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Since this whole topic degenerated into the usual balance flamefest where every topic ends up if unmoderated it's time for it to clean up. Locking this down for a while. Any posts made after my post [page 233] not addressing the changes in this patch directly and containting flames or general balance whine will get banned for at least a week. ~Nyovne
There is way too much flaming in this thread right now. Calm down before you post! (Page 271) ~iamke55 |
Masters zerg here,
I believe this change won't go live, for several reasons.
1) Blizzard has already stated on several occasions that they are not in the habit of removing aspects from their gameplay. Rather they prefer to balance the other races to compensate for other race's abilities. After all, a game with less options is less fun...
2) If neural can't target massive, it is utterly useless. The only units that it would work on now are siege tanks, immortals, and air units besides battlecruisers and carriers/mothership. But mutalisks are better at dealing with siege tanks and hydras are better at dealing with immortals, both cheaper zerg units than the infestor. Of course it can work on ghosts and high templar but good luck getting that to work in a battle...
3) The infestor is tier 2 with neural being the second upgrade it can get... and this lets zerg contest with a tier 3 army composition. Given the fragility of the infestor and the cost... meaning you can only have lings or at best roaches (which delays your hive timing) in your army composition, I feel like this is extremely fair. The problem most people have is that they let a zerg with infestors sit on their energy for too long, then are surprised when they are facing broodlords and 10+ infestors with near maxed energy. But zerg never lets a high templar protoss sit for too long... nor a ghost heavy terran (IMMvp vs July). So I think the problem is protoss and terran's resistance to REACT to a zerg unit composition. After all, zerg is the reactionary race... why should they have to do anything more than build units and attack like always.
As a suitable balance change, I would increase the energy to 125 so you can't neural twice with one infestor and/or decrease the range to 7 so siege tanks/thors and colossi can still target them but normal units (marine/marauder and gateway) can't.
Fair?
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SoCal8907 Posts
On September 09 2011 23:44 AlgoFlash wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 23:40 zalgolisk wrote:
My personal suspicion is that the NP nerf is being placed in PTR primarily to force Zerg players there to actually /test/ the changes. As it is, too many people may be using Infestors "too much" for a proper test of the balance changes.
Now the counter to mothership is to scout and start Hydras if it's backed by air, or ignore it and overrun with Roaches if it's backed by ground, in the same way that Roaches can end up countering void ray builds. This tests the cost buff for Overseers indirectly.
The counter to ground massive units is, of course, Ultras. People may simply not be building them enough for a test, since we're used to them taking 70 (70!) seconds to see a possible return on investment. (Though Zealot/Archon may still be challenging to fight.)
The NP nerf is likely too severe to be left in the game proper -- its only reasonable targets are casters now. Once they gauge the strength of the Overseer/Ultralisk buffs, we will probably see a gentler nerf of NP at worst. We may even see an energy cost buff -- if its only reasonable targets are casters, then it needs to be brought in line with Feedback and EMP (especially since you actually have to research it).
Purely speculation, of course; I have no affiliation with Blizzard's testers. Excellent speculation.
actually, this would make a lot of sense. good spot!
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On September 09 2011 23:44 Zeon0 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 23:38 Reborn8u wrote:
Dear Zerg player,
Comon guys, chin up. You can overcome this. Stop thinking about the infestor and look at a much broader subject. The next time you loose to Protoss I'd like you to ask yourself a few questions.
"Did I use mobility? Did I attack their army from as many angles as possible? Did I back stab whenever possible? Did I use drops or nydus to punish greed? Did I micro my expensive units well, and not suicide them? Did I scout well, seeing their composition and tech early then getting the proper units and upgrades? Was I greedy at the right times or too greedy at times?"
These things are fundamentals tactics and concepts of Zerg and I honestly see a lot of zergs who are completely ignoring them. If you loose to a protoss watch your replay and ask these questions. You might realize some weaknesses in your play, and that can make you a much better player. If you're flustered have a friend watch the replay and ask these questions, I'd bet that if you lost, some of the answers to them will be "no" yeah, and the Protosses will think "are 5 colossi enough to push or should i wait for the 6th?" and "should i build 3 or 4 cannons at my third?"
