This guide will explain basic opening build orders for Zerg, Terran, and Protoss, which are safe to use on multiple maps and against various opponents. These builds are designed to be simple to execute and difficult to overcome and, whilst not overly elaborate, they will provide you with a solid foundation that’ll help you become increasingly competitive. Once you feel yourself reaching a ‘high level of play’, you can adapt these builds according to your own thoughts and the more aggressive tactics you’re being confronted with at the upper level.

These builds are based on three core foundations:

• Safety
• Solidness
• Economy

A ‘safe’ build is designed to deter and deflect any early aggression your opponent throws at you. The build needs to be ‘solid’ because you don’t want it to contain any flaws that your opponent can exploit. At the same time we don’t want ‘safe’ and ‘solid’ to hurt your ‘economy’, you still want to saturate your mineral line and expand as quickly as possible to keep your income high.

Zerg

This Zerg build order revolves around getting the early Zergling speed upgrade. It’ll enable you to deflect incoming attacks and allow you to establish a second hatchery at your natural expansion. You’ll want to hatch as many drones as possible, but at these key supply counts you’ll want to build the following:

9 Overlord
14 Extractor
14 Spawning pool
15 Overlord
16 Queen
16 2 sets of zerglings
16 Speed upgrade
20 Expansion



Once your Zerglings burst into life, you’ll want to use them to seize map control (primarily by taking the Xel Naga towers). Be sure to leave a Zergling outside your opponents’ base and you’ll be able tell when he is looking to get aggressive. By obtaining this level of map control you’ll be able to build drones freely and, when you do spot an incoming attack, you can quickly switch to Zerglings/Roaches (defensive Spine Crawlers too if required). As you grow stronger, it is vital as a Zerg player to maintain your scouting. If you know what is coming your way, you’ll have the time to manoeuvre into the ideal position to overrun your opponent.

Terran

This Terran opening requires you to wall a ramp off and get three early barracks to produce units and secure vital upgrades. Follow this with a small pressure push, whilst seizing your natural expansion.

9 Supply depot
12 Barracks
13 Refinery
15 Supply depot
15 Orbital Command
16 Marine into Tech lab
19 Stim
20 Barracks
20 Barracks
28 2nd Tech lab (for combat shields)
33 Combat Shields
43 Concussive Shells



Once you have completed this list of upgrades, move down and take your natural expansion. You can use a scan from the Orbital Command to scout your opponents’ army and potentially push with your marine/marauder army. If you decide not to push, because you have spotted an even more formidable force, you can use your upgrades in a defensive manner and assume that you must have a superior economy. If need be, definitely add bunkers to your defence and use Stim from the inside to help survive any onslaught. If your economy remains intact, there should come a point where you can burst out and take the initiative.

Protoss

With this build you are going to go for one Gateway, into a fast Robotics Facility, then send an Observer to scout your opponent, whilst adding an Immortal and two more Gateways, before going for your expansion. This provides you with enough cover to defend against any attack, discover your opponents’ intentions, and pick the best time to secure your natural expansion.

9 Pylon
12 Gateway
14 Assimilator
16 Pylon
18 Cybernetics Core
18 2nd Assimilator
22 Stalker
24 Warp Gate Research
24 Robotics Facility
28 Sentry
29 Gateway
29 Gateway
30 Observer
37 Immortal



Once the Observer scouts your opponents’ base you have two options. Based on what you have seen you can either wait within your base and increase your unit count and fend off any aggressive attack, or you can move down the ramp and build your expansion and defend further forwards. Once you secure and saturate your natural expansion, you’ll have a solid unit count and you should be looking to control the centre of the map (helps with decision making). If you performed this build correctly, you should be in a great position to dictate the course of the game.

Conclusion

You now have a solid build for each race, which gives you the upper hand against many players on Battlenet. You might want to write down some of those key supply numbers, so you can glance at them whilst in a game. Precision execution gets increasingly important as your opponents get tougher. Everything is now up to you! Enjoy it, I know you will!