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Short distances favor against Zerg
It works against FE Zerg, and it's true that almost all Zerg FEs these days, but 1 base Zerg deserves more credit than it gets. If the Zerg plays extremely agressively I think the zerg can gain a strong advantage from it. A late rush is surprizingly devestating against toss players in particular.
Because T's marines and Ps Zealots are that much better than zerglings. Even if you opt to play 1 base you'll be forced to sunken up even a little bit or make early roaches which effectively rapes your economy in comparation to a T's or a P's giving you either safety (sunkens) or 1 cute timing push(roaches/banes)
Zerg is a reactionary race. The zerg player reacts to what his opponent is doing. You need time to get enough units to kill that timing push coming to kill you, while balancing economy and army when P/T can make both at the same time. Imagine if that dreaded 1/1/1 T push spawns instantly in your base instead of giving you the precious 30-45-60s to make more units to defend it.
MorroW is correct in his assessments. Don't think about it "always being correct" but think about it with BOs in mind and a belle-curve. In most cases the short distance will be disadvantageous to zerg.
backdoors to main favor toss
I see why you said this, but at the same time it goes hand in hand with Open areas favoring Zerg. 2 entrences opens a player to all sorts of harass. A trait of a strong Zerg player.
Generally, the backdoors favor agressive play styles. They are a Ts worst nightmare. Usually it's the P/Z that are agressive. Ts tend to play the more slow/safe style of play. Massing 200/200, getting expands up and all that jazz, while a P/Z will most likely want to put a dent in that plan with harassment. In ZvP the aggressive one can be either the P or the Z., but usually the Z relys on sunkens for defence early game when it's the most fragile part of the game, much more than a P on cannons which tends to favor P.
potential for harass favors terran
I take it you mean reapers and maps like arid wastes? True, although protoss have more trouble than Zerg and Zerg can use it. Maybe it favors against Protoss more than it favors Terran.
There is more to harassment than just simply reapers. Thorship, hellions, nukes, fast banshees, cute pushes that aim to kill expands are all at the Ts disposal. A well executed thorship is a nightmare for a Z. Sometimes it even makes you wonder if the game is actually balanced, that hard you're getting raped. Hydras, queens, sunkens all die in a matter of seconds to a thor on a cliff with a MULE repairing it.
Z can forget about cliffing anyone until mid-T2 when oov drops and nydus doesn't become an all-in. Besides we don't have a unit with a decent range to cliff. Hydras have 6 rage while colossi and tanks 9 and 13 respectively. Cliffing is almost worthless to us because we can shut down mining from maybe 2-3 minerals and 1 gas when the P/T can out right kill the expand.
P needs robotics for warp prisims, colossi and other jazz. Voids are getting countered more and more by Ts/Zs making the harass much less effective.
mainbases with high money favors toss
Why toss and not terran? It means the player doesn't need to expand as early, which is a terran trait. Could you elaborate on this?
Simply because Ps tech is more expensive and 1-on-1 better than Ts.
islands favor zerg
As the other player said, it favors terran. It's too easy for a terran to lift off a CC, build a handful of missile turrets, and have a base that if nothing else will kill a ton of units before it goes down.
I agree, this one probably favors T early game here, not Z. Late game probably Z because of nydus.
safe natural favors zerg
Again i'll return to the open ground argument. It may help a FE Zerg against an early harass, but in the long term having more easily harassed bases is good for the Zerg player. It's just zerg should be extremely focused on harass and leave chokepoints or well defended areas alone.
In safe he means easily defendable, and a short distance from your main. Take DO as an example. Everyone has a hard time expoing there, but Z suffers most from it. The nat is so far away you'll need to be jumping back and forth between your main and nat to defend it. Making sunkens is a pain the ass. The distance is easily abusable by P/T when attacking. Also, Z expands faster than T/P which makes his expos naturally more prone to aggression and harassment. All the 3 races like safe expands. It's just that Z profits from them the most.
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I think a lot of cliffs don't only favour terran but also toss because obviously it makes it so much easier for colossi to micro and also as in BW carriers are much stronger. One thing that really sucks is that you can't really implement any low ground expansions because of tanks 
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Every map is Terran favored until proven otherwise 
No, seriously, until you get to see 50+ matches on a map between progamers, it's extremely difficult to say whether it's balanced or not, because the possible builds on each and every map evolve too.
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Probably an even 50-50 win rate at the top levels of competitive play would mean the map is balanced. Even if the races aren't that well balanced, maps can be imbalanced a bit to even the playing field.
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my biggest gripe with sc2 so far are the maps. they are so friggin small, tightly packed, and have such close starting positions. this makes for incredibly cheesy play style, and causes to blizzard to balance the game improperly rather than changing the maps to suit the game.
when i make maps, i try to make design them to have far more open map spaces, much riskier gameplay, and make use of new sc2 features like watchtowers, rocks, cliffs and double cliffs, all in an effort to force players to be more aggressive, and punish those who decide to turtle or stick with "blob" play.
i believe sc2 can live upto the playstyle found in sc1 - you just need maps like those in sc1 to promote that kind of play.
