Hello everyone, have a seat and stop in to hear my proposal. I am an RTS newbie, who originally started playing SC2 more than a year after its release and I am proud that I was sucked in by the youtube video of Tastosis casting an exciting pro matchup. However I got to thinking recently about the origins of the SC2 scene and how BW has affected it. I've watched a few games be played and know a little around the scene thanks to the teamliquid sidepanel, but like the majority of us newer SC2 players, I don't know much of BW past that it was the booming predecessor to SC2.
I will give it a lot of credit that it continues to be a popular scene for pro-leaguers and sponsors alike to stay involved to give players and events life. I also am very confused on how people believe that the actual game-design and balance is exponentially better. Intuitively, there are BW fanboys that will always throw out irrational arguments that can convince otherwise unknowing readers like any other major phenomena. The statements keep appearing by many people with a variety of arguments, such as not rewarding poor micro (such as 1aing to victory) to better unit compositional design. I cannot decipher the difference and often times wish to simply look away and go watch whoever is streaming SC2.
Over the past few days I am more intrigued by the development of BW over time and how it will be similar and different from SC2 development. BW reigned for almost a decade without competition and the players naturally sorted out who is best and that the biggest argument for SC2's "newbiness" is that not everything has been figured out and the fact that new and viable builds in the metagame vary drastically month-to-month. As far as I am concerned, BW players have almost completely optimized responses and the matter of difference tends to be control. (Note: this is my predisposition to BW and may not be fact) Not only am I interested in how the pros play the game, but how the game "played" the pros. How did Flash get to his position and keep it? Could it be done in SC2, especially this early and with massive metagame changes happening in HotS?
These are a few of my inquiries and I would ask for friendly help from my readers. I would like to document my predispositions to the BW scene as a new SC2 player, discuss with experienced watchers and players of both BW and SC2 the differences and similarities, and ultimately find out if SC2 has the juice to be another BW, a game capable of slightly changing rules but infinitely changing gameplay.
Ultimately, I plan on making a small documentary to stream and post to youtube about SC2 in relation to BW to introduce newer SC2 players into the long term outlook of BW and extrapolate the information we have about both games right now to look forward into a success or failure of SC2.
My opinion is its absolutely fine to be sceptical as long as you make the effort to see what the difference is, a lot of SC2 players will make up stuff about BW and that's what annoys a lot of people. Noting that almost every person who has played BW has played SC2, and many of them play both at a high level.
As for learning about BW, there are plenty of threads that have popped up recently helping those who wish to transition.
You don't need to play the game to understand the beauty of it, I was addicted to watching tastless and sdm cast GomTV BW before I actually started playing. That's a good starting point i guess, any flash/bisu/jaedong game casted by Tasteless should be good but it won't get you to the juicy parts of BW that makes everybody love the game.
You should also watch some FPVODs not because you want to get motion sickness, but to show the mechanical difference between games.
Note that the Bisu build came roughly 7 years after pro BW inception. Saviors builds 5-6 years. Flash build 9 years.
Most of them causing people to cry imba and certain matchups completely un-winnable for at least a year. Most of these builds have stood the test of time and variants are still completely in use today.
[Like the 1-1-1 in SC2, there were many of these imba builds developed in BW over many years, but were eventually completely figured out a year or so later]
History: I suggest reading into (and watching vods of) the ...
Love sluggaslamoo's post too but I do think you need to play it at least a little bit, I wouldn't just leave it up to fpvods. At least play some against the AI, then watch some pro games, then go back in the game and try to do what the pros did.
I'll be looking into the videos and unfortunately I do not have BW access (though Im sure I could pirate it).
I'd like to observe the game but I understand how much SC2 babysits you when it comes down to it, because rallying and units straying are issues in BW (especially workers....gahhhhh)
On January 26 2012 14:34 TG Manny wrote: I'll be looking into the videos and unfortunately I do not have BW access (though Im sure I could pirate it).
