I love this game and will geek out over all of the epicness that come out of pro games, but I feel that macro games are much too passive as opposed to macro games in BW.
I know this game isn't BW and is pretty much entirely different, but I feel that if macro games were made to be more active, pro tournaments would produce a lot more epic games and results and attract a lot more attention. What prevents this game from being as active as BW was? The dependency on workers, higher supply units, small and boring maps(compared to BW), and fragile and small armies which disappear in the blink of an eye.
BW's resource collection rate is substantially higher than that of SC2. This allows for less workers required and more army to fight with. The fact that units were less supply and maps were much bigger also helped out with the large army aspect of the game. With gigantic armies and gigantic maps, there was a lot more action and there were a lot more game changing aspects other than a drop that killed a bunch of workers or one big army killing another army and the game is now over.
Starcraft 2 is more like chess where late late game situations tend to become a matter of waiting and unit control rather than tactics. If the Protoss moves out his death ball to try and kill the Zerg base and end the game, he risks getting out of position and the game ends right there. If both Terrans are maxed out on Vikings and Battle Cruisers, it becomes a matter of waiting for someone to make the first attack, as every other strategy you have left is nonviable (Boxer vs Rain). I would rather see a TvT where both players have their armies all over the place like trying to hold the line down the middle while sending platoons all over the map trying to find the slightest advantage than a waiting game where the only epic moments of the game are a move out that almost happened or a drop that killed a bunch of workers.
This is why I love the ZvT match up so much. It has everything that makes for epic macro games. Brood Lords, Infestors, Tanks, Thors, and turrets/bunkers hold the middle while lings, mutas, marines, ghosts, traverse the map looking for advantages. This is as Stacraft 2 is currently, what if we were to add elements of BW games into the Starcraft 2 universe. Larger, more interesting maps, a lesser need for workers, larger armies, and lower supplied units.
I know we haven't reached the skill ceiling yet. Players rather work on mechanics and build orders rather than crazy tactics and strategies. Custom maps haven't been incorporated into professional play as widely as it has been in BW. But, it's something to think about.
tl;dr BW macro games were crazy. SC2 macro games are chess (interesting, but not active). Maybe if we added some basic elements of BW into SC2 we can see some crazy games?
All the matchups in SC2 tend to last until 200/200 in a macro game. This is because of various elements. You need more workers to saturate to a decent level, and there's 2 gas instead of one (twice as many gas miners). Units in SC2 also tend to cost more supply. Tanks cost 3 supply, Immortals cost 4, roaches cost 2. In BW, tanks costed 2 supply, I don't recall a massable 4 supply unit and the equivalent to roaches, hydras, were 1 supply.
In BW, the only matchup that regularly went to 200/200 is TvP.
Little by little people are figuring out ways to poke at players. Until that research is completed people will be passive as the small pieces of aggression are not effective enough. But do not be mistaken it will come in time(And expansions).
I'm not sure if macro games in general are as dull as you described. If attacks/pressure were as rare as you seem to think, people would be going fast third and stuff like that.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
There's always something each player can do to gain advantages during a game, even during late game stalemates. For example, in ZvZ player can use burrowed infestors to sneak into mineral lines and in TvT players can use cloaked ghosts and drops to bypass tank lines. As Starcraft 2 continues to develop, players who are able to use harassment and small engagements will come out on top. The current style of sitting back and macroing while waiting for a large engagement works because both players are playing passively. As overall player skill and game understanding rises I feel like we will see more engagements and harass from both sides in order to gain minor advantages which will eventually snowball into a victory. Just remember how people played back in beta. No drops in TvP, basically every game was a 1 base timing attack, no infestor harass, etc.
Basically, once the matchups are more developed and players can no longer win by turtling all game long there will be more action.
On November 23 2011 12:48 eSuBuildings wrote: BW's resource collection rate is substantially higher than that of SC2. This allows for less workers required and more army to fight with. The fact that units were less supply and maps were much bigger also helped out with the large army aspect of the game. With gigantic armies and gigantic maps, there was a lot more action and there were a lot more game changing aspects other than a drop that killed a bunch of workers or one big army killing another army and the game is now over.
As a zerg (in BW ad SC2), this is completely untrue for me . A "massive" zerg army is like 120 food.
Problem in sc2 is stuff like roaches, A max zerg army looks so small because having 70+ workers only leaves room for like 65 2 food units.
