OpenRA

It continually surprises me how all the top players in RA have different strengths and weaknesses, and yet remain competitive. You'd think we'd have players who are just good at everything, but that's not necessarily the case. Just for fun I thought I'd go over some of them, feel free to add your own.

Lorrydriver
++Strong Build Orders
+Good Micro
+Good Macro

Lorrydriver is the closest we got to a powerful all rounder. What puts him on top is his map specific build orders, which put him ahead from start to finish.

Barf
+++Excellent Macro
+Good Build Orders

-Weak Micro

If FiveAces were a dagger, Barf would be the sledgehammer. Barf excels through his extremely strong early game macro, which can outright win him the game or put him in a strong lead moving into mid game. While his micro isn't bad, he can struggle late game where micro becomes more important than macro.

Gatekeeper
++Strong Aggressive Openers
+Good Micro
+Good Harassment
+Innovative Build Orders

--Floatkeeper

Gatekeeper is adept at crafting off meta build orders, the best of which are his aggressive openers. Complimented with his good micro and harassment, he often punishes greedy opponents who expect more safe openers. Unfortunately, the intense micro involved in harassment often leads to him forgetting to macro, which can lead to stinging defeats after fantastic openers.

Smitty
+Cool Under Pressure
+Good Micro
+Good Macro

Another all rounder, Smitty is quite capable of holding his own at any point of the game. Smitty is particularly strong in scrappy games, where things do not quite go as planned.

FiveAces
+++Air General
+Innovative Build Orders
+Good Defense

--Fragile Openers
-Weak Macro


Fiveaces can micro a unit to kill 5x its worth, but he'll only have two of them. A player known to go for risky tech based openers, you do not want to face him in a late game scenario.

Orb
++Strong Micro
+Innovative Build Orders
+Good Defense

-Weak Openers
-Weak Macro

If FiveAces was the dagger, Orb would be the short sword. A relatively new member of the competitive scene, Orb has been able to shove his way into the scene by pioneering and refining off meta builds. A strong late game player, his builds often leave him vulnerable early game.


Happy
++Happybox
+Good Aggression

-Weak Micro

Fond of the pillbox and arty, Happy is able to strike deep into enemy territory due to his well defended bases.

Omnom
+++Master of the Base

-Weak Macro

A terror but one season ago, recent balance changes have made his play style weaker, but still terrifying. Omnom relies on quickly cornering his opponent by expanding across the entire map, and then choking him with base defenses.

Doomsday
++All Ins

-Weak Macro
-Weak Micro

King of upsets, Doomsday has managed to surprise the community two seasons in a row by taking matches off much stronger opponents. Never let your guard down against Doomsday.

Kuba
+++ kubaserv

Catgirls420
+++ Aggression
++ Beautiful human being
+ Defender of the community
+ Gives back to the community with extensive balance testing

- There are no negatives, what are you dumb?

Okay, here's what I think about our top players.

Lorrydriver

+++++ There's always another army
+++ best overall balanced strategy
+++ dictates games with his multi tasking and split aggression
+++ pace
++ solid macro
++versatile

--- doesn't spam enough defensive structures (when nothings happening)
-- always wants to be in control of the game and therefore tends to attack more than he should

The reigning RAGL-Champion didn't lose a RA tournament or league he participated in. He seems to be most balanced and versatile player at the moment. He can choose from a number of different strategies and tactics and he isn't afraid to occasionally throw in a cheese strategy to catch his opponent off guard.

Barf
+++ Stomper
+++ Barfranger...
++Solid macro
+Good T2 (Hinds,Yaks etc.)
+Very few silly mistakes
+Good Build Order variations

-- stubbornness when trying to finish off weaker turtle players
- T3 play is not as strong as the rest of his game

Barf doesn't do many mistakes and changes his style and build orders depending on who he's up against. I'd say he's probably the most solid player out there.

OMnom
+++ pace
+++ best micro
+++ hyper aggression
++solid macro

--- impatient
--hyper aggression
--stubbornness

OMnom always dictates the pace of the game and you'll find yourself playing a passive game against him just because he doesn't allow you to do anything else. His ability to force mistakes is phenomenal. However, his best strengths are also his weaknesses. He overcommits, doesn't counter your tech, or just overmacros from time to time.

Happy
+++ best double ref player
++ early game aggression
++ map presence and map control
++ solid macro
+good timing in build orders and attacks

--- thrower of bo5s
-- aggression decreases significantly as the game gets longer
-emotional

Happy's early game is probably one of the scariest to play against and if he gets ahead early you don't stand much chance. However, in even mid-late games, he sometimes becomes too passive and doesn't take enough risks anymore.


kazu.
+++ kazu school
++ patience
++ very good late game
++ solid macro and micro

-- passiveness
-patience

Every new player who wants to be in the top10 has to lose at least 100 games in a row against kazu in order to become good. Myself, OMnom and Happy are only a few examples.
kazu. is a very smart player and once he's ahead it's almost impossible to come back against him. When kazu is behind he'll rather try and force a stalemate game than going for an allin attackmove. Even if that would be his only chance of winning.

Smitty
+++++ best eco re-builder (don't ever try sniping his ore trucks, it's fucking pointless)
+++ sick late game
++ different small build order and strategy changes according to the map
++ solid macro

Neutral
Heavily reliant on momentum, long winning streaks, long losing streaks.

----- Lorrydriver in competitive matches
--- too predictable
-- talking himself down


Smitty's A game is incredibly solid, if you want to win against that Smitty you better bring everything you got and more. Smitty's C game is not very special. There's no Smitty B game. Eventhough he's probably joking most of the times when talking about how bad he is at this game, it might actually pull him down a little bit from time to time. Especially when early games don't go his way.

.1
+++ never lost a game without an external reason
++ solid defense
++ very good overall strategy
+good macro

-passiveness
-once behind, always behind

.1 also known as The Slayer of Barf should definitely count to the top 10. He's pretty solid overall and can take games off of everybody.

WhoCares
+++ 4 Minute Demo truck

--- on 2 harvesters

'nuff said

Orb and Gatekeeper
I agree with most of what you said about yourself and Gatekeeper.

I beat .1 yesterday on Baphomet

He did GG saying he had to take a phone call though so accurate description

Happy wrote: ↑Catgirls420
+++ Aggression
++ Beautiful human being
+ Defender of the community
+ Gives back to the community with extensive balance testing

- There are no negatives, what are you dumb?

Hehehe Happy is joking nice 1 ;D

Lorrydriver wrote: ↑
.1
+++ never lost a game without an external reason

haha

Lorrydriver wrote: ↑ WhoCares
+++ 4 Minute Demo truck

--- on 2 harvesters

Lies !

WhoCares
+++ SEVEN Minute Demo truck

--- build order and macro stop for no reason when the first demo truck exits the wf

Would like to take your critical analyses on board too.

I think for me:

++ Macro economy
+ Turtle defence; hard to break through
+ Late game attrition
+ Unit retreats

----- Doesn't gg until clearly lost all cheese potential
--- Fears attacking expansions
-- Lack of aggression
- Fragile openers
- Lack of finishing blows, resulting in window of opportunity for comebacks

War of attrition over striking blows, schedule matches in your calendar for half an hour.