Starcraft AI blog

Here’s what I found out about Antiga’s donated openings. (Thanks again to Iruian, by the way.) This post is only about the openings themselves. Also donated are weights, how often to play each opening in each matchup, which I’ll consider separately. My plan is to distribute the donated file along with Steamhammer’s source, so that whoever wants to can easily borrow the openings and weights. The openings are good, so I’ll also put most of them directly into Steamhammer’s regular configuration; Randomhammer will play them when it rolls protoss.

Going by names, Antiga’s openings are a superset of Steamhammer’s. But 3 of the openings with the same names are different, so it’s a little confusing.

identical openings

• 1ZealotCore
• DTRush
• DTDrop
• CorsairDT (weak because Steamhammer sucks with corsairs)
• 12Nexus
• 13Nexus

openings new in Antiga

These are good openings, so at the moment I’m thinking I’ll throw them into Steamhammer’s config for active use. The weights are a separate question.

• 9-10Gate
• NoZealotCore
• 10-15GateGoon
• 2ZealotCore
• 2GatewayGoonExpo
• Nexusfirst5zealotExpo

openings that are shared but different

I tested the shared openings by playing them against each other head-to-head. I’ll call it Steamhammer versus Antiga, though both sides were running identical Steamhammer code. I didn’t pay attention to the results of the games, which varied depending on how battles happened to come out. I paid attention to macro: Who had more income, who produced units more efficiently, who was able to expand sooner.

• 9-9 gate The 2 openings proceeded in lockstep until Antiga went out of book. Then Steamhammer’s beautifully optimized UAlbertaBot zealot rush quickly pulled ahead. It evened out somewhat after Steamhammer also went out of book, but not entirely.

• 10-12 gate Steamhammer’s 10-12 gate opening is not as highly optimized. Again the openings were identical until Antiga went out of book. Steamhammer pulled ahead, but not dangerously. I don’t see any big difference in strength between the openings, only a small advantage to Steamhammer’s existing opening.

• ForgeExpand The openings are the same, except that Antiga adds a third photon cannon at the end of the opening. It barely delays the early zealots and dragoons, so I judge it an improvement: Safer and practically as aggressive. I will switch Steamhammer’s opening to this version.