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On August 12 2010 05:24 Ndugu wrote:
What Zerg units actually hard-counter something?
BLings counter marines
Roaches counter Hellions & Reapers
Hydras counter vikings
Corrupters counter Vikings, BCs
Mutas counter Marauders
Infestors Counter Thors & Bio
Ultras counter mech in open field
On August 12 2010 05:24 Ndugu wrote:
Protoss units that can be warped-in are not very strong counters to anything as well.
High Templars are strong counters to an awful lot of things, actually.
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On August 12 2010 05:52 Ndugu wrote:
Lol I came on this blog to rage so thats why I'm posting.
I'm Diamond. I like to play around with unorthodox builds, hence why I tried Carriers. He didn't scout them until a little bit before he pushed, but was able to have a bunch of vikings because had a reactor starport already for medivacs.
Being able to hard-counters like that should have an investment.
Obviously my specific game was a lost cause, as I was trying something unorthodox in Starcraft II versus Terran... not an option. Ever.
I was proposing a solution that would allow something like surprise Carriers to actually accomplish something.
A solution already exists: Don't gamble when you suck.
Please post some reps Mr. Diamond gosu.
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The #1 defense used on these forums. "I am in Diamond league."
Post replays or continue to get people to disagree with and flame you.
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On August 12 2010 06:00 Kralic wrote:
The #1 defense used on these forums. "I am in Diamond league."
Post replays or continue to get people to disagree with and flame you.
Heh, anyone with some competitive bw background can easily get into diamond without spamming games day and night. It really isn't a defense for anything.
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Scotland3152 Posts
Ghosts + Tanks + Vikings + Marauders + Marines + Hellions + Banshees + Ravens.
Every one of those units is very powerful. They are flexible because of this.
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On August 12 2010 06:05 Glacierz wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2010 06:00 Kralic wrote:
The #1 defense used on these forums. "I am in Diamond league."
Post replays or continue to get people to disagree with and flame you. Heh, anyone with some competitive bw background can easily get into diamond without spamming games day and night. It really isn't a defense for anything.
hence replays
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The flexibility of terran openings is hard to deal with overall because protoss and zerg are less flexible in the openings that they can do.
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It's a little strange that the most popular opener involves building one of every production facility and still having enough units to make game ending attacks in the first 10 minutes. Not to mention it's also the safest opening. Compared to say, zerg, where even getting a lair off one base is asking a lot.
Protoss I think is the finest balance between the two. They have one base builds but they don't have some absurd collosus voidray stalker zealot sentry opening, it's not a veritable 1 base tech buffet like Terran is
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On August 12 2010 06:32 floor exercise wrote:
It's a little strange that the most popular opener involves building one of every production facility and still having enough units to make game ending attacks in the first 10 minutes. Not to mention it's also the safest opening. Compared to say, zerg, where even getting a lair off one base is asking a lot.
