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ill start off by saying, after searching for various terms relating to this search i didnt find anything relevant to what i actually want to convey but ive read several posts on the contrary to what i believe.
So there has been numerous countless issues with unit pathing in sc2, people complaining about gateways trapping units between pylons, units getting stuck in places they should, workers taking an extensively long path to get to minerals or a geyser.
yet i still found nothing relating to how STUPID the broodwar unit pathing is,i played wc3 before sc2 and had not played sc1 (bw wasnt out when i had sc1) since i got my very first pc with its fantastic 2gb hard drive and 1.2ghz processor, with a whopping 128mb of ram.
i digress, unit pathing i feel is such an important issue in sc2 that they scrapped the system totally from broodwar, clogging on ramps/bridges/chokes means you lose units on broodwar, as your units will for some reason try to find the longest way around the map when there is a single other unit blocking them (even when its your own units!)
i have a feeling im going to have alot of people telling me to stfu because of this post, and alot of people saying l2p, yes, i agree my unit control isnt the best it could be on broodwar but i never really considered getting units up and down ramps a big part of the micro-management.
on the other hand my unit control in sc2 is (id like to think) above average, dont get me wrong, i dont have a gripe with the entire bw control system, i actually appreciate watching good players even more now that i know what it entails to even move your units around the map.
really the topic i started this off with is simple, why have i seen so many complaints reflecting onto the pathing system on sc2, i know it has its flaws, but compared to broodwar its come a long LONG way,
of course there is always going to be the bw purists who dislike the pathing system in sc2 for no real reason other than its different
so with all that said my final thought and possibly a question to you all is, what do you make of the intelligent pathing systems in place in sc2 as opposed to broodwar?
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broodwar isn't a better game than sc2 but the way things worked out with how bad alot of features are (12 unit selection limit, tons of bugs that greatly increased the skillcap, unit pathing being so bad etc) due to the fact the game was made 50 years ago, it's amazing to watch/play and requires ungodly amounts of skill. If you're not ready to guide your dragoons every step of the way on anything that isn't a completely open field then too bad, because for the people who can do it while still managing everything else it's extremely rewarding. I would not call SC2 "dumbed down", and the best player still wins 95% of the time in SC2, just like BW, but due to the massive interface improvements (which are great, and i'm not bashing them) it's no doubt a far easier game than broodwar. Using skill to get around the archaic interface, pathing issues etc are the reasons BW is such a great game and thats why we're able to watch korean players in total awe.
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On June 09 2010 22:54 faction123 wrote:
broodwar isn't a better game than sc2 but the way things worked out with how bad alot of features are (12 unit selection limit, tons of bugs that greatly increased the skillcap, unit pathing being so bad etc) due to the fact the game was made 50 years ago, it's amazing to watch/play and requires ungodly amounts of skill. If you're not ready to guide your dragoons every step of the way on anything that isn't a completely open field then too bad, because for the people who can do it while still managing everything else it's extremely rewarding. I would not call SC2 "dumbed down", and the best player still wins 95% of the time in SC2, just like BW, but due to the massive interface improvements (which are great, and i'm not bashing them) it's no doubt a far easier game than broodwar. Using skill to get around the archaic interface, pathing issues etc are the reasons BW is such a great game and thats why we're able to watch korean players in total awe.
this.
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The only reason units in BW dont clump is because they occupy a 2D space with a set amount of pixels instead of a 3d space hence limiting the amount of stuff that can pass through in a certain time. If you think they don't clump, play TvP with bio against HT and see what happens. The other problem with the 2d engine is that only a certain amount of pixels can go through the ramp which is a certain amount of pixels, causing really weird pathing for large units with a large amount of pixels. The pathing is completely weird, that also allows for wall ins for T, and forge FE's for protoss to prevent ling runbys through really awkward looking stuff. It's the 2d interface more than the AI pathing imo. But again remember that SC2 ramps are much larger too than BW ramps, goons won't have the same problems with a python ramp in comparison to let's say a Luna ramp because it's much larger.
Honestly though, proper rally points will solve all your problems for BW, unless you are playing on sin peaks, but then you have to be skilled to play that anyways.
I really don't like the clumping movement of SC2, but that's only due to 3d unit design, for small units in BW(lings,rines) clump just as bad, you just dont notice it as much because the resolution is lower and they take up a much larger in game space due to the 2d interface.
Edit: Just remember because of that clunky 2d interface with huge units you get the epic mid-late game battles that take up screens, storms that cover entire screens, protoss engaging seige tank lines that take up a quarter of the map. Units being larger makes the game and the battles feel a lot more epic, BW 200/200 battles were much more awesome to look at in comparison to SC2 200/200 battles(see Idra vs Ra on metropolis).
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Simply increasing the bounding box sizes for the units would reduce clumping in SC2.
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I'd say the main reason people don't complain very much is that old BW players (especially those who still favor the game over SC2) tend to enjoy the insane amount of babysitting you need to be doing in the game.
And I have to admit I definitely belong in that group; SC2 is just so user friendly it disgusts me.
That being said the game is of course very competitive and the better player usually wins but I think the "skills" what will allow future SC2 progamers to get ahead are gonna be very different from the ones needed in BW.
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It's more than just the magic box mechanic. Say you have a group of 12 lings. (BW) Even though they easily fit inside the magic box, yhey will spread out into a single-file line if you just give them a single move command.