EsuBuildings xd I posted this like 3 months ago on Gamefaqs. Its basically because everyone is lazy and rather max out before doing any type of harassment. The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis:
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
I was going to come in here and rail on you, but then I actually read the post fully, and I can see what you mean. I do agree that too much of the army gets tied up in workers in SC2. I think cutting the resource gathering rate was one of the worst decisions in SC2. I remember being so pissed off about it when I first found out. I think they should put it back closer to what it was, because the slower gas gathering rate is really gimping the tech rush to tier 3 into mass tier 3. I used to love massing tier 3 units in BW.
I think this comes down in large part to skill level, I just dont think sc2 pros have learned to utilize agression to its full potential yet. That said, the game is clearly far more dynamic than it was in the eary days, and I think it will continue to progress and improve as players themselves improve and understand the game better.
For every SCII game that you can say went into an overly passive mode, I can point out a game with a totally epic late game. consider: Thorzain vs. MC g4 Huk vs. Moon Dreamhack group stages Sen vs. Socke NASL and many more
1. Bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps. Stuff like twice the size of metalopolis. A map like Tal darim alter should be one of the smallest maps out there. This way 'ball armies' will simply fail, because you can only hit one part of their base, while if they hit you at multiple locations at once you'll probably lose. Because of big maps you would bring back the seige/perimeter lines. You would have zergs placing burrow banelings in areas to block off paths/swarm hosts for this as well. Warp gate for Protoss would be great here for them to warp into any base to protect it. The game would be so much better.
2. Take away the mass multi section of units. You don't have to limit it to 12 like in BW, however everything is in one big ball/ 1-3 control groups only. Maybe cap it at like 24-32 units or something. Units/armies would be WAY harder to control if you had to use like 6 hotkeys for a 200/200 army. It would put more skill back into the game. Way more IMO. Being able to select all of your units in 1 control group is so noob-ish. Even bad players might even agree to that.
3. Like TT1 kind of said in his post. The less casting units the better. Take away that stupid "get over here" thing from the viper. Less spells actually = more action. Having just 2-3 total spells per race actually makes them more exciting. TT1 also said each race having few spells to support the army, even though they're strong. They won't be as strong with armies separated around the map instead of a big ball.
Dumb Dustin Browder fails to realize. Sorry I'm calling him dumb, it's just I feel a sense of ignorance with his logic of 'this is the game I made, not the game you want' Dustin, we don't want these changes because it will be like BW. We want these changes because it will make the game a better RTS. It's already not like BW. The units are so much more fast paced IMO.
He said he's looking at ways to split those balls up. Start with those basic ones.
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: EsuBuildings xd I posted this like 3 months ago on Gamefaqs. Its basically because everyone is lazy and rather max out before doing any type of harassment. The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa8xMv5fhQo
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
One big thing you notice in this game is that worker scouting isn't shut down at the 4 minute mark. I'd love to see that come back.
I think the GSL finals between MMA and MVP was a series overall that showed the weakness of passive play. MVP mech style was generally considered more passive than, say MKP's bio, but was also more successful and consistent. However MMA essentially proved that bio was still very viable and in many ways superior to mech in TvT, even against the world's best mech player. That series was incredibly back and forth, with MMA making attacking everywhere, while MVP struggled to catch up.
On November 23 2011 13:10 HuHEN wrote: I think this comes down in large part to skill level, I just dont think sc2 pros have learned to utilize agression to its full potential yet. That said, the game is clearly far more dynamic than it was in the eary days, and I think it will continue to progress and improve as players themselves improve and understand the game better.
On November 23 2011 12:52 FragRaptor wrote: Little by little people are figuring out ways to poke at players. Until that research is completed people will be passive as the small pieces of aggression are not effective enough. But do not be mistaken it will come in time(And expansions).
Again this is not a matter of time, its inherent in the game design. Even the worst players on ICCUP have more action packed games than the highest level ladder players in SC2.
The time horse has been beaten to death. When you can just look at the game design and see how it's not possible. The reason TvZ is so developed is that it has Tanks, its a lot like TvP in BW. Where T is always jostling for position and point capture, while P is trying to look for opportunities to exploit Terran weaknesses. Similar applies to TvT, this is why Zerg and Protoss need strong immobile slow-shot siege units (Reaver, Lurker), it creates much better battle dynamics.
On November 23 2011 13:12 Nizzy wrote: 1. Bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps. Stuff like twice the size of metalopolis. A map like Tal darim alter should be one of the smallest maps out there. This way 'ball armies' will simply fail, because you can only hit one part of their base, while if they hit you at multiple locations at once you'll probably lose. Because of big maps you would bring back the seige/perimeter lines. You would have zergs placing burrow banelings in areas to block off paths/swarm hosts for this as well. Warp gate for Protoss would be great here for them to warp into any base to protect it. The game would be so much better.
