|
On September 09 2011 01:43 mrlie3 wrote:
OP already suggested a perfect solution to this problem - bring back the Shield Battery, strengthen gateway units, and weaken high-tech units (eg. Immortal obviously since Immortal with proxy Shield Battery means imba)
This would not be a perfect solution... The Shield Battery would be insanely strong offensively, especially when coupled with things like Blink Stalker pressure/rush.
If you strengthen Gateway units, you will absolutely crush Zerg in the early game with good Force Fields. It's already close with "weaker" Gateway units, an idea on which I'm not sold on. It'd be a blowout with stronger Gateway units. =/
|
I really think it's fine the way it is. Why change it? You still see Terran and Zerg loosing to Protoss. So cmon, as soon as protoss is in a slump, they have to complain that THEY are imbalanced. Its all in the metagame, hello guys, protoss was winning 2 months ago, exclusivly. You have to adapt your play. You cant just go to blizzard and ask them for a buff, then it would ruin the game. "hey blizz buff marines, the die too quickly" - no we cant because then they would be op. Same with stalker.
So guys, just chill, READ FORUMS, WATCH REPLAYS and practice, the only way getting better. You wont get any better by writing long posts about how to "buff" races.
|
I don't think the warpgate mechanic needs to be changed at all. Yes, it gives Protoss the advantage in certain situations, but the game is balanced around the situational advantages/disadvantages that every race has. I could write a page or two on how the MULE gives an "unfair advantage" to Terran players, or how Zerg's greater remaxing ability gives an "unfair advantage" but in the end it's pointless because the game is balanced around it. The ease of making bunkers/spines (especially bunkers) and the fact that Marauders and Roaches (which also melt both Zealots and Sentries) are better than Stalkers (early game anyway, but I'm trying to keep this post as short as possible) balance the fact that the offensive Toss can warp in wherever you allowed their nearest pylon to be placed. Nothing broken about it.
Edit: and as far as the warpgate mechanic shifting the balance so that Toss is weaker defensively, I'm sorry but I'd have to disagree there too. Like you said, the only situations in which cannons aren't viable static defense are pretty early game, as any Protoss, depending on what they scout, should have a forge up not too long after their second base, and I personally find that Toss early game is fine without cannons, based on my own play (which I'll admit is Platinum level so not as indicative of true balance) but also on the many, many pro level games I've seen... Protoss tends to lose in at least the midgame if not very late. There are a couple of all-in after the Toss FE scenarios that seem to be successful but that is because the defending player is caught off guard.
|
I for one would agree with adding in the shield battery. It would slightly increase the defender's advantage, while not really messing with the offender's advantage. And I think this would really make a big difference to the way PvP usually turns out. 4 gating would not be so strong anymore... unless u warp in a shield battery at your proxy 
However, it could have some insane consequences like abuse and that would obviously have to be taken into account. It would be really nice if Blizzard looked into this and considered it though.
|
On September 08 2011 19:25 Pzar wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote:
Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something? Well, jus thinking out loud here, but I never understood why warpgates allowed for higher production throughput than gateways. It made more sense to me that you should be giving up -something- (resources or time) to gain the front-loaded anywhere there's a power field style of unit creation. Especially given that you can convert warpgates back to gateways. Plus it'd be cool to see gateways<->warpgates happening as protoss move between defensive and offensive =P
Protoss gateway units are generally a little too weak (for reasons mentioned above) to justify their long build times in the lategame. However, shorter build times would overpower already potent VERY earlygame strats (2gate, proxy gates, etc) so the build time decrease that has to happen somewhere is bundled into warpgate.
regarding the op, yeah i've thought this for a while, i'm glad someone made a post on it, although its difficult to see the correct course of action to rectify the situation. I kinda feel like blizzard internally made the argument that forcefield will offset the defenders weakness and that was generally accepted, but then they made maps where forcefield is bad, which seems a bit odd. I'd like to see how protoss fares if every map were FFE friendly
|
Why not add a shield battery upgrade to the Nexus..that way you couldn't build one next to your proxy pylon in an aggressive timing push (unless you build a...PROXY NEXUS?). Would also make a lot more sense when protoss FE in PvZ, and then zerg proceed to make 90 drones and throw units at you for the rest of the game.
|
On September 09 2011 01:58 ShaEreHugo wrote:
I really think it's fine the way it is. Why change it? You still see Terran and Zerg loosing to Protoss.
