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I'm replying to the specific points about Starcraft 2 here, but really this is off topic considering that nobody is actually saying Professional Gamers in the year 2011 should be compared to word processor "power users" in the year 1989.

Professional Starcraft 2 players need to use hotkeys because they have to be able to do multiple tasks at once - they're macroing with their left hand while clicking around the mini-map and performing other tasks with their mouse hand. You couldn't play SC2 (well) with just the keyboard or just the mouse.

As for the muscle memory for mouse movements, there's no question that Pro SC2 players have exactly that. If you watch a pro give his opening workers commands, it looks like what he's doing should be impossible. You or I couldn't sit down at a computer and do it. But they can precisely because of muscle memory: they know how far a mineral node is from the starting base and exactly what mouse movements are needed to select a worker and send him to a specific mineral patch, then select the next and so on. It's true that in Starcraft 1 this muscle memory was even more necessary as SC2 has automated (to a high degree) many tasks that once required precisely practiced mouse movements, but you still see SC2 players using those skills that they learned from Brood War.




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