2. Take away the mass multi section of units. You don't have to limit it to 12 like in BW, however everything is in one big ball/ 1-3 control groups only. Maybe cap it at like 24-32 units or something. Units/armies would be WAY harder to control if you had to use like 6 hotkeys for a 200/200 army. It would put more skill back into the game. Way more IMO. Being able to select all of your units in 1 control group is so noob-ish. Even bad players might even agree to that.
3. Like TT1 kind of said in his post. The less casting units the better. Take away that stupid "get over here" thing from the viper. Less spells actually = more action. Having just 2-3 total spells per race actually makes them more exciting. TT1 also said each race having few spells to support the army, even though they're strong. They won't be as strong with armies separated around the map instead of a big ball.
Dumb Dustin Browder fails to realize. Sorry I'm calling him dumb, it's just I feel a sense of ignorance with his logic of 'this is the game I made, not the game you want' Dustin, we don't want these changes because it will be like BW. We want these changes because it will make the game a better RTS. It's already not like BW. The units are so much more fast paced IMO.
He said he's looking at ways to split those balls up. Start with those basic ones.
His method for splitting those balls up doesn't make any sense though. Hes just trying to make gimmicky units that don't work well within the main army.
There is a fundamental problem to this, the core armies are going to become even SMALLER. In BW the core army looked HUGE, you would just look at an army like that on the minimap in absolute awe, and this is partly due to the huge supply units in SC2. A 200/200 bio ball in BW had a roughly 160 unit blob moving around the map, SC2 is less than half of this.
The second problem is it is the wrong way to tackle the issue. The problem is not synergy of the colossus or MMM or anything like that, its lack of units that benefit hugely from tactical situations. A zerg army with 1 defiler is 10x stronger than one without, you don't see that from the infestor. A lurker in a choke is 10x more powerful than in the open, this is not the same for the baneling. In fact the only thing close to this is split marines and tanks.
About the micro Ai comment, true nobody can ever reach that, but it is impressive how good certain players can do that and the skill is only going to rise:
That video just proves what a joke the SC2 graphics and pathing is. Big blobs of stuff shooting at eachother. What you guys also have to remember is that you can't compare BW in 2002 with SC2 today. SC2 today is dominated mostly by players with a lot of experience. MVP and MC trained BW for years on most of their free time. Their overall RTS skills are much better than Boxer's was in 2002, and they probably have double the APM, if not more. The top SC2 players today are really good and there's really not much Flash will be able to add. Whatever Flash did, Nada had already done a few years prior. The only thing Flash brought to the table was strategies, his ability to read games and adept and his flawless macro. If Flash switches, you might be able to see some creative strategies, or brilliant comebacks, but that's it. You will not see him change the standards on micro. Nada could match Flash easily on micro in BW, and what have he done for SC2 micro?
This is Nada's marine micro in BW. That group of mnm did around 10 times more damage than they was worth.
In similar situations, I have personally lost around 30 mnm to half of that amount of lurkers. The BW engagements are intense and requires your immediate attention so that you're not caught off guard. SC2 will never be able to offer that, and on top of that, SC2 will always be plagued by the blobby graphics.
The ppl who are saying it's a natural progression to go from BW to SC2 clearly have no clue what you're talking about since you can't see that there's a huge difference between the games.
The reason why we are angry is because we feel that SC2 is a downgrade. Tell us why our players should switch to a game that is worse? Also tell us why we should watch said game instead? Everybody would have questioned KESPA's sanity if they had transitioned into WC3 a few years ago, so how come BW -> SC2 is taken for granted? Blizzard games are not like Tekken, where there are little to no difference between each new version of the game. If a transition to SC2 is to take place, wouldn't you first have to ask yourself if SC2 actually is a better game? This is a question that the ppl who switched to SC2 never asked themselves. They just hyped it up blindly and assumed that the game would follow the same path as BW.
