On November 24 2011 02:19 Switchy wrote: Dustin Browder said SC2 is not broodwar, if you dont like it thats tough shit. These threads are pointless
Nobody wants SC2 to be BroodWar, I don't understand why individuals such as yourself don't let it sink in. People want certain aspects that make BroodWar a truly great game to be carried over to SC2, of course no one wants the same damn game. There are flaws in SC2 just like there are flaws in BW. SC2 can be improved a lot by carrying over some thing that made BW great, read Ver's post dammit, it's true. There is little in SC2 that can distinguish top players from another, the skill ceiling is quite low. Defense busting is too easy, positioning is about the only thing that can give you an advantage over another player (not in dirt/rocks leagues).
edit: removed a deserved insult
If by carrying stuff over you mean archaic concepts like no MBS, limited unit selection and no smart casting. I know some people have difficulties with understanding this, but those were not features. Those were limitations. The pop cap? A limitation. Hell, in age of empires, which came around the same time like starcraft, one could select around 30-40 units.
Starcraft: Brood War is what it is today because of the players and map makers, not because of blizzard.
This is why i have trouble not hurling insults, you people really think that BW-no-MBS is what people wanted carried over?! Are you a freaking....man no-MBS?!!! Are you kidding with me, bro?!
This is the problem with the forums, littered with players that never even played BW or never understood what made it VERY entertaining, and DYNAMIC. It's just so one dimensional right now, position your units correctly, and you have the advantage, not much else to gain an advantage.
Day9 mentions this all the time (Ver touched on this), one of BWesque features is that you could control zones/spaces very well with certain powerful defensive units (tanks/lurkers/reavers/HT), now choosing to keep all supply in your army and using some else where is EXTREMELY coinflippy and just plain gamble.
P.S. Smartcasting: it should be left as is, but the addition of more spells, heck the addition of more ridiculous gimmicky spells like the HotS Viper's "get over here" doesn't fit in SC2, seriously balancing the game by adding more gimmick spells, instead of having players micro better, it's just not fun for watchability. All there is to it is Tap-Click, wooptydooo!!! For example, as most of us enjoy Bw/SC2 because it's fun to watch, do you think WoW is fun to watch? Just mashing spells all day, you really want that?
Starcraft is not about spamming spells, I find it hard to believe that any one that is of high level play wants this.
On November 24 2011 04:26 andrewlt wrote: Another thing they need to took at is supply. For all their talk about how SC2 is not BW, it's curious that they kept the 200 supply max from BW even though the new worker economy and unit supply costs demand a higher supply limit.
200 supply is something sacred to Blizzard and didn't started with starcraft 1. They will never change it. (but every race has a method to increase their army supply late game in sc2.) And since they wanted games to be shorter its no wonder that the supply costs were increased, especially on the aoe units (oh wonder could it be balancing). And maps could always reduce the mining possibilities per base, to reduce the worker count / make more bases needed so you won't be able to defend them all with just one army etc and make the game more dynamic. But that is stuff that won't happen overnight, or because its to slow for some people and they open a post, comparing current bw with current sc2, i can remember the times still where nothing happened in bw until the map was mined out and those weren't tvts.
You will have to wait till one year maybe after LotV, until then people will wait for Blizzard before they try out big things ^^.
I think BW is more developed. Also its not like every bw game is super active. amazing game but it was very very passive. And it basically came down to unit control.
Hell even TvT in BW came down to BC SV Goliath (compared to BC, Viking, Raven) on certain maps. Drop harass has developed immensely from MMA style drops all the time to timing drops more like MVP. Toss players still have weak drop play lategame. Same for Zerg players.
Both PvT and PvZ are becoming more and more about spread out gameplay. PvP is a mess and ZvZ is imo more interesting than BW where anything past spire tech basically never happens.