BW units are all very finicky about having enough space around them, and if you want have baller micro, you have to be mindful of that. The SC2 pathing engine implements a few things that make big changes to the way units move, mainly that each unit predicts the path of other units, and will alter their own path to make more room for the others. This makes controlling and splitting up small groups less important.
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yeah lol the unit pathing is better in SC2 but that's a part of what makes BW more fun to play , when you dodge lurkers or spread your marines and make manual arcs and so on...It's a part of what's fun in battle ,not just charging and casting a few spells then retreating with your massive ball(wich you can do in Bw too if you've got the mechanichs to actually control your army decently)
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On June 09 2010 23:13 samachking wrote:
The only reason units in BW dont clump is because they occupy a 2D space with a set amount of pixels instead of a 3d space hence limiting the amount of stuff that can pass through in a certain time. If you think they don't clump, play TvP with bio against HT and see what happens. The other problem with the 2d engine is that only a certain amount of pixels can go through the ramp which is a certain amount of pixels, causing really weird pathing for large units with a large amount of pixels. The pathing is completely weird, that also allows for wall ins for T, and forge FE's for protoss to prevent ling runbys through really awkward looking stuff. It's the 2d interface more than the AI pathing imo. But again remember that SC2 ramps are much larger too than BW ramps, goons won't have the same problems with a python ramp in comparison to let's say a Luna ramp because it's much larger.
Honestly though, proper rally points will solve all your problems for BW, unless you are playing on sin peaks, but then you have to be skilled to play that anyways.
I really don't like the clumping movement of SC2, but that's only due to 3d unit design, for small units in BW(lings,rines) clump just as bad, you just dont notice it as much because the resolution is lower and they take up a much larger in game space due to the 2d interface.
Edit: Just remember because of that clunky 2d interface with huge units you get the epic mid-late game battles that take up screens, storms that cover entire screens, protoss engaging seige tank lines that take up a quarter of the map. Units being larger makes the game and the battles feel a lot more epic, BW 200/200 battles were much more awesome to look at in comparison to SC2 200/200 battles(see Idra vs Ra on metropolis).
fantastic post, very well thought out and supremely informative, id never really given much thought to the 2d engine having alot to do with unit pathing, similar to the way you can hide small units (workers/rines/lings/blings) behind buildings in sc2 without them being at all visable (due to the 3d engine).
i much prefer the BW forum on TL as there is hardened vets of the game, as opposed to all the newbies (such as my self) that sc2 attracted.
sometimes i feel sorry for the mods when i think of the huge influx of visitors and spam posts they have had to take on due to sc2 making RTS a mainstream genre once again.
either way its super nice to have everybodys input in a topic i feel strongly about, and as mentioned in the post i quoted (a topic i covered very breifly in the OP) the crazy unit pathing makes for brilliant games in BW.
also one other thing, DROPSHIPS! i find them to be alot more micro intensive than in sc2 due to the improved AI of the dropship, in bw it will drop 3-4rines and still have half a load due to it not actually moving to drop the others in open space, where as the drop ships in sc2 will physically force units out of the way to unload them
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tl;dr (all). Do you think that getting a 200/200 army up a ramp in 4 seconds like in sc2 is better then?
User was temp banned for this post.
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If you think thats cool, watch some pro games (TvT's) where they unload 6+ seperate moving dropships completely in 5 seconds.
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On June 10 2010 00:32 eth3real wrote:
tl;dr (all). Do you think that getting a 200/200 army up a ramp in 4 seconds like in sc2 is better then?
if you had actually bothered to read the OP you wouldnt be asking stupid questions like that, why bother posting on this thread at all?
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On June 10 2010 00:33 D-Lite wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 00:32 eth3real wrote:
tl;dr (all). Do you think that getting a 200/200 army up a ramp in 4 seconds like in sc2 is better then? if you had actually bothered to read the OP you wouldnt be asking stupid questions like that, why bother posting on this thread at all?
Read it and I don't know why you called my question stupid because you didn't adress anything remotely like it in the OP.
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On June 10 2010 00:33 D-Lite wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 00:32 eth3real wrote:
tl;dr (all). Do you think that getting a 200/200 army up a ramp in 4 seconds like in sc2 is better then? if you had actually bothered to read the OP you wouldnt be asking stupid questions like that, why bother posting on this thread at all?
But you complained about that...
The ramp is suppose to be a strategic location that you defend. You would never a-move up a ramp in sc1 because stuff would glitch out and you would lose units. That's part of the strategy of BW
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It's not that we don't want improved unit pathing, its that the ramp is no longer a very strategic point on the map. As long as you can see up the ramp, it provides almost no strategic positioning.
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No body addresses it because everyone is used to it. But ya.. Ramps suck.
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After going back to BW since playing WoL, it amazes me how unbelievably frustrating BW is. Yea, it takes significantly more skill (solely due to an absolutely terrible UI by today's standards), but it's all just frustrating crap that makes me want to gouge out by eyeballs - I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. I for one am glad that the archaic crap is gone - it leaves more room for skill to develop based on actual strategy/doing things instead of managing a terrible UI. Granted, WoL isn't there yet and definitely doesn't take as much skill as BW, but games need to evolve and not rely on meticulous, boring tasks in order to have a higher skill ceiling. WoL is (trying to) take us in that direction.