What happened with BW in Korea was a miracle and it would require a really awesome game if we are to ever see such a great scene again. The fact that KESPA seems open to just disband this scene in favor of SC2, who's future is very uncertain, is quite saddening. BW won't last forever, but I highly doubt that the korean viewers will accept SC2. As ppl have said, the SC2 scene is niched towards gamers. What will happen when the next big RTS is released? I remember WC3 was huge a few years ago, atleast among gamers. Now the game is pretty much dead. But more importantly, the mainstream non gamers in Korea couldn't care less about SC2. BW have transcended to another level. In Korea it's mainstream, a sport. I remember reading a recent interview with the young Samsung KHAN progamer Reality, where he said that the high school he attended was very understanding of his BW career, and that they let him follow a more personalized scheduling plan in school, so that he could more easily focus on both gaming and school. That's how mainstream BW is in Korea. Even grown up parents watch BW with their kids, and teenage girls follow the scene and their players as if they were K-pop stars. I don't think most SC2 fans really understand how huge BW is in Korea, and how many different groups of ppl that SC2 would have to appeal to for a transition to work.
1225 (7 lurker gas cost) / 25 (baneling gas cost) = 49
I think its even more sad that if you could actually micro 11 marines and 1 medivac to kill 49 banelings, 20 zerglings, a Hatchery and an Evo Chamber, there would be mass screams of imba and Blizzard would never let it happen. T_T
Although at the same time other races had equal opportunities to gain huge advantages by exploiting weaknesses in small battles.
Of course to have situations like the above, Blizzard would need to remove auto-clumping. I think this is the biggest issue that needs to be resolved, players are too scared to engage each other because armies are almost 100% efficient at all stages of the game. If you removed clumping, players would be more inclined to be opportunistic and engage when the other player has moved out of position.
The second point I need to make about this is that de-clumping won't cause dragoon AI problems. Remember Warcraft III pathing? That used a very similar algorithm to Broodwar, its just that it wasn't a 13 year old game and pathfinding had gotten better since then.
On November 23 2011 13:18 Bagration wrote: I think the GSL finals between MMA and MVP was a series overall that showed the weakness of passive play. MVP mech style was generally considered more passive than, say MKP's bio, but was also more successful and consistent. However MMA essentially proved that bio was still very viable and in many ways superior to mech in TvT, even against the world's best mech player. That series was incredibly back and forth, with MMA making attacking everywhere, while MVP struggled to catch up.
It's a problem with Protoss, not the game. Every other matchup is fine to me, but the Protoss mechanics make it so it's good to just sit on a few bases and mass an army. The mass recall thing they have in mind for HotS is obviously overpowered if used defensively, but it could be interesting offensively. I think it should deplete the shield and mana of your army after use, to make sure you can't just expand everywhere and defend for free.
I would argue the level of depth seen in broodwar is a possibility for SC2, it is simply a matter of time as players learn when, where and how such tactics are viable. Right now players are still dealing with more superficial elements of the game to some extent, but as they become more comfortable and solid in these regards, it will open up more opportunities for 'activeness'. I would venture, correctly done, an 'active' playstyle is always preferable to a passive one. Don't forget the game is still young! You can't really compare an RTS game after one year to Broodwar game played in 2011.
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: EsuBuildings xd I posted this like 3 months ago on Gamefaqs. Its basically because everyone is lazy and rather max out before doing any type of harassment. The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis:
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
One big thing you notice in this game is that worker scouting isn't shut down at the 4 minute mark. I'd love to see that come back.
Of course it isn't, how else would you scout for a hydra bust? xd Good players are notorious for keeping their scouting workers alive for a really long time, even sending out another one if they're unsure of their opponent's build. You rarely see this in SC2 which leads to it's coinflippy nature and passivity
It's just the way the game is now. The only person that is aggressive even close to constant in the game is SeleCT, and you see him sometimes lose too many units and just outright lose. People are just too scared to attack at a lot of the times, once the game gets played more, people will know when to, and not to, attack.
On November 23 2011 13:23 MilesTeg wrote: It's a problem with Protoss, not the game. Every other matchup is fine to me, but the Protoss mechanics make it so it's good to just sit on a few bases and mass an army. The mass recall thing they have in mind for HotS is obviously overpowered if used defensively, but it could be interesting offensively. I think it should deplete the shield and mana of your army after use, to make sure you can't just expand everywhere and defend for free.
have u test that in the custom map in wol? the radius of the recall is like the radius of the Warp Prism... so like 10units can be transported. and also the units take like 4seconds to get there..
I think it's getting better (more drops/harass/multi-tasking in PvZ recently), but I do agree it seems that in SC2 it's harder when you engage, you can't really retreat. Things like concussive shell, stim, FF, or etc. that stop you from running, and like you said, battles happen faster meaning they are more sensitive, meaning there is less incentive for a player to engage in battle if he doesn't want to play risky.
But another thing I haven't thought of is units costing more supply. The 6 supply units that each race has, for example. Though they are also bigger, so I guess the army size is still bigger.