Try to win one fight against a masters zerg without FF micro and colo micro. Keeping zeals in front, microing HT's. Making important decisions on moving out on the map vz Z mobility, how many stalkers to send to stop mutas. You wont
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On September 09 2011 23:44 AlgoFlash wrote:
The counter to ground massive units is, of course, Ultras..
I wonder what you are smoking..
Archon don't care about Ultra
Thor destroy them in fight
Colossis will never get hit by Ultra with proper control.
Do i miss a mysterious massive ground unit ?
Ultra are good tank and kills armored shit fast when they can hit them. You don't build them to counter something. When you try that, they get stuck, absorb damage but never hit what you want lol
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On August 25 2011 10:14 awu25 wrote:
Mod edit: Infestors' neural parasite ability no longer works on massive units.
Finally... I can't even count anymore how many times a 200 vs 200food army turned into a 230 vs 170 food army for the zerg within seconds, only because of this...
Like someone else said, zergs will actually have to make a choice now, and not automatically go for 15 infestors every single game/matchup...
Anyway, I can't wait to see how it'll evolve from there, and ofc if the change is gonna hit the live version...
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RIP to a cool spell :/. Would've just made more sense to make fungal not freeze units but slow instead. That's usually the source of the infestor bitching, and admittedly it isn't very fun to watch. Neural was so-so at best before, now it's useless.
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I'm not completely sure.
1st Amulet removed, then thors cannons made useless, now they trying to destroy insfestors.
It's what I call overnerf, nerf one race and buff slightly others and you can multiple it by 2.
They should give something in exchange, mana reduction, range increase. I don't know.
IMO:
Amulet nerf was required, but not removal.
Thor cannon nerf was required, but they overnerfed it.
Fungal nerf is required, but not neural.
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On September 09 2011 23:40 zalgolisk wrote:
My personal suspicion is that the NP nerf is being placed in PTR primarily to force Zerg players there to actually /test/ the changes. As it is, too many people may be using Infestors "too much" for a proper test of the balance changes.
Now the counter to mothership is to scout and start Hydras if it's backed by air, or ignore it and overrun with Roaches if it's backed by ground, in the same way that Roaches can end up countering void ray builds. This tests the cost buff for Overseers indirectly.
The counter to ground massive units is, of course, Ultras. People may simply not be building them enough for a test, since we're used to them taking 70 (70!) seconds to see a possible return on investment. (Though Zealot/Archon may still be challenging to fight.)
The NP nerf is likely too severe to be left in the game proper -- its only reasonable targets are casters now. Once they gauge the strength of the Overseer/Ultralisk buffs, we will probably see a gentler nerf of NP at worst. We may even see an energy cost buff -- if its only reasonable targets are casters, then it needs to be brought in line with Feedback and EMP (especially since you actually have to research it).
Purely speculation, of course; I have no affiliation with Blizzard's testers.
You actually think that Blizzard's master plan is to get Zergs to test the PTR changes by not building the unit that they would be building anyway were this change not to be implemented? That is pretty far out there.
"Guys, we're not going to be going to a parallel bizzaro universe, but we're going to have you test some stuff to see what would happen if we did even though it we aren't and after you're done testing it you can go back to doing the stuff you always did." Sounds productive.
edit: I'd bet money that almost no-one here even plays the PTR at all. I tried to do a bunch of testing but I went undefeated and eventually hit 8+ minute queue times because there was literally no one queuing at the PTR diamond level.
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I am in no way (as many otheres here) to talk about any balance aspects, however I wonder if the research of NP can be justified, if that changes goes through, as you will really only NP ghosts / templar and siege tanks, as any other target is pretty much a waste of energy.
It's not too hard to snipe the NP-infestors with stalkers / marines, at least from what we see on high level streams. Doesn't that take away another micro aspect of the game, and makes it easier again?
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Give me back my dark archon and proper mind control!!!!!!!!!!!
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So now what happens when a terran goes mech + ghost? Thor steam rolls and ghost snipes behind? Sweet!!!
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SoCal8907 Posts
On September 09 2011 23:51 Cyrak wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 23:40 zalgolisk wrote:
My personal suspicion is that the NP nerf is being placed in PTR primarily to force Zerg players there to actually /test/ the changes. As it is, too many people may be using Infestors "too much" for a proper test of the balance changes.
