I still don't see how this makes for a fun game. It is basically you win or lose one shot kill type of thing. No real battle to see who is a better tactician/strategist, no real push to make it feel like the game can go either way throughout the game. This just maybe how I feel about it personally see I'm not a big fan of putting everything into "one final swing" type of play.

This is why I like Red Alert 3 better.

It has its own problems though...

the solution seems simple enough, non ranked play.

That is, have the ladder for competitive PvP players, and non ranked play for those who would like to finish a game rather then lose / "win" (via opponent quitting) in 5 minutes.

True. If you and a friend agreed to build for 20 minutes before attacking, the same scenario would happen, although maybe you wouldn't feel the frustration that Brad describes when he says he "can’t just get to play the actual game". The slope is still there, and every lost battle ensures that you're less able to fight the next, until you eventually decide to resign. In some games perhaps a cunning strategy can turn the tables around, but at high level play that is very uncommon.

I saw this coming eventually

The OP is a little overblown. Im a platinum player and have never seen anyone quit out if there initial rush fails.  

YOu might encounter cheese every 1 in 5 games. Occasionally there is a try hard cannon rush but if you scout the 2 or three places and hv good building placement its easily stoppable. Probes can attack too!!!

The frustrating thing about the lower levels is that majority of the time ppl use the same build. Terran it 3 rax MMM 1 base all in. Zerg it fast Roach off 1 base. when you learn to deal with these things you get easy wins rise up the ladder and then start playing the epic 3-4-5 base games that go back and forth and require constant unit composition cahnges and a battle for upgrades. Fighting or watchtower control and battleing it out for specific areas on the map just to gain a small advantage not to actually win the game then and there but to give you the best oppotunity too.

For me, being a protoss player. I have several solid openings that are designed to hold off that INITIAL all in rush. Zerg - 3 gate, with 1 zealot, multiple sentry and mass stalker. This allows you to FF the ramp and hold off roaches with stalkers....NOTE: I only do that specific build if i scout a spawing pool and no expo. Rarely are you able to see the Roach warren start but then if the rush dosnt come expand. Into 6 gate pressure with mass sentry to split there army.

Against terran. 1 gate, robo, FE. Or 1 Gate robo into 3 gate robo. Observer is key to see whats coming.

Cheese is stopable and very satisfying when you do. It took me a while to relise that at ealry levels the best way to avoid the cheese is to chees yourself......then when your in high gold league. YOu can play a "normal" game which is very enjoyable.

At the lower levels, a 3 void ray rush against zerg works 95% of the time. And if it dosnt it induces so much defence that your ground army can stomp them. I have never cannon rushed.....thats no fun, but 4 gateing & void ray rush  are the extend of my "Cheese" and they are not really all in plays, as you can transition out of it.

Macro and build order are very important to prevent it as well, scouting is essential, but if you miss it it dosnt mean complete death. Protoss have sentrys to hold the ramp, i suggest you use them to get past that initial crap.

I know at times its frustrating but stick it out. Scout, adapt, and when you get into upper gold the games are very enjoyable. Youll still get cheesed occasionally but it not at the insane levels of the lower leagues. And then the reward for winning is the feeling you get when you have just outwitted your opponent with good macro and a solid unit composition.

The rewards are there, just stick it out and when you get a game where every mineral on the map is mined out and there is one final battle that you win by having one stalker and a Dark tempar left over. Its a very gratifying feeling, 45minutes well spent and a replay youll watch again and again.

Work on it. Love it enjoy it and the game will love you back. Yes some ppl a sad all in losers. Rise above it and enjoy the potential every game bring. Oh, and dont be afraid to bad mouth the CHEESING FKER after you win. Even more gratifying hearing them cry and try justify that it wasnt an all in build. lmfao.

Enjoy, and be sure to smile

Well, Battle.net is a system that encourages that kind of behavior. The only thing that affects your ranking is a win or a loss. Sure enough, people will chase rankings the same way they chase shiny armor in World of Warcraft.

To be fair, I haven't seen all-in strategies being employed very often in high level tournament play (although I don't follow the game too closely, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). These players have the skill to counter any early rush if they see it coming (and they usually do, since they scout very well), making those strategies too high risk to employ at this level of play.