Protoss I think is the finest balance between the two. They have one base builds but they don't have some absurd collosus voidray stalker zealot sentry opening, it's not a veritable 1 base tech buffet like Terran is
yeah seriously I remember a game where qxc did some nonsense marine/marauder/medivac/viking/raven 1-base strategy vs me and rolled me
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On August 12 2010 05:24 Ndugu wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2010 05:22 Impervious wrote:On August 12 2010 05:16 Ndugu wrote:On August 12 2010 05:13 MangoTango wrote:
What Terrans lack in inability to mass produce an army (Chronoboost/WarpGate or mass Larva morph), they make up for with the ability to produce the RIGHT unit. If the Terran makes the WRONG unit, the Terran loses. This is why unscouted tech switches are so bad for Terran, we can't just warp in 4 Stalkers instantly to scare away the Void Ray, we can only make a couple Marines at a time. This is true, but scouting as Terran isn't exactly a challenge x_X. My main point, which I will refine and eventually make a non blog post, is that Vikings and Hellions are too good and too strong of hard-counters to be so easily massable without any kind of an investment. Moving their upgrades to a specific building will mean they can get made, but wont be SO strong until the Terran makes a bit of an investment. For example, what if Viking +armor damage was added to fusion core and hellion pre-ignitor were moved to engineering bay? Would add a tiny bit more time/investment for a Terran to use those units in their strategy. Well, a lot more investment in the fusion core example. Note that I am saying do this in FUTURE expansions, as it would require a lot of re-balancing to make this work for Wings of Liberty. Preignitor is in the tech lab. Massing hellions takes a reactor. Two different tech labs, requiring 2 different production facilities to work properly. And why should you have to pay for bonus damage? Why should it be the only unit in the game that has to do this? Fighting off the first void ray in TvP can be bad enough (if your opponent can micro well), depending on how fast he rushed to it and how delayed your starport is..... Also, if preignitor was added to the ebay, hellion rushes would be even stronger..... You could get the upgrade while the factory was still building (or time it to start right as the building finishes, if that's a required building to upgrade), put the factory on a reactor made by the barracks, and mass reactor hellions, getting the upgrade really, really quickly..... Yea, kinda dumb idea overall..... Thanks for suggesting a way to make terran even easier to play though  Once again, I didn't say "MAKE THIS BALANCE CHANGE TO FIX GAME KK GO". I said in the future, when the game as a whole receives a substantial rebalance as a result of expansions. The ability to rapidly mass units that instantly hard-counter something is bad design.
What? If I go for a mass marauder/hellion build, and a Z switches to Muta production and makes 10+ mutas in the next production cycle, the whole Z mechanic needs to be revamped? How about P being able to warp in the right gateway units necessary at that point with zero delay?
Nawe, you left yourself open to vikings (which are essentially the Wraith of SCBW). If I had 2-3 starports in SCBW, and you tried to switch to Carriers, and I made some Wraiths (which pretty much own Carriers), would you be screaming imbalance about the Terran ability to counter Carriers? Fuck no, cause Wraiths suck in 99% of situations.
Vikings are a good ata unit, and a decent gtg unit, with good maneuverability. Getting upgrades for them is good, because they use the same upgrades as Battlecruisers, which helps if the game lasts that long. They are a solid unit. But they are pretty fragile, even though they don't have any hard counters. It's why they can see use in all 3 matchups. But they're far from imbalanced.....
What Zerg units actually hard-counter something?
Banelings counter marines pretty hard.
Protoss units that can be warped-in are not very strong counters to anything as well. P and Z both trade strength (in terms of hard-countering) for flexibility. Terran doesn't.
What? Stalkers are a pretty good unit, especially against Hellions. Sentries (damn forcefields) can be used to cut my army in half, so you only have to face half of it, and can crush it with relative ease. Or you can use the guardian shield to seriously cut back on the damage my marines do. Zealots are pretty tough buggers. And High Templar own bio hard.....
You do make a good point about hellions tech lab/reactor. Maybe the same exact thing could be done for Vikings... put an upgrade for it on tech lab.
Like what kind of upgrade? I don't see what you could put there that wouldn't affect something major..... Terran needs vikings.....
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United States47024 Posts
On August 12 2010 05:33 Ndugu wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2010 05:30 MangoTango wrote:On August 12 2010 05:19 Glacierz wrote:On August 12 2010 05:13 MangoTango wrote:
What Terrans lack in inability to mass produce an army (Chronoboost/WarpGate or mass Larva morph), they make up for with the ability to produce the RIGHT unit. If the Terran makes the WRONG unit, the Terran loses. This is why unscouted tech switches are so bad for Terran, we can't just warp in 4 Stalkers instantly to scare away the Void Ray, we can only make a couple Marines at a time. The same thing can be said to Zerg as well... I think sc2 still has too many hard counters, which makes scouting much more important than macro/micro mechanics. Negative. If a Terran is to be prepared for "anything," he will need to have a couple of every tech building, hence the 1/1/1. But this implies he will be unable to make much of any particular unit. If you get Void Ray'd as Zerg, you get a couple extra queens while you wait for Den and then spam 12 Hydras. If I get Void Ray'd as T, I hope my Reactor is on my Port so I can make 2 Vikings, or else I'm in trouble. Marine/ghost does fine versus Void Rays. Mass marine does fine versus Void Rays. If Void Rays could pwn you unless you countered them with vikings specifically, I could understand the immense strength, range, bonus damage, and massability of vikings. And, I am mostly talking about fairly late game. Once you reach two-bases and Terran has every unit producing structure. Mid-game is cool and balanced, as Terran may not have starport fast enough, etc.