On November 24 2011 02:19 Switchy wrote: Dustin Browder said SC2 is not broodwar, if you dont like it thats tough shit. These threads are pointless
Nobody wants SC2 to be BroodWar, I don't understand why individuals such as yourself don't let it sink in. People want certain aspects that make BroodWar a truly great game to be carried over to SC2, of course no one wants the same damn game. There are flaws in SC2 just like there are flaws in BW. SC2 can be improved a lot by carrying over some thing that made BW great, read Ver's post dammit, it's true. There is little in SC2 that can distinguish top players from another, the skill ceiling is quite low. Defense busting is too easy, positioning is about the only thing that can give you an advantage over another player (not in dirt/rocks leagues).
edit: removed a deserved insult
If by carrying stuff over you mean archaic concepts like no MBS, limited unit selection and no smart casting. I know some people have difficulties with understanding this, but those were not features. Those were limitations. The pop cap? A limitation. Hell, in age of empires, which came around the same time like starcraft, one could select around 30-40 units.
Starcraft: Brood War is what it is today because of the players and map makers, not because of blizzard.
This is why i have trouble not hurling insults, you people really think that BW-no-MBS is what people wanted carried over?! Are you a freaking....man no-MBS?!!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME, bro?!
This is the problem with the forums, littered with players that never even played BW or never understood what made it VERY entertaining, and DYNAMIC. It's just so one dimensional right now, position your units correctly, and you have the advantage, not much else to gain an advantage.
Day9 mentions this all the time (Ver touched on this), one of BWesque features is that you could control zones/spaces very well with certain powerful defensive units (tanks/lurkers/reavers/HT), now choosing to keep all supply in your army and using some else where is EXTREMELY coinflippy and just plain gamble.
P.S. Smartcasting: it should be left as is, but the addition of more spells, heck the addition of more ridiculous gimmicky spells like the HotS Viper's "get over here" doesn't fit in SC2, seriously balancing the game by adding more gimmick spells, instead of having players micro better, it's just not fun for watchability. All there is to it is Tap-Click, wooptydooo!!! For example, as most of us enjoy Bw/SC2 because it's fun to watch, do you think WoW is fun to watch? Just mashing spells all day DO YOU WANT THAT??? Noobs owning up people because they know how to roll their face across the keyboard (ie. Paladin WotLK), since how is totally unwatchable, even look at DotA, or LoL, not AS fun as SC to watch, still bunch of just spamming spells.
Starcraft is not about spamming spells, if you think that GTFO of this game.
I was agreeing with you until you decided to go "ps:" with nothing but a very elitist opinion. Have a little bit more respect for a scene that annihilates bw and sc2 combined. It may not be your cup of tea, but that doesn't mean that what they're drinking is bad.
Now don't get me wrong. I'm not disagreeing with you as I feel SC2 shouldn't be spellcasty, but I find it annoying how people always look down on something because they don't share the same views.
On November 24 2011 04:45 Glockateer wrote: Collision and unit spreading should be tweaked a bit for sure and I really wish SC2 would experiment with 250 supply and maybe 1 gas geyser per base (while changing the income of it) to offset the worker supply problem. I think the macro gimmi... mechanics are too much a part of SC2 already for them to be removed. Plus, they're meant to be something that require you to spend more APM. That means there'd be even less APM requirements without them unless macro and unit movement became harder in some way.
Certain things like warp gate and forcefields should be removed and units buffed elsewhere. Fungal growth shouldn't 100% stop a unit, especially with the "zerg disruption web" they want to add in HotS. Units hopefully will be adjusted for a little more micro ability room to shoot and move more effectively.
Terran shredders with tanks will help in defenders advantage just like the new underground broodlord of zerg but protoss don't seem to get anything in that regard in HotS. Maybe they think forcefields are good enough? Also, the tempest is a bit of a joke compared to the carrier but that is a different discussion.
These are the innovative and SMART tiny tweaks that could possibly improve SC2 A LOT, but Dustin Boulder thinks that adding more and more gimmick spells shit will fix things. No, you fix it by fixing the current problems not adding units new units, to counter the problems of the previous expansion, while also ADDING more balance problems.
This guy's idea may not be the FINAL solution, but it is clever, requires very little effort on the part of game designers, and it tackles current problems!!!
P.S. the replicant -__- another great example of D.B. moronic method of balance. Let's add a unit that can copy another unit, because this race has trouble countering a certain build, thus we can ignore all the current problems, and we get another unit with quirky-gimmick spells that we can add flashy graphics to. Do you guys see where this game is headed with that tool under the helm?
