On Teamliquid, I frequently come across people with this idea that mechanics kills strategy. They refer to a game without mechanics as being like chess, pure strategy. As a decent chess player, I couldn't help but believe that this is further than the truth.
Strategy, for our purposes, can be easily defined as a series of decisions made to increase the likelihood of a certain event happening. There is NO DEFINITE outcome from strategic decisions. Why is this? Well, here is a strategy in chess.
This is the sicilian defense, in which black responds to e4 with ...c5, with the aim of queenside agression that forces white to defend the aggression, rather than continuing with his kingside attack. At this stage in the game, there is no clear outcome from ...c5 because there are to many variables to be calculated.
Here is the converse of a strategy, a calculation. White knows he has won. Chess has lots of strategy, but also has a lot of simple calculations. In order for a game to have even a higher level of strategy, it must have more variables than can be calculated even with a computer. Here is where mechanics come in. With mechanics, a game has a degree of variability. A game where there are less mechanics in essence has less strategy than one that has more mechanics. There is more gray lines, more big picture things to look at rather than simple A beats B beats C therefor I go D and win.
And here is where SCBW comes in.
Here is one of my favorite games, a TVZ on Tau Cross by the great masters of our age, Flash and Jaedong. There is no simple strategy to beating Flash's unit composition. There is no unit that simply "counters" marines like in so many modern RTS's have built in. In order to respond to Flash, Jaedong must abuse the mobility of Flash's army and take the whole map.
Mechanics, though they are sometimes a larger focus than strategy at a low level, are NOT the underlying factor at higher levels. Flash is forced to make a crucial decision during the middle of the game. Do I keep on attacking or do I try to take more expansions? The answer was not a simple one and mechanics are what makes that question so complex. If Jaedong has the mechanics to hold off the attacks from multiple locations, it will be fruitless to continue attacking. If not, Flash can take out Jaedong's 2 o'clock expansions.
If there had been no mechanics in that game, it would have come down to a simple calculation on whether or not Flash had the units to take out the expansions. It would have been basically math. I have A, he has B, A beats B, therefor I win. Mechanics actually ADD to the strategic element of the game.
I agree, I hate the idea people seem to have gotten that less mechanics = more strategy. I didn't even play BW before, and am only meddling in it now, and even I can see that that is wrong. I haven't watched many BW games either, but it's pretty cool to see macro players, and how it takes excellent mechanics to have good, powerful, macro. In SC2, I just don't get that same feeling watching supposed "macro" players, as it seems that it has shifted the importance from the skill needed to macro like that, to a more general "strategy" driven approach. I might be way off base here, but what I mean is that it's based less off mechanics and skill, and more on build order and passivity.
On March 12 2011 07:43 Mr. Wiggles wrote: I agree, I hate the idea people seem to have gotten that less mechanics = more strategy. I didn't even play BW before, and am only meddling in it now, and even I can see that that is wrong. I haven't watched many BW games either, but it's pretty cool to see macro players, and how it takes excellent mechanics to have good, powerful, macro. In SC2, I just don't get that same feeling watching supposed "macro" players, as it seems that it has shifted the importance from the skill needed to macro like that, to a more general "strategy" driven approach. I might be way off base here, but what I mean is that it's based less off mechanics and skill, and more on build order and passivity.
But that's just my view.
I think you understood exactly what I meant by this post. Thanks for taking the time to read it! edit: I also think your quote is rather clever.
On March 12 2011 07:43 Mr. Wiggles wrote: I agree, I hate the idea people seem to have gotten that less mechanics = more strategy. I didn't even play BW before, and am only meddling in it now, and even I can see that that is wrong. I haven't watched many BW games either, but it's pretty cool to see macro players, and how it takes excellent mechanics to have good, powerful, macro. In SC2, I just don't get that same feeling watching supposed "macro" players, as it seems that it has shifted the importance from the skill needed to macro like that, to a more general "strategy" driven approach. I might be way off base here, but what I mean is that it's based less off mechanics and skill, and more on build order and passivity.
But that's just my view.
I think you understood exactly what I meant by this post. Thanks for taking the time to read it! edit: I also think your quote is rather clever.
Anyone who thinks less mechanics equals more strategy is so far gone it's best just to pat them on the head while saying 'whatever you say, sweetie.' Sometimes I'll turn on an SC2 stream just to see if the game as changed, and it'll be a master league player, and he'll be making so many basic strategy mistakes I'll wonder how he even got there. Then he attacks with his ball of death, it beats the enemy's ball of death, and I realise... It didn't even matter that he was too nooby to check for expos, that he was too nooby to know his opponent did an all in and clearly didn't have a hidden expo now, 5 minutes after he should have checked. All he had to do was a move and macro his army. The fact that a player like that isn't punished for being completely clueless kind of says to me that the strategy elements of SC2 are not as important as they were in BW. I suppose at the highest level of SC2 there will be a few subtle instances where strategy gains a player the advantage, but it seems much less important than it was in BW, where even if your macro was awful, if you were smart you could still win vs dumber players.