I'd like to observe the game but I understand how much SC2 babysits you when it comes down to it, because rallying and units straying are issues in BW (especially workers....gahhhhh)
You can play for free on iCCUp. (where most of TL plays I'm pretty sure) http://www.iccup.com/
It'll be somewhat of a serious blow to your credibility if you aren't at least solid D at BW imo
It'll be somewhat of a serious blow to your credibility if you aren't at least solid D at BW imo
Thank you for the linkup! If I play terran in SC2 which race does that correlate best to in BW? I may just play for fun...
However I question why you mention the quoted text.
I don't intend to make any statements that require true credibility of myself in BW discussion, I just want to be aware of my ancestors in a sense. I understand that for more credibility I should be decent at the game but at the same time do all professional researchers of any arbitrary subject need hands-on?
I'm barely plat in SC2 :O Unless D is like...silver...then I have a long way to go.
Slug's post is very good, and I'll offer my own perspective:
The emphasis in SC2 is on builds, clearly, while in BW it is on control. You have that analysis down, and that's a really good starting point. I think it's important to ask two things: "why?" "is this temporary for SC2 or permanent?"
I think the answer is that SC2 lacks a major control element to combat. You simply cannot micro your way to victory with a tiny army that is well controlled, because your units just don't gain that much effectiveness with good control vs bad control. It's exactly what Day[9] has talked about, which is a "unit multiplier" from good control. In SC2 it's like 1.5 or 2x, but in BW it's like 10x for almost every unit. Without the monumental disparity between well controlled and poorly controlled armies, the game comes down more to builds and higher strategic choices like compositions, rather than execution.
It is my opinion that this is not going to go away without a major rework of the game design of SC2 (and I have written two articles on the matter, search for Philosophy of Design). While the game remains in this state, there will never be a Flash. Interestingly enough, in BW, better control opens up strategic options for you, and closes them for your opponent. In SC2, that is not really the case most of the time, and the way to shut down some strategies is to simply scout better and have well planned responses. You can't simply control your way out of a situation, nor can you make a nonviable strategy viable with better control.
I don't see SC2 ever becoming an esport with a legacy. I think it'll have its run and then die off a year or two after the final expansion.
Terran in sc2 has some similarities to terran in bw. Specifically that the marine tank composition is pretty strong, especially in tvz where it is very standard. Still, you'll find that the mechanical difficulty of playing marine medic is extremely higher due to the 12 unit selection limit. Most people agree that protoss is easier at the lower levels. It tends to require the least apm, so it might be the better race to start out with if you are not confident in your basic mechanics.
edit: in response to the above:I think control isn't the whole issue. Certainly, there could and should be a greater reward for micro, but the truth is there is ample opportunity for micro in certain places. Also, it just isn't that exciting to see micro be the end all be all. The game isn't supposed to be about who has the fast hands.
The big thing is the small armies beating bigger armies. In bw there are units and abilities that help to control territory. Spider mines, siege tanks, lurkers, dark swarm, arbiters, reavers, and probably more if I really stop to think about it. All of these allow for a smaller army to hold a position or engage another army and achieve extreme cost efficiency if the opponent foolishly charges in. This is a large part of why bw rewards small engagements so much more than sc2.
In sc2 there are certain units that allow small armies to defeat larger armies, however this effect is much more binary. That is, either you have a collosus while they have no vikings or you don't. Either you get tanks before the baneling bust comes in or you don't. With good micro you can kill collosus with just infantry or split banelings to minimize tank splash, however, you will never really do it to point of being cost effective. On the other hand, consider dark swarm. On the surface of it, dark swarm seems like a much more binary skill as it gets off and immediately makes all ranged units useless. Really though, it allows for a much more dynamic game. You get to choose how to skew your composition toward melee units, or to skew towards anti casters (sci vessels, dark archons), or and this is the best response, to just use smart army movement. You move forward aggressively to force the dark swarm in a defensive location, then just back up out of it. Rinse and repeat until the zerg finds himself sitting under a dark swarm in the middle of the map, cut off from reinforcements and with an ever dwindling force.
