EPTOn September 09 2012 11:00 Purind wrote:
I clicked this thread expecting a discussion about how in BW, you could do many many things with the same units (eg. you can build vultures and tanks every single TvP, but your playstyle can change dramatically, and the playstyle depend on how you use your units, not which units you build). The "Strategy" (in quotations) represents how a large population thinks that scouting XYZ and building ABC to COUNTER the opponent's comp, or casting sick spells is the greatest deepest strategy ever, and that we favour "strategy" like "I build units that counter your units and I win mwahaha" to depth that allows us to squeeze every advantage out of every unit we have in ways other than winning the direct confrontation
I wasn't really expecting a "SC2 ezmode" thread
I clicked this thread expecting a discussion about how in BW, you could do many many things with the same units (eg. you can build vultures and tanks every single TvP, but your playstyle can change dramatically, and the playstyle depend on how you use your units, not which units you build). The "Strategy" (in quotations) represents how a large population thinks that scouting XYZ and building ABC to COUNTER the opponent's comp, or casting sick spells is the greatest deepest strategy ever, and that we favour "strategy" like "I build units that counter your units and I win mwahaha" to depth that allows us to squeeze every advantage out of every unit we have in ways other than winning the direct confrontation
I wasn't really expecting a "SC2 ezmode" thread
There's always a chance of someone crying when unnecessary complications get phased out. Reminds me of these forums during beta. Endless, endless crying over the fact that new people might actually be able to do something. Heavens, no, we can't have that. Why not make it so you need the game to be a job to play it properly? That sounds good.
Now that my blood pressure is lower, I wanted to highlight your post because it makes a good observation. SC2 unit design is very focused on direct counters, and on stupid gimmickry. You want depth? Make units that can be used in multiple ways, make stuff that respects the the fundamental tenets of an RTS. That is to say, away with the warpgates and Oracles and other nonsense: Make units that shoot stuff. Banshees are often integrated into armies in clever ways because their way of harassment is shooting stuff and bailing out.
Same applies to Marine-Medivac drops, Zerglings, Hellions. To Stalkers and Mutas. To a small extent Zealots. The scouting is tense because they have to stay there. The harassment is tense because they have to stay there. They can be used in other ways like to pick off reinforcements because they can actually kill stuff. Marines and Zealots especially can use terrain to their advantage brilliantly. Compared to an Oracle, this is world of strategic depth (and a lot of interesting, not-tedious use of control and attention), where the Oracle just feels unsatisfying, lame and narrow. But no, Blizzard doesn't give a damn. Make Protoss more grounded and sane? NO. MORE GIMMICKS. Similar things about the Warhound and it's one-dimensional counter role (were it not the stupidly OP lolmachine it is right now).
From WoL, macro games are good right? Let's make sure Zerg can press that sddddd with the Queen change. Sure is good right? And we all know how that turned out. 14 minute super greedy Hive turned into 12 minute safe and standard one. The long game is exciting in part because you have to survive until then. Greed loses it's luster when it stops being risky. When that happens, things just turn absurd and absurdly boring.
Apart from fundamentals, what else might the game need? I'd say variety. To bring up an example from Street Fighter 4: There is a character called Ryu (you might know him!). Ryu is not difficult to control. Very simple, straightforward special moves, normal moves and general gameplan. Not terribly much in the way of minute character-specific knowledge. He's also quite good. Oh god, easymode, no? Well, yes and no. Ryu is a character that is very easy to learn, but asks players to know spacing very well because that is the only game he has. To be a pro, you have to be stupidly good at those basics. Ryu existing is a good thing because not everyone likes doing super long technical combos or the like. Some just want to play a game of spacing. Ryu allows people to do that, and to win the player is required to be good in spacing.
ey had gotten legitimately outplayed by Z players shining in the skills the Zerg faction is supposed to test. This is good.
But some people just like doing difficult things. In Street Fighter 4, there are characters like Ibuki that require players to press a lot of buttons fast to do long-ish combos. There are characters like Akuma that, while not requiring a terrible amount of super fast action, are frail, require moves to be done precisely (Akuma's moves active parts - the ones that hurt people - are very, very short), and have absurd amounts of character-specific things they need to do to compete at a high level. Then there's Gen, who combines a lot of that - he's frail, he's very basics-oriented like Ryu, but required to press a lot of buttons fast due to managing two stances, and has a fair amount of character-specific tricks.
