"Acceleration" is the SC2 engine simulating a unit's momentum, and results in units slowing down before coming to a stop. But as with most things in Starcraft, you can override standard unit behaviour with manual real-time inputs, generally referred as "micro" (as opposed to "macro"; which is the broader management of economic/ tech progression). Speed mining is done by clicking right next to a mineral patch with an individual worker, then rapidly clicking the patch proper. If done right, the worker will approach the mineral at full speed all the way, instead of slowing down before stopping to mine like usual. Do this with two workers at the same time and it results in a tiny increase in income (measured as minerals mined per unit of time). And again, this being Starcraft, small optimizations quickly compound into clearly noticeable advantages, as long as they remain "realistic" to accomplish in a real match. You can manually pull this off with a pair of workers on a single mineral patch, if you are good enough, but there are evidently lots of other, more useful stuff to do with your limited human multitasking. However, bots can leverage their computational skills by reliably pulling of this kind of unrealistic, "theoretical" optimizations. Fun fact: The worker counter is meant for optimal-enough, unattended mining. That's why bots mine an 8-patch mineral line with way less than 16 workers.
"Acceleration" is the SC2 engine simulating a unit's momentum, and results in units slowing down before coming to a stop.
But as with most things in Starcraft, you can override standard unit behaviour with manual real-time inputs, generally referred as "micro" (as opposed to "macro"; which is the broader management of economic/ tech progression).
Speed mining is done by clicking right next to a mineral patch with an individual worker, then rapidly clicking the patch proper. If done right, the worker will approach the mineral at full speed all the way, instead of slowing down before stopping to mine like usual. Do this with two workers at the same time and it results in a tiny increase in income (measured as minerals mined per unit of time).
And again, this being Starcraft, small optimizations quickly compound into clearly noticeable advantages, as long as they remain "realistic" to accomplish in a real match.
You can manually pull this off with a pair of workers on a single mineral patch, if you are good enough, but there are evidently lots of other, more useful stuff to do with your limited human multitasking. However, bots can leverage their computational skills by reliably pulling of this kind of unrealistic, "theoretical" optimizations.
Fun fact:
The worker counter is meant for optimal-enough, unattended mining. That's why bots mine an 8-patch mineral line with way less than 16 workers.
Really impressive by Dominion Dog, love the run by defense that it was maintaining for the whole game
Be aware violance to small zerglings.
Impressive