Jason "Lost" Brand gives a high-level perspective on the new maps, and resulting shifts in the metagame.


February 25th, 2011: Blizzard updates the map pool. What new and exciting surprises await us? What new wonders are we to behold? While the new maps are, in many ways, a vast improvement on their predecessors, some have some fatal flaws in my eyes.

Let's have a quick look, shall we?

Starting with Backwater Gulch, we have a seemingly decently sized four player map, with corner spawns and good naturals. However, a closer looks reveals how bad the natural is, being parallel to the main base plateau, making defense of this expansion extremely difficult to early pressure. Additionally, we have destructible on two sides of the natural's plateau, adding a certain versatility to mid to late gameplay. High yield minerals and two watch towers populate the center, making control of the middle an absolute necessity.

This is a map with a lot of mid to late-game potential but one that, I find, will have a hard time getting there. Due to the way the natural expansions are set up on this map there are a lot of ways games can go, which will lead to an overall change in play style with the addition of this map to the map pool, with games varying from early aggressive one basing to macro heavy games with a lot of harassing and epic battles. This will be a map to watch for in tournaments as the level of variety its capable of will make for exciting matches.

Slag pits is next up, another seemingly large, four player map with corner spawns and close naturals. The naturals on this map are, in fact, quite a bit better and easier to defend with close proximity to the ramp. This map was modeled after Metalopolis, according to Blizzard, and there are undeniable similarities such as center watch towers and high yield expansions, though the high yields are a bit more spread out to the sides on this map. Cross spawn and close air spawn make this a great macro map, but the extremely close ground spawn positions with backdoor rocks to the natural make close spawn a virtual Zerg nightmare, with natural positions closer even than Steppes of War.

This map would be nearly ideal if close spawn were disabled, as it is one in three games will favor aggressive early game styles and two of out three will favor a more macro based style. Due to the insane proximity of close spawns, the game play will be radically different (even more so than the other four player maps) based on spawns on this map, leading to a many different types of matches, from 4 gate to 40 minute macro games.

The Shattered Temple.. now here's a map. This is the updated, more balanced version of The Lost Temple. This is a large, four player map with a ton of open space and easily defendable naturals, accessible thirds with destructible debris and a refreshing lack of ledges to be abused by races that shall remain nameless. The corner islands are now connected by land and blocked by destructible debris, there is a single watch tower in the middle replacing the two with ledges on Lost Temple.

Overall, I think, it's a solid and balanced map that is helping us see an increase in macro games. In my opinion, ST has become the best map in the pool, edging out Metalopolis. First, unlike many maps, there are no small corridors in which to pass between bases, making it more generically balanced. This map will, similar to the others, result in a metagame shift to less early aggression styles like four gate and two-rack bunker all ins. With not-so-close close-spawn distance and a wide open area, this admittedly pro-Zerg player is in love with it.

The final map added to the pool is that of Typhoon peaks. This is quite a large map with corner spawns, naturals akin to delta quadrant and two watch towers in the middle as well as corridors blocked by destructible debris connecting the top bottom naturals. This map has a lot of expansions and a fairly close third, making it a map with a lot of versatility, allowing for either early aggression or heavy macro.

In terms of game play, this is my second favorite of the new new maps as it large and will undeniably result in a lot of mixed play. The spawns are all fairly far apart, making early aggressive styles less effective, but not impossible. The "smoke grass" makes for some interesting dynamic as well, where well prepared and thought out ambushes can be instantly game changing.

One thing I find that the new maps all have in common is size and space. With the exception of close spawn on Slag Pits, Blizzard (like me), seems to want to push the game toward more macro-oriented styles. They've also added new features and tricks that savvy players will be able to use to their advantage, without being game breaking like the cliff drops and backdoor-rocks of olde.

All in all, the changes to the map pool were, to my eyes, a good and necessary thing and the maps added are more balanced than the ones they replaced, which has already resulted in a shift in the metagame. Many of these maps are reminiscent of Metalopolis, a good move by Blizzard as it is by far the most balanced as well as most popular map.

Lost is a 4000+ rated Zerg player, consistently in the top 50 on North America's rankings