EPTNew units:
Widow mine
Everything about the widow mine is what I want in a new unit, they are such a simple unit that does so much. It's a positional/static unit that can provide map vision/control, it can be used to defend drops and banshees as well as an offensive tool with your army. I experimented one game trying a widow mine drop opening but it seemed really ineffective, the splash damage seems quite small but its direct damage is insane, 1 shotting banshees/stalkers etc. The widow mine is just so fun to use with other units and stuff its by far the best new unit in the game for me. We need more units that work and mesh well with other units and the widow mine does this very well. In Broodwar there were tons of unit combinations that were so dynamic and worked so well with each other and were two separate units but in combination became so deadly and were so fun to play with, Defilers + Lurkers, Shuttle + Reaver, Tanks + anything, the widow mine with mech gives you this unit dynamic that has really been lacking in WoL thus far and is a lasting unit that is great for spectators as well as players.
Warhound
I don't know why I'm ever going to make tanks again, I can get a stronger, more mobile, cheaper unit which costs less supply and builds faster. The whole reason you made tanks in broodwar were for their insane range and damage and because goliaths sucked vs ground (in general) warhounds are so good vs ground I find myself feeling tanks are slow useless cost too much and are annoying now. Warhound combinations with almost any other mech or bio terran unit seemed super powerful. I played vs lastshadow last night and he went warhound + marine and warhound + marauder combos which seemed really good vs my more tank heavy pure mech combination. Vs zerg warhounds are insane too, roaches seem like utter shit vs them, as long as terran takes care of the anti air weakness (maybe go mass marine + warhound?) warhound deathballs seem unkillable. The big problem with the warhound though is the unit is just a pure 1a unit with no upgrades or anything. This unit is great but its really not too fun to play with and doesn’t have much room for any micro potential or interesting stuff.
Battle Hellions
My stance on battle hellions has been the same since day 1 of the alpha, still super good vs chargelots, lings, fairly fun to play with in general and add a nice dynamic to a terran mech army. They're like beefy firebats which is pretty much exactly what blizzard intended them for I think. There was one game last night where I was getting ling bane allined and I had literally just 4 battle hellions kill 40-50 lings and then I split them and banes did hardly any damage. One thing I hope blizzard changes is treat battle hellions differently than hellions in standard mode. When I left click battle hellions I only want to select my battle hellions not all hellions on the map. In broodwar tanks in siege mode vs tanks not sieged were treated as separate units and I want battle hellions to behave the same way.
Swarm Host
Feels like a lurker but not. Locusts also have an upgrade so they last longer which seems like an upgrade everyone will get by default 100% of the time. (just like pathogen glands I guess) Swarm hosts seemed really strong in general but I can't help but constantly wish they were just lurkers. They still serve a pretty nice positional based role which WoL desperately lacks, they’re good siege/positional units that work well with other units and for controlling areas on the map. Even though it’s not the lurker the swarm host is still pretty fun to play with and really feels alot like a lurker at the end of the day. Locusts are pretty interesting as well although I really don't think we needed more units that spawn free units. (broodlords weren’t enough?) I feel like if you turned the swarm host into some sort of reaver type thing and made locusts cost 15 or 25 but made them way more powerful (like scarabs in broodwar) this unit would be infinitely more interesting and demand way more respect/map presence. Swarm Host really feels like it should be that tier 2 domination unit that’s really expensive but kicks ass and it feels like it falls just a little short of that right now. Without support and other units they just get totally wrecked even by basic stalker/zealot forces. Swarm hosts need to demand a little more respect in my opinion…
Viper
Haven't had a chance to play with this much, I assume its still how it was in alpha even though I haven’t seen or played much with it yet. Definitely has a lot of potential and is a fun unit to play with at first glance.
Protoss I haven't played with at all yet, from what some people are saying it's the most boring of the three races right now at least in terms of new stuff added. The oracle still seems like a really cool/fun unit, the only thing I don't really like with the mineral lockdown shit is it's just like the crappy static stale WoL abilities like forcefield and fungal, abilities that aren't fun to watch pull off just "Oh he placed some forcefields” or "oh he didn't forcefield/fungal" maybe make it somehow take more skill to lockdown an entire mineral line or somehow make it better but harder to use. Or make it more fluid, abilities in general I think are more fun for spectators when there is more fluidity to how they are casted. Plague/Ensnare in broodwar kept the units in motion so the other player could react or at least try to mitigate the damage, the oracle stuff on mineral lines is just another “oh he casted it” static type thing that is cool in theory but not a lasting thing that is fun to watch or execute time after time.
Conclusion:
In general I was going mech most of my early games in all matchups, widow mine drop opening is a terrible build although it seems good in theory. The splash just doesn't seem to do enough to kill scvs in big numbers unless they stack everything and take 2 mine shots or something. Warhounds seem good vs everything in every situation. Any time I was making warhounds I was winning games easily. Terran is really fun to play, mech is the future, a huge part that makes mech going fun now is its more mobile (which sort of feels strange and is completely different than broodwar mech) also when you don't have to make siege tanks anymore its easier to go mech, never get caught unsieged again should be the warhounds slogan because it's really just a 1a unit. Goliths were the same way in broodwar except the big difference now is warhounds trash everything on the ground. If your going to have a unit trash everything with 1a either make it expensive and hard to get alot of (sort of like thor?) or change it to make it take some sort of skill to use. Warhound is a great unit but its just so damn easy to use it's not fun. Widow mines on the other hand are hard to use well and so fun to play with.
Feel like I'm sort of rambling now and saying things I've already said three times over, all in all hots is pretty fun with some really new interesting stuff, but also standard cookie cutter boring stuff that quickly could lead to becoming stale once the game gets figured out.
). Agreed its just what WOL needed. However I'd like to see the timer back. It feels just a little bit too much like the spider mine at the moment. 10 seconds is waaaay too long. I'd like to see a 2 second timer or something. Just enough to micro away the damage if you get stuck and notice it instantaneously. And obv buff the damage at the same time.