Now the counter to mothership is to scout and start Hydras if it's backed by air, or ignore it and overrun with Roaches if it's backed by ground, in the same way that Roaches can end up countering void ray builds. This tests the cost buff for Overseers indirectly.
The counter to ground massive units is, of course, Ultras. People may simply not be building them enough for a test, since we're used to them taking 70 (70!) seconds to see a possible return on investment. (Though Zealot/Archon may still be challenging to fight.)
The NP nerf is likely too severe to be left in the game proper -- its only reasonable targets are casters now. Once they gauge the strength of the Overseer/Ultralisk buffs, we will probably see a gentler nerf of NP at worst. We may even see an energy cost buff -- if its only reasonable targets are casters, then it needs to be brought in line with Feedback and EMP (especially since you actually have to research it).
Purely speculation, of course; I have no affiliation with Blizzard's testers. You actually think that Blizzard's master plan is to get Zergs to test the PTR changes by not building the unit that they would be building anyway were this change not to be implemented? That is pretty far out there. "Guys, we're not going to be going to a parallel bizzaro universe, but we're going to have you test some stuff to see what would happen if we did even though it we aren't and after you're done testing it you can go back to doing the stuff you always did." Sounds productive. edit: I'd bet money that almost no-one here even plays the PTR at all. I tried to do a bunch of testing but I went undefeated and eventually hit 8+ minute queue times because there was literally no one queuing at the PTR diamond level.
no.. it would be to get zergs to test different unit compositions VS the changes they made.
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Protoss could always target fire the infestor which is good for the game because it requires some micro. If the range is the problem they could make NP's range a little shorter. Now it seems that we go back to the failed roach hydra corruptor composition.
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My take as a protoss is that the neural nerf is too drastic. I'd much prefer a nerf to not allow it to target massive flying units. There are huge crews on on carriers, MS, and BC's, how the hell could a slug mind control them all with one tentacle?
I've never had a problem with neural in my personal games and I like what the spell does in pro games, it promotes target firing. Nerfing neural on flying units would add more late game counters and give more reason to explore underused units.
/my 2 cents.
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Russian Federation114 Posts
I expected to see a return of mutas ZvP after the removal of the instant storm warpin, maybe the zerg play style really is limited by the efficiency of the infestor.
The infestor needs a nerf, but zerg should be given units strong enough to deal with deathballs.
Hydras and Ultralisks are too weak to do so at the moment. Ultra aoe should be buffed back to its 1.1 range (without the PF exploit).
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On September 09 2011 23:46 Demigod18x wrote:
Masters zerg here,
I believe this change won't go live, for several reasons.
1) Blizzard has already stated on several occasions that they are not in the habit of removing aspects from their gameplay. Rather they prefer to balance the other races to compensate for other race's abilities. After all, a game with less options is less fun...
2) If neural can't target massive, it is utterly useless. The only units that it would work on now are siege tanks, immortals, and air units besides battlecruisers and carriers/mothership. But mutalisks are better at dealing with siege tanks and hydras are better at dealing with immortals, both cheaper zerg units than the infestor. Of course it can work on ghosts and high templar but good luck getting that to work in a battle...
3) The infestor is tier 2 with neural being the second upgrade it can get... and this lets zerg contest with a tier 3 army composition. Given the fragility of the infestor and the cost... meaning you can only have lings or at best roaches (which delays your hive timing) in your army composition, I feel like this is extremely fair. The problem most people have is that they let a zerg with infestors sit on their energy for too long, then are surprised when they are facing broodlords and 10+ infestors with near maxed energy. But zerg never lets a high templar protoss sit for too long... nor a ghost heavy terran (IMMvp vs July). So I think the problem is protoss and terran's resistance to REACT to a zerg unit composition. After all, zerg is the reactionary race... why should they have to do anything more than build units and attack like always.
As a suitable balance change, I would increase the energy to 125 so you can't neural twice with one infestor and/or decrease the range to 7 so siege tanks/thors and colossi can still target them but normal units (marine/marauder and gateway) can't.
Fair?