But you complained about that...
The ramp is suppose to be a strategic location that you defend. You would never a-move up a ramp in sc1 because stuff would glitch out and you would lose units. That's part of the strategy of BW
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It's not that we don't want improved unit pathing, its that the ramp is no longer a very strategic point on the map. As long as you can see up the ramp, it provides almost no strategic positioning.
That isn't the issue at all. The issue is that in terms of game mechanics is it isn't nearly as destructive to A-move up a ramp - due to high ground advantage being much smaller than in BW, you can't punish people for trying to go up ramps as much. It has very little to do with the pathing. That "strategy" was just an incredibly annoying side-effect of the pathing.
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I don't have anything to add to the topic since I think the posters before me have already provided very good reasons, but I'd just like to point out the maturity of the posts in this thread. Now I remember what I'm missing out on in the SC2 forums with all those Internet winners over there T_T
Oh, I would like to point out that the pathing in SC1 exaggerated the mobility discrepancies between the races. I loved it 
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ill leave it at this, its pretty clear people think im complaining about something when i actually stated in the OP im not complaining about anything at all, just high lighting an issue a bw newbie such as my self has noticed, and why there really isnt that much information on it.
id just like to say thanks to the people who input relevant information and provided theorys/answers
and id like to say to the ignorant few, please read posts before you jump in with your 2 cents
and yeah faction123, drop ship play is something i really admire in broodwar by pro's, it amazes me how they can act so fast and so controlled
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On June 09 2010 23:13 samachking wrote:
The only reason units in BW dont clump is because they occupy a 2D space with a set amount of pixels instead of a 3d space hence limiting the amount of stuff that can pass through in a certain time. This is 100% wrong, the colision detection in sc2 is just as 2d as in BW. SC2 is a 2d game displayed in 3 dimensions, the gameplay is still 100% 2d.
The pathfinding logic used in sc2 is exactly the same as the one used in BW. Which is also exactly the same used of pretty much any other game that ever existed. Pathfinding is a very known science that any average computer science student knows of. There aren't much new tricks to how it's made in the last decades.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pathfinding
The pathing in WC3 and SC2 only feels smoother than the one in BW because the calculations are done faster. Pathfinding is a very CPU intensive process and it's what games spend most of their processing time doing. Since at the time BW launched the computers were slower, if Blizzard pushed too much into the pathfinding the game would slow down. So they simply made units look for new paths less often and used less "pixels" (known as threads) to calculate paths. So computers of 10 years ago wouldn't crash.
In SC2 and WC3, since computers are now faster, Blizzard just made units recalculate more often and use more threads to calculate it. Since now computers can handle it. Other than that, the system is exactly the same. The only difference between BW and SC2 pathing is that SC2 is faster. Nothing else. All those dragoons getting blocked in ramps are just symptoms of units not re-calculating their paths more often into smaller threads.
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for those players thinking that the tremendous amount of skill needed to play BW is figuring out unit pathing- your wrong.
SCBW has a less sophisticated than SC2 or other newer rts, but to say that unit pathing defines BW is grossly inaccurate. Doing so is an extremely obtuse view of the game imo.
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On June 10 2010 02:05 Misrah wrote:
for those players thinking that the tremendous amount of skill needed to play BW is figuring out unit pathing- your wrong.
SCBW has a less sophisticated than SC2 or other newer rts, but to say that unit pathing defines BW is grossly inaccurate. Doing so is an extremely obtuse view of the game imo.
Noone said that but it's one of many things that together adds up to increase the skill ceiling.
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On June 09 2010 22:46 D-Lite wrote:
on the other hand my unit control in sc2 is (id like to think) above average, dont get me wrong, i dont have a gripe with the entire bw control system, i actually appreciate watching good players even more now that i know what it entails to even move your units around the map.
So what, you can kite?
I hate the sc2 unit pathing. At least in Broodwar, units moved in a line. Like a parade. And who doesn't like a parade? But in sc2, units are just like, "hey we need to move from point A to point B. I know! let's have an orgy on the way. wooo"
All the ground units in sc2 are men.
sc2 unit pathing is gay
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I find it much easier to make my units do what I want in SC1. It's easier to create arcs when the units string out. It's easier to position units when they don't shove each other around. It's easier to select units when they actually occupy the space they're drawn in. (Bizarrely, it's air units that try to maintain a respectful distance from each other, even though they don't take up space...)
I think 1a or 1a2a syndrome is harder to break in SC2 (people did it in SC1, it was just 1a2a3a and maybe 4a) because it's actually harder to separate and position your units.