By the end of the game MVP had 70-some workers of Leenock's and still lost.
I think it's pretty well shows how (not imbalanced word here) not good this game is. Can you imagine zerg in SCBW win, even after loosing 70(!!!) workers?...
This could change as time goes on, as Artosis constantly preaches, even the best players in the world right now are terrible compared to the best players in 5 years. Look at early BW games and the players then look terrible compared to A-teamers now.
As players get better they should be able to handle keeping up constant pressure on their opponents and we'll see it more. I've seen play PvZ's where he constantly pressures the Zerg and eventually we'll see more players adopt that into their play.
On November 23 2011 13:35 Ver wrote: sc2 is not remotely like chess.
The difference you noted between bw and sc2 is a combination of simplicity and the superiority of offense over defense. The reason you see so much dancing of armies jockeying for a tiny increase in position in sc2 is because there's so few ways to gain an advantage. Many sc2 games literally come down to the positioning before a fight because nothing else matters remotely as much as winning a battle. In bw engaging correctly was just one of many, many factors in determining victory. Certain players like Jaedong were known for their consistent ability to engage right, while others like iloveoov were particularly bad at it but could win through a variety of other means. In sc2 if you can't engage very well you will never be among the best. When you remove all the nuances of bw that determined skill, you are left with a select very few factors, most notably engaging, but also blind build order luck, that massively determine the outcomes of games because there's so little else to influence the outcome.
Disagree with this. Fighting isnt just about position, for instance the Terran matchups require a ton of micro to be able to play well. ZvP is about knowing when you can engage in poor position but still come out better off. And while you draw comparisons to Jaedong/iloveoov the same comparisons can be made in SC2 - there are players who engage really well, there are players who focus on macro and their ability to outproduce their opponents (more commonly zerg players) and there are players who focus on harass and more indirect means of winning the game (more commonly protoss players) this in addition to the full spectrum of defensive play through to balls to the walls aggression. Saying SC2 is just positioning is a gross simplification and is like saying BW was just macro.
The other reason for favoring big battles and massive 1a armies is the ease of movement. Movement in bw is much more subtle and difficult to organize and execute. Position (like high ground) meant much more, all races had various tools which favored defense over offense (reavers/storm in pvz, tanks/mines, scourge/swarm/lurker vs vessels, better static defense, etc). Furthermore, the smooth a.i in sc2 means that it's really easy to attack bases without bothering to micro and do insane damage. Plus there are a number of tools which effectively fight defensive setups (banelings, infested terrans, forcefields, immortals, colossus, marines, marauders) These reasons are exactly why backstabs so good in sc2 compared to bw and why you get many, many more base trades. Ironically, base trades and backstabs happen the most in the matchups most like BW in terms of skill, defense, and positioning: tvz and tvt.
I don't get what you are getting at here. Big battles and 1a armies happened in BW, and despite it being easier in SC2 we are seeing trends at all levels of play moving towards multiple hotkey usage for armies and less ball vs ball games (in fact, barely any for the last 8 months). As for defense vs offense, I think you'll find that defensive play is viable and that holding aggression is becoming more and more common - see huk holding 2rax with his FE builds for instance. Defending is harder than attacking, that is why PvT was so hard for Terrans in SC1 at lower levels - as SC2 grows we will see more defensive plays being utilised.
How does this lend itself to big 1a armies? Because if you are devoting say 15-20 supply to a distraction or secondary maneuver, that means your main army will have that much less supply. Therefore it's much easier for you to just get run over by a-move, and that will lose you the game outright in most cases because it's so hard to comeback. You can overcome this advantage to some degree as defense isn't entirely meaningless, particularly in tvz and tvt, but an extra 20ish supply is a lot more meaningful in most cases than a good position. In bw, position is much more important than army size, and you'd routinely see large armies improperly wielded be defeated or warded off by well employed tactics or setups. Someone like Flash couldn't make a fraction of the comebacks he did in bw playing sc2 because it's just too easy to bully your opponent around once you have a lead and you don't have much leverage to 'outplay' someone when behind. Furthermore there are a number of mechanics in place which very effectively dissuade spread out forces in favor of gathering one big army: Terran drops in tvp are absolutely terrifying, but these are more than "balanced" out by feedback, warpins, and blink. Trying to harass past a certain point is often just going to lead to wasted units, which could in turn lower your main army strength for a critical moment and make you vulnerable to getting a moved to death. In TvT the combination of vikings, sensor towers, great mobility of marines and hellions, and powerful turrets has made it very difficult in general to effectively harass behind a certain point.
