Patch 1.4 PTR Notes (updated 9/8) - Page 60

On August 25 2011 13:09 _Search_ wrote:
Mothership
Acceleration increased from 0.3 to 1.375.
The Mothership’s Cloaking Field no longer cloaks all units instantaneously, but rather adds units to the cloak field over time (maximum of 25 per second). This should alleviate “Mothership Lag” issue when a Mothership comes online.

I hope this promotes more Mothership play. It's such an interesting unit. At the same time though, Protoss late game definitely did NOT need any help. Colossus nerf please.

Warp Prism
Shields increased from 40 to 100.

Not a particular fan of this one, mainly because Warp Prisms are such a powerful unit already, especially for such a cheap cost (no gas?!?!). The only reason tosses don't use them is because they're afraid of losing them, which speaks more to the lack of maturity in toss play than imbalance because, considering what the unit does, it's DEFINITELY worth the money.

On August 25 2011 13:09 _Search_ wrote:

Ultralisk
Build time decreased from 70 to 55.

Interesting, but I think Ultras were fine. It's not like Zerg was ever hampered by unit build times anyways. They can mass anything they have the money and larva for. I feel this is Blizzard's desire to bring an underused unit into the game, but build time is not the way to do it. They just need to let Ultra pathing be uninhibited by lings.

On August 25 2011 13:09 _Search_ wrote:
Now that I've had a good think here's my reaction to 1.4:

(Rank 1 Master Terran perspective)


General
Unit vision up ramps has been reduced by 1.

Defender's advantage!! Very necessary. This will stop Toss from saccing a unit up a ramp to warp stuff in past static defense.


PROTOSS
Immortal
Attack range increased from 5 to 6.

I first suggested this exact change a year ago. I knew back then that immortals were simply not effective enough for their cost, even if I was in gold league.


Mothership
Acceleration increased from 0.3 to 1.375.
The Mothership’s Cloaking Field no longer cloaks all units instantaneously, but rather adds units to the cloak field over time (maximum of 25 per second). This should alleviate “Mothership Lag” issue when a Mothership comes online.

I hope this promotes more Mothership play. It's such an interesting unit. At the same time though, Protoss late game definitely did NOT need any help. Colossus nerf please.


Stalker
Blink research time increased from 110 to 140.

This is great because blink really should be a late game ability and not conducive to a timing attack. Terran is far too vulnerable to blink Stalkers on maps like Tal'Darim, though this change will likely have greater effect in the other matchups.


Warp Prism
Shields increased from 40 to 100.

Not a particular fan of this one, mainly because Warp Prisms are such a powerful unit already, especially for such a cheap cost (no gas?!?!). The only reason tosses don't use them is because they're afraid of losing them, which speaks more to the lack of maturity in toss play than imbalance because, considering what the unit does, it's DEFINITELY worth the money.


TERRAN
Barracks
Build time increased from 60 to 65.

lolwut? Is this to help with 2 rax? I don't know how much effect it will have on that, but Terran has the hardest time producing units in the early game, especially against toss, and this will make Terran far too vulnerable to early pressure.

I once suggested this very change, but coupled it with a marine time decrease and Orbital Command time decrease (5 secs). Terran is simply far too vulnerable in the early game to anything that can get around a bunker. Basically what this is doing is making any Terran non-bio build auto-lose to early pressure.

Can this nerf not be accompanied by a reactor core build time buff? The Terran macro game already suffers as it is, without double-punishing Terrans for trying to tech.

Hellion
Infernal Pre-Igniter damage upgrade decreased from 10 to 5.

Defense against hellions was already getting figured out. This nerf is totally unnecessary. Zergs have long learned to defend against them, Protosses have no fear of them and Terrans were learning to cope. 19 damage is still enough to 2-shot lings, just not workers until +2 mech weapons. Even worse, now zealots and marines are even MORE effective against hellions, when hellions should totally own both. This is the type of nerf that will remove the unit from the game, just like reapers, and Blizzard needs to be making Terran units less specialized and more cohesive, not the opposite.

Either remove Pre-igniter altogether and give hellions a +3 damage buff (11 +6 v light) or raise the hellion rate of fire and add a pre-attack pause, like in the alpha, like Thors currently have. This will force hellions to stay stationary before they fire, which will make hellion raids less effective, but allow them to gel more easily into a greater army mix.

Really Blizzard should be changing the Hellion to make it more effective in a general army and less effective in a raid. A straight-up nerf like this one will only remove it from the game, which is tragic, since the Hellion had essentially just entered the game.