I think one culprit is simply units moving so close to each other unlike in BW. This causes armies to be in much closer proximity during battles so there's less of that constant back and forth that you saw in BW... they still have a little of that in SC2, but, for example, in TvZ, zerg can remax an army much much faster and lings are much much faster, so I don't feel that back and forth balance is quite like it was in BW. Maybe I just remember wrong.
But anyways yes I think the game will become less passive as time goes by. Back in beta people just deathballed cus they didn't know what to do. SC2 has still been only out for 1 year. In a few years players should be much much better and therefore play at a level that the current top BW pros do. That + new/better maps will help a lot
I also wondered about why the food count is only 200/200, especially now that you need more workers. I felt the 200/200 in BW was fine, perhaps they preferred it differently. I mean it's not bad right now, but it's a bit different. Armies clump up faster and fights are over faster, and armies cover less ground, unlike in BW where there was more army and longer fights because it took longer for each unit to reach the frontlines, and you had a little more army supply.
Meh all I know that it is getting better, so I will keep hoping that it will continue to keep getting better.
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.
On November 23 2011 13:23 MilesTeg wrote: It's a problem with Protoss, not the game. Every other matchup is fine to me, but the Protoss mechanics make it so it's good to just sit on a few bases and mass an army. The mass recall thing they have in mind for HotS is obviously overpowered if used defensively, but it could be interesting offensively. I think it should deplete the shield and mana of your army after use, to make sure you can't just expand everywhere and defend for free.
have u test that in the custom map in wol? the radius of the recall is like the radius of the Warp Prism... so like 10units can be transported. and also the units take like 4seconds to get there..
No I haven't tested it. It doesn't make sense to even talk about the specifics yet, as it will all change. But the whole idea behind it is to facilitate pokes, and I think that's going in the right direction if they don't make it too powerful defensively and they make the deathball weaker.
Passive vs aggressive play is really up to the players themselves. I honestly think that in sc2 you can be as aggressive as you want in any or all stages of the game, even the most turtled passive player cannot defend everywhere at once and even at the high levels of play players often don't split their army properly to deal with multipronged aggression.
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.
1) bigger maps, need a ton of HUGE maps 2) no unlimited unit selection. 3) a bit more ridiculousness. like in BW 2 tanks behind a wall would kill infinity dragoons if they tried to bust but in sc2 protoss wouldn't even notice the fact they are being shelled when they right click on the supply depot kill it walk through then click on the tanks one by one and then just win.
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.
On November 23 2011 13:50 Raiznhell wrote: 1) bigger maps, need a ton of HUGE maps 2) no unlimited unit selection. 3) a bit more ridiculousness. like in BW 2 tanks behind a wall would kill infinity dragoons if they tried to bust but in sc2 protoss wouldn't even notice the fact they are being shelled when they right click on the supply depot kill it walk through then click on the tanks one by one and then just win.
Disagree, tanks can do quite a lot o.o
I do think a limited unit selection would be good tho (they have one actually im pretty sure, like 160 units, but it could be smaller, not like BW of course, but where you need to think just a little, like maybe 64 or something lol)
I really don't think this comparison is worthwhile at all. Brood War has developed so much and the player's mechanics in that game were far beyond those of who are playing SC2 right now so they could macro perfectly and constantly use their units in various ways since they knew what to do with them because BW was figured out.
Yeah I wish the balance of action would spread out better... its either extremely powerful cheese / timing pushes.... or turtle to death ball. In either case the game ends really fast with either timing push ending teh game quickly, or non activity to max army and its over so fast. Part of the reason is death ball and the units clump up hard on one screen... maybe bring back bw unit spacing where army stretches out across a few screens... or if that is impossible really nerf the deathballs/aoe spells...
On November 23 2011 13:50 Raiznhell wrote: 1) bigger maps, need a ton of HUGE maps 2) no unlimited unit selection. 3) a bit more ridiculousness. like in BW 2 tanks behind a wall would kill infinity dragoons if they tried to bust but in sc2 protoss wouldn't even notice the fact they are being shelled when they right click on the supply depot kill it walk through then click on the tanks one by one and then just win.
Disagree, tanks can do quite a lot o.o
I do think a limited unit selection would be good tho (they have one actually im pretty sure, like 160 units, but it could be smaller, not like BW of course, but where you need to think just a little, like maybe 64 or something lol)
i think 32 would make sense as it would be essential one tab of 4x8 units
I watched the last proleague finals, and I saw like 3 zergs do a 3 hatch hydra all-in against Protoss. Then I remembered how people complained about how there was too many all-ins in SC2, or that the macro games suck.