Since when does 1/1/1 get a Ghost Academy early enough for void rays?
On August 12 2010 05:44 Ndugu wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2010 05:42 Hawk wrote:
No, sorry. You're just terrible. Don't even need a rep to confirm it. You game summary more or less sums that up.
Scouting a tad helps. It's not that simple to completely change from mauraders to mass vikings quickly. It's certainly not quick if you were able to get carriers out by the time you realize it...
Obviously I was messing around with a terrible build, you angry defensive Terran. Switching from MMM to vikings is the easiest thing in the world. You have a reactored starport for medivacs... I had enough of an advantage that it should have won, but the Terran was able to very quickly switch his build to counter what I was doing, and I don't like the design behind that. Carriers are a totally non-viable unit in PvT as a result.
Terran will always have an armory and a shit-ton of factories in SC1 TvP.
They can always churn out a bunch of Goliaths, so Carriers are a totally non-viable unit in TvP.
Oh, wait...
Honestly, Terran has always had the hardest counter units by design: Siege Tanks vs heavy units, Vultures and Firebats vs. light units, Goliaths vs air, Valkyries vs. mutas, etc. This hasn't changed. As far as flexibility? Again, they're fine--Protoss and Terran both gained a lot of flexibility going into SC2. The only thing regrettable is that Zerg isn't as flexible as it should be, which can honestly be fixed by 1 or 2 early-game changes that make hatch before pool viable again.
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Difference between races imo is that terran can never make a bad decision when making buildings. Terran doesn't have to commit so much to the early decisions as the other races have to. Everything has a good follow up.
And there has to be some kind of problem with that fact that terran has the best units and abilities for everything.
Longest range for air and land.
Most ways to detect cloaked units.
Most ways to harass.
Sensor towers to see drops from miles away.
Fastest unit in early game.
Most ways to scout.
Ability to get great economy with half of the workers and less expos with mules vs other races.
Ability to completely wall off your base and still be able to go in and out yourself.
Ability to make OC safely inside the main to increase economy and move out when its safe.
Just PF and the mining scvs defend far away expos really good vs quite large group of any ground units.
SC2 is a new game and the strategies are developing all the time but im pretty sure that after a year terran won't look like the way it looks like now.
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Where-as, when a Terran scouts Collosi, Carriers, etc, they stop making medivacs and make vikings, 2 at a time. No extra building needed. No serious time investment needed.
One more time, making units that are hard-counters but also extremely massable and cost-effective is bad design.
THEY AREN'T MASSABLE.
You need to understand this.
Terrans take by far the longest to create any type of army. If someone attacks you with a ground army and it gets wrecked by your Carriers, it's highly, highly unlikely that he'll be able to produce enough Vikings to hold it off by the time the Carriers get to his base, whereas the Zerg can easily make enough Corruptors and the Protoss can easily warp in enough Stalkers.
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Lol at terran players ignoring the point or resorting to ad hominems.
I'm sure you're really great at this game and that's why you picked Terran.
I admit and have already admitted the build I used was bad... I was pointing out the reason it is completely 100% non-viable against Terran and how that is bad design.
I'm also not suggesting any changes be implemented in Wings of Liberty, as that would obviously break the game.
I am suggesting that in future expansions with different balance considerations UNITS THAT ARE POWERFUL, HARD-COUNTERS, should not be so easily massed without some more investment or time investment.
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Jeez the Terrans are impossible to talk to.