Personally, as someone who only plays casually these days, I prefer the gameplay of something like Company of Heroes (victory points, the way resources work and low unit count).

If it is possible for a gamer to derive fun from the game itself and not from winning then I would argue that the game is poorly designed. In fact, I would question whether the player is even playing a game and not simply toying with a map editor. A well designed game motivates the player and makes them want to win in a meaningful way.

Why do you think Tetris, arguably the greatest game of all time, was so popular? Was it because people simply liked playing with shapes and still had fun even when they lost? No. It was because Tetris, like all great games, motivated the player to place the shapes in the right way and ultimately "win" the game (get a new high score). In some ways Tetris is a lot like Starcraft. If the OP were playing Tetris and not Starcraft, I would image he would say:

"I don't like Tetris anymore. In my last five Tetris games I kept getting three of those z-shaped figures in a row. I want to enjoy the game by getting shapes that nicely fit into the holes I make. The only choice I have is to figure out how to make holes that fit the z-shape. But when I do that I sometimes get three square block figures in a row and now my z-shape strategy doesn't work! I hate having to keep up and create new strategies when I get the same shape multiple times in a row! Realistically the only thing Mr. Pajitnov can do is not allow the game to release the same shapes multiple times in a row. That way I can finally enjoy the game and not worry about winning!"

No actually I think it is the game.  Blizzard has a history of making games that have strategy tailored to people with ADHD.... 

Every since Warcraft 2, in 1995 anyway.

Since that time I can't think of a single strategy game they had release that didn't have some form of Rush tactic.... and it also seems that as the designs became more modern the effectivness of "Rushing" increased.

I think that their games` designs encourage that sort of play.

Nothing wrong with that, I am just not in thier marketing "target group", and don't buy thier games (at least not since Warcraft 3).

I think you are one of those win/lose players then. I lose games all the time and still enjoy them. I don't have to win a game to like a game. Hell I might not even become good at a game but still play it. It's about fun, not winning and losing for some of us. There is nothing poorly designed about a game that people enjoy whether they lose or win. I think you completely missed point on this one.

It's a problem with all online games, though worse with RTS'.  You have a small group of people who want to play, and you have a much larger group of people who just want +1 win as fast as possible.  Too many fun games have been reduced to shit by a player base that use 5 minute win cheese tactics, every day, every game.  The age of a game doesn't seem to matter here.  Regardless of how old the game and how small the playerbase, you STILL seem to run into more people who just want to win ASAP.

The only solution is to play with friends, or play in unranked games where you are more likely to find people who actually want to play.  I can't even remember the last time I played a game of 1v1 ranked.  In 2v2 and 3v3 with friends you tend to at least be guaranteed a 15-20 minute game.

I don't really understand any of it.  If there's a cash prize for being in the top 3, then sure.  Do what it takes to win if you're aiming for that.  But in most games I've played, people don't respect the #1 player.  The #1 player is usually just infamous for abusing a cheese tactic when something was badly imbalanced.  That guy with the 400-10 record?  Yeah, nobody is buying that skill got them there.

This really isn't the case in SC2. It probably helps that there's nothing "badly imbalanced" to abuse at this stage. In all the big "pro" events with money involved the last matches tend to be pretty hard-fought and the winners (and losers) are pretty well respected. Just this weekend Sweden hosted DreamHack 2010, with I think about an $18,000 USD prize pool for winning the SC2 tournament. The finals were best-of-5, played out all 5 matches (one player won first 2 matches, other player won next 2 to tie the score, so the 5th was the final round) and included several 30+ minute games.

The problem is not with the game itself, but really with the way the ladder system is set up. People who want to move up the ladder need a lot of wins and points, and the fastest way to advance is to get fast wins. Couple that with the fact that a lot of players in the lower ladders have trouble defending early pressure turns what's normally considered harassment into a quick win.

There are "safe" and "unsafe" builds, and when the "pro" players lose quickly, it's usually because they lost gamble: they tried an unsafe build for an advantage, and got caught with their pants down.