I could go on with other examples, but the point is that there are things that allow small armies to effectively engage large ones. Most of these things require some smart positioning or targeting from the player and can similarly be combated with smart positioning and control from the opponent. At the moment, sc2 just requires that you have the right units at the right time and get off the right spells before your opponent gets theirs. We've seen some progress, but I also feel there is simply a limit to how much can be done without more of an emphasis on controlling space. It seems blizzard may be moving in this direction for HOTS.
It'll be somewhat of a serious blow to your credibility if you aren't at least solid D at BW imo
Thank you for the linkup! If I play terran in SC2 which race does that correlate best to in BW? I may just play for fun...
However I question why you mention the quoted text.
I don't intend to make any statements that require true credibility of myself in BW discussion, I just want to be aware of my ancestors in a sense. I understand that for more credibility I should be decent at the game but at the same time do all professional researchers of any arbitrary subject need hands-on?
I'm barely plat in SC2 :O Unless D is like...silver...then I have a long way to go.
I play toss in starcraft 2 at masters level and play broodwar sometimes; ill tell you, broodwar is Hard. (prob its me, but i am really bad at broodwar; i like to play it but sometimes i give up on it lol) I knew BW for a long time but only found out about pro-scene after sc2 release. Since then i've paid more and more attention to it. If you have played broodwar and then u see what Jaedong, Bisu, Flash, Stork, etc do... you will be amazed. I recommend you try broodwar, and then see a Flash game or something like that. I see them and i am speechless, this is why i will continue to watch broodwar as long as I can, even tho I play sc2. And from time to time play on iccup to get killed by protoss.....
On January 26 2012 15:20 phyren wrote: Terran in sc2 has some similarities to terran in bw. Specifically that the marine tank composition is pretty strong, especially in tvz where it is very standard. Still, you'll find that the mechanical difficulty of playing marine medic is extremely higher due to the 12 unit selection limit. Most people agree that protoss is easier at the lower levels. It tends to require the least apm, so it might be the better race to start out with if you are not confident in your basic mechanics.
No race in SC2 is like terran in BW. Terran in BW is extremely positional and requires an incredible amount of apm, awareness, and micro. It is, mechanically, the hardest race by far to learn. I would say that as an SC2 player you almost have to play protoss, at least until you become mechanically capable of playing the other races so you can focus on strategy and decision making.
On January 26 2012 15:20 phyren wrote: Terran in sc2 has some similarities to terran in bw. Specifically that the marine tank composition is pretty strong, especially in tvz where it is very standard. Still, you'll find that the mechanical difficulty of playing marine medic is extremely higher due to the 12 unit selection limit. Most people agree that protoss is easier at the lower levels. It tends to require the least apm, so it might be the better race to start out with if you are not confident in your basic mechanics.
No race in SC2 is like terran in BW. Terran in BW is extremely positional and requires an incredible amount of apm, awareness, and micro. It is, mechanically, the hardest race by far to learn. I would say that as an SC2 player you almost have to play protoss, at least until you become mechanically capable of playing the other races so you can focus on strategy and decision making.
In theory, tvz in sc2 is somewhat similar to terran in bw. Specifically, skills like marine splitting, handling multiple drops at once, worrying about burrowed splash units, defending against mutalisk timings, tank positioning, etc, etc. are all present in both. However, you are right, these skills are so, so much more difficult to master in bw as they are all done with a more difficult interface and need to be done while considering numerous other things that just aren't present in sc2.
Still, I would say the relative difference of apm requirements between races, while suggesting an sc2 player try toss, really isn't so important. As was stated earlier, playing bw at even the casual D+ and above levels is essentially sufficient to hold masters in sc2. As the op is plat and considering not playing at all, much less playing against other people, I think he would do well to pick w/e race he likes and just try some vs ai, maybe the missions.