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rule 1
dumber units = smarter players
welcome to SC
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On June 10 2010 01:47 VIB wrote:Show nested quote +On June 09 2010 23:13 samachking wrote:
The only reason units in BW dont clump is because they occupy a 2D space with a set amount of pixels instead of a 3d space hence limiting the amount of stuff that can pass through in a certain time. This is 100% wrong, the colision detection in sc2 is just as 2d as in BW. SC2 is a 2d game displayed in 3 dimensions, the gameplay is still 100% 2d. The pathfinding logic used in sc2 is exactly the same as the one used in BW. Which is also exactly the same used of pretty much any other game that ever existed. Pathfinding is a very known science that any average computer science student knows of. There aren't much new tricks to how it's made in the last decades. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PathfindingThe pathing in WC3 and SC2 only feels smoother than the one in BW because the calculations are done faster. Pathfinding is a very CPU intensive process and it's what games spend most of their processing time doing. Since at the time BW launched the computers were slower, if Blizzard pushed too much into the pathfinding the game would slow down. So they simply made units look for new paths less often and used less "pixels" (known as threads) to calculate paths. So computers of 10 years ago wouldn't crash. In SC2 and WC3, since computers are now faster, Blizzard just made units recalculate more often and use more threads to calculate it. Since now computers can handle it. Other than that, the system is exactly the same. The only difference between BW and SC2 pathing is that SC2 is faster. Nothing else. All those dragoons getting blocked in ramps are just symptoms of units not re-calculating their paths more often into smaller threads.
Thanks for the correction and really informative post ^__^. I felt the pathing was similar in both games, but I thought it was due to the 2d spacing rather than the computer calculating pathways, thanks for the correction, I guess this makes sense. But again units in BW still felt like they clumped less( despite clumping i.e moving unseiged tanks) in comparison to SC2 units because they took up more space in general, but I guess pathways work for both, but it's messed up at BW ramps or weird places due to pathfinding I suppose.
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10387 Posts
On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction.
...What the hell have you been doing?
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Learn to balance move and a-move. Noobs!
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On June 10 2010 05:53 ArvickHero wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. ...What the hell have you been doing?
If you tell a bunch of Dragoons to move across a small bridge, some will inevitably walk the opposite direction for a certain amount of time because they tried to find a new path due to the fact that other Dragoons block their path. They'll walk a different direction for a certain amount of time before turning around again and actually walking across the bridge. It's the same with ramps and small chokes.
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On June 10 2010 07:06 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 05:53 ArvickHero wrote:On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. ...What the hell have you been doing? If you tell a bunch of Dragoons to move across a small bridge, some will inevitably walk the opposite direction for a certain amount of time because they tried to find a new path due to the fact that other Dragoons block their path. They'll walk a different direction for a certain amount of time before turning around again and actually walking across the bridge. It's the same with ramps and small chokes.
but with proper control you can make them seamlessly move across, if you a move them yeah of course some are gonna stop in the middle to attack andblock the path of the others and cause them to try to find another way around, but obviously the solution is to manually control your units which is just one of the many reasons bw is an amazingly skillful game vs sc2
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The pathfinding logic used in sc2 is exactly the same as the one used in BW. Which is also exactly the same used of pretty much any other game that ever existed. Pathfinding is a very known science that any average computer science student knows of. There aren't much new tricks to how it's made in the last decades.
Not true - flowfield pathing is pretty new and only recent games use it (SupCom may have been the first - please correct me if I'm wrong). That didn't exist back in 1998. Like you say - it wouldn't be possible on decade old computers.
This demonstrates the difference pretty well:
+ Show Spoiler +
Pathing feels different in SC2 because it's done differently. Collision detection is only a small part of it; collision avoidance has a higher priority when it comes to pathing (Brood War basically didn't have any  ).
If you tried this in brood war you would be waiting for a very long time:
+ Show Spoiler +
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On June 10 2010 07:12 faction123 wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 07:06 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 05:53 ArvickHero wrote:On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. ...What the hell have you been doing? If you tell a bunch of Dragoons to move across a small bridge, some will inevitably walk the opposite direction for a certain amount of time because they tried to find a new path due to the fact that other Dragoons block their path. They'll walk a different direction for a certain amount of time before turning around again and actually walking across the bridge. It's the same with ramps and small chokes. but with proper control you can make them seamlessly move across, if you a move them yeah of course some are gonna stop in the middle to attack andblock the path of the others and cause them to try to find another way around, but obviously the solution is to manually control your units which is just one of the many reasons bw is an amazingly skillful game vs sc2
The problem is that the thing that causes the game to require more skill is simply old and outdated programming that's frustrating. It's a terrible design philosophy to have to rely on archaic UI's in order to force the skill ceiling higher. Games should be evolving to make the skill ceiling raise with deeper strategic thinking and more interesting and complicated tasks. It shouldn't rely on bugs and a crappy UI.
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It's hard for a large group to move through a narrow passage, and often requires someone directing the flow of traffic if you want it to happen quickly. I dunno why it's unfair and 'outdated programming' for the game to reflect that truth.
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On June 10 2010 08:41 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 07:12 faction123 wrote:On June 10 2010 07:06 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 05:53 ArvickHero wrote:On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. ...What the hell have you been doing? If you tell a bunch of Dragoons to move across a small bridge, some will inevitably walk the opposite direction for a certain amount of time because they tried to find a new path due to the fact that other Dragoons block their path. They'll walk a different direction for a certain amount of time before turning around again and actually walking across the bridge. It's the same with ramps and small chokes. but with proper control you can make them seamlessly move across, if you a move them yeah of course some are gonna stop in the middle to attack andblock the path of the others and cause them to try to find another way around, but obviously the solution is to manually control your units which is just one of the many reasons bw is an amazingly skillful game vs sc2 The problem is that the thing that causes the game to require more skill is simply old and outdated programming that's frustrating. It's a terrible design philosophy to have to rely on archaic UI's in order to force the skill ceiling higher. Games should be evolving to make the skill ceiling raise with deeper strategic thinking and more interesting and complicated tasks. It shouldn't rely on bugs and a crappy UI.
