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What makes a unit interesting?
An interesting unit is interesting because it has a unique means of attacking plus a weakness. A weakness is a property of the unit that can be used against it. For example, mutalisks have a propensity to stack up, making them vulnerable to fungal, splash damage, etc.
Mutalisk
The mutalisk is, in my view, a less interesting unit than it was in broodwar due to the change in acceleration mechanics and the micro that enabled, but the mutalisk still has a very interesting and unique means of attacking that makes it an entertaining unit.
Siege Tank
Siege tanks are an interesting unit because they have a powerful long range splash attack, but also because they have weaknesses like fire causing friendly fire, and having to go in and out of siege mode to attack.
Dark Templar
Dark Templar are interesting because they hit hard and are invisible, but they’re also incredibly soft and can’t really handle direct combat. They would not be an interesting unit if they were visible and durable -- they would be a stronger zealot. The formula for what makes a cool unit is pretty well established.
Reaver
The broodwar reaver was an interesting unit because while it had an incredibly powerful attack, the AI on it was terrible, the scarab could be dodged or simply become a dud. The reaver was also a ridiculously slow unit, almost always needing a shuttle escort.
Lurker
Would lurkers be nearly as interesting if you couldn’t dodge their attacks?
Turning to WoL units, it's easy to see why some feel that it's not as interesting to watch as Broodwar is.
Take for instance the colossus. The comic book equivilent of this unit is superman – an alien with unlimited power capable of overcoming death itself. His sole threat, kryptonite, was about as useless and anti-climactic of a weakness as possible for a comic book hero. And that’s why superman is such a boring hero – because he lacks weaknesses.
The colossus is the same. The colossus is a siege tank with twice the health that doesn’t have to be in siege mode. It can also walk over cliffs and break force fields. With such a repertoire of abilities, it needs a serious weakness in order to be an interesting unit. And I do not feel that the fact it can be targeted by anti-air is a weakness as much as it is the only effective means of attacking a colossus in most situations.
Summary
This is not a “nerf colossus” post. This is not about the colossus being too strong. The colossus wouldn’t be a more interesting unit if it did less damage or if its upgrade took longer to finish. The colossus is just one of the many WoL units that I feel are not nearly as interesting as the broodwar counterparts they’ve replaced. We could write the same for other boring units (especially the roach), and it would be just as effective of a critique.
Should the Heart of the Swarm expansion continue to improve StarCraft 2 for e-sports and spectators, the units to put on the chopping block first should first and foremost be the boring ones. (props for removing overseers to this end.)
 
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I was ready to switch to sc2 when it came out but I found my race (zerg) pretty boring.. two ranged ground units, no lurkers, no muta micro, and decisionless larva vomit and creep expand all game. Anyway I really really hope they put the lurker back in hots, but I think they've already announced all the units?
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ppl are looking forward that blizzard put bw into sc2 ui.
graphic and command issues are why bw is out
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On February 18 2012 15:51 winthrop wrote:
ppl are looking forward that blizzard put bw into sc2 ui.
graphic and command issues are why bw is out
a unit selection limit would essentially eliminate deathball syndrome
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Well said.
Collossi (SC2) vs Reavers (BW)
Hellions (SC2) vs Vultures (BW)
Thors (SC2) vs Goliaths (BW) <-- Also the new HotS goliath (maddog or whatever the fuck) looks terrible.
Hydralisks (SC2) vs Hydralisks (BW) <--- enough said, really. Fuck roaches.
Swarm Host (HotS) vs Lurkers (BW) <-- I'm really not at all convinced by SH, but I'll give it a shot I guess.
Mothership (SC2) vs Arbiters (BW)
High Templar (SC2) vs High Templar (BW) <-- Thank smartcast for this nonsense.
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On February 18 2012 16:01 Hinanawi wrote:
Well said.
Collossi (SC2) vs Reavers (BW)
Hellions (SC2) vs Vultures (BW)
Thors (SC2) vs Goliaths (BW) <-- Also the new HotS goliath (maddog or whatever the fuck) looks terrible.
Hydralisks (SC2) vs Hydralisks (BW) <--- enough said, really. Fuck roaches.
Swarm Host (HotS) vs Lurkers (BW) <-- I'm really not at all convinced by SH, but I'll give it a shot I guess.