The trick, here? All those four characters (out of 40) are viable. Some more, some less so than others. But the key thing here is that players are not required to do what they dislike - I don't have fast fingers but I can still play Ryu and Akuma competently. Someone else isn't a fan of delicate positioning, they have characters that need less of it to succeed. Some of these things are blatantly more difficult than others to do, which is fine. Learning any one of those four will mean you're able to compete.
As an example from the Magic world, my pet deck is difficult to play. I play it because I enjoy it. Do I cry because my opponent plays a simple, very aggressive deck which is hard to take on? No. Because he enjoys what he does, and if both are competent the match is fair. Both have their chances, but both need to play correctly to win. He kills the wrong combo piece, he'll suffer mightily. I play carelessly, he notices it, he kills a piece at an inopportune time and I am dead in the water. His part is undoubtedly somewhat simpler, but it is by choice I play what I play. Not like I do not have options.
An analogy from SC2 would be old TvZ if we suppose Terran is at least slightly more difficult to control: Old Zerg was a decision making and positioning based race. So you didn't have to micro as much, but you actually had to out position and outdecide the Terran opponent to win. If he had stupid good macro, you had to figure out ways around that. Even when T was a bit weaker, I often heard T players say they liked TvZ because they felt they knew why they lost. Zerg easier overall due to lesser control requirement, perhaps, but they felt that the Zerg did his part.
This is where the problem in SC2 is, where the problem with many of Blizzard's decision making trends lies: Their gimmicky instead of broad and basic unit designs, their sledgehammer patches, the game's lack of factions. They amount to a lack of viable options to play in a manner you enjoy. It is fine that Marine based styles are very demanding to control. It is not fine that they are the only viable playstyle of one faction out of three in a game (Gen is fine because he is one character out of fourty, my deck is likewise fine because it is one deck out of over half a dozen viable archetypes in the format). It is fine that muta-ling is frail and requires great awareness and good control to do well - you can just play Ling-Infestor instead which plays very differently. The recent Queen patch is not fine - Zerg doesn't have to outplay the Terran anymore to be ahead, they just are by default. In the past it was a fair enough contest.
Finally, something about the players and about the source of challenge: I have noticed that Starcraft players tend to think of player and faction relationships in a somewhat strange way. TaeJa wins, Terran is fine. Very strong players keep winning, oh my gawd, faction OP. And so on. I'd like less attention given to the faction and more to the player. Is Terran okay in WoL? No. Is TaeJa an ungodly monster from Hell? Yes. I've seen Zangief players winning vs. Sagats and Akumas (bulky guy vs. people who throw fireballs. Ludicrously hard match to win). Is the match fine? No. You can usually simply see the retardation onscreen and see how the Zangief player won through hard work and patience. The match is still stupid, the Gief is just that good. If Korean Terrans are dominating due to doing ridiculous things, the solution is to give other races ways to combat that if they do not have some already (I'd argue they did already a few patches ago) and just recognize the person as a monster. Some time ago Stephano was becoming really good. At that time I would've said Zerg was probably the best faction. Not by much, but still. Was it Zerg winning those games? To a point. But mostly it was just this French bastard seeing your Marine's toe and somehow knowing what you're doing down to the second. Then he killed you. Like the Koreans who practice a lot and rigorously to have stupidly good control, Stephano just had a godlike gamesense, the key skill to be good as Zerg. And they looked like undefeatable monsters because they were monsters. If you know to a T what your opponent is doing as Z you're going to win. Likewise if you have godlike micro, you're going to roflstomp as T. That's quite fine. Balance at a high level if you like, but please LET the monsters be monsters. If you nerf the faction so the monsters stop being monstrous and so you need to be a monster to win, what is the goddamn point anymore?
Secondly about the challenge. Things being hard to do for their own sake (default things anyway like one entire faction's macro) is typically bad and annoying. I'm kind of tired of writing more, so a simple example: A Bunker rush is stupidly easy. Make a Bunker, make some Marines, bam, insane pressure on Hatch. So OP, right? But we all know that Bunker rushing is actually a contested test of skill - that is, it depends on your opponent. Bunker rushing against a competent defense is a whole different ball game. People keep championing things being more and more difficult to do so people can be 1337 and they can lick their boots and then deride other people for wanting to be able to do things at all. They just end up being obnoxious dickheads. Why do that? If you want more skill, why not promote more ways for people to contest others? This would allow great players to outplay others more while not being tedious and irritating. So, yeah. Don't be an annoying elitist person who's no fun. Instead please, everyone, try to promote chances for everyone to have fun playing a game of Starcraft. If there's enough, Blizzard just might listen as well.