So you think the macro mechanics should be removed? (Or at least, allow more options, like autocast)
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On June 10 2010 08:54 Severedevil wrote:
It's hard for a large group to move through a narrow passage, and often requires someone directing the flow of traffic if you want it to happen quickly. I dunno why it's unfair and 'outdated programming' for the game to reflect that truth.
It's also really hard to shoot flesheating bouncing worms at people.
Trotting something like the realism argument out brings the level of the forum down.
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Pathing is fine in broodwar. As loads of people have already stated, it's the fact the broodwar is hard to play that makes it fun.
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On June 10 2010 07:44 cloudica wrote:Show nested quote +The pathfinding logic used in sc2 is exactly the same as the one used in BW. Which is also exactly the same used of pretty much any other game that ever existed. Pathfinding is a very known science that any average computer science student knows of. There aren't much new tricks to how it's made in the last decades. Not true - flowfield pathing is pretty new and only recent games use it (SupCom may have been the first - please correct me if I'm wrong). That didn't exist back in 1998. Like you say - it wouldn't be possible on decade old computers. This demonstrates the difference pretty well: + Show Spoiler +http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tGEDppMsHk Pathing feels different in SC2 because it's done differently. Collision detection is only a small part of it; collision avoidance has a higher priority when it comes to pathing (Brood War basically didn't have any ).If you tried this in brood war you would be waiting for a very long time: + Show Spoiler +http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukmd3-C92ic
Indeed. The pathing ai of BW considers other units as simple obstructions, no different from static terrain or dodads. Each unit does not consider the movements of other units, hence why they make no effort to 'unblock' ramps and chokepoints.
This problem is 'fixed' in SC2, however it is also worth noting that units will in fact 'artifically' clump (more than in BW) as their normal bounding boxes are actually compromised when they move (as can be seen in the video).
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I would really love a nice balance between BW's 'wtf are my dragoons doing' and SC2's ridiculous unit bunching. =/
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cant believe you posted sumperme commander 2 rofl it looks so dumb
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On June 10 2010 04:47 samachking wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 01:47 VIB wrote:On June 09 2010 23:13 samachking wrote:
The only reason units in BW dont clump is because they occupy a 2D space with a set amount of pixels instead of a 3d space hence limiting the amount of stuff that can pass through in a certain time. This is 100% wrong, the colision detection in sc2 is just as 2d as in BW. SC2 is a 2d game displayed in 3 dimensions, the gameplay is still 100% 2d. The pathfinding logic used in sc2 is exactly the same as the one used in BW. Which is also exactly the same used of pretty much any other game that ever existed. Pathfinding is a very known science that any average computer science student knows of. There aren't much new tricks to how it's made in the last decades. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PathfindingThe pathing in WC3 and SC2 only feels smoother than the one in BW because the calculations are done faster. Pathfinding is a very CPU intensive process and it's what games spend most of their processing time doing. Since at the time BW launched the computers were slower, if Blizzard pushed too much into the pathfinding the game would slow down. So they simply made units look for new paths less often and used less "pixels" (known as threads) to calculate paths. So computers of 10 years ago wouldn't crash. In SC2 and WC3, since computers are now faster, Blizzard just made units recalculate more often and use more threads to calculate it. Since now computers can handle it. Other than that, the system is exactly the same. The only difference between BW and SC2 pathing is that SC2 is faster. Nothing else. All those dragoons getting blocked in ramps are just symptoms of units not re-calculating their paths more often into smaller threads. Thanks for the correction and really informative post ^__^. I felt the pathing was similar in both games, but I thought it was due to the 2d spacing rather than the computer calculating pathways, thanks for the correction, I guess this makes sense. But again units in BW still felt like they clumped less( despite clumping i.e moving unseiged tanks) in comparison to SC2 units because they took up more space in general, but I guess pathways work for both, but it's messed up at BW ramps or weird places due to pathfinding I suppose.
The beautiful thing about SC1 is that you can force your units to recalculate their path as many times as you want just by spam clicking. It even works if you put move commands in a que (good for getting a big fat tank through your scvs or whatever).
Anyway, thanks OP for your beta testing of SC:BW. It's just kind of 10 years too late. Take a look at the system requirements on the side of you SC Box. Do you see the Operating System called Windows 95? You may have never heard of it, but that's what SC was designed to run on.
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Lol D-Lite is my IRL nickname . Hi op ^-^. On topic, agree with your points.