Mothership (SC2) vs Arbiters (BW)
High Templar (SC2) vs High Templar (BW) <-- Thank smartcast for this nonsense.
"maddog" LOL. arent they called "hellhound"?
I as a zerg player dont need dark swarm and lurkers back though. they just promote turtling.
But more micro-intense units(especially with zerg) would be great
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On February 18 2012 16:01 Hinanawi wrote:
Well said.
Collossi (SC2) vs Reavers (BW)
Hellions (SC2) vs Vultures (BW)
Thors (SC2) vs Goliaths (BW) <-- Also the new HotS goliath (maddog or whatever the fuck) looks terrible.
Hydralisks (SC2) vs Hydralisks (BW) <--- enough said, really. Fuck roaches.
Swarm Host (HotS) vs Lurkers (BW) <-- I'm really not at all convinced by SH, but I'll give it a shot I guess.
Mothership (SC2) vs Arbiters (BW)
High Templar (SC2) vs High Templar (BW) <-- Thank smartcast for this nonsense. Actually, the hydralisk is one of the few boring units in broodwar (along with the zealot and MM... I guess every race needs a boring unit). Admittedly they are weak against storm, seige tanks, and MM. But just having a counter shouldn't count as a weakness in the sense of making a unit interesting.
For SC2 I think banelings meet the criteria (and, I guess, so do scourge in BW).
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On February 18 2012 16:21 munchmunch wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2012 16:01 Hinanawi wrote:
Well said.
Collossi (SC2) vs Reavers (BW)
Hellions (SC2) vs Vultures (BW)
Thors (SC2) vs Goliaths (BW) <-- Also the new HotS goliath (maddog or whatever the fuck) looks terrible.
Hydralisks (SC2) vs Hydralisks (BW) <--- enough said, really. Fuck roaches.
Swarm Host (HotS) vs Lurkers (BW) <-- I'm really not at all convinced by SH, but I'll give it a shot I guess.
Mothership (SC2) vs Arbiters (BW)
High Templar (SC2) vs High Templar (BW) <-- Thank smartcast for this nonsense. Actually, the hydralisk is one of the few boring units in broodwar (along with the zealot and MM... I guess every race needs a boring unit). Admittedly they are weak against storm, seige tanks, and MM. But just having a counter shouldn't count as a weakness in the sense of making a unit interesting. For SC2 I think banelings meet the criteria (and, I guess, so do scourge in BW).
The BW Hydralisks did look and sound so much cooler.
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ummm, if they remove the colossus, what exactly would you do to counter the terran bio ball? and dont say high templars b/c ghosts are rather effective....
the worst unit in sc2 is the hydralisk. it was so baller in sc:bw, and now it just sucks. =(
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The HoTS replacement for the Thor is called the Warhound, and looks like an SCV on stilts. I guess they're trying really hard to avoid making them look like goliaths but aren't too creative either  .
On February 18 2012 16:29 dAPhREAk wrote:
ummm, if they remove the colossus, what exactly would you do to counter the terran bio ball? and dont say high templars b/c ghosts are rather effective....
the worst unit in sc2 is the hydralisk. it was so baller in sc:bw, and now it just sucks. =(
Carriers are pretty bad too.
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On February 18 2012 16:29 dAPhREAk wrote:
ummm, if they remove the colossus, what exactly would you do to counter the terran bio ball? and dont say high templars b/c ghosts are rather effective....
the worst unit in sc2 is the hydralisk. it was so baller in sc:bw, and now it just sucks. =(
Reavers? Imagine the rape some well-microed reavers could inflict on bioballs.
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On February 18 2012 16:51 Hinanawi wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2012 16:29 dAPhREAk wrote:
ummm, if they remove the colossus, what exactly would you do to counter the terran bio ball? and dont say high templars b/c ghosts are rather effective....
the worst unit in sc2 is the hydralisk. it was so baller in sc:bw, and now it just sucks. =( Reavers? Imagine the rape some well-microed reavers could inflict on bioballs.
Too much. You don't need to imagine, reavers ARE in the game. Just not available in the standard gamemode. SC2 Reavers are almost identical to BW Reavers, except that they aren't dumb and fire a pair of scarabs that hit the same target for 62.5 damage each.
