I love some maps, I hope we will see them at SSL 1
(4)KICK BACK 0.80
This map makes me remember Colosseum maps but double interesting from 2 bases inside the mains. Only bad thing in this one is so small main bases. Lead to players will die from recall, doom drop or lack of land to spend money.
There are so much bases outside, if you are greed to take 2 bases early, maybe you are blocked and wait to die. It's pretty mind game, I love it.
(2)Back Street 0.3
This map combines between Autobahn and (4)KICK BACK 0.80. There are 3 Assimilators, they are useless, it should remove all or add more to split map if all Assimilators are destroy.
The nice thing in this one is 2 backdoors that are blocked by line eggs. This map is encourage turtle strategy with 5 bases, you just sit at home and take them slowly.
(3)Random Forest 0.85
This map is a upgrade from the legendary map aka Hunter. It's so hard to take 3rd bases, this thing makes me remember maps in 2001-2005. Fortunately, 3rd bases also so hard to attack by roadway. It's encourage drop and air units. It's pretty similar Outsider map but (3)Random Forest 0.85 promotes variety strategy, build order... Outsider just a marco map.
It will have so many situations in this map. It belongs to IQ and creative of players.
(2)Monty Hall SE 2.15
I think this is the best map in the map pool.
It's not like (3)Random Forest 0.85, players can rush so easily. (2)Monty Hall SE 2.15 allow cheese, marco or making air units that it's rarely we see on other maps.
There are 2 islands at top left and bottom right. You can control 6 bases at there. It's so funny and amazing!
Some things I want to say:
1. No one cares the map pool, except some guys here. No gosu, no streamer, no audience... all of them just play on FS 1.3 and the map pool came out about 1 year before. They are rather play 10000000000 times on Retro, Polypod, Neo Dark Origin, Apocalypse and try to avoid Blitz Y, Troy SE (2 best maps that they have)
2. Why mapmakers make an effort to create 99% balance maps. Do they know VETO exist in the Earth? and at all league/tournament?
3. If 100% maps get balance, Terran will win 100%. So, it's actually not balance, not fair. Finally, mapmakers can't do what they want to do. It's the same to StarCraft.
4. Do you know why we like playing on ladder and love watching league/tournament? It has CHALLENGE. Everyone (except me) likes easy maps (standard marco maps). So what a challenge in those maps? If you think you are good at StarCraft, just pick Terran and play on Troy SE vs Zerg, Protoss. If your opponents are not computer, your winrate must be less than 10%.
5. I really don't care or love any maps. I am just so bored when I have to play and watch on some maps in 100000000000000000 times.
So Illusion (pointless gimmick), Catalyst (balance issue), Back Street (balance issue), and Random Forest (less said the better) are removed from the candidate pool. I'd say good riddance, although the remaining maps don't strike me with amazement.
Note that this is still not the official map pool (only to be announced in July). Late addition/removal still possible (this is what happened a few seasons ago).
The Dark Origin - Retro - Apocalypse period is such a nice one, for both progamers and casual players on the ladder: - NDO: PvT 49% , TvZ 52% , ZvP 52% - Retro: PvT 51%, TvZ 57% (oops), ZvP 52% - Apocalypse: PvT 52%, TvZ 53%, ZvP 51%
It's quite balanced at pro level and not too hard for casual players to play. I know we have to eventually phase them out just to refresh thing but doubt the new map pool would achieve such balance.
My guess: Pantheon is a less balanced Radeon. Kick Back is Zerg heaven. Deja Vu will be just another Allegro. Minstrel probably Terran favored with such layout. Dominator probably balanced as most 3p maps.
For casuals on the ladder, it'd be hard since 3 vetoes are not enough for this pool. We may all have to unban Fighting Spirit lol.
On June 17 2024 20:57 TMNT wrote: The Dark Origin - Retro - Apocalypse period is such a nice one, for both progamers and casual players on the ladder: - NDO: PvT 49% , TvZ 52% , ZvP 52% - Retro: PvT 51%, TvZ 57% (oops), ZvP 52% - Apocalypse: PvT 52%, TvZ 53%, ZvP 51%
It's quite balanced at pro level and not too hard for casual players to play. I know we have to eventually phase them out just to refresh thing but doubt the new map pool would achieve such balance.
My guess: Pantheon is a less balanced Radeon. Kick Back is Zerg heaven. Deja Vu will be just another Allegro. Minstrel probably Terran favored with such layout. Dominator probably balanced as most 3p maps.