Get a grip. Just because you can post one youtube example of a sick BW game (which is a game that was pro for 8-9 years by that stage) does not exclude the fact that many of them were quite similar to SC2 games. There are plenty of passive games, plenty of all-ins. Both games are interesting in their own ways. I can also find vods of sick late-game SC2 games, like an earlier poster mentioned. Thorzain vs MC in TSL was quite memorable, and HuK vs Moon at Dreamhack group stage as well. This is excluding the fact that TvZ/ZvT in SC2 is almost awesome in every match provided it gets past the 10min mark.
We are only at one stage of the game, and this is what a lot of people who make posts and threads about this stuff don't understand. SC2 does not stop here, and it doesn't continue in a linear fashion. We didn't see a lot of SC1 and in BW the progress throughout the game was similar to SC2. Do not compare SC2 to BW without taking into account the timeline. BW has been around since '98 and SC2 has been out for a year and a bit, if anything compare BW after a year to SC2 after a year. Is the current play less exciting that BW today? Yes it is, because the game has not been nearly fleshed out as BW; one we know everyone about SC2 and HotS and whatever comes next, then we'll start to see that crisp and exciting play.
On November 23 2011 14:11 bennyaus wrote: I watched the last proleague finals, and I saw like 3 zergs do a 3 hatch hydra all-in against Protoss. Then I remembered how people complained about how there was too many all-ins in SC2, or that the macro games suck.
Get a grip. Just because you can post one youtube example of a sick BW game (which is a game that was pro for 8-9 years by that stage) does not exclude the fact that many of them were quite similar to SC2 games. There are plenty of passive games, plenty of all-ins. Both games are interesting in their own ways. I can also find vods of sick late-game SC2 games, like an earlier poster mentioned. Thorzain vs MC in TSL was quite memorable, and HuK vs Moon at Dreamhack group stage as well. This is excluding the fact that TvZ/ZvT in SC2 is almost awesome in every match provided it gets past the 10min mark.
the problem is: sc2: 1 sick late game engagement = gg bw: can produce prolonged sick engagements throughout the game
Yeah probably better to just say SC2 and BW is two different game but similar name and some units... what about that rumor I heard about starcraft pheonix though something like a graphically updated BW or was that false?
From what that blizzard employ casting with Artosis at MLG said, it appears that they're making maps larger over time. Really really large maps might have seemed a little overwhelming on release, but as the game grows and evolves I'm sure we'll see more BW-esque maps that'll allow for more of the engagements you're talking about.
I gotta disagree with the OP. I certainly agree that BW macro games are more fun to watch than SC2 macro games. But you've got the "why" completely wrong.
There's several things that makes BW games look more epic than SC2:
1. SC2 shows much more screenspace than SC1. In SC1 we were always stuck with a 4:3 aspect ratio with tiny resolutions. In SC2 we have access to 16 and 16:10 and higher resolutions, which means we see *much* more stuff in SC2. Put SC2 into 4:3 aspect mode, gimp down the resolution, and then suddenly armies "look" more like BW. But nobody is going to do that with SC2 if they have the option for a better spectating experience.
2. SC2 has much more unit clumping than BW. If you take a screenshot of 20 SC2 Zealots and map them onto 20 SC1 Zealots then its pretty easy to see the difference.
3. Limited unit selection rewards multiprong attacks and hurts straight up pushes. So the action in BW was always much more spread over the map.
4. BW did not have any spectator tabs. You can find out very quickly in a game like Boxer vs Rain what each player is making via looking up at the tab. But in BW you gotta scramble all around the map to check which production facilities are active, and individually check to see what each player is building.
Those are the only reasons why imo. Maps and resource collection rate has nothing to do with it. Sure, MLG and Ladder maps are too small, but GSL maps are as large as MSL OSL. They simply *look* smaller due to the above two things.
There's no way that Blizzard is going to gimp their game just to make it more BW-y. Sure it might make SC2 a better spectator experience, but it would make SC2 a much worse playing experience. SC2 is much more popular now worldwide than BW ever was because unlike SC1, SC2 is a much easier game to play. More players translates into more viewers. Korea was the exception, not the rule.
On November 23 2011 14:11 bennyaus wrote: I watched the last proleague finals, and I saw like 3 zergs do a 3 hatch hydra all-in against Protoss. Then I remembered how people complained about how there was too many all-ins in SC2, or that the macro games suck.