Then why are we seeing increasing protoss harass vs zerg in SC2? Contrast to SC1, after scourges were out harass (as protoss vs zerg in sc1) is comparable to harass as protoss vs terran in sc2! Army size is just as important in BW and that is why you see people regularly sac'ing workers to make room for more supply - we're not doing that in sc2 yet! There is a lot of room to outplay opponents in SC2, Protoss excluded (they are the exception here, and these issues will hopefully be fixed in HOTS).
No this problem isn't going to be fixed with time. It has nothing to do with how young the game is, only a little bit with how bad players are, and everything with how the game is designed. Until that is addressed, the only way things can change is by drastically altering maps to promote more defense and large-scale combat which can help but only to a small degree. Blizzard designed the game to favor offense and ease of use: these are the results of such decisions.
Your arguments are picking and choosing arguments and excluding the reality of the big picture. There are elements of everything that you say is lacking in SC2 at the moment if you bother to watch any high level tournament. As I said, it is always easier to attack so be patient with regard to defense and indeed we are seeing defensive plays becoming more and more effective. Open your eyes, SC2 is evolving to be a perfect successor to SC1.
how come this is being vastly ignored, weird.
A actually disagree with his opinions. While I respect Plexa I find he often gets somewhat overly passionate about things and thus misses the point. I felt Ver was misconstrued many times and Plexa was using a strawman argument. "Fighting isnt just about position". Ver never said that, he said a lot of engagements come down to just positioning.
Honestly how often do you see a PvT or ZvP or ZvZ or PvP engagement, where the guy who makes an early engagement mistake can come out on top with superior post-engagement tactics/micro? This happens a lot in BW, see Flash/Savior get wittled down, down, down, thinking they're gonna lose and then suddenly, BOOM he suddenly makes out and the tables are completely turned.
The only one that comes to mind is marine vs banelings, oh forgot to seige your tanks? No problem, micro your marines like a fucking god and you can still come out on top. And you know what, that's what makes battles great and unpredictable. There's lots of dynamics like that in BW, hardly any apart from marines vs banelings in SC2.
I and others even SC2 only players have posted that SC2 is based on passive play, single brief engagements and pre-emptive decision making, sorry but this is a trend of SC2 that isn't in normal BW games no matter what people say (except maybe Flash's or Best's).
The only time this doesn't exist to the extreme in SC2 is in TvT and TvZ, but most people are not worried about that, those matchups for the most part are fine, there is still a lot of clumping and moving around the marine tank deathball with drops here and there but the overall dynamic we want exists.
I don't mind if people disagree, but what he said was pretty accurate and people just ignored it imo.
Also, people are comparing a very old and figured out game with a year old one. It's more than normal that the latter will have less depth, it's just normal. Also, in a high level of play, if you do a bad engagement, you shouldn't really win if the opponent's micro matches yours, and I don't really recall that many actions in BW that match your statement.. At least compared with the time that competitive BW has. I just can't understand why people are whining about skill ceilings, being mechanics or strategies, it's not even close. SC2 players are still refining their mechanics to the maximum consistency/efficiency let alone talk about tactical depth. I do feel that the concern coming from BW players is genuine, but somewhat rushed, that's all.
By the end of the game MVP had 70-some workers of Leenock's and still lost.
I think it's pretty well shows how (not imbalanced word here) not good this game is. Can you imagine zerg in SCBW win, even after loosing 70(!!!) workers?...
With the amount of people talking about "lots" of comebacks yeah I guess...
IMO SC2 degrades to a "mass unit ball" vs "mass unit ball" battle late in the game. Gaming companies always seem to over engineer the gameplay of sequels to classic games. The problem is they aren't hardcore gamers and don't understand what made the original game so great. What you are looking for can't be made by a company. It must be a mod made by somebody in the community. Start a pro-mod thread and see what develops .
