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8751 Posts
If you haven't heard, an NA 5300 MMR (rank ~73 GM) player by the name of ProbeScout managed to defeat Zest in a tournament. As far as I know, ProbeScout always opens forge and proxy cannons. He did it in both of his games vs Zest to achieve the 2-0 victory.
First of all, having watched his FPVoD, my foremost reaction was empathetic happiness. It's a little sad to me that the reaction to his accomplishment is dominated by discussions of balance and game design. We are fans and viewers of a competition. A massive underdog victory by a player who seems to me to be nothing but a good-willed competitor should be something that sparks joy in us all (except diehard Zest fans but I'd hope even they could spare a moment of exploration from the other perspective and enjoy it as well).
That said, there's nothing wrong with using this event to do a little analysis of the state of the game. But I never see what I consider the most important point taken into consideration: taking control of the game. There is an extremely high value in dictating the path a game takes. Progamers can hope to force their opponent down a certain path by doing certain things that should elicit the hoped-for responses, but it's not an exact science.
Cannon-rushing remains powerful to this day because one player can completely dictate the path the game will take by making a forge and a proxy pylon. Once that is accomplished, the most important factor in determining the winner is all the technical knowledge involved in executing and defending cannon rushes. All other game knowledge and skills become mostly irrelevant.
This can happen for other builds, for normal builds. Mostly we think of aggressive builds doing this, like Parting's Soul Train, or Parting's 4gate blink, or Parting's... well, mostly we think about Parting coming up with an aggressive build and the game hinges on Parting's ability to execute it and his opponent's ability to defend it.
But it can happen for macro builds, too! Think about someone like Stats who safely expands and defends up to 3-4 bases and, at most, sends out a warp prism with 4 zealots as his only aggression before he's nearly maxed out. Such a playstyle leaves the opponent a lot of choices for attempting to crack it, but often the fact remains that only one choice doesn't cede some kind of advantage to Stats: expand and macro too. So it can be quite similar in practice: attempt to interrupt Stats's gameplan in a disadvantaged way, or follow along with his gameplan and get outplayed because he's the best macro and late game player.
Cannon-rushing is the best version of this. It's the absolute best way to dictate the path the game takes and it prunes away the maximum amount of general game knowledge and skills, making victory determined by the smallest set of skills and knowledge possible. Be better than your opponent in that small set of skills and knowledge, and you win.
Is that unfair? Is that so bad? Does it cross the line? The funny thing is that if it actually was too good, the problem would take care of itself. Cannon rushing would become so common that everyone would get better at defending it. Well, pros would. Most players are hardly getting better at all. Any solution that involves players having to learn something new and improve is not helpful to most players. That's why cannon rushing is so frustrating for most players: it's an extremely condensed and clear demonstration of their inability to do better on their 2nd, 3rd, 10th, 100th time facing the exact same thing.
Anyway, back to pros. Right now cannon rushing occupies a weird space where a few dedicated cannon rushers have elevated their cannon rushing game far beyond what any occasional cannon rusher can achieve. Any player who is not privy to what the best cannon rushers can do will absolutely lose games to them, even if they're pros. If the pros got enough practice against it, they'd become virtually immune to it. But they don't, so they aren't. And why don't they hit them on ladder, at least? Because these cannon rushers struggle to hit MMR's that match with pros, dragged down by lower win rates against zerg and terran, and dragged down by players recognizing them and metagaming them for an easier defense. And, in fact, dragged down by amateur players who get so much more practice against cannon rushers that they're better at defending it than some pros are.
I really enjoyed ProbeScout's victory from a game design perspective by respecting the power of dictating the path of the game. I'm not convinced that it's overpowered. I believe some players are far better at doing it than some other players are at defending it, but with equal practice doing it and defending it, the defender has the advantage. So that's fine. I think it'd be most excellent to see a progamer plan to do a cannon rush on a map in a bo5 and actually execute it at the level of a dedicated cannon rusher, since some progamer attempts at cannon rushing in the past have been pretty poor showings.
I personally expect to lose to a lot more cannon rushes but I hope to enjoy the process of improving against them.
 
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Good blog post NonY.
On one hand, I have always said shield batteries built outside of a Nexus's overcharge range should start with zero energy. This would practically eliminate the proxy Voidray shenanigans, but defensively they would remain the same. Balance wise I don't see an actual argument against this change.