This is not about your laddering experience.
Its all in the metagame, hello guys, protoss was winning 2 months ago, exclusivly.
Umm no? Check the racial distribution in the gsl for example and stop making stuff up.
"hey blizz buff marines, the die too quickly" - no we cant because then they would be op..
OP against whom? the other terran in the finals? I dont think so.
|
On September 08 2011 19:25 Pzar wrote:
Well, jus thinking out loud here, but I never understood why warpgates allowed for higher production throughput than gateways.
It made more sense to me that you should be giving up -something- (resources or time) to gain the front-loaded anywhere there's a power field style of unit creation. Especially given that you can convert warpgates back to gateways.
Plus it'd be cool to see gateways<->warpgates happening as protoss move between defensive and offensive =P
Yes. This is what I think a lot of people look forward to. Something that gives defender's advantage back to Protoss.
A tweak to look into would be to add what Belisarius said. Warp-ins provide an upfront load of units and this is an important aspect of warp-ins. Units at 5 and 40 sec are definitely better than units at 30 and 60 sec (if you understand what I mean) This gives the attacking player 20 sec, between times 40 and 60 sec to attack with an additional set of units. If we tweak numbers to make it say 5 and 50 sec, while keeping gateway units to pop out at 30 and 60, then it might be workable, but that significantly affects timings and reinforcements against T and Z, where warp ins might be necessary. (I took out his suggestion about the cost, it was the instant gateway spawn that could fix the upfront problem)
On September 08 2011 22:28 Belisarius wrote:
No that's my point. I'm toss by the way, I know how important that wave is. That's why I said warpgate should upgrade both gateway mode and its warp in mode.
I'd have the standard gateway train time mode disappear (because it's useless once you have wg), replaced with a mode where the units spawn instantly as with warpgate but do so at the gateway, as if they'd been trained. So you still get the extra round of units when WG comes online.
I see a lot of people making absurd arguments that the WG mechanic also has defender's advantage. See following:
+ Show Spoiler +On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote:
you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be.
Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
The main point of a defender's advantage is that the distance that reinforcing units have to travel is WAY less than the distance that attacking units have to travel. Sentries help this out by delaying attacking units, thereby relatively shortening the time it takes for your units to come out.
Bunkers and Spine crawlers also achieve defender's advantage by being very cost effective through the increased range/damage + additional health. In addition, as the OP mentioned, ramp usage is important. As for Protoss, since they cannot effectively use the forge as a tech choice, it would be okay if there were some defensive structure available after the gateway. Hence, a lot of people suggested making the shield battery available again. So, this is a viable option as it gives all three races a defensive structure after gateway/rax/pool. However, we may need to examine that further as a shield battery can certainly be placed at forward pylons (similar to, but not exactly the same as bunkers).
As for the people suggesting warp-in times being different based on distance from original nexus or gateways, this introduces new complex mechanics. For example, would the warp in times be continuous in regards to distance measures? As in, would 5 meters be associated with 30 sec, 5.1 meters be associated with 30+x sec, and 5.2 meters be associated with 30+2x sec? Or would 5-10 meters be associated with 30 sec, and 10-20 be associated with 40 sec, and so on? (like multiple rings) Disregarding numbers that can be tweaked and adjusted, this option introduces multiple new problems. Should mapmakers now take into account "warp in ring" ranges? Are gamers supposed to calculate how much distance something is during their practice? As for me, I think that this new mechanic would introduce unnecessary refinement just to be able to warp in where they want.