On November 23 2011 13:35 Ver wrote: sc2 is not remotely like chess.
The difference you noted between bw and sc2 is a combination of simplicity and the superiority of offense over defense. The reason you see so much dancing of armies jockeying for a tiny increase in position in sc2 is because there's so few ways to gain an advantage. Many sc2 games literally come down to the positioning before a fight because nothing else matters remotely as much as winning a battle. In bw engaging correctly was just one of many, many factors in determining victory. Certain players like Jaedong were known for their consistent ability to engage right, while others like iloveoov were particularly bad at it but could win through a variety of other means. In sc2 if you can't engage very well you will never be among the best. When you remove all the nuances of bw that determined skill, you are left with a select very few factors, most notably engaging, but also blind build order luck, that massively determine the outcomes of games because there's so little else to influence the outcome.
The other reason for favoring big battles and massive 1a armies is the ease of movement. Movement in bw is much more subtle and difficult to organize and execute. Position (like high ground) meant much more, all races had various tools which favored defense over offense (reavers/storm in pvz, tanks/mines, scourge/swarm/lurker vs vessels, better static defense, etc). Furthermore, the smooth a.i in sc2 means that it's really easy to attack bases without bothering to micro and do insane damage. Plus there are a number of tools which effectively fight defensive setups (banelings, infested terrans, forcefields, immortals, colossus, marines, marauders) These reasons are exactly why backstabs so good in sc2 compared to bw and why you get many, many more base trades. Ironically, base trades and backstabs happen the most in the matchups most like BW in terms of skill, defense, and positioning: tvz and tvt.
How does this lend itself to big 1a armies? Because if you are devoting say 15-20 supply to a distraction or secondary maneuver, that means your main army will have that much less supply. Therefore it's much easier for you to just get run over by a-move, and that will lose you the game outright in most cases because it's so hard to comeback. You can overcome this advantage to some degree as defense isn't entirely meaningless, particularly in tvz and tvt, but an extra 20ish supply is a lot more meaningful in most cases than a good position. In bw, position is much more important than army size, and you'd routinely see large armies improperly wielded be defeated or warded off by well employed tactics or setups. Someone like Flash couldn't make a fraction of the comebacks he did in bw playing sc2 because it's just too easy to bully your opponent around once you have a lead and you don't have much leverage to 'outplay' someone when behind. Furthermore there are a number of mechanics in place which very effectively dissuade spread out forces in favor of gathering one big army: Terran drops in tvp are absolutely terrifying, but these are more than "balanced" out by feedback, warpins, and blink. Trying to harass past a certain point is often just going to lead to wasted units, which could in turn lower your main army strength for a critical moment and make you vulnerable to getting a moved to death. In TvT the combination of vikings, sensor towers, great mobility of marines and hellions, and powerful turrets has made it very difficult in general to effectively harass behind a certain point.
No this problem isn't going to be fixed with time. It has nothing to do with how young the game is, only a little bit with how bad players are, and everything with how the game is designed. Until that is addressed, the only way things can change is by drastically altering maps to promote more defense and large-scale combat which can help but only to a small degree. Blizzard designed the game to favor offense and ease of use: these are the results of such decisions.
I think there are some valid points in this about why brood war is different then starcraft 2 for better or worse. I would argue better but everyone has their opinions.
By the end of the game MVP had 70-some workers of Leenock's and still lost.
I think it's pretty well shows how (not imbalanced word here) not good this game is. Can you imagine zerg in SCBW win, even after loosing 70(!!!) workers?...
So wait, first it was 1 bad engagement just destroys you and now we found a counter to that argument it's not good either? Just say it, you want bw 2.0 and just that, every single rule should be same.
No kidding the game is passive, builds haven't been felt out yet.
And no, BW is not a better game, but a better metagame. It's undeniable to anyone with enough metagame knowledge on both games that BW is a far better game to spectate.
On November 24 2011 09:42 Eufouria wrote: This could change as time goes on, as Artosis constantly preaches, even the best players in the world right now are terrible compared to the best players in 5 years. Look at early BW games and the players then look terrible compared to A-teamers now.