It'll be somewhat of a serious blow to your credibility if you aren't at least solid D at BW imo
Thank you for the linkup! If I play terran in SC2 which race does that correlate best to in BW? I may just play for fun...
However I question why you mention the quoted text.
I don't intend to make any statements that require true credibility of myself in BW discussion, I just want to be aware of my ancestors in a sense. I understand that for more credibility I should be decent at the game but at the same time do all professional researchers of any arbitrary subject need hands-on?
I'm barely plat in SC2 :O Unless D is like...silver...then I have a long way to go.
Go play protoss. It's the least mechanically demanding race at lower level.
BW is a strange pickle. Every time we think it's been figured out, something different pops up. Mutalisk stacking was not discovered until half way into professional gaming (half way to current date), and the game was heavily micro oriented before such transition. Just last year, we've experienced a use of queens (which is pretty much labeled useless before then) as a means to stop the doom mech push, since we've just reached the point when players have the mechanics to utilize them efficiently.
Flash is a freak of nature and his game sense is just inexplicable. I'm inclined to believe he's like the Rain man of the BW world, with his BW skills analogous to Rain man's computation skills. It's funny how he actually appears OCD when he sets up for playing, having to measure the perfect angle and placement for his keyboard. It's been a running joke that Flash uses map hacks, not just among the TL community but the Chinese one as well:
Pretty much sums up how everyone who has watched BW for years explain his play. We can't.
It'll be somewhat of a serious blow to your credibility if you aren't at least solid D at BW imo
Thank you for the linkup! If I play terran in SC2 which race does that correlate best to in BW? I may just play for fun...
However I question why you mention the quoted text.
I don't intend to make any statements that require true credibility of myself in BW discussion, I just want to be aware of my ancestors in a sense. I understand that for more credibility I should be decent at the game but at the same time do all professional researchers of any arbitrary subject need hands-on?
I'm barely plat in SC2 :O Unless D is like...silver...then I have a long way to go.
D stands for Solid Diamond, D+ is low masters, C- is higherish mid masters.
D- is everything below solid diamond.
Well, now that SC2 has a lot of knowledge behind it it's hard to draw direct comparisons. Mechanically, anything not D- is masters, since that's how it was on release. If you're C ranks, you should be high masters, or even GM potentially. You don't need 200 apm to play SC2. You need 200 apm to not feel like a complete idiot in BW, and you're still terrible.
I think the answer is that SC2 lacks a major control element to combat. You simply cannot micro your way to victory with a tiny army that is well controlled, because your units just don't gain that much effectiveness with good control vs bad control. It's exactly what Day[9] has talked about, which is a "unit multiplier" from good control. In SC2 it's like 1.5 or 2x, but in BW it's like 10x for almost every unit. Without the monumental disparity between well controlled and poorly controlled armies, the game comes down more to builds and higher strategic choices like compositions, rather than execution.
I don't see SC2 ever becoming an esport with a legacy. I think it'll have its run and then die off a year or two after the final expansion.
I want to key in on both of these passages.
In the beginning of Brood War, was it not the same? I want to look for the earliest recorded "top level" games of BW I can find to see how they played compared to even a few years later. Marines, as displayed by MarineKing, Polt, Bomber, and MMA have incredible damage potential and good survivability when micro'd well. Stalkers, especially with blink, can be micro'd for high level survivability to ensure highest DPS possible. Templar, Infestor, and ghost caster units find stronger utility every time a big match is won by their useage. Even from the time I began to watch at MLG Orlando there is a much higher overall level of play, most of which is based upon micro abilities. PvP 1-base wars look tighter and tighter, ZvZ ling/bling skirmishes too.
