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The_Pacifist
United States540 Posts
On September 12 2010 11:21 awesomoecalypse wrote: This is in no way a "unique niche" in the sense of a different sci fi genre. Pokemon isn't about different genres fighting each other Dark pokemon. Fire pokemon. Water pokemon. Steel, psychic, flying, ground, grass. Need I go on? EDIT: And they also have hybrids.  | ||
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awesomoecalypse
United States2235 Posts
first of all, warcraft only had 2 races at first, orcs n humans, the otehr races in warcraft are added as the sotryline gets more indepth, but you'll notice warcraft is still alliance/horde, basically humans vrs orc... It doesn't matter how many races Warcraft has. it could have 2, it could have 20. No matter what, they're all high fantasy. There is no Warcraft unit, race, class or monster that wouldn't fit right into a game of D&D. Again, for Warcraft races to be equivalent to Starcraft races, they wouldn't just have to look and play differently, they would need to draw their inspiration from entirely different kinds of fantasy. You'd need a race based on George RR Martin-style "gritty fantasy", a race based around Conan-like "sword and sorcery", a Tolkeinesque "high fantasy" race, a "Fairy Tale" race, etc. | ||
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latan
740 Posts
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EternaLEnVy
Canada513 Posts
On September 12 2010 11:05 Skyze wrote: I think WC3 had good balance for 4 races. The issue was never updating the map pools, so 1/2 races always dominated. Different maps = balance for races, as is shown in BW.. without new maps, BW would be terran dominated more than it already is (imagine if everygame was Lost Temple still on BW???) Other than that, I agree that SC should stick with 3 races. but disagree with many of your other points, such as 4 races in a game is not possible to balance. It just takes more work, and with WC3 being more reliant on other factors to balance the game such as heroes and creeps, racial balance was easier to achieve (like I said, outside of the lame map pools/maybe some very minor balance things, but overall it was solid and each race had multiple top tournament titles, which you can argue is more balanced than BW which has only had like 3-4 protoss victories in OSL/MSL's in the past what.. 6 years?) The 3 races against each other in SC has win rates over the other with less than 55%. In war3, I believe undead gets ridiculously raped by orc/human (like 60%) and ne gets raped by UD (55%?) orc gets raped by NE. The only mu that was even was HU/NE and even that was stupidly gay. | ||
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Seide
United States831 Posts
On September 12 2010 11:24 alkampfer wrote: weak, medium , strong ? so terrans are medium strenght hmmmm... Marauder best t1 unit is very strong... Thor is very strong Bc is very strong... hmmm i don't think the phylosopy is respected... You sir fail at some reading comprehension jesus. He means in the general idea of things. Terran unit medium cost/medium strength, zerg low cost/low strength, protoss high cost/high strength. Its a general theme, not every single unit is going to fit that theme, eg Ultras, BCs | ||
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Yurie
11806 Posts
AI/machine race, might be a branch of terran though since they already have their adjutants. Or perhaps a race that uploads their minds into the network upon death instead of being re-born as the protoss. Pure magic race, think science fantasy like the Darkover novels. Everything they do is magic based. Making it feel and look totally different from Protoss might be hard but is fully possible. Problem is another worker mechanic that fits the theme, maybe summon in slaves from their home planet to build it? Perhaps the Terran variant but needing more workers or some such. Units would be low tech with lots and lots of spells. Bows, magic staves and variants of lancers, swordsmen and so on. Still loads of overlap with Protoss. Or perhaps having no actual attacks that can penetrate the armors/shields of the other races and thus using magic for all attacks, both ranged and melee. Touch spells being more powerful due to no interference from the air inbetween. Dimensional gates or direct teleportation for travel between planets, ignoring space except to have some anti space weapons. Most unique part of them would be that they can't visit space for long periods of time with their own technology, limiting the battlefields they can be on. A pure magic race could probably make its own slot if you tweaked it until it worked and fit. Perhaps all their units are actually groups of magicians specialising in that task, so a tier 3 magic circle has 20 workers in it and you lose them as you lose health. Only to regen back at a teleportation thingy with reinforcements coming in or merging different circles to get a better unit back up to health... | ||
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awesomoecalypse
United States2235 Posts