And on the other hand, I completely agree this style of play opens a ton of cool design discussion and philosophy. If we were to never get another balance patch, this type of strategy would eventually be figured out to the point where a player like Zest could always do a very conservative build and outplay a lesser player. But I think the question is, how long of a time is that going to be? And does StarCraft need this playstyle to be guaranteed right out of the gate, no matter the MMR difference?
In my + Show Spoiler + elitist opinion, players like Clem or Zest should not be able to be trounced by 1-2k lesser players. StarCraft has always been unmatched in the e-sports world due to its true infinite skill ceiling. The fact that practically any low masters player "could" catch any top3 Protoss/Terran off guard with this play is where I find issue.
I could talk for hours on how stupid a design choice it was to make entry level, high damage output Protoss air units faster, but that's a different issue. StarCraft 2 is still my favorite and imo the best RTS ever made, but dear lord air units and proxy shield batteries have made things far more straight-and-to-the-point in certain situations.
Has is one of my favorite players, he played off meta, and his own style which lead to scrappy games, truly real-time-strategy, where things weren't just "who can click faster on 1v1 Destination no rush 10". But with voidray/batteries, anyone can be Has, but without the blank canvas. Voids/Batteries is an already placed stencil, and you can choose how much you want to fill in with the spray paint.
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Very interesting. Never really thought about cannon rushing except for the times getting cannon rushed 
Imo your arguments are comprehensible and at least in this first moment i come to the same conclussions as you do.
Thank you for this interesting view
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just my point of view as someone who does not actively play sc2 partly due to the prevalence of these types of strategies: a game where cheeses like these are so powerful is not fun. "Fun", you know, the thing that most people play video games for? Playing against stuff like it and learning how to defend it is not what I want out of an RTS game.
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8751 Posts
On October 01 2021 03:37 blabber wrote:
just my point of view as someone who does not actively play sc2 partly due to the prevalence of these types of strategies: a game where cheeses like these are so powerful is not fun. "Fun", you know, the thing that most people play video games for? Playing against stuff like it and learning how to defend it is not what I want out of an RTS game.
uhh it wouldnt be a problem for you playing it casually. this is for competitive play. like this kind of strategy is something you see on the ladder and in tournaments
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On October 01 2021 04:02 NonY wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2021 03:37 blabber wrote:
just my point of view as someone who does not actively play sc2 partly due to the prevalence of these types of strategies: a game where cheeses like these are so powerful is not fun. "Fun", you know, the thing that most people play video games for? Playing against stuff like it and learning how to defend it is not what I want out of an RTS game. uhh it wouldnt be a problem for you playing it casually. this is for competitive play. like this kind of strategy is something you see on the ladder and in tournaments
playing something for fun & playing something for competitive reasons is not necessarily mutually exclusive, IMO. I would imaging a lot of people ladder, etc for the "fun" of playing on a ladder and being competitive. For example, I'm a masters level player and have been since masters first got introduced (not trying to brag or anything since obviously you're a pro and are better at games than I will ever hope to be). I do not want to "work" on defending cannon rushes because that is stupidly dumb and not fun, IMO. It's like if spawning pools were still 150 minerals in BW and every zerg 4-pooled. I'm trying to play Starcraft, not "defend 4-pool"-craft. Anyways, I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end.
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France13015 Posts
This reminds me of my 3rax marine scv all-in in TvP during WoL days. The build was a bit more technical than it sounds at first (I gave it to a gold player and he couldn't beat people with it, in spite of them being much worse than the opponents I faced), and I had around 80% winrate with it against any protoss (pro included) in europe. It even worked on HasuObs in go4sc2 (although obviously in the bo1 stage, but it worked on Adonminus on ladder several times in a row), despite his scouting, because of the proxy locations that usually made you scout it too late (and if you scouted only the main it kinda looked like the standard expand build). The only protoss pro that managed to hard counter it without knowing it would come was french player Adelscott, because he was a paranoid scouter especially in tournaments.
While I semi frequently met pros on ladder (hard to know my exact MMR since it was hidden at the time, but I could meet Happy #1 rank), my TvZ and TvT were below 50% so I did not meet the same protoss pros a lot of time, and it would hardly work two times in a row even if the pro has not that much practice against it, but it's in the same vein of pruning away the usual "macro game" skills of the starcraft, while being a battle of this small particular skillset of properly doing the build for the attacker, while knowing the proper response and being able to anticipate it.