This is my hypothesis, that the gamespeed and unit density of SC2 is what hinders the same "multiplicity" from being apparent. 60 marines > 30 marines, given equal upgrades and no major positioning or micro advantage. But what about something like mid-game 20 stalker vs 15-17 marauder? Should blink be involved, the losses could be cut substantially even to the point where the mauraders get cleaned up with minimal kills. Now extrapolate to larger plausible but uncommon engagements of double the size, 40 stalkers to 30-34 marauders (with no marines or zealot or other tech) then the same theoretical situation occurs but the blink micro is so hard in addition to target firing effectively to keep good cost effectiveness.
Knowing Terran I shall give an example. I have a nearing max army of MMMVG vs standard protoss lategame. Even within this month the pros are not making new builds, persay, but they are increasing their army control to lose less and take more in each engagement. Terrans have been making the effort to make their bio balls roam the map in three clusters to engage any open-field protoss push out from an amazing concave with no onbvious direction for archon or zealot to go and maximizing "tech snipe" ability of HT, archon, collosus, everything Protoss try to hide. The cost effectiveness goes through the roof.
All races can get better with their individual units, I believe, at the top level to make them more cost efficient. Whether they are mutalisk, siege tanks, marines, stalkers, roaches or phoenix. With current overall macro of "standard" builds such as reactor hellion in TvZ, two pros who will macro perfectly in this situation gives advantage to whoever has the better micro and it snowballs. Small lead here, incremental lead there, and a big lead end game, killed opponent and take the victory.
Whether I am correct or not is for time to tell and for more information to be observed (yay MLG/GSL!). I'd like to point out the last statement, the final SC2 expansion will probably extend SC2's life the span of BW at the moment, and given the magnitude of change toward unit composition rather than pure unit density in HotS (relative to WoL) for cost efficiency we may see more change toward that golden sweetspot BW has found in their unit control, while leaving more units for players to control in general.
I think the answer is that SC2 lacks a major control element to combat. You simply cannot micro your way to victory with a tiny army that is well controlled, because your units just don't gain that much effectiveness with good control vs bad control. It's exactly what Day[9] has talked about, which is a "unit multiplier" from good control. In SC2 it's like 1.5 or 2x, but in BW it's like 10x for almost every unit. Without the monumental disparity between well controlled and poorly controlled armies, the game comes down more to builds and higher strategic choices like compositions, rather than execution.
I don't see SC2 ever becoming an esport with a legacy. I think it'll have its run and then die off a year or two after the final expansion.
I want to key in on both of these passages.
In the beginning of Brood War, was it not the same? I want to look for the earliest recorded "top level" games of BW I can find to see how they played compared to even a few years later. Marines, as displayed by MarineKing, Polt, Bomber, and MMA have incredible damage potential and good survivability when micro'd well. Stalkers, especially with blink, can be micro'd for high level survivability to ensure highest DPS possible. Templar, Infestor, and ghost caster units find stronger utility every time a big match is won by their useage. Even from the time I began to watch at MLG Orlando there is a much higher overall level of play, most of which is based upon micro abilities. PvP 1-base wars look tighter and tighter, ZvZ ling/bling skirmishes too.
This is my hypothesis, that the gamespeed and unit density of SC2 is what hinders the same "multiplicity" from being apparent. 60 marines > 30 marines, given equal upgrades and no major positioning or micro advantage. But what about something like mid-game 20 stalker vs 15-17 marauder? Should blink be involved, the losses could be cut substantially even to the point where the mauraders get cleaned up with minimal kills. Now extrapolate to larger plausible but uncommon engagements of double the size, 40 stalkers to 30-34 marauders (with no marines or zealot or other tech) then the same theoretical situation occurs but the blink micro is so hard in addition to target firing effectively to keep good cost effectiveness.
Knowing Terran I shall give an example. I have a nearing max army of MMMVG vs standard protoss lategame. Even within this month the pros are not making new builds, persay, but they are increasing their army control to lose less and take more in each engagement. Terrans have been making the effort to make their bio balls roam the map in three clusters to engage any open-field protoss push out from an amazing concave with no onbvious direction for archon or zealot to go and maximizing "tech snipe" ability of HT, archon, collosus, everything Protoss try to hide. The cost effectiveness goes through the roof.