Dark pokemon. Fire pokemon. Water pokemon. Steel, psychic, flying, ground, grass. Need I go on? Elements aren't genres, any more than "orc" is a different genre from "elf". If people really think a new race can fit into Starcraft's modus operandi of "the different races are different genres", then name a genre of Sci Fi that isn't currently covered. Not a new race, like "squid people" or "robot people" or something. A new genre. A type of Sci Fi story, which many different works fit into, which is not currently covered by 1 of the 3 races. I guarantee you cannot. As I said in the OP, the only major sci fi genre not covered by one of the races is cyberpunk, and that simply doesn't fit into Starcraft in any way, shape or form. | ||
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Elwar
953 Posts
On September 12 2010 11:14 awesomoecalypse wrote:Mech are already Terran. Robots are already Protoss. But they're not really. Not in thematic terms, its not their embodiment. As you put it. Dismissing the notion out of hand is fairly weak. A mech, AI race, like the geth from Mass Effect, would be a unique theme. The whole thread is based around some arbitrary notions of what SC lore is about, its kind of hard to argue against because it boils down to 'nuh-uh' or 'is too'. In the OP you specifically say you can't have any race weaker than the zerg or more powerful than the protoss, and I'm willing to bet you're going to say theres no point having another in-between. 'There are three races in SC so gosh darnit you can only have three degrees of seperation' Its funny, in terms of lore Blizzard themselves are setting up a race more powerful than the protoss, guess they're, as you put it, just stupid. | ||
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wail
United States26 Posts
However most people probably don't want one. You're right that in the broadest possible terms, there's not enough "thematic" material to bring in another race. However, it's certainly possible to look at things and break them down differently. For example, lets look: Terrans - Truckers in Space. Not much else to say here. Protoss - Babylon 5 Minbari, 40k Eldar. Honor-bound warrior/religious race with telepathic powers. Zerg - Tyranids. Organic based race with hivemind and extremely destructive. Possible "themes" for a 4th race: 1. Technology-based adaptationist race. Think Replicators from SG1. 2. Post-Technological race focusing exclusively on psionic powers, energy beings, etc. 3. Espionage-based race. If Protoss are similar to Klingons, then these guys would be more similar to the Romulans. That's off the top of my head. All of these can fit just fine into the Starcraft Universe (although - naturally when you introduce more things to compare, the points of comparison become more finely tuned. Starcraft covers things in broad strokes with only 3 races, whereas most other science fiction settings featuring multiple aliens will assign certain general characteristics like "Militaristic," "Religious" or "Greedy" to races, and you can get as detailed as you want when discussing characteristics, but the more broadly they're defined the more distinct your races will be.) | ||
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awesomoecalypse
United States2235 Posts
Various things that might be tweaked to be unique. AI/machine race, might be a branch of terran though since they already have their adjutants. Or perhaps a race that uploads their minds into the network upon death instead of being re-born as the protoss. Pure magic race, think science fantasy like the Darkover novels. Everything they do is magic based. Making it feel and look totally different from Protoss might be hard but is fully possible. Problem is another worker mechanic that fits the theme, maybe summon in slaves from their home planet to build it? Perhaps the Terran variant but needing more workers or some such. Units would be low tech with lots and lots of spells. Bows, magic staves and variants of lancers, swordsmen and so on. Still loads of overlap with Protoss. Or perhaps having no actual attacks that can penetrate the armors/shields of the other races and thus using magic for all attacks, both ranged and melee. Touch spells being more powerful due to no interference from the air inbetween. Dimensional gates or direct teleportation for travel between planets, ignoring space except to have some anti space weapons. Most unique part of them would be that they can't visit space for long periods of time with their own technology, limiting the battlefields they can be on. A pure magic race could probably make its own slot if you tweaked it until it worked and fit. See, this at least is a different genre. The problem is...its not a science fiction genre. You're simply suggesting they add a fantasy race into a sci fi universe. It would be thematically distinct, but since Starcraft is about sci fi, it still wouldn't fit. | ||
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ROMBOMTHEMAGIC
United States6 Posts
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Aberu
United States968 Posts
On September 12 2010 11:05 Chronopolis wrote: 3 Races = 3 non-mirror matchups to balance 4 races = 6 non-mirror matchups to balance Easy as that. 2 Races = 1 Non-mirror matchup to balance 1 Race = Nothing but a mirror matchup to balance Not trolling just pointing out why I think that Red Alert 2 was AWESOME. | ||
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Yurie
11806 Posts