when i make maps, i try to do the following:
1) Main
- can (must) be wall-in'd
- must have cliff access for reaper play
- cliffs must be quickly scoutable by the player to avoid cheesy proxy pylon play
- entrance must be easily attackable in some way by enemy (not susceptible to cheesy turtle play)
- try as much as i can to make drop play viable
- if nat is close by, have a small main (big main for far away nat)
2) Nat
- close or far depending on size of main, but not too far for zerg players
- easily defendable
- must have wider entrances
- hatch/cc/nexus cannot be sieged (mineral line can be) OR provide easy way to attack tanks/colossus if building is within vision
3) other expansions
- far away
- introduce risky play with limited minerals/gas/rocks
4) map in general
- alot of paths for different attack vectors/flanking
- wide open paths to prevent siege turtling and forcefield cheese
- alot of useful watchtowers to provide vision for map, defense, scouting etc
- far main distance to avoid cheesy rush plays like VR rush
indeed, sometimes i laugh at the comments in map threads saying "lol siege tanks" or "so op for zerg".
stop being such babies kplzthx?
blizzard already babies players enough. its time for a change imo. time to make sc2 actually challenging, instead of having a bunch of D- players cheesing around in diamond rank.
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On July 01 2010 23:51 Latham wrote:
Because T's marines and Ps Zealots are that much better than zerglings. Even if you opt to play 1 base you'll be forced to sunken up even a little bit or make early roaches which effectively rapes your economy in comparation to a T's or a P's giving you either safety (sunkens) or 1 cute timing push(roaches/banes)
Speedlings eat early marines without a wall and because of Speedling/Zealot mechanics banelings are devestating to protoss. Zealot's main strength in a Zealot/speedling battle is that even semi-surrounded zealots can kill a couple lings before they die. If you baneling a group of zealots to 1/2 HP their effectiveness drops to closer to 1/4 or 1/5. Speedlings rape any other toss unit short of teir 2.5/3.
In most cases the short distance will be disadvantageous to zerg.
I think Zerg players just need to develop better 1 base plays, honestly. I find my ZvP to be borderline Imba and middle expansion over a FE to be competitive against Terran.
backdoors, are a Ts worst nightmare.
agreed.
Usually the Z relys on sunkens for defence early game when it's the most fragile part of the game, much more than a P on cannons which tends to favor P.
Honestly i don't really see that against toss. I mean I personally prefer to go all in against Toss. The way I see it is the Zerg wants the other player to go to the middle of the map early, before he can attack the zerg's back door. The Zerg player also can easily move out and put early pressure on the other player's backdoor. This forces the toss/terran to waste resources on cannons and defenses while forceing them to move back and forth to protect 2 entrences. The zerg player has no qualms about fighting in the open terrain.
There is more to harassment than just simply reapers. Thorship, hellions, nukes, fast banshees, cute pushes that aim to kill expands are all at the Ts disposal.
Fair enough, I think I just wasn't clear on what he meant. Its a bit vague.
In safe he means easily defendable, and a short distance from your main. Take DO as an example. Everyone has a hard time expoing there, but Z suffers most from it.
I see. Taken to the extremes like DO it does make it difficult for zerg, but how many maps take it to the extreme? Not many. In moderation, like most of the 4 player FFA maps such as Kulas, the open naturals provide a lot of tactical advantages for a Zerg that terran and protoss can't exploit as well.
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Maps can not be "totally balanced", because every race has different strengths and even some different strategies for a single race would benefit from certain terrain features or not. Wide open maps favor Zerg with loads of ground hordes, but Terran infantry tactics can benefit from them as well. Maps with loads of high and low grounds and ramps inbetween obviously help Terran mech, but Protoss with their Colossi and blinking Stalkers could abuse them. That said the "enforced" walkways for Thors would hinder their defensive useability against Mutalisks (unless you move them with Medivacs, which could be shot down by Mutas again), so the "Zerg ground army fetishists" will whine about such a map (Desert Oasis / Kulas Ravine), but those who might use Mutalisk tactics might think of them as fair.
There is no such thing as "balance"! It doesnt exist between the races and certainly not for maps. You can only have maps / units which are not too imbalanced for a given combination of matchup / map / playing style preferences.
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A balanced map includes EVERYTHING.
they include islands, maybe in base expos, chokes, open areas, hard to take thirds and fourths, backdoors, cliffs at nats for harass, etc.
Can anyone think of a good example of a map like that?
I can.
Lost Temple.
it has cliffs. it has islands. it has open area in the center. it has easy to capture nat. it has large mains. it has high yield. it has chokes. it has stuff that make it a good map for all races.
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On July 02 2010 02:06 Antares777 wrote:
A balanced map includes EVERYTHING.
they include islands, maybe in base expos, chokes, open areas, hard to take thirds and fourths, backdoors, cliffs at nats for harass, etc.
Can anyone think of a good example of a map like that?
I can.
Lost Temple.
it has cliffs. it has islands. it has open area in the center. it has easy to capture nat. it has large mains. it has high yield. it has chokes. it has stuff that make it a good map for all races.
Antares gets it the closest I'd say. 'Balanced maps' really - in my mind, and I think in minds of most competent players is a map where multiple play styles are valid. 1 base tech, 2 base turtle, eco-heavy builds, rush builds, tech builds, and everything in between should all be viable - this is how one determines a balanced map. Can I go MMM + Thor with two base on game and have a viable chance at winning, and then the very next game go one base hard-tech to Banshee and still have a viable chance to win (obviously these are just examples). The point is that players should have the option to use a variety of play styles and builds - a map which allows this is generally balanced.
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EPT