As players get better they should be able to handle keeping up constant pressure on their opponents and we'll see it more. I've seen play PvZ's where he constantly pressures the Zerg and eventually we'll see more players adopt that into their play.
but with 2 additional expansions coming out, it's going take a long time
On November 24 2011 04:26 andrewlt wrote: Another thing they need to took at is supply. For all their talk about how SC2 is not BW, it's curious that they kept the 200 supply max from BW even though the new worker economy and unit supply costs demand a higher supply limit.
200 supply is something sacred to Blizzard and didn't started with starcraft 1. They will never change it. (but every race has a method to increase their army supply late game in sc2.) And since they wanted games to be shorter its no wonder that the supply costs were increased, especially on the aoe units (oh wonder could it be balancing). And maps could always reduce the mining possibilities per base, to reduce the worker count / make more bases needed so you won't be able to defend them all with just one army etc and make the game more dynamic. But that is stuff that won't happen overnight, or because its to slow for some people and they open a post, comparing current bw with current sc2, i can remember the times still where nothing happened in bw until the map was mined out and those weren't tvts.
You will have to wait till one year maybe after LotV, until then people will wait for Blizzard before they try out big things ^^.
Great post agree with everything.
Bolded part is something I thought about too. People always talk about races being OP, but I often feel like the most OP thing in the game are bases. I think the pressure to expand should be heavier on the players. Basically, ''nerfing'' bases (less resources available per base) could be interesting.
Doing so would cause more resources to go into additional expansions, meaning the players should reach 200/200 later in the game than they can right now. It would also force multitask as you would be spread out on the map quicker, since you should have more bases. There is a lot of possibilities and weird tweaks that could happen by messing with bases. Less workers needed for saturation, less patches, only 1 geyser per base, whatever you can think of. I feel like Blizzard needs to explore those territories more.
I have a slightly different take on the whole problem with SC2. Lots of people have pointed to the problem of the big clumping ball of units as being far too effective. Small forces have no way of gaining tactical advantages against the ball and are easily steamrolled. Some have suggested that we apply 1990s era fixes to the problem (bring back crappy AI pathing / limit # of units per control group) but in my view this is a step backwards in game design and betrays limited imagination. What's really the problem here is the unrealistic and silly line-of-sight mechanics of SC2.
The reason that the big ball of units is so effective is because everybody in the ball can shoot as long as they're in range. For some reason, that marine/stalker/roach that's sitting in the middle of the ball can shoot right through 3,4,5 ranks of his buddies and not risk a single friendly-fire casualty. Why does this matter? Because it rewards people for keeping their units in a clump. In real life, a ball is the stupidest formation a military force could employ. It limits the frontage of the unit (ability to shoot) and it minimizes the survivability of the unit (one grenade in the middle kills everybody). A small force holding a narrow choke should be an equalizer in SC2, but unless that choke is the top of a ramp, the ball will win every time. Ironically, for melee vs the ball, it's even worse. The choke is actually a disadvantage for melee units when it should be the other way round.
In SC2, the only real way to punish a ball is splash damage which is why so many late game matches devolve into two big clumps maneuvering around in circles while the spellcasters try to get off the big splash attack to gain the advantage. In HOTS, this is only going to get worse as Blizzard tries to add more and more gimmicky spells to try and break up the ball.
So how do you fix it? Employ real line of sight. The game is built on a frickin' 3D engine! In this day and age, it should be trivial to figure out if a unit has a straight line of sight to a target. Units that shoot straight will need to spread out. Units that have firing arcs (like siege tanks or, gasp, reapers) or are especially tall (i.e. colossus) gain a unique new advantage. Melee units are not as disadvantaged against ranged units. Air cover becomes much more important instead of the mostly situational thing it is in SC2. And range, interestingly, becomes a non-static thing. For example, a marine shooting up at a 45 degree angle doesn't shoot as far but this is partially balanced out by the fact that even guys in the back ranks can shoot up (at the scary colossus). Higher elevation could even improve range so that high ground becomes even more important.