For casuals on the ladder, it'd be hard since 3 vetoes are not enough for this pool. We may all have to unban Fighting Spirit lol.
Damn I never realized just how balanced that trio was. That's really really special to have a 2, 3, and 4p map all balanced at the same time (sans Retro's TvZ). Hope they bring back both Apoc and NDO at later dates and find a better 4p TvZ balanced map!
On June 17 2024 20:57 TMNT wrote: The Dark Origin - Retro - Apocalypse period is such a nice one, for both progamers and casual players on the ladder: - NDO: PvT 49% , TvZ 52% , ZvP 52% - Retro: PvT 51%, TvZ 57% (oops), ZvP 52% - Apocalypse: PvT 52%, TvZ 53%, ZvP 51%
It's quite balanced at pro level and not too hard for casual players to play. I know we have to eventually phase them out just to refresh thing but doubt the new map pool would achieve such balance.
My guess: Pantheon is a less balanced Radeon. Kick Back is Zerg heaven. Deja Vu will be just another Allegro. Minstrel probably Terran favored with such layout. Dominator probably balanced as most 3p maps.
For casuals on the ladder, it'd be hard since 3 vetoes are not enough for this pool. We may all have to unban Fighting Spirit lol.
Damn I never realized just how balanced that trio was. That's really really special to have a 2, 3, and 4p map all balanced at the same time (sans Retro's TvZ). Hope they bring back both Apoc and NDO at later dates and find a better 4p TvZ balanced map!
Neo Daek origin went through four versions before it reached a balanced state. First two versions were a terran's nightmare. Retro was more or less instantly somewhat balanced but also required a couple tiny adjustments. Apocalypse was more or less an instant hit.
I didn't love Apocalypse when it first came out but it really grew on me. Fantastic map. It's really hard to make balanced and enjoyable 3-player maps too. To be fair it's basically an evolution on Ascension though.
On June 17 2024 20:57 TMNT wrote: The Dark Origin - Retro - Apocalypse period is such a nice one, for both progamers and casual players on the ladder: - NDO: PvT 49% , TvZ 52% , ZvP 52% - Retro: PvT 51%, TvZ 57% (oops), ZvP 52% - Apocalypse: PvT 52%, TvZ 53%, ZvP 51%
It's quite balanced at pro level and not too hard for casual players to play. I know we have to eventually phase them out just to refresh thing but doubt the new map pool would achieve such balance.
My guess: Pantheon is a less balanced Radeon. Kick Back is Zerg heaven. Deja Vu will be just another Allegro. Minstrel probably Terran favored with such layout. Dominator probably balanced as most 3p maps.
For casuals on the ladder, it'd be hard since 3 vetoes are not enough for this pool. We may all have to unban Fighting Spirit lol.
Damn I never realized just how balanced that trio was. That's really really special to have a 2, 3, and 4p map all balanced at the same time (sans Retro's TvZ). Hope they bring back both Apoc and NDO at later dates and find a better 4p TvZ balanced map!
Neo Daek origin went through four versions before it reached a balanced state. First two versions were a terran's nightmare. Retro was more or less instantly somewhat balanced but also required a couple tiny adjustments. Apocalypse was more or less an instant hit.
Definitely feels like 2p maps will need some major adjustments over time while 4p and 3p maps will be more or less balanced from the start with a few smaller adjustments. 2p being the case where specific matchups will have some wild numbers and changing aspects of the map would maybe overcompensate on other matchups, making adjustments very specific to cater to a specific matchup.
I'm gonna go ahead and write to my heart's content about the entrants in this map pool, because that is something I legitimately love to do. Gratitude to the map makers, tournament designers, and TL.net.
Pantheon 0.8: What an incredible map! It looks like a twist on Vermeer with less oppressive Zergling highground zoning lanes against mech, but with a bigger open center with a hole in it. I like gladiator style maps like this to be in a tileset with less doodads. I think it will play better than Vermeer across just about every matchup. That said, it's important to have an oppressive map like Vermeer adding some fear into the map pool sometimes. I'm glad this got picked, especially over Vermeer.