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On June 10 2010 08:54 shalafi wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 08:41 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 07:12 faction123 wrote:On June 10 2010 07:06 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 05:53 ArvickHero wrote:On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. ...What the hell have you been doing? If you tell a bunch of Dragoons to move across a small bridge, some will inevitably walk the opposite direction for a certain amount of time because they tried to find a new path due to the fact that other Dragoons block their path. They'll walk a different direction for a certain amount of time before turning around again and actually walking across the bridge. It's the same with ramps and small chokes. but with proper control you can make them seamlessly move across, if you a move them yeah of course some are gonna stop in the middle to attack andblock the path of the others and cause them to try to find another way around, but obviously the solution is to manually control your units which is just one of the many reasons bw is an amazingly skillful game vs sc2 The problem is that the thing that causes the game to require more skill is simply old and outdated programming that's frustrating. It's a terrible design philosophy to have to rely on archaic UI's in order to force the skill ceiling higher. Games should be evolving to make the skill ceiling raise with deeper strategic thinking and more interesting and complicated tasks. It shouldn't rely on bugs and a crappy UI. So you think the macro mechanics should be removed? (Or at least, allow more options, like autocast)
Not at all, and I've been a big supporter of keeping the macro game intact. However, we shouldn't purposely rely on an old UI and bugs to keep that high skill ceiling in - we should be pushing for developers to fix these annoyances and come up with new and interesting things to add depth to the game. BW is a great game and undoubtedly the best RTS/best competitive video game ever, but I don't think it's a great game because of the shitty UI and bugs. I find that the ridiculously high skill ceiling is an unintended side-effect of these frustrating features and we should work to improve and find better ways to challenge gamers mechanically.
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are you people retarded, its not old its not crappy, its just basic and simple. Like any game that requires skill. There just isn't much to it except playing the game and figuring out what works best for yourself.
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On June 09 2010 22:46 D-Lite wrote:
i have a feeling im going to have alot of people telling me to stfu because of this post
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On June 10 2010 08:41 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 07:12 faction123 wrote:On June 10 2010 07:06 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 05:53 ArvickHero wrote:On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. ...What the hell have you been doing? If you tell a bunch of Dragoons to move across a small bridge, some will inevitably walk the opposite direction for a certain amount of time because they tried to find a new path due to the fact that other Dragoons block their path. They'll walk a different direction for a certain amount of time before turning around again and actually walking across the bridge. It's the same with ramps and small chokes. but with proper control you can make them seamlessly move across, if you a move them yeah of course some are gonna stop in the middle to attack andblock the path of the others and cause them to try to find another way around, but obviously the solution is to manually control your units which is just one of the many reasons bw is an amazingly skillful game vs sc2 The problem is that the thing that causes the game to require more skill is simply old and outdated programming that's frustrating. It's a terrible design philosophy to have to rely on archaic UI's in order to force the skill ceiling higher. Games should be evolving to make the skill ceiling raise with deeper strategic thinking and more interesting and complicated tasks. It shouldn't rely on bugs and a crappy UI.
SC didn't rely on archaic AI's to make the skill ceiling higher because it was made in 1998. Of course if a developer released an RTS that purposefully limited itself instead of fully utilizing 12 years of advances they'd be retarded, no ones stating otherwise.
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surprised this topic hasn't died yet. I think its pretty much agreed that the pathing is (at this point) just another obstacle to overcome.
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I dont like it when people call the BW unit behavior a terrible bug, or accuse it of having a "crippled" interface because in reality it just doesnt do as much for you as games like WC3 or SC2. As many have already said, the difficulty in BW of controling your units and workers while simultaneously keeping your other mechanics up is tremendous compared to SC2 because units are much better at going where you tell them to without you issuing multiple commands just to get those dragoons moving to the low ground.
One thing to think about is exacty how much of the game would idealy be automated and how much should be manual. In order to give a definite answer you have to specify what the priorities of the game are. If you wanted to make the skill cap as high as you possibly could then the game might involve you sending every single worker back and forth while they mine instead of an automated system. This would be so increadably difficult that only the absolute best could get anywhere close to an efficient game. In fact the skill cap would be soo high that the majority of the market would be effectively incapable of having fun playing the game due to its lack of user friendliness.
Now on the other side of the spectrum a game totally designed to be as user friendly as possible would allow any player to play the game compotently right from when they learn the basics by eliminating the difficulty by making much of the mentally challenging multitasking automatic. This game might have autocast worker production and automatic army formation (units form up in a logical formation automatically). It might also lower the damages of units just enough that the new gamer will have time to back out if they realize the battle has become unfavorable or a counter has been played. Lastly the game would probably reduce the player's ability to harass the enemy, as such a thing can overwhelm a new player, and make it too stressfull.
Neither of these games would technically be worse than the other. They both just have their own goals in mind. Starcraft BW is closer to the first game presented while Starcraft 2 is closer to the second. Saying one of the two is "better" than the other is incorrect when the goals under which they are made are different. Which game you like is a matter of personal preference.
I personally perfer BW, and love it's difficulty even if im not that good.
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On June 10 2010 13:28 AaronEB wrote:
surprised this topic hasn't died yet. I think its pretty much agreed that the pathing is (at this point) just another obstacle to overcome.
Not quite... would you consider fitness an obstacle to overcome when playing basketball?
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PRECISELY WHAT BUHHY said.