Of course, such a radical change would require completely rebalancing the game and so likely isn't in the cards. But imagine the possibilities. Unit positioning and unit control would become critically important, small well-managed forces could defeat larger poorly managed forces, and spell-casters, while important, wouldn't be the micro focus of every engagement. Such gameplay would be so exciting to watch and mastering the skills necessary would truly separate the great from the merely good.
Considering the way the game is progressing lately, SC2 is still maturing. Some games have constant aggression at all time while others are more laid back. I think in general, the more comfortable a player is with his build, the more you will see him poking and being aggressive. After build refinement, the next step in optimization is trying to up the games pace using micro situations to throw of your opponent.
So as stated in the OP, SC2 is becoming more interesting and I believe that the "macro" builds in games still have much more promise to be more active.
On November 24 2011 11:33 Pablonius wrote: I have a slightly different take on the whole problem with SC2. Lots of people have pointed to the problem of the big clumping ball of units as being far too effective. Small forces have no way of gaining tactical advantages against the ball and are easily steamrolled. Some have suggested that we apply 1990s era fixes to the problem (bring back crappy AI pathing / limit # of units per control group) but in my view this is a step backwards in game design and betrays limited imagination. What's really the problem here is the unrealistic and silly line-of-sight mechanics of SC2.
The reason that the big ball of units is so effective is because everybody in the ball can shoot as long as they're in range. For some reason, that marine/stalker/roach that's sitting in the middle of the ball can shoot right through 3,4,5 ranks of his buddies and not risk a single friendly-fire casualty. Why does this matter? Because it rewards people for keeping their units in a clump. In real life, a ball is the stupidest formation a military force could employ. It limits the frontage of the unit (ability to shoot) and it minimizes the survivability of the unit (one grenade in the middle kills everybody). A small force holding a narrow choke should be an equalizer in SC2, but unless that choke is the top of a ramp, the ball will win every time. Ironically, for melee vs the ball, it's even worse. The choke is actually a disadvantage for melee units when it should be the other way round.
In SC2, the only real way to punish a ball is splash damage which is why so many late game matches devolve into two big clumps maneuvering around in circles while the spellcasters try to get off the big splash attack to gain the advantage. In HOTS, this is only going to get worse as Blizzard tries to add more and more gimmicky spells to try and break up the ball.
So how do you fix it? Employ real line of sight. The game is built on a frickin' 3D engine! In this day and age, it should be trivial to figure out if a unit has a straight line of sight to a target. Units that shoot straight will need to spread out. Units that have firing arcs (like siege tanks or, gasp, reapers) or are especially tall (i.e. colossus) gain a unique new advantage. Melee units are not as disadvantaged against ranged units. Air cover becomes much more important instead of the mostly situational thing it is in SC2. And range, interestingly, becomes a non-static thing. For example, a marine shooting up at a 45 degree angle doesn't shoot as far but this is partially balanced out by the fact that even guys in the back ranks can shoot up (at the scary colossus). Higher elevation could even improve range so that high ground becomes even more important.
Of course, such a radical change would require completely rebalancing the game and so likely isn't in the cards. But imagine the possibilities. Unit positioning and unit control would become critically important, small well-managed forces could defeat larger poorly managed forces, and spell-casters, while important, wouldn't be the micro focus of every engagement. Such gameplay would be so exciting to watch and mastering the skills necessary would truly separate the great from the merely good.
That could be pretty awesome, maybe in a StarCraft3 (I hope they don't make that) Realistically, forcing people to expand more sounds like the best solution so far
On November 24 2011 11:33 Pablonius wrote: Some have suggested that we apply 1990s era fixes to the problem (bring back crappy AI pathing
But why is having the units spread out more the same as crappy AI pathing from the 90s? Is it really impossible to have units get to where you want them to using the fastest path and not get stuck, but stay farther apart while doing it? Didn't people say WC3 had something like this?
I want someone to explain why it is impossible to have less deathballs and good modern pathing at the same time.
Also your idea is interesting maybe someone can create a test map for it. (There should be test maps for a lot of ideas)
On November 24 2011 11:33 Pablonius wrote: I have a slightly different take on the whole problem with SC2. Lots of people have pointed to the problem of the big clumping ball of units as being far too effective. Small forces have no way of gaining tactical advantages against the ball and are easily steamrolled. Some have suggested that we apply 1990s era fixes to the problem (bring back crappy AI pathing / limit # of units per control group) but in my view this is a step backwards in game design and betrays limited imagination. What's really the problem here is the unrealistic and silly line-of-sight mechanics of SC2.