All races can get better with their individual units, I believe, at the top level to make them more cost efficient. Whether they are mutalisk, siege tanks, marines, stalkers, roaches or phoenix. With current overall macro of "standard" builds such as reactor hellion in TvZ, two pros who will macro perfectly in this situation gives advantage to whoever has the better micro and it snowballs. Small lead here, incremental lead there, and a big lead end game, killed opponent and take the victory.
Whether I am correct or not is for time to tell and for more information to be observed (yay MLG/GSL!). I'd like to point out the last statement, the final SC2 expansion will probably extend SC2's life the span of BW at the moment, and given the magnitude of change toward unit composition rather than pure unit density in HotS (relative to WoL) for cost efficiency we may see more change toward that golden sweetspot BW has found in their unit control, while leaving more units for players to control in general.
Cost efficiency will never reach the amount that was apparent even during the Boxers reign (arguably when BW really took off as an esport).
How about this. Bring out a calculator and calculate the cost effectiveness of Nada's bio army.
Lurker = 125 gas/125 minerals (multiply by 7)
Medic/Firebat = 50 minerals / 25 gas
How many banelings is that? (include the lings that were also suicided, a hatchery and evo chamber) How many medivacs and marines is that?
Now try and imagine a bio army as small as that accomplishing anywhere near the same thing? Its theoretically impossible.
Why never? Because marines will always die against banelings, that's how marine splitting works. You minimise the amount of damage taken to banelings. Theoretically 1 marine can kill infinite amounts of lurkers, 2 lurkers can kill infinite amounts of bio. That's how dynamic the micro is in BW.
I suggest you watch Lomo's FPVOD, imagine opening a game with 11 vikings and killing a ridiculous amount of corruptors and hydras.
It'll be somewhat of a serious blow to your credibility if you aren't at least solid D at BW imo
Thank you for the linkup! If I play terran in SC2 which race does that correlate best to in BW? I may just play for fun...
However I question why you mention the quoted text.
I don't intend to make any statements that require true credibility of myself in BW discussion, I just want to be aware of my ancestors in a sense. I understand that for more credibility I should be decent at the game but at the same time do all professional researchers of any arbitrary subject need hands-on?
I'm barely plat in SC2 :O Unless D is like...silver...then I have a long way to go.
D stands for Solid Diamond, D+ is low masters, C- is higherish mid masters.
D- is everything below solid diamond.
Well, now that SC2 has a lot of knowledge behind it it's hard to draw direct comparisons. Mechanically, anything not D- is masters, since that's how it was on release. If you're C ranks, you should be high masters, or even GM potentially. You don't need 200 apm to play SC2. You need 200 apm to not feel like a complete idiot in BW, and you're still terrible.
Bakuryu is an A+ zerg, and has 150 apm. Considering A+ is enough to compete at high level in WCG, i hardly think apm is any more important in BW than in SC2.
Its strange, apm makes a big difference in BW, but so does strategy, tactics, etc. So it balances itself out. SC2 rewards all rounded players the most, because being better at one aspect only makes a small difference.
In BW, being the best in a single aspect can make a huge difference and compensate for being low level in other areas. Consider Stork and Savior's APM which is around the 230 mark, but they are strategic geniuses, both of them S-Class players. In BW I have found players with more extremeties in style than in SC2, and this is where the whole notion of skill ceiling comes in, the ability to compensate for other skills, by having extreme skill withing a single aspect.
Imagine if MC could win with just pure sentries and forcefields (no stalkers), just like Jaedong can with mutalisks, that is the level we are talking about.
EPT
If I play terran in SC2 which race does that correlate best to in BW? I may just play for fun... ![[image loading]](http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/3953/shutdowneverything.jpg)