I also like the suggestion that Milkis made:
+ Show Spoiler +On September 08 2011 22:32 Milkis wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 22:25 Excludos wrote:On September 08 2011 21:55 Milkis wrote:
in my opinion if they make warp gate have a significantly longer cool time you'd get defender's advantage back and would let you get away with buffing protoss units a bit to deal with other kinds of attacks protoss has :p How is that suppose to work out exactly? whetever you have 4 stalkers, or one stalker as strong as 4 that takes 4 times as long to build, it doesn't matter. The fact is that you can still warpin everywhere, and if protoss had defenders advantage, timing attacks would be too strong =| I rather like the idea of units either costing more, or take longer to warp in, depending on the distance you warp in from the warpgate. The defender wouldn't use warpgates, so they can reinforce faster (in PvP), so early aggression plays are discouraged a bit. You can then buff gateway units on top of that to make them more workable against pushes like 1/1/1
This is a bit different from the "warpgate cd longer than gateway" because it gives Blizzard the option to buff/nerf Protoss units if needed. With the other solutions, we rely on the fact that Protoss units are unchanged, and are discussing warp gate changes with the current state of Protoss units in mind.
I think this post may be a little long, but I enjoy intelligent, civil discussion on this matter. Hopefully, this can summarize a portion of this thread and prevent some misunderstandings.
|
On September 08 2011 19:13 RodYan wrote:
The solution is:
-Make Gateways start with warpgate
-Proxy pylon warp-in is a mid or late game upgrade
Do you know how ridiculous that would make 2gate zealot? Also, the proxy pylon "upgrade" is just, it just blows my mind. It'd ruin Protoss, having to make units from each individual gateways radius. Plus hotkeying all your gateways would be a bit pointless since you'd have to go to each individual gateway to make them. It'd be like Brood War, which is an amazing game, but is known for its bad engine.
|
Introduce a buffed shield battery for defense.
Buff Zealot and Zergling (cant rebalance one without the other, marines are too strong by comparaison anyway)
WARP IN UNITS WITHOUT SHIELDS, you can either engage at risk or wait for recharge 
As for the melee unit buff, I honestly think if forces didnt naturally clump up, they would be much more effective....
|
what the point of shield batteries, when Ghosts still can emp all shields of allmost all Protoss unit with 1-2 emps?...
But Op is right, Protoss lacks defenders advantage on maps where natural is open.
|
There is a fundamental issue with the way warp works as well.
Basically when warp finishes you go from your last round of just produced units to warping in just a few seconds. It is almost impossible to balance those two timings.
If Toss can defend fairly right before warp then 15 seconds and potentially 16 supply later their attack is massively imba.
If instead you balance toss for after warp finishing, then 15 seconds earlier at 16 lower supply Toss is unable to defend.
The ability to warp in units must be seperated from the ability accelerate production. I propose the following:
Gateway goes away and only warpgates exist.
By default Warpgates can only warp in units within radius of a Pylon that is near a Nexus.
Warpgate/Gateway build time is increased. (maybe 10ish seconds)
The Warp Upgrade allows protoss to warp in units at any pylon.
What this does:
#1: Proxy gating goes away. Even if I build 3 gates your base I can only warp in units at my base.
#2: 4 gate attack is delayed because Gateway build time is delayed.
#3: Protoss is significantly better when defending because the first round of units arrives faster since they are "warped" in.
A second possibility related to OP is to change the nature of the cannon.
Players that do not play Toss have no idea how hard it is to defend rushes when you have no access to Cannons. As zerg or Terran you scout a rush and drop a bunker or spine. Imagine if Bunker required Ebay or Spine required Evo Chamber?
To make the Toss mechanic more similar to Zeg and Terran I would propose making cannon require only Gateway, but Cannons would neither be able to detect nor shoot at air until Forge is complete.
|
What if when you warped in your units had no shields, so you would have to wait out the recharge period. Also to make it easier to defend because of this, you can give the nexus a power grid once you get warpgates so that warping in at a nexus would make your units spawn with shields. Attacking while not having shields would be pretty suicidal imo so this would definately reduce aggressive play. Also i guess warping in at a warp prism should also give shields, so you could use a warp prism for a modern proxy pylon
|
On September 09 2011 02:40 meadbert wrote:
There is a fundamental issue with the way warp works as well.
Basically when warp finishes you go from your last round of just produced units to warping in just a few seconds. It is almost impossible to balance those two timings.
If Toss can defend fairly right before warp then 15 seconds and potentially 16 supply later their attack is massively imba.
If instead you balance toss for after warp finishing, then 15 seconds earlier at 16 lower supply Toss is unable to defend.