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On June 10 2010 10:16 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 08:54 shalafi wrote:On June 10 2010 08:41 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 07:12 faction123 wrote:On June 10 2010 07:06 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 05:53 ArvickHero wrote:On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. ...What the hell have you been doing? If you tell a bunch of Dragoons to move across a small bridge, some will inevitably walk the opposite direction for a certain amount of time because they tried to find a new path due to the fact that other Dragoons block their path. They'll walk a different direction for a certain amount of time before turning around again and actually walking across the bridge. It's the same with ramps and small chokes. but with proper control you can make them seamlessly move across, if you a move them yeah of course some are gonna stop in the middle to attack andblock the path of the others and cause them to try to find another way around, but obviously the solution is to manually control your units which is just one of the many reasons bw is an amazingly skillful game vs sc2 The problem is that the thing that causes the game to require more skill is simply old and outdated programming that's frustrating. It's a terrible design philosophy to have to rely on archaic UI's in order to force the skill ceiling higher. Games should be evolving to make the skill ceiling raise with deeper strategic thinking and more interesting and complicated tasks. It shouldn't rely on bugs and a crappy UI. So you think the macro mechanics should be removed? (Or at least, allow more options, like autocast) Not at all, and I've been a big supporter of keeping the macro game intact. However, we shouldn't purposely rely on an old UI and bugs to keep that high skill ceiling in - we should be pushing for developers to fix these annoyances and come up with new and interesting things to add depth to the game. BW is a great game and undoubtedly the best RTS/best competitive video game ever, but I don't think it's a great game because of the shitty UI and bugs. I find that the ridiculously high skill ceiling is an unintended side-effect of these frustrating features and we should work to improve and find better ways to challenge gamers mechanically.
Do you know that they removed UI features from SC2 to make it more challenging? Namely, the wireframe-casting?Do you think that was a right decision?
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On June 09 2010 23:08 slowmanrunning wrote:Show nested quote +On June 09 2010 22:54 faction123 wrote:
broodwar isn't a better game than sc2 but the way things worked out with how bad alot of features are (12 unit selection limit, tons of bugs that greatly increased the skillcap, unit pathing being so bad etc) due to the fact the game was made 50 years ago, it's amazing to watch/play and requires ungodly amounts of skill. If you're not ready to guide your dragoons every step of the way on anything that isn't a completely open field then too bad, because for the people who can do it while still managing everything else it's extremely rewarding. I would not call SC2 "dumbed down", and the best player still wins 95% of the time in SC2, just like BW, but due to the massive interface improvements (which are great, and i'm not bashing them) it's no doubt a far easier game than broodwar. Using skill to get around the archaic interface, pathing issues etc are the reasons BW is such a great game and thats why we're able to watch korean players in total awe. this.
Yup. This pretty much sums it all up.
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Basically what im getting from the OP is,
1. Started as a War3 Player.
2. Moved onto SC2 with its nice unit pathing and very few movement problems.
3. Decides to play SC:BW
4. Gets to bw and doesnt like having to do things himself.
5. Creates a thread on TL complaining about it
6. ????
7. profit.
Thats just me though, SC1 is soooo superior cause of the bugs and bad AI its not even funny, yeah you have to do stuff yourself but big fucking deal, id ont like the ai making my shit mine for me, i dont like it showing my idle workers and as such making me into a lazy bastard, i dont like how it takes no skill to fill an entire screen with a spell,I dont like my units moving in a big sex ball or any of that either but hey man thats just me.
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On June 11 2010 03:12 arb wrote:
Basically what im getting from the OP is,
1. Started as a War3 Player.
2. Moved onto SC2 with its nice unit pathing and very few movement problems.
3. Decides to play SC:BW
4. Gets to bw and doesnt like having to do things himself.
5. Creates a thread on TL complaining about it
6. ????
7. profit.
Thats just me though, SC1 is soooo superior cause of the bugs and bad AI its not even funny, yeah you have to do stuff yourself but big fucking deal, id ont like the ai making my shit mine for me, i dont like it showing my idle workers and as such making me into a lazy bastard, i dont like how it takes no skill to fill an entire screen with a spell, but hey man thats just me.
Notice where this man is from, gentlemen. Please be kind to him.
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On June 11 2010 03:12 arb wrote:
Basically what im getting from the OP is,
1. Started as a War3 Player.
2. Moved onto SC2 with its nice unit pathing and very few movement problems.
3. Decides to play SC:BW
4. Gets to bw and doesnt like having to do things himself.
5. Creates a thread on TL complaining about it
6. ????
7. profit.
Thats just me though, SC1 is soooo superior cause of the bugs and bad AI its not even funny, yeah you have to do stuff yourself but big fucking deal, id ont like the ai making my shit mine for me, i dont like it showing my idle workers and as such making me into a lazy bastard, i dont like how it takes no skill to fill an entire screen with a spell, but hey man thats just me.
Haha yeah... though I do believe the SC UI can be improved, like a higher resolution, better pathfinding AI (search through more paths) and maybe increased unit selection based on race or supply.
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Roffles
Pitcairn19291 Posts
Rofl, Noobville. Poor Empyrean and Arb. =(
But Arb makes legitimate claims, cause SC2 has pretty much been dumbed down to where the AI can handle much for you, making it much easier to play. Because units don't clump as well, it takes more time to move them into advantageous positions simply because they don't clump into a big ball that you can move up a ramp in less than like 3 seconds. I wouldn't say BW unit pathing is necessarily a bug or something, just a slight flaw that helps distinguish between a good multitasker and a not so experienced player. But in SC2, it's hard to see that skill gap.
Btw, goons and goliaths are still the dumbest units alive.