Get a grip. Just because you can post one youtube example of a sick BW game (which is a game that was pro for 8-9 years by that stage) does not exclude the fact that many of them were quite similar to SC2 games. There are plenty of passive games, plenty of all-ins. Both games are interesting in their own ways. I can also find vods of sick late-game SC2 games, like an earlier poster mentioned. Thorzain vs MC in TSL was quite memorable, and HuK vs Moon at Dreamhack group stage as well. This is excluding the fact that TvZ/ZvT in SC2 is almost awesome in every match provided it gets past the 10min mark.
the problem is: sc2: 1 sick late game engagement = gg bw: can produce prolonged sick engagements throughout the game
that's undeniable
Did you even watch the Thorzain v. MC game he was talking about? No that's not undeniable. It's wrong
I've had the same feelings as the OP for awhile. SC2 just isn't designed a certain way to make more epic and more entertaining macro games than BW, for many reasons already stated. SC2 is still awesome, but it is inferior to BW from a spectator point of view imo. Hopefully the 2 expansions and map designs changes that.
On November 23 2011 14:12 ptrpb wrote: We are only at one stage of the game, and this is what a lot of people who make posts and threads about this stuff don't understand. SC2 does not stop here, and it doesn't continue in a linear fashion. We didn't see a lot of SC1 and in BW the progress throughout the game was similar to SC2. Do not compare SC2 to BW without taking into account the timeline. BW has been around since '98 and SC2 has been out for a year and a bit, if anything compare BW after a year to SC2 after a year. Is the current play less exciting that BW today? Yes it is, because the game has not been nearly fleshed out as BW; one we know everyone about SC2 and HotS and whatever comes next, then we'll start to see that crisp and exciting play.
I have taken the timeline into account, I know they're two entirely different games and should not yet be compared in too much depth. I'm speculating different methods to make watching professional starcraft more exciting. If you go to Korea you see thousands upon thousands of people screaming and cheering for the genius plays and tactics that the BW pros perform, the audience loves all of the action that is happening. Then you go to a foreign SC2 tournament where you have the same situation except toned down. You will have a very attentive crowd and you will only hear those excited screams and shouts whenever a ridiculously good and creative play happens, a huge huge lead is taken, or a giant fight occurs. But until then, you'll hear lots of oooh's and ahhh's.
If we had the same kind of macro games that BW did, where there was excitement upon every level and on every corner of the map, imagine how that would attract people? We already have spectators that don't play, but still watch because they find the game interesting. There are still those people that find the game boring to watch because of all of the waiting that happens. We could expand the scene even further by appealing to more people.
On November 23 2011 14:11 bennyaus wrote: I watched the last proleague finals, and I saw like 3 zergs do a 3 hatch hydra all-in against Protoss. Then I remembered how people complained about how there was too many all-ins in SC2, or that the macro games suck.
Get a grip. Just because you can post one youtube example of a sick BW game (which is a game that was pro for 8-9 years by that stage) does not exclude the fact that many of them were quite similar to SC2 games. There are plenty of passive games, plenty of all-ins. Both games are interesting in their own ways. I can also find vods of sick late-game SC2 games, like an earlier poster mentioned. Thorzain vs MC in TSL was quite memorable, and HuK vs Moon at Dreamhack group stage as well. This is excluding the fact that TvZ/ZvT in SC2 is almost awesome in every match provided it gets past the 10min mark.
the problem is: sc2: 1 sick late game engagement = gg bw: can produce prolonged sick engagements throughout the game
that's undeniable
Did you even watch the Thorzain v. MC game he was talking about? No that's not undeniable. It's wrong
sigh. how can you make an argument through a pool of 1 game. i have watched 6 years of bw and since the release sc2, and that was my honest opinion.
On November 23 2011 14:13 Nizzy wrote: SC2 is more like WC3 than BW which is wrong. 'Balls of armies, and more spell casters than BW" that perfectly describes SC2/WC3.
On November 23 2011 14:04 Korste wrote: I'm interested to see how sc2 games will change when/if the bw players come over.
What are Flash,Jaedong,Bisu is going to do with the extra 300 apm ? even boxer,nada,july are players with great achievement under their belt can't do much for the game or revolutionize the game to the extend you wanted like Bisu's PvZ revolution against savior . DB with his statement that " If you don't like sc2 play Bw " is not a attitude ,a developer like him should have , At least valve are actually listening to the pro's with the upcoming Dota 2 and CS Global offensive , it's good to see old names like Ksharp,Frod,Nothing back in action .