The ability to warp in units must be seperated from the ability accelerate production. I propose the following:
Gateway goes away and only warpgates exist.
By default Warpgates can only warp in units within radius of a Pylon that is near a Nexus.
Warpgate/Gateway build time is increased. (maybe 10ish seconds)
The Warp Upgrade allows protoss to warp in units at any pylon.
What this does:
#1: Proxy gating goes away. Even if I build 3 gates your base I can only warp in units at my base.
#2: 4 gate attack is delayed because Gateway build time is delayed.
#3: Protoss is significantly better when defending because the first round of units arrives faster since they are "warped" in.
A second possibility related to OP is to change the nature of the cannon.
Players that do not play Toss have no idea how hard it is to defend rushes when you have no access to Cannons. As zerg or Terran you scout a rush and drop a bunker or spine. Imagine if Bunker required Ebay or Spine required Evo Chamber?
To make the Toss mechanic more similar to Zeg and Terran I would propose making cannon require only Gateway, but Cannons would neither be able to detect nor shoot at air until Forge is complete.
You could make the ability to warp in at a pylon an upgrade in the robotics support bay or TC
|
Good read.
Since these threads always digress into suggested balance changes. Give my gateway units a temporary buff like a stim where I can trade all of my shields for a temporary raw damage amplifier...would help with EMP being completely broken against toss and deal with awful gateway DPS, which is in fact awful compared to the other races lower tier stuff.
|
I like the idea of warpin being an extreme late-game tech for defending multiple expansions and harassing the enemy. Kinda like recall. Its exactly what Protoss needs especially when all races can harass much easier. I mean even in BW, its almost impossible to beat a 200/200 3/3 Terran with Protoss, Jangbi did it, but he had 6 bases vs 3 and about 30 gateways while doing perfect storms and stasis.
The problem is that its a super long duration but super cheap 50/50 upgrade from the cybernetics core, which is just ridiculous. In BW players would sometimes opt for air upgrade for a corsair opening, but with the massive research time and brainless decision making required for this upgrade, you will never have a strategy that researches anything else first.
IMO it should be researched from the templar archives, same as blink (which is currently citadel i know). Then the protoss player can decide whether he wants blink or warp in, depending on the situation.
At this point in time, players should have enough robo units and sentries to deal with warp-gate timings. It would still be bad, but no where near as bad. It should be coupled with longer cooldown times so that you would choose between warp-gate or gateway depending on the situation, and also longer warp-in times the further away from a nexus you get so it becomes more of a clutch defense tool rather than offensive.
Shield battery for Protoss is also a good idea, in SC2 every race lacks defenders advantage right now.
|
On September 08 2011 19:20 XenoX101 wrote:
The solution is this, warpgate should be a tier 2-2.5 upgrade and decrease gateway unit build times to match warpgate times. It should not be the first thing you get with a cybernetics core, having such an advantage so quickly in the game is silly and the equivalent of zerg getting ovie speed + ventral sacs off of hatchery tech. If it cost 200/200 and didn't speed up unit build times I think it would be perfectly positioned for the mid-late game as a sensible upgrade rather than a game-breaking one.
how is warpgate gamebreaking? The advantage warpgates bring is balanced out by the crappy cost inefficient warpgate units that are warped in early game as well as the fact that its much harder to macro warpgates than it is simple gateways (if you don't understand why then you just don't understand)
|
Gateways produce units quicker, warpgates actually take time to morph. Problem solved.
Honestly it isn't that hard to see this obvious solution. You are able to make units a tiny bit quicker out of gateways for defense, but when you want to go offense a 30-45 second transformation to a warpgate with a longer cooldown seems a lot more balanced. Allows 4 warpgates to attack and 3 gateways to defend. "But this makes 4 gating terrible in PvP!"
Yeah. I know.
|
I wouldn't mind having a mechanic that made units come out of whichever gateway you wanted and removed the warp-in thing. It would be like that show stargate, where units just walk through. So you build a zealot and it just walks out from the gateway with no build time, but with cool down. That way if you wanted to proxy you'd have to build a pylon AND a gateway. In exchange we could buff gateway units and there you go.
|
Having a shield battery after gate would be the coolest thing in the whole world.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
