 2 metagame, this match-up is one of the most well-developed strategically simply because there are so many Terran players. In matches of equal skill levels, the dominant Starcraft 2 Terran vs Terran strategy is to control the air. Terran ground units are too slow to exercise map control, so Vikings usually determine how the matches go. This match-up can produce some of the longest, most exciting games…as well as some of the longest, unbelievably dull and boring games. Let us hope our Kenyan Terrans can give us some good games!

Possible Hot Games
These are very exciting matches that we could see happen in Safari Cup #3. In no particular order:

1. EldHawke Vs COMMA – come on, who wouldn’t want to see brother Vs brother in glorious StarCraft battle?
2. RaegisKain Vs Xelleo – Xelleo has never really “broken” onto the scene despite being an extremely talented player. If he can take out the former champion of Kenya, he will definitely have proven a point!
3. RaegisKain Vs Psyko Fero – former champion Vs current champion. Psyko is also the one who dethroned RaegisKain. Time for some revenge, ama?
4. mosh Vs RaegisKain – “forever-second”mosh has been on the receiving end of PsykoFero’s dominance. He has a chance to hand out some pain to RaegisKain. RaegisKain, on the other hand, must prove that he can take out mosh if at all he is to ever regain his Kenyan crown.
5. Psyko Fero Vs mosh – Psyko will probably win this 2-0. Hehe. Unless mosh has something up his sleeve after his string of losses against Psyko. This is turning out to be THE StarCraft rivalry to watch in Kenya. We do hope that these two meet in what could be our own “el classico“.

Whatever happens, this will go down in history as one of the biggest StarCraft-fests in Kenyan history, so far.

Who are you rooting for? What do you expect? Who do you think will win?

As you well might know, The Naivasha Jaza Resort is one of the sponsors of the upcoming Safari Cup #3.

Well, we have good news. Jaza Resort have just confirmed that they shall be giving away complimentary tickets for two to stay at the resort for two nights. This will be valid from January 1 2012 to February 20, 2012.

Even better, the resort is giving away five tickets which shall be going to the top five players of the Safari Cup! The package to each of the five winners is worth Kshs 8,000/-

Yes, you have the chance to win yourself and your spouse/girlfriend/boyfriend a free trip to a beautiful tourist resort in Naivasha. All you have to do is play StarCraft!

About Jaza Resort
Jaza Naivasha Resort is a sanctuary of tranquility and conviviality that rejects the rigidity of modern life. Tucked away overlooking the magnificent Lake Naivasha and dormant, Mt Longonot, accommodating only Forty pampered guests at a time. Jaza Resort embraces a warm casual atmosphere within African Simplicity.

Kalongo on Reddit!

It is probably not a big deal, but we think it is. Thank you, Reddit.

We rose to a high of #2 on /r/starcraft:

Kalongo on Reddit!

Also, we got close to 4,000 visitors to the site in less than four hours.

You can find our Reddit post here: Announcing a KENYAN StarCraft tournament (Yes we love StarCraft in Kenya!).

The Safari Cup is the first of its kind, being the only StarCraft 2 tournament in Kenya. The participants are comprised of past and present Kenyan StarCraft champions who are eager to make the tournament exciting and entertaining.

This edition of the Safari Cup is also the first to have formal sponsors. The sponsors are DukaPress and Jaza Resort who are pioneers helping to grow the competitive gaming industry in Kenya.

Stay tuned to Kalongo.com for up to date information regarding the third edition of the Safari Cup.

About The Safari Cup
The Safari cup is a StarCraft 2 tournament organised by Kalongo.com. It is a fun, regularly-held tournament for Kenyan players (run by Kenyan players). The idea is to introduce, maintain and grow competitive play among Kenyan players.

About DukaPress
DukaPress is a simple and free WordPress e-commerce system. It is proudly Kenyan. With DukaPress you can quickly and easily set up a fully featured online shop which can be used to sell digital or physical goods to customers all over the world.

About Jaza Resort
Jaza Naivasha Resort is a sanctuary of tranquility and conviviality that rejects the rigidity of modern life. Tucked away overlooking the magnificent Lake Naivasha and dormant, Mt Longonot, accommodating only Forty pampered guests at a time. Jaza Resort embraces a warm casual atmosphere within African Simplicity.

About Kalongo.com
Kalongo.com is a website that aims to nurture and grow competitive gaming in Kenya. It is run by the very best of Kenyan gamers who want to see their unusual and exciting “e sport” grow in the country.

Hey everyone! Do you like Starcraft 2? Do you like being entertained? Do you like helping out sick children? Well then, I’ve got exactly what you need. Welcome to the second showing of The Rumble in the Bronze!

What the heck is the RitB? Basically, a bunch of talented guys from the Penny Arcade forums and I decided on a whim to hold a charity event with the proceeds going to the Penny Arcade Child’s Play charity. We somehow got a professional announcer and player, Geoff “iNcontrol” Robinson, to cast the event. The hook was that all the players in the event would be bronze league level. For those of you who don’t know, the Bronze League is the lowest level of Starcraft players.

The results were amazing! We ended up having several thousand people watch the stream and generated over $3,000. This year we are doing it again and got Geoff to cast once again. People really loved watching bad players go at it with Geoff making jokes at their expense. Personally I think we can reach $5,000 if everyone gets out there and really helps spread the word.

Learn more: The Rumble in the Bronze: Throwdown in Tinseltown!