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On February 18 2012 16:53 Demonhunter04 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2012 16:51 Hinanawi wrote:On February 18 2012 16:29 dAPhREAk wrote:
ummm, if they remove the colossus, what exactly would you do to counter the terran bio ball? and dont say high templars b/c ghosts are rather effective....
the worst unit in sc2 is the hydralisk. it was so baller in sc:bw, and now it just sucks. =( Reavers? Imagine the rape some well-microed reavers could inflict on bioballs. Too much. You don't need to imagine, reavers ARE in the game. Just not available in the standard gamemode. SC2 Reavers are almost identical to BW Reavers, except that they aren't dumb and fire a pair of scarabs that hit the same target for 62.5 damage each.
Tweak them, and buff Terran mech. Bioballs against P just feels wrong anyway.
Whoops, there's me wanting to turn SC2 into the 'exact same game as BW' again.
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On February 18 2012 17:04 Hinanawi wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2012 16:53 Demonhunter04 wrote:On February 18 2012 16:51 Hinanawi wrote:On February 18 2012 16:29 dAPhREAk wrote:
ummm, if they remove the colossus, what exactly would you do to counter the terran bio ball? and dont say high templars b/c ghosts are rather effective....
the worst unit in sc2 is the hydralisk. it was so baller in sc:bw, and now it just sucks. =( Reavers? Imagine the rape some well-microed reavers could inflict on bioballs. Too much. You don't need to imagine, reavers ARE in the game. Just not available in the standard gamemode. SC2 Reavers are almost identical to BW Reavers, except that they aren't dumb and fire a pair of scarabs that hit the same target for 62.5 damage each. Tweak them, and buff Terran mech. Bioballs against P just feels wrong anyway. Whoops, there's me wanting to turn SC2 into the 'exact same game as BW' again.
I think Blizzard really wants to avoid randomness now, as they have nothing in SC2 that's really random. It'd be nice to see a nerf that makes the reaver exciting to watch but hard to use without randomizing the scarabs, but until then, I don't see the reaver coming into SC2.
EDIT: Siege tanks, Hellions, and Thors have all been nerfed several times because they were too strong, by the way.
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don't forget the arbitor -> mothership change :\
man i really wanted to like SC2, but blizzard fucked up 
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On February 18 2012 17:15 Demonhunter04 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 18 2012 17:04 Hinanawi wrote:On February 18 2012 16:53 Demonhunter04 wrote:On February 18 2012 16:51 Hinanawi wrote:On February 18 2012 16:29 dAPhREAk wrote:
ummm, if they remove the colossus, what exactly would you do to counter the terran bio ball? and dont say high templars b/c ghosts are rather effective....
the worst unit in sc2 is the hydralisk. it was so baller in sc:bw, and now it just sucks. =( Reavers? Imagine the rape some well-microed reavers could inflict on bioballs. Too much. You don't need to imagine, reavers ARE in the game. Just not available in the standard gamemode. SC2 Reavers are almost identical to BW Reavers, except that they aren't dumb and fire a pair of scarabs that hit the same target for 62.5 damage each. Tweak them, and buff Terran mech. Bioballs against P just feels wrong anyway. Whoops, there's me wanting to turn SC2 into the 'exact same game as BW' again. I think Blizzard really wants to avoid randomness now, as they have nothing in SC2 that's really random.
I never really understood that since I always though that was one of the most interesting unit weaknesses.
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Warpgate and Sentry are 2 large parts of why i find protoss really are alot less fun to play than in BW.
I would like to try and see how the game would do without macro mechanics, but i dont have much against them.
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Replacing the Colossus with a tweaked Reaver would solve pretty much all of Terran's problems late game in TvP, because the current issue is that you have to overmake Vikings to kill the Colossi, then have nothing left to actually fight the rest of the army.
Reavers wouldn't scale nearly as well with the rest of the army, because you couldn't just a-move them, microing a bit to let Stalkers kill Vikings. You would have to babysit them near the front of your army, maybe with Warp Prisms, and it would make them easier to pick off with Marauders (stimmed) etc. Then Vikings could be used for what they were intended to be used for - anti-air, rather than anti-Colossus.
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I completely fucking agree with OP.
The Colossus is the number one most boring fucking unit in SC2, and I absolutely hate it. I was praying they'd take it out for HotS, but they're not... ugh.
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EPT