Pity the carrier is such a worthless unit. Both Terran Zerg have a nice heavy powered lategame air unit to run to. I guess the fair compensation for this is just how ridiculously awesome 9range collosi really are.
Vikings have 9 range and absurd dps annnd the fact that the reactor starpport will always exist means that carriers will never be used in this game. To be fair... havn't quite figured out how to effectively micro carriers, but it seems like they're going to need a good healthy buff.
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What, exactly, is your point?
I didn't pick terran cause I felt it was the strongest race..... I still feel that Zerg probably takes that one, not by sheer power, but by speed and maneuverability. I picked it because it felt like it was the most versatile. Regardless of the situation, there are usually several different, good responses, while Z and P felt lacking to me. Not underpowered, just less options available.
I don't see how reactors doubling the production rate of vikings or hellions are a bad thing, they take nearly as long to build as a new facility, they are relatively expensive, and prevent you from using a tech lab to get the more specialized units, as well as the upgrades.....
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United States10774 Posts
On August 12 2010 12:23 Impervious wrote:
What, exactly, is your point?
I didn't pick terran cause I felt it was the strongest race..... I still feel that Zerg probably takes that one, not by sheer power, but by speed and maneuverability. I picked it because it felt like it was the most versatile. Regardless of the situation, there are usually several different, good responses, while Z and P felt lacking to me. Not underpowered, just less options available.
I don't see how reactors doubling the production rate of vikings or hellions are a bad thing, they take nearly as long to build as a new facility, they are relatively expensive, and prevent you from using a tech lab to get the more specialized units, as well as the upgrades.....
I find PvT to be difficult for that exact reason. Terran is too versatile and has so many options/playstyles they can execute. Some are harder than others, which makes good Terran players so hard to beat.
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anyone else think it's kind of ridiculous that starports with a reactor can pump out two medivacs OR two vikings at the same time? Why can't it be only one of them like the barracks and factory? I think it'd be cool to see either the viking or medivac require a tech lab.
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The problem with 1/1/1 is that a terran player can get almost every unit with just one tech lab. Therefore, Terran's have an incredible variety of harrass possibillities (reapers into hellions into banshees for instance). These builds require almost no extra (cut in economy) investment as compared to other builds but still open up all the unit possibillities for mid-game.
An easy solution would be to to pay minerals/gas for a building to lift of. It doesn't have to be much, but 25/25 might be sufficient.
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A solution already exists: Don't gamble when you suck.
Please post some reps Mr. Diamond gosu.
I'm not sure I've encountered a player as needlessly obnoxious as you on this website.
This is not about my skill level. Yes, I am a Diamond player, as is anyone with a reasonable amount of skill. I've played Random, I can easily beat Diamond level Zerg and Protoss players of similar skill when I play as Terran thanks to 1-1-1.
No need to post a replay of the game I mention because it was a silly game where I had such a huge advantage that I thought I could go blink stalkers + carriers. The terran player hard-countered both my units, and that is totally balanced within the current game. No one should ever make Carriers and while that is not fun, it is balanced just fine.
My only qualification that I claim is as someone interested in the design process behind my favorite RTS, particularly its system of hard-counters and my opinion that Terran's immense flexibility in making hard-counter units.
The best example is BW Goliath ---> viking. Goliaths were great, but limited by the fact that they were on the ground, required a range upgrade that, even after having it, was still outranged by carriers. Carriers could still survive and accomplish SOMETHING when Goliaths existed. You needed to build an extra factory to mass them, etc.
It was like the immortal vs stalker--- immortals wtfpwn stalkers, but they can't be made quickly without more investment. They can be microed against by a good player using Stalkers, etc.
Not reactor +A + move = carriers are not a viable unit in 1v1.
On August 12 2010 12:23 Impervious wrote:
What, exactly, is your point?
I didn't pick terran cause I felt it was the strongest race..... I still feel that Zerg probably takes that one, not by sheer power, but by speed and maneuverability. I picked it because it felt like it was the most versatile. Regardless of the situation, there are usually several different, good responses, while Z and P felt lacking to me. Not underpowered, just less options available.