While I think it's a bit ridiculous to have such an upset happen in bo3, I agree that it's ultimately a non event in serious competitions. It was also fun and exciting in Nation Wars 2019 to watch the italian and finnish cannon rushers try to upset koreans players with it, but iirc it did not work even once (although one kinda worked but was a throw, probably due to nerves of cannon rushing in a live tournament). Especially in PvP / mirror you can't really be triggered about it unless this happens repeteadly.
KingCobra beating Clem and MarineLord in a row was wayy more upsetting to me, and makes me a bit sad we will most likely not get another update/patch to the game.
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On October 01 2021 06:51 blabber wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2021 04:02 NonY wrote:On October 01 2021 03:37 blabber wrote:
just my point of view as someone who does not actively play sc2 partly due to the prevalence of these types of strategies: a game where cheeses like these are so powerful is not fun. "Fun", you know, the thing that most people play video games for? Playing against stuff like it and learning how to defend it is not what I want out of an RTS game. uhh it wouldnt be a problem for you playing it casually. this is for competitive play. like this kind of strategy is something you see on the ladder and in tournaments playing something for fun & playing something for competitive reasons is not necessarily mutually exclusive, IMO. I would imaging a lot of people ladder, etc for the "fun" of playing on a ladder and being competitive. For example, I'm a masters level player and have been since masters first got introduced (not trying to brag or anything since obviously you're a pro and are better at games than I will ever hope to be). I do not want to "work" on defending cannon rushes because that is stupidly dumb and not fun, IMO. It's like if spawning pools were still 150 minerals in BW and every zerg 4-pooled. I'm trying to play Starcraft, not "defend 4-pool"-craft. Anyways, I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end.
It may be whatever floats your boat. However, what floats YOUR boat is completely arbitrary. Since you are unwilling to invest anything into the game, you choose an arbitrary element of the game to declare as "stupidly dumb and not fun" as though that is some sort of profound statement of truth that is universally accepted. There's no real reason for it. You simply don't want to learn how to play against it and seem to believe that's a valid argument for why this game element is bad for the game.
While that may be what floats your boat... you must see how that's not really helpful to anybody else. Without any argument as to why the strategy may be genuinely imbalanced, you simply offer a single subjective opinion that can't really warrant any response other than "okay".
It feels like "I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end" is just a self-protective statement to try to prevent anyone from responding after you've said something that begs continued conversation and argument.
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Very good post. Speaking as someone who mostly watches competitive SC and plays only very rarely & casually (and for stretches not at all), I definitely think it's more fun to have strategies like cannon rush be viable in competitive play. IMO some degree of unpredictability and incommensurability is pretty integral to what makes Starcraft a great ESPORT. It's not just about getting really good at one single thing, but about flexibility and strategic thinking and the ability to rapidly switch between different skill sets.
It seems like over time cheesy/aggressive strategies have generally gotten weaker and less effective and less common, which certainly has its benefits, but I very much think it should always be to some degree a part of standard competitive play. You shouldn't have to be some kind of god-mode evil genius to mix in cheese and expect it to sometimes work. Cannon rushing certainly doesn't seem to be a big problem at the top levels, but the chance that it could occasionally work/catch someone off guard is good for the game as competitive viewing experience.
Now yes, a lot of the experience of being a bad/casual player playing the ladder is just constantly failing very basic skill-checks. But that's certainly not confined to cannon rushing (and actually at the very low levels I've played at cannon rushing is one of the relatively easier skill checks to work on and eventually pass).
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On October 02 2021 07:50 Captain Peabody wrote:
Very good post. Speaking as someone who mostly watches competitive SC and plays only very rarely & casually (and for stretches not at all), I definitely think it's more fun to have strategies like cannon rush be viable in competitive play. IMO some degree of unpredictability and incommensurability is pretty integral to what makes Starcraft a great ESPORT. It's not just about getting really good at one single thing, but about flexibility and strategic thinking and the ability to rapidly switch between different skill sets.
Yeah this how I've always felt about "cheese". I remember early in Flash's career he cheesed Bisu or something and a lot of people were really mad about it and shitting on him. But most cheese is a calculated gambit, and as Nony points out it's not as if it's a strategy that is so inherently powerful that people using it always win. It's just another tool in a player's toolbox and it's tense and dramatic to watch as a spectator. There's a real lack of humility in the attitude that your opponent should play how you want them to or else they're bad and it's unfair.
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NonY dishing out the wisdom. As far as I'm concerned this is the proper, but harder, attitude towards life in general (not that I always approach things this way  ).