On September 12 2010 11:37 awesomoecalypse wrote: See, this at least is a different genre. The problem is...its not a science fiction genre. You're simply suggesting they add a fantasy race into a sci fi universe. It would be thematically distinct, but since Starcraft is about sci fi, it still wouldn't fit. Ah but the Darkover series takes place on a world that has a highly devolped magical society while being marginally part of an intergalactic empire that shares a lot of similarities with the Terrans in SC. So it is Scifi in setting, while also being fantasy. There are probably other series that uses a high tech environment, but comes to a magical solution as the next step. edit to expand some. They have hover cars, but power them by magic instead of normal fuels. They have a space port, but don't really care about it. They can produce fire fighting chemicals by extracting and refining it using magic and so on. | ||
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Mortaegus
United States7 Posts
Anyone here played Earth 2160? That game had three very distinct human factions, and I would love to see another human faction, but something unique unto itself. Perhaps a return of the UED but using mostly robotics and mechs controlled by artificial intelligences but with human commanders. As far as balance is concerned, that has more to do with units cost/effect ratio than with the race mechanics. | ||
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awesomoecalypse
United States2235 Posts
(although - naturally when you introduce more things to compare, the points of comparison become more finely tuned. Starcraft covers things in broad strokes with only 3 races, whereas most other science fiction settings featuring multiple aliens will assign certain general characteristics like "Militaristic," "Religious" or "Greedy" to races, and you can get as detailed as you want when discussing characteristics, but the more broadly they're defined the more distinct your races will be.) Thats my point though. Terrans may be, in the most specific sense, "truckers in space". But on a thematic sense, they are also the embodiment of an entire genre of "realistic" and human-oriented science fiction which encompasses many different works, from Mechwarrior to Battlestar Galactica to Firefly. The other ideas people are bringing up aren't, "hey, there's this entire genre of science fiction which is totally unrepresented in the Starcraft spectrum, so lets add a race to represent that genre" They are, basically, the Warcraft approach of adding races which may be distinct in terms of visuals or gameplay, but don't embody a distinct genre. | ||
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forgotten0ne
United States951 Posts
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billyX333
United States1360 Posts
thats one reason (of many) i didnt really like wc3. all there races were quite similar. although they built differently, they shared the same tech path, same/similar sieging units, altar/shop and t1 building all with identical functions. there isnt the shield vs regen vs repair/heal properties separating the races either. the units are also all built the same way. boring compared to starcraft IMO. you cant get any more unique than it is right now. Three races is the maximum you can go and still have completely unique races + perfect balance. | ||
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Yurie
11806 Posts
On September 12 2010 11:46 billyX333 wrote: Three races is the maximum you can go and still have completely unique races + perfect balance. Stating such absolutes always comes back to bite you. ^^ It just hasn't been done yet. You could add another one to SC and remain completely unique, my idea for that would be a fantasy race in a sci fi setting. Balancing would of course be up in the air.  edit, question. Do we know what is on the other side of Protoss space? | ||
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qwerty100
United States15 Posts
1. Realistic (humans), relying on elite squads 2. Psychic advanced aliens (Goa'uld), relying on powerful ships and weapons, but masses of fighters and soldiers 3. Highly advanced, powerful aliens (Agard), relying on extremely powerful ships 4. Creepy, psychic aliens (Wraiths) 5. Transcendant, mysterious beings (Ancients), like the Xel'Naga 6. Advanced, deceptive beings (Ori), with advanced technology and masses of followers 7. Swarming mechs (Replicators), that are all made of the same basic unit and can combine (imagine that mechanic) I especially would like to see something like #7. Ultimately, I think it comes to what characteristics we use to define the niches of races. If we drew a 3x3 of several "distinguishing" characteristics, we may easily find niches for many races. I.e. On one side, "Biological, Mechanical, Psychic" and on the other side, "Many weak units, Many specialized units, Few powerful units." As you could imagine, we have Zerg fulfilling the first two characteristics, Terran the second two, and Protoss the third two. But what about "Mechanical, Many weak units"? Replicators. "Biological, Few powerful units"? Wraiths, or maybe Species 8472 from Star Trek: Voyager. Something like the Borg from Star Trek would fit "Biolgical", "Mechanical", "Many weak units" (individual Bord), and "Few powerful units" (Borg starships). That would be exciting. Etc. In summary, by expanding what we consider to distinguish a theme, we can in fact many more themes to explore. | ||
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WarChimp
Australia943 Posts
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