I believe this change will go live for several reasons:
1)Blizzard has 'removed' aspects of the game before, reaper nerf, High templar ugrade remove, Void ray upgrade remove. I agree it's not the most ideal way of fixing something, but maybe they don't see another way
2)Will it be useless? at this moment it's easily the best ability in the game, if ur protoss opponent has 6 Colossi it's so easy to counter them with a couple of upgraded infestors, especially in ZvP people just get demotivated to even make T3 units in the lategame. Because what's the point? With every Colossus you made you only make the Zerg army stronger.
3) The infestor allready has 2 very very strong abilities, Infested terrans and Fungal growth, The infestor became an 'I counter everything' unit the last few months which wasn't intended at all.
Can you honestly tell me there is a situation in where you wouldn't make Infestors nowadays in all matchups?
They should buff some other things for Zergs to make up for this change because I agree it's a big, but justified nerf.
Masters Protoss btw
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On September 09 2011 23:55 immortlone wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 23:51 Cyrak wrote:On September 09 2011 23:40 zalgolisk wrote:
My personal suspicion is that the NP nerf is being placed in PTR primarily to force Zerg players there to actually /test/ the changes. As it is, too many people may be using Infestors "too much" for a proper test of the balance changes.
Now the counter to mothership is to scout and start Hydras if it's backed by air, or ignore it and overrun with Roaches if it's backed by ground, in the same way that Roaches can end up countering void ray builds. This tests the cost buff for Overseers indirectly.
The counter to ground massive units is, of course, Ultras. People may simply not be building them enough for a test, since we're used to them taking 70 (70!) seconds to see a possible return on investment. (Though Zealot/Archon may still be challenging to fight.)
The NP nerf is likely too severe to be left in the game proper -- its only reasonable targets are casters now. Once they gauge the strength of the Overseer/Ultralisk buffs, we will probably see a gentler nerf of NP at worst. We may even see an energy cost buff -- if its only reasonable targets are casters, then it needs to be brought in line with Feedback and EMP (especially since you actually have to research it).
Purely speculation, of course; I have no affiliation with Blizzard's testers. You actually think that Blizzard's master plan is to get Zergs to test the PTR changes by not building the unit that they would be building anyway were this change not to be implemented? That is pretty far out there. "Guys, we're not going to be going to a parallel bizzaro universe, but we're going to have you test some stuff to see what would happen if we did even though it we aren't and after you're done testing it you can go back to doing the stuff you always did." Sounds productive. edit: I'd bet money that almost no-one here even plays the PTR at all. I tried to do a bunch of testing but I went undefeated and eventually hit 8+ minute queue times because there was literally no one queuing at the PTR diamond level. no.. it would be to get zergs to test different unit compositions VS the changes they made.
Okay, now, again, please explain how there is any utility in that whatsoever when that's not how Zergs play on live. I've been through enough games with enough balance patches to tell you definitively that players do not adjust their play until they are forced to.
Occam's razor says that this change is a direct response to the <30% GSL win rates in PvZ rather than some temporary social experiment on a PTR that noone actually plays on.
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Neural will still be good against immortals, tanks, void rays and other high cost effective units. I agree with this nerf but I'd prefer if they keep NP on massive and instead increase the cost of fungal and infested terrans.
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On September 09 2011 23:56 SolidZeal wrote:
My take as a protoss is that the neural nerf is too drastic. I'd much prefer a nerf to not allow it to target massive flying units. There are huge crews on on carriers, MS, and BC's, how the hell could a slug mind control them all with one tentacle?
I've never had a problem with neural in my personal games and I like what the spell does in pro games, it promotes target firing. Nerfing neural on flying units would add more late game counters and give more reason to explore underused units.
/my 2 cents.
For me neither range or dmg or FG was the problem, rather the chain fungaling.
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As a toss myself, I agree that massive being immune to NP is pretty lame, but when you have enough infestors to just take over all collossi, it gets frustrating. What about having NP be a channeling spell? That way it could be cast, but the HT/Ghosts could get off their spells to cancel it out. That, or you could have the cost of the spell directly related to the unit they are trying to control (light, armored, massive etc)
My bigger problem is the FG snare. Slow would be better, or at least have massive immune to the snare rather than NP.
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EPT