Guru-status achieved!
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On October 02 2021 05:57 Therapist. wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2021 06:51 blabber wrote:On October 01 2021 04:02 NonY wrote:On October 01 2021 03:37 blabber wrote:
just my point of view as someone who does not actively play sc2 partly due to the prevalence of these types of strategies: a game where cheeses like these are so powerful is not fun. "Fun", you know, the thing that most people play video games for? Playing against stuff like it and learning how to defend it is not what I want out of an RTS game. uhh it wouldnt be a problem for you playing it casually. this is for competitive play. like this kind of strategy is something you see on the ladder and in tournaments playing something for fun & playing something for competitive reasons is not necessarily mutually exclusive, IMO. I would imaging a lot of people ladder, etc for the "fun" of playing on a ladder and being competitive. For example, I'm a masters level player and have been since masters first got introduced (not trying to brag or anything since obviously you're a pro and are better at games than I will ever hope to be). I do not want to "work" on defending cannon rushes because that is stupidly dumb and not fun, IMO. It's like if spawning pools were still 150 minerals in BW and every zerg 4-pooled. I'm trying to play Starcraft, not "defend 4-pool"-craft. Anyways, I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end. It may be whatever floats your boat. However, what floats YOUR boat is completely arbitrary. Since you are unwilling to invest anything into the game, you choose an arbitrary element of the game to declare as "stupidly dumb and not fun" as though that is some sort of profound statement of truth that is universally accepted. There's no real reason for it. You simply don't want to learn how to play against it and seem to believe that's a valid argument for why this game element is bad for the game. While that may be what floats your boat... you must see how that's not really helpful to anybody else. Without any argument as to why the strategy may be genuinely imbalanced, you simply offer a single subjective opinion that can't really warrant any response other than "okay". It feels like "I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end" is just a self-protective statement to try to prevent anyone from responding after you've said something that begs continued conversation and argument.
I never argued that was imbalanced or anything, as I'm not well versed in enough in the current sc2 landscape to really know. All I know is that an (what I am guessing is) an amateur player 2-0'ing a top Korean with what is a cheese build and from what I gather, it is a very powerful & popular strategy. I'm just providing a point of view as to why some people may think it's a problem that such a thing exists in sc2. And that you can't assume everyone will just want to have to deal with it.
I will just mention that I vaguely remember tower-rushing being incredibly powerful in warcraft 3 at one point, and that ended up turning off a lot of people.
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On October 03 2021 08:00 blabber wrote:Show nested quote +On October 02 2021 05:57 Therapist. wrote:On October 01 2021 06:51 blabber wrote:On October 01 2021 04:02 NonY wrote:On October 01 2021 03:37 blabber wrote:
just my point of view as someone who does not actively play sc2 partly due to the prevalence of these types of strategies: a game where cheeses like these are so powerful is not fun. "Fun", you know, the thing that most people play video games for? Playing against stuff like it and learning how to defend it is not what I want out of an RTS game. uhh it wouldnt be a problem for you playing it casually. this is for competitive play. like this kind of strategy is something you see on the ladder and in tournaments playing something for fun & playing something for competitive reasons is not necessarily mutually exclusive, IMO. I would imaging a lot of people ladder, etc for the "fun" of playing on a ladder and being competitive. For example, I'm a masters level player and have been since masters first got introduced (not trying to brag or anything since obviously you're a pro and are better at games than I will ever hope to be). I do not want to "work" on defending cannon rushes because that is stupidly dumb and not fun, IMO. It's like if spawning pools were still 150 minerals in BW and every zerg 4-pooled. I'm trying to play Starcraft, not "defend 4-pool"-craft. Anyways, I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end. It may be whatever floats your boat. However, what floats YOUR boat is completely arbitrary. Since you are unwilling to invest anything into the game, you choose an arbitrary element of the game to declare as "stupidly dumb and not fun" as though that is some sort of profound statement of truth that is universally accepted. There's no real reason for it. You simply don't want to learn how to play against it and seem to believe that's a valid argument for why this game element is bad for the game. While that may be what floats your boat... you must see how that's not really helpful to anybody else. Without any argument as to why the strategy may be genuinely imbalanced, you simply offer a single subjective opinion that can't really warrant any response other than "okay". It feels like "I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end" is just a self-protective statement to try to prevent anyone from responding after you've said something that begs continued conversation and argument. I never argued that was imbalanced or anything, as I'm not well versed in enough in the current sc2 landscape to really know. All I know is that an (what I am guessing is) an amateur player 2-0'ing a top Korean with what is a cheese build and from what I gather, it is a very powerful & popular strategy. I'm just providing a point of view as to why some people may think it's a problem that such a thing exists in sc2. And that you can't assume everyone will just want to have to deal with it. I will just mention that I vaguely remember tower-rushing being incredibly powerful in warcraft 3 at one point, and that ended up turning off a lot of people.