Raven
Seeker missile movement speed increased from 2.5 to 2.953.

FINALLY!!!! No more vikings escaping Seeker Missile scot-free! Options in the imba Brood Lord/Corruptor/Infestor v. Viking/Marine wars! And, most importantly, AOE FOR TERRANS!! (besides tanks, which were hardly the equivalent of psi storm, colossi, carriers and fungal growth, if not also banelings (no one's ever perfected a "tank bust"))

ZERG
Infestor
Fungal Growth damage changed from 36 (+30% armored) to 30 (40 vs Armored).

This won't effect PvZ too greatly, unless units recharge shields while under FG (if they do then it's a big nerf as Zealots and Stalkers will each require an extra FG), but this is a welcome nerf in the Brood Lord/Corruptor/Infestor v. Viking marine match. Marines with combat shields and adequate medivacs will mostly survive 2 fungals and Vikings will require 4 FGs instead of 3 to die.

We all knew FG was too powerful. This nerf is well-deserved.

Overseer
Morph cost decreased from 50/100 to 50/50.
Contaminate energy cost increased from 75 to 125.

Still trying to help Zergs against cloaked units. This buff is unnecessary. Spore Crawler buff was enough.

Ultralisk
Build time decreased from 70 to 55.

Interesting, but I think Ultras were fine. It's not like Zerg was ever hampered by unit build times anyways. They can mass anything they have the money and larva for. I feel this is Blizzard's desire to bring an underused unit into the game, but build time is not the way to do it. They just need to let Ultra pathing be uninhibited by lings.

On August 25 2011 13:14 eviltomahawk wrote:

It's really only a change to the measure of APM.

If all those left-hand APM tricks actually physically helped in improving a player's effective APM, then they will continue to help.

The number is meaningless if the actions are meaningless, IMO.

On August 25 2011 13:16 mprs wrote:
The Raven Change:



The black dot means HSM was faster than the stock speed of the unit.

The double gray dot means HSM will be now faster (or the same) as this unit.

So what changed? HSM will now be faster than:


• Workers (Probes, SCVs, Drones, and MULEs)
  
• Vikings
  
• Banshees
  
• Dark Templar
  
• Archons
  
  HSM will now be the same speed as:
  
  
• Ultralisks
  
• Un-upgraded Zerglings
  
• Un-upgraded Reapers
  
• Corrupters
  
• Stalkers
  

Note: The speeds of the "same speed" units are actually 2.9531, and the Raven buff is listed as 2.953. I'm not sure if this is a rounding problem or if they are meant to be faster by an incredibly small amount so that they could out run the HSM over a long period of time. It wouldn't make sense because if they were the same speed, the same effect would occur. I personally believe that they are both 2.9531, but obviously that could be subject to change.

I guess most notably, Seeker missles can really REALLY decimate worker lines if you don't know react very quickly and know which worker is being targeted. I guess this will make up for some of the lost worker destruction from the BFH nerf.

Being faster than vikings will be a huge deal in TvT, as you can ward off pesky vikings away from tanks and what not. Being faster than archons is pretty meaningless, since HSM radius is 2.0 and it will pretty much only hit one archon 99% of the time (correct me if I'm wrong). Ultralisks are in the same category of explanation. Zerglings, DTs, and Reapers are non-issue. HSM can now be used to ward off a group of stalkers now I guess, which could be some cool play. This can also apply to corrupters, but I have a hard time finding a reason for a Z to use corrupters vs T. Perhaps this will allow sky Terran to be viable and having an answer for mass corrupters?

To conclude, this change is going to have only significant repercussions in worker harass, and Vs. Viking and combat.

On August 25 2011 13:14 eviltomahawk wrote:

It's really only a change to the measure of APM.

If all those left-hand APM tricks actually physically helped in improving a player's effective APM, then they will continue to help.

The number is meaningless if the actions are meaningless, IMO.

On August 25 2011 13:10 Oceaniax wrote:



Reducing the gas cost by 50% is a good change, but it would also make it A LOT easier to mass them up to deny production via contaminate. It's not a big deal now since the cost is so high, but I could definitely see late game Z strategies incorporating that in a big way if it was twice as easy to mass, hence the bump up in the energy cost.

On August 25 2011 13:18 Kluey wrote:
The warp prism change isn't really that great. It's like what they did with the Ghost. They just tweak it a little bit and people go crazy and try experimenting with it. 60 extra shield won't save you from viking fire or it won't make it invincible.