The reason that the big ball of units is so effective is because everybody in the ball can shoot as long as they're in range. For some reason, that marine/stalker/roach that's sitting in the middle of the ball can shoot right through 3,4,5 ranks of his buddies and not risk a single friendly-fire casualty. Why does this matter? Because it rewards people for keeping their units in a clump. In real life, a ball is the stupidest formation a military force could employ. It limits the frontage of the unit (ability to shoot) and it minimizes the survivability of the unit (one grenade in the middle kills everybody). A small force holding a narrow choke should be an equalizer in SC2, but unless that choke is the top of a ramp, the ball will win every time. Ironically, for melee vs the ball, it's even worse. The choke is actually a disadvantage for melee units when it should be the other way round.
In SC2, the only real way to punish a ball is splash damage which is why so many late game matches devolve into two big clumps maneuvering around in circles while the spellcasters try to get off the big splash attack to gain the advantage. In HOTS, this is only going to get worse as Blizzard tries to add more and more gimmicky spells to try and break up the ball.
So how do you fix it? Employ real line of sight. The game is built on a frickin' 3D engine! In this day and age, it should be trivial to figure out if a unit has a straight line of sight to a target. Units that shoot straight will need to spread out. Units that have firing arcs (like siege tanks or, gasp, reapers) or are especially tall (i.e. colossus) gain a unique new advantage. Melee units are not as disadvantaged against ranged units. Air cover becomes much more important instead of the mostly situational thing it is in SC2. And range, interestingly, becomes a non-static thing. For example, a marine shooting up at a 45 degree angle doesn't shoot as far but this is partially balanced out by the fact that even guys in the back ranks can shoot up (at the scary colossus). Higher elevation could even improve range so that high ground becomes even more important.
Of course, such a radical change would require completely rebalancing the game and so likely isn't in the cards. But imagine the possibilities. Unit positioning and unit control would become critically important, small well-managed forces could defeat larger poorly managed forces, and spell-casters, while important, wouldn't be the micro focus of every engagement. Such gameplay would be so exciting to watch and mastering the skills necessary would truly separate the great from the merely good.
Sadly, I feel the coming expansions to SC2 will be enough to throw the balance way off. Something as big as your proposed change would likely cause many players (pros and casuals) to quit the game. Not only because of lacking balance, but because it changes the actual gameplay, it's almost an different genre all together.
With that said, someone really should make an RTS like this. I get a feeling that it would have a hard time attracting casual players though, since the gameplay could get pretty confusing at times, especially if they come from a game like SC2.
On the other hand, the skillcap for micro/positioning would be so insanely high that watching pro games would be amazing.
Maybe we could see this in the future, but I think it will be hard to get a huge viewer base (which is needed for an esport) without a lot of casuals playing the game. Just look at why LoL has absolutely crushed HoN and DotA in viewers.
On November 24 2011 11:33 Pablonius wrote: Some have suggested that we apply 1990s era fixes to the problem (bring back crappy AI pathing
But why is having the units spread out more the same as crappy AI pathing from the 90s? Is it really impossible to have units get to where you want them to using the fastest path and not get stuck, but stay farther apart while doing it? Didn't people say WC3 had something like this?
I want someone to explain why it is impossible to have less deathballs and good modern pathing at the same time.
Also your idea is interesting maybe someone can create a test map for it. (There should be test maps for a lot of ideas)
I bet they could just do something like the auto-spread that air units have right now. If the units have to through a choke, they should be able to go as close to eachother as they can right now. But while moving in the open, they would chose some personal space and spread out a bit more.
That way, units wouldn't get caught in their own base (dragoons, looking at you), but would still be more spread out in battles.
I guess they could add movement/battle formations, but that would change a lot more than just unit clumping. Like in AoE, you could have the squishy units in the middle of the army, with more bulky units surrounding them, or decide how much spacing there should be between each unit in the army. Also stuff like spear-formed fronts and other fun stuff.
EPT
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