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On June 11 2010 02:05 shalafi wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2010 10:16 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 08:54 shalafi wrote:On June 10 2010 08:41 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 07:12 faction123 wrote:On June 10 2010 07:06 Stratos_speAr wrote:On June 10 2010 05:53 ArvickHero wrote:On June 10 2010 00:50 Stratos_speAr wrote:
I really don't see how people enjoy telling their Dragoon to walk across a bridge and then watching it walk literally in the opposite direction. ...What the hell have you been doing? If you tell a bunch of Dragoons to move across a small bridge, some will inevitably walk the opposite direction for a certain amount of time because they tried to find a new path due to the fact that other Dragoons block their path. They'll walk a different direction for a certain amount of time before turning around again and actually walking across the bridge. It's the same with ramps and small chokes. but with proper control you can make them seamlessly move across, if you a move them yeah of course some are gonna stop in the middle to attack andblock the path of the others and cause them to try to find another way around, but obviously the solution is to manually control your units which is just one of the many reasons bw is an amazingly skillful game vs sc2 The problem is that the thing that causes the game to require more skill is simply old and outdated programming that's frustrating. It's a terrible design philosophy to have to rely on archaic UI's in order to force the skill ceiling higher. Games should be evolving to make the skill ceiling raise with deeper strategic thinking and more interesting and complicated tasks. It shouldn't rely on bugs and a crappy UI. So you think the macro mechanics should be removed? (Or at least, allow more options, like autocast) Not at all, and I've been a big supporter of keeping the macro game intact. However, we shouldn't purposely rely on an old UI and bugs to keep that high skill ceiling in - we should be pushing for developers to fix these annoyances and come up with new and interesting things to add depth to the game. BW is a great game and undoubtedly the best RTS/best competitive video game ever, but I don't think it's a great game because of the shitty UI and bugs. I find that the ridiculously high skill ceiling is an unintended side-effect of these frustrating features and we should work to improve and find better ways to challenge gamers mechanically. Do you know that they removed UI features from SC2 to make it more challenging? Namely, the wireframe-casting?Do you think that was a right decision?
All-or-nothing is a pretty bad logical fallacy to rely on. Just because I think we should add some things doesn't mean I think we should add everything under the sun.
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On June 11 2010 03:20 Roffles wrote:
Rofl, Noobville. Poor Empyrean and Arb. =(
But Arb makes legitimate claims, cause SC2 has pretty much been dumbed down to where the AI can handle much for you, making it much easier to play. Because units don't clump as well, it takes more time to move them into advantageous positions simply because they don't clump into a big ball that you can move up a ramp in less than like 3 seconds. I wouldn't say BW unit pathing is necessarily a bug or something, just a slight flaw that helps distinguish between a good multitasker and a not so experienced player. But in SC2, it's hard to see that skill gap.
Btw, goons and goliaths are still the dumbest units alive.
well i didnt mean to imply it was a bug but yeah..it is verrrry buggy at times, but its what makes the game amazing.
as for bugs, you ever tried to move stuff up a ramp and it all starts getting stacked and messing up? 
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besides the bad pathing (which is a flaw in my book) the magic boxes are bigger in bw (which is better).
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The reason the BW pathfinding is "better" is exactly because of the baby sitting element. Focusing on what your army is doing should directly correlate to how effective your army is. Just look at Effort vs Flash, Effort capitalised on Flash's un-attended marines by flanking and contributed a lot to winning the game, this would be a completely different story in SC2 because the marines would remain in a ball.
The other thing is magic boxing, in BW I could micro my dragoons in magic boxes against tanks to avoid splash damage, I can't do this in SC2 they just ball up. In fact it is much harder for good players to spread their units out like in BW.
So the new AI makes it easier for bad players who just A-move, but it makes it impossible for anyone better than that to actually do anything about it, and that makes for a less exciting game.
On June 10 2010 01:47 VIB wrote:Show nested quote +On June 09 2010 23:13 samachking wrote:
The only reason units in BW dont clump is because they occupy a 2D space with a set amount of pixels instead of a 3d space hence limiting the amount of stuff that can pass through in a certain time. This is 100% wrong, the colision detection in sc2 is just as 2d as in BW. SC2 is a 2d game displayed in 3 dimensions, the gameplay is still 100% 2d. The pathfinding logic used in sc2 is exactly the same as the one used in BW. Which is also exactly the same used of pretty much any other game that ever existed. Pathfinding is a very known science that any average computer science student knows of. There aren't much new tricks to how it's made in the last decades. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PathfindingThe pathing in WC3 and SC2 only feels smoother than the one in BW because the calculations are done faster. Pathfinding is a very CPU intensive process and it's what games spend most of their processing time doing. Since at the time BW launched the computers were slower, if Blizzard pushed too much into the pathfinding the game would slow down. So they simply made units look for new paths less often and used less "pixels" (known as threads) to calculate paths. So computers of 10 years ago wouldn't crash. In SC2 and WC3, since computers are now faster, Blizzard just made units recalculate more often and use more threads to calculate it. Since now computers can handle it. Other than that, the system is exactly the same. The only difference between BW and SC2 pathing is that SC2 is faster. Nothing else. All those dragoons getting blocked in ramps are just symptoms of units not re-calculating their paths more often into smaller threads.
Its not exactly the same, SC2s pathfinding algorithm is a lot more advanced than SC1, but yes both still uses 2D collision detection. It is to do with processing power but also pathfinding AI knowledge of the time. Threading has nothing to do with pixels or pathing either, but it allows multi-core processors to process more things at once or asynchronously.
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EPT
magic box