Kick Back 0.8: This is three-base PvZ but with tiny expansions. Stressful. I mean, we've seen what Snow can do with 3 bases worth of income once the infrastructure was already in place... and we DO get 9 patches in the main. But what's to stop zerg from securing an easy-to-defend pocket expansion with no room to drop on it? This is it boys, it's TIME FOR CONTACT! BRING ON THE DISRUPTION WEB CORSAIR LATEGAME. If we can just prevent an extreme routing for the entirety of 5 bases of action, we can start using D web with storm reaver support and zerg would be forced to GG. They will be forced to play into our hands. Problem is preventing them from getting 5 easy bases. That turns to 6 real quick. We better have 5 when they have 6, and we better prevent 7 for a while. At the end of the day, it's an 8 base grind. This map is anything but relaxing.
Deja Vu 0.81: High-ground takes the win. Undroppable ridges.- attacking that third is a trap in the lategame, and highly necessary earlygame. Preventing Terran from having a full 3-base economy may be the most difficult thing about PvT on this map. Lots of room for maneuverable earlygame shuttle cheese.
Illusion 0.85: Less resources per base was an experiment in Starcraft 2. I assure you, gentle viewers, it went way less balanced than it would be in Broodwar. I was actually pretty excited about the layout before the gimmick was discovered. Why not just make this a legit standard map? It's taking some of the best of Vermeer. Creepy Vermeer as an Illusion?! We won't know this season. But I think this is a great one to keep in the pocket. I practice on Illusion.
Catalyst 0.8: Personally, I would have chosen Catalyst without the siege tanks, and a few hostile goliaths in the center rush path, and one hostile goliath per path on the top and bottom to artificially lengthen those rush distances. Zerg will have to take an inefficient overlord path to overlord scout - but the overlord scout distance still wouldn't be too long.
Minstrel 0.82: This map sucks for Zerg against Terran. It's balanced and cool for PvZ, though. But, it won't feel that way if you just play safe against 9 pool to scrape that MMR off your boot. Zergs would rather cheese and get good at a balanced map than try to learn a map under the oppression of a Terran - which Minstrel surely is. EZ Points. Then PvT comes along and makes you question everything... keeping observers alive is the most important objective of this map.
Backstreet 0.2: TvT playground for the keedz.
Random Forest 0.85: One to two base aggro practice for the keedz.
Dominator: Hard Yes on this map.
Monty Hall 2.15: The GOAT cheese map makes a startling return! Yay
Overall - I'm happy with the maps chosen. This is going to be a very wild SSL!!!
Nice, they got rid of most of the funky stuff and we're guaranteed to have several special games on Monty Hall, Minstrel and Kick Back. Looks like a good mix to me. + Show Spoiler +
On June 17 2024 20:57 TMNT wrote: The Dark Origin - Retro - Apocalypse period is such a nice one, for both progamers and casual players on the ladder: - NDO: PvT 49% , TvZ 52% , ZvP 52% - Retro: PvT 51%, TvZ 57% (oops), ZvP 52% - Apocalypse: PvT 52%, TvZ 53%, ZvP 51%
It's quite balanced at pro level and not too hard for casual players to play. I know we have to eventually phase them out just to refresh thing but doubt the new map pool would achieve such balance.
My guess: Pantheon is a less balanced Radeon. Kick Back is Zerg heaven. Deja Vu will be just another Allegro. Minstrel probably Terran favored with such layout. Dominator probably balanced as most 3p maps.
For casuals on the ladder, it'd be hard since 3 vetoes are not enough for this pool. We may all have to unban Fighting Spirit lol.
Damn I never realized just how balanced that trio was. That's really really special to have a 2, 3, and 4p map all balanced at the same time (sans Retro's TvZ). Hope they bring back both Apoc and NDO at later dates and find a better 4p TvZ balanced map!
Radeon is another map with almost perfect 50% WRs in all matchups (source). Also it is one of the very few maps where Zerg is at 50% WR ZvT, I'm glad it'll be coming back.
I struggle to understand why Radeon is supposed to be better for Zerg compared to all the other 4p maps. Liquipedia even has it at 58% WR ZvT, however on a much smaller sample.
Is it me or progamers are not bothering to use the new maps too much ? I remember in the past everyone was so excited to try new maps. You could see Rush ; Light Mini and Jaedong giving feedback on the organizer afreeca blog. Idk i feel like they are not really testing them. I wonder if Progamers are actually giving up on ASL now that is restarting to be SSL.
They are just idle.. no one wants new or fresh maps instead of maps used to be. They try 1st match with new mappool, 2nd match with old mappool, because there is someone who has not experienced new maps. but it's already 4 weeks from the first some new maps announced.
EPT
vs Action 
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