I don't see how reactors doubling the production rate of vikings or hellions are a bad thing, they take nearly as long to build as a new facility, they are relatively expensive, and prevent you from using a tech lab to get the more specialized units, as well as the upgrades.....
I will explain one last time, as I prepare to make this into a non-blog post again.
This game has hard counters. HARD counters. It is a fact of life and I am assuming it will continue to be one.
For example, the immortal. It does 50 damage to armored, but is balanced by its crap range of 5 and slow speed, which means that even stalkers can kite it. You have to micro it, and I think to a certain extent it is designed to be used alongside warp prisms.
It is also balanced by a very long build time, and the fact that you will have to throw down an additional robotics facility and wait for it to build before you can produce 2x immortals at a time.
For Hellions and Vikings, you will always have a factory or Starport, at least one, as a part of any reasonable build once you get past mid-game.
As a result, Terran can pump out Vikings to wtfpwn armored/massive air units without making any additional investment in terms of making additional buildings, procuring additional research, etc. It's just make Vikings off of the reactor starport you already have and win.
In the current game, THIS IS NOT OVERPOWERED. It's not overpowered because people won't go carriers. People won't go Collosi (for long) as they will switch to templar tech when you get vikings. ETC
I am simply saying it is bad design. The ability to MASS hard-counter units, without going out of your way as Terran makes Tech paths for Protoss and Zerg non-viable.
An example of good design is the Thor. It has a lot of trade-offs for its ability to counter mass air, such as its slow movement, long build time, and the requirement for an armory. It won't always just casually be ready to make when you see a spire-- you have to take time and make an investment to counter mutas. Once you make that investment, the Zerg player can either micro very very hard and keep using them, or must stop making mutas. That is how countering works. You make a time and money investment and when the time comes, it pays off in allowing you to have units that give you an advantage over your enemies units, not a result of physical skill, but of your ability to adapt and plan.
For Vikings, that is not the case. The design of the Hellion, where you have to get the research on a tech lab before being able to double-pump upgraded hellions, is a good one. You cant instantly wtfpwn light units and you can do quite well against lings with micro pre-upgrade. It introduces the trade-off of "How fast do I want my hellions? Do I want to grab the upgrade or double-pump them? Do I need to build a 2nd factory so I can do both".
I suggest that in the future Vikings return to 8+6, and an upgrade to increase their damage to armored appears on the tech lab (perhaps give Raven's seeker missile for free in exchange lol).
This way, if a Protoss player sneaks Carriers or Collosi, the Terran player can't instantly switch from reactored medivacs to reactored, hard-counter vikings. It takes a time investment. You shouldn't always just be able to hard-counter a unit as soon as you see it. As Protoss and Zerg you have to scout and pre-emptively adapt to your opponents army. As Terran, you are granted too much flexibility.
I played Terran for a while and I was amazed that I could build one of each production building (extremely fast teching) and have an army strong enough to expand. Can you imagine a Protoss player building a gateway, a robotics facility, and a stargate, and then having enough army to push out and expand? Obviously different races are different, and I think that down the line 1-1-1 won't be viable because players will adapt to have MUCH stronger early pressure Korean style.
But once it is late game, Terran can make any unit when the need arises. Without any investment, buildings, tech, or research.
On August 12 2010 05:58 EccoEcco wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2010 05:24 Ndugu wrote:
What Zerg units actually hard-counter something?
BLings counter marines Roaches counter Hellions & Reapers Hydras counter vikings Corrupters counter Vikings, BCs Mutas counter Marauders Infestors Counter Thors & Bio Ultras counter mech in open field Show nested quote +On August 12 2010 05:24 Ndugu wrote:
Protoss units that can be warped-in are not very strong counters to anything as well. High Templars are strong counters to an awful lot of things, actually.
High templars are another example of a GOOD and REASONABLE hard-counter. Requires a building and two researches before it can wtfpwn your MMM ball. I don't switch my gateway's addon and double-pump high templar as soon as my void rays force you to go marines...
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