On March 12 2011 07:52 Chef wrote: Anyone who thinks less mechanics equals more strategy is so far gone it's best just to pat them on the head while saying 'whatever you say, sweetie.' Sometimes I'll turn on an SC2 stream just to see if the game as changed, and it'll be a master league player, and they'll be making so many basic strategy mistakes I'll wonder how they even got there. Then they attack with their ball of death, it beats the enemies ball of death, and I realise... It didn't even matter that he was too nooby to check for expos, that he was too nooby to know his opponent did an all in and clearly didn't have a strong army. All he had to do was a move and macro his army. The fact that a player like that isn't punished for being completely clueless kind of says to me that the strategy elements of SC2 are not as important as they were in BW. I suppose at the highest level of SC2 there will be a few subtle instances where strategy gains a player the advantage, but it seems much less important than it was in BW, where even if your macro was awful, if you were smart you could still win vs dumber players.
I admire your blog so much Chef! When I was writing this I was trying to write like I see you doing. Thanks for your input. I also agree completely with what you are saying.
Great post, etheovermind. Bookmarked. I'm not as eloquent with my words as I would like to be, so the next time I come across this argument I'm going to EZmode direct people to this post because you laid it out perfectly
On March 12 2011 08:01 Mr. Wiggles wrote: So just a question, but do you think anything could be changed or added in the expansions in SC2 that could ameliorate this situation?
Where do you think the root of the problem lies?
I believe that there would need to be some "comeback" units. Units at the highest tier that when used properly would allow someone to come back from almost any situation. Ex. defiler, hold-lurkers, reavers. This should also include getting rid of smart-cast. 12 unit select and MBS will probably never go and I don't think its crucial that they do though it would make the game a bit better IMO.
On March 12 2011 08:05 Bobo_XIII wrote: Great post, etheovermind. Bookmarked. I'm not as eloquent with my words as I would like to be, so the next time I come across this argument I'm going to EZmode direct people to this post because you laid it out perfectly
Thanks so much! Response to those types of arguments are exactly what I was hoping this would be used for.
On March 12 2011 08:01 Mr. Wiggles wrote: So just a question, but do you think anything could be changed or added in the expansions in SC2 that could ameliorate this situation?
Where do you think the root of the problem lies?
I believe that there would need to be some "comeback" units. Units at the highest tier that when used properly would allow someone to come back from almost any situation. Ex. defiler, hold-lurkers, reavers. This should also include getting rid of smart-cast. 12 unit select and MBS will probably never go and I don't think its crucial that they do though it would make the game a bit better IMO.
Yeah, I'd also like to see more units like that. It seems there is almost a scarcity of units that greatly reward and scale well with good use and control at the moment. I feel there was a lot of strategy in those units too, because they were very key to the match in their usage. They also promoted lots of positional play, that I think lacks a bit in the current game.
Do you think changing unit collision size would do much? I think that might help to alleviate some of the "death-ball" moments of the game, and might add a bit more to positioning and micro when engaging.
On March 12 2011 08:01 Mr. Wiggles wrote: So just a question, but do you think anything could be changed or added in the expansions in SC2 that could ameliorate this situation?
Where do you think the root of the problem lies?
I believe that there would need to be some "comeback" units. Units at the highest tier that when used properly would allow someone to come back from almost any situation. Ex. defiler, hold-lurkers, reavers. This should also include getting rid of smart-cast. 12 unit select and MBS will probably never go and I don't think its crucial that they do though it would make the game a bit better IMO.
Yeah, I'd also like to see more units like that. It seems there is almost a scarcity of units that greatly reward and scale well with good use and control at the moment. I feel there was a lot of strategy in those units too, because they were very key to the match in their usage. They also promoted lots of positional play, that I think lacks a bit in the current game.
Do you think changing unit collision size would do much? I think that might help to alleviate some of the "death-ball" moments of the game, and might add a bit more to positioning and micro when engaging.
Increasing collision size would be excellent. In BW, you have these awesome lines of units spread out all over the map and its just so sick.
I was just thinking about this, how mechanics and strategy are inevitably tied together. At the simplest level even cheeses (mostly relatively simple strategies) have a very variable effectiveness that depend greatly on mechanics.
On March 12 2011 08:01 Mr. Wiggles wrote: So just a question, but do you think anything could be changed or added in the expansions in SC2 that could ameliorate this situation?
Where do you think the root of the problem lies?
I believe that there would need to be some "comeback" units. Units at the highest tier that when used properly would allow someone to come back from almost any situation. Ex. defiler, hold-lurkers, reavers. This should also include getting rid of smart-cast. 12 unit select and MBS will probably never go and I don't think its crucial that they do though it would make the game a bit better IMO.
Yeah, I'd also like to see more units like that. It seems there is almost a scarcity of units that greatly reward and scale well with good use and control at the moment. I feel there was a lot of strategy in those units too, because they were very key to the match in their usage. They also promoted lots of positional play, that I think lacks a bit in the current game.
Do you think changing unit collision size would do much? I think that might help to alleviate some of the "death-ball" moments of the game, and might add a bit more to positioning and micro when engaging.
Increasing collision size would be excellent. In BW, you have these awesome lines of units spread out all over the map and its just so sick.
Yeah, that's my favourite thing from starting to watch BW. Like I said, I really hope they add something that promotes positional play, because it's almost rare to see people fighting on multiple fronts or in larger battle lines.
EPT![[image loading]](http://imgur.com/5d8S8.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://imgur.com/dOPQ0.jpg)