Your point of view is why I've gotten totally bored of watching any type of multiplayer game nowadays. There is a very vocal group of players in anywhere from RTS to card games to fighting games who view aggressive strategies as illegitimate. The macro/zoning/control players keep blathering about how skilled they are compared to everybody else.
For casual players and viewers, I would argue that constant NR15 would bore them faster than cannon rushes would.
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On October 03 2021 08:21 andrewlt wrote:Show nested quote +On October 03 2021 08:00 blabber wrote:On October 02 2021 05:57 Therapist. wrote:On October 01 2021 06:51 blabber wrote:On October 01 2021 04:02 NonY wrote:On October 01 2021 03:37 blabber wrote:
just my point of view as someone who does not actively play sc2 partly due to the prevalence of these types of strategies: a game where cheeses like these are so powerful is not fun. "Fun", you know, the thing that most people play video games for? Playing against stuff like it and learning how to defend it is not what I want out of an RTS game. uhh it wouldnt be a problem for you playing it casually. this is for competitive play. like this kind of strategy is something you see on the ladder and in tournaments playing something for fun & playing something for competitive reasons is not necessarily mutually exclusive, IMO. I would imaging a lot of people ladder, etc for the "fun" of playing on a ladder and being competitive. For example, I'm a masters level player and have been since masters first got introduced (not trying to brag or anything since obviously you're a pro and are better at games than I will ever hope to be). I do not want to "work" on defending cannon rushes because that is stupidly dumb and not fun, IMO. It's like if spawning pools were still 150 minerals in BW and every zerg 4-pooled. I'm trying to play Starcraft, not "defend 4-pool"-craft. Anyways, I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end. It may be whatever floats your boat. However, what floats YOUR boat is completely arbitrary. Since you are unwilling to invest anything into the game, you choose an arbitrary element of the game to declare as "stupidly dumb and not fun" as though that is some sort of profound statement of truth that is universally accepted. There's no real reason for it. You simply don't want to learn how to play against it and seem to believe that's a valid argument for why this game element is bad for the game. While that may be what floats your boat... you must see how that's not really helpful to anybody else. Without any argument as to why the strategy may be genuinely imbalanced, you simply offer a single subjective opinion that can't really warrant any response other than "okay". It feels like "I get your point of view too and this is mine. It's whatever floats our boats, in the end" is just a self-protective statement to try to prevent anyone from responding after you've said something that begs continued conversation and argument. I never argued that was imbalanced or anything, as I'm not well versed in enough in the current sc2 landscape to really know. All I know is that an (what I am guessing is) an amateur player 2-0'ing a top Korean with what is a cheese build and from what I gather, it is a very powerful & popular strategy. I'm just providing a point of view as to why some people may think it's a problem that such a thing exists in sc2. And that you can't assume everyone will just want to have to deal with it. I will just mention that I vaguely remember tower-rushing being incredibly powerful in warcraft 3 at one point, and that ended up turning off a lot of people. Your point of view is why I've gotten totally bored of watching any type of multiplayer game nowadays. There is a very vocal group of players in anywhere from RTS to card games to fighting games who view aggressive strategies as illegitimate. The macro/zoning/control players keep blathering about how skilled they are compared to everybody else. For casual players and viewers, I would argue that constant NR15 would bore them faster than cannon rushes would.
yea these whiners are running aoe4 development too
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off tangent, but I still believe there should be separate MMRs for each matchup, as it's pretty much a unique game for each MU. Then the final MMR is calculated by a 'weighted average' of these MMRs i.e. the MU you played the most affects the final MMR proportionately more. Would result in better matchmaking.
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all’s fair in love and war.
having a specific playstyle or build order that forces hard choices and forces a calculated response in seconds is something that enrages the general population of players because they do not want to make hard choices make calculations or be punished for slow decision making; they want to play their game and not have to be pushed into unfamiliarity.
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i dont follow sc2, but cannon rush vs progamer and 2-0 him?
BALLER
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EPT