I'm gonna talk about the elephant in the room: what makes SC2 boring/passive, is the imbalance.
There is just no way for some matchups to end well if not by turtling the hell up and massing a 200/200 fully upgraded army. While Blizzard fails to correct the mistakes they made, we are forced to play and watch huge maps like Calm Before The Storm to avoid your early cheeses. However, as Noblesse showed against InCa, even in ginormous maps like CBTS, it is possible to 2 rax bunker rush, then Marine-SCV all-in and still be ahead both economically and military. Zergs can 6pool/Roach-Rush and play macro at the same time, like July and some other guys have shown time and time again. So... The problem with SC2 is simple: fix the imbalance and the game becomes interesting, with no need for huge maps which force a long boring passive game.
On November 23 2011 13:50 Raiznhell wrote: 1) bigger maps, need a ton of HUGE maps 2) no unlimited unit selection. 3) a bit more ridiculousness. like in BW 2 tanks behind a wall would kill infinity dragoons if they tried to bust but in sc2 protoss wouldn't even notice the fact they are being shelled when they right click on the supply depot kill it walk through then click on the tanks one by one and then just win.
Disagree, tanks can do quite a lot o.o
I do think a limited unit selection would be good tho (they have one actually im pretty sure, like 160 units, but it could be smaller, not like BW of course, but where you need to think just a little, like maybe 64 or something lol)
Don't cripple the UI just for the sake of making it harder. It is not intuitive and I am glad blizzard never went that route.
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.
Great post! I really agree that it is easy to base trade in SC2. Something that you kind of touch upon is how easy it is to snowball into a victory in SC2.
The games like a year old. We went from no macro to lots of macro. it depends on the maps and people figuring out ways to attack. toss are just getting into warp prisim harass and zerg are getting into muta roach ling attacking. As of now if you can get to 200/200 with no1 attacking you and you win people dont see a need 2 change it up until a problem arises. thats how the game goes. Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
On November 23 2011 14:11 bennyaus wrote: I watched the last proleague finals, and I saw like 3 zergs do a 3 hatch hydra all-in against Protoss. Then I remembered how people complained about how there was too many all-ins in SC2, or that the macro games suck.
Get a grip. Just because you can post one youtube example of a sick BW game (which is a game that was pro for 8-9 years by that stage) does not exclude the fact that many of them were quite similar to SC2 games. There are plenty of passive games, plenty of all-ins. Both games are interesting in their own ways. I can also find vods of sick late-game SC2 games, like an earlier poster mentioned. Thorzain vs MC in TSL was quite memorable, and HuK vs Moon at Dreamhack group stage as well. This is excluding the fact that TvZ/ZvT in SC2 is almost awesome in every match provided it gets past the 10min mark.
the problem is: sc2: 1 sick late game engagement = gg bw: can produce prolonged sick engagements throughout the game
that's undeniable
Did you even watch the Thorzain v. MC game he was talking about? No that's not undeniable. It's wrong
sigh. how can you make an argument through a pool of 1 game. i have watched 6 years of bw and since the release sc2, and that was my honest opinion.
All I was trying to do was refute your blanket statement about late game sc2, hence using a single game as a counter example. As someone who has watched almost no BW I will not make any blanket statements about either game. All I know is that I love watching SC2, and I can remember quite a few games that were action packed and provide counter examples to some of the arguments people are making.
when i see flash do his standard 15cc into death mech march he has the same passive play that terrans do in sc2 once they hit a army size that can match up to the enemy they will consider moving out.
of course, minimal harass via vultures/helions/rine drops is about all they will do
I'm actually kind of shocked to read that browder say those type of things and ignore pros and fan concerns, that reminded me ALOT of ghostcrawler when I used to play WoW...but at least they clearly stated they want sc2 as eSport.
Again with the comparison of SC2 vs BW. When will people understand that sc2 is a different game and will never be "BW". Anyways I don't agree that Sc2 is "passive", patches and changes made it that way. When sc2 came out, games were very fast and players tend to go 1 base. Builds from 2 gate zealot to 9/10 barracks are all changed because people want longer games and Blizzard listened. Supply depot before rax, zealot time/warp gate increased and largers are some changes that make sc2 "passive". Also the game is new so we can't say a lot from it but basing on HOTs, sc2 will be more passive. New defensive units like swarm host, replicator, shredder will award passive players.
On November 23 2011 14:41 Lewan72 wrote: This game is still young, let the meta game flourish and I expect to see advanced action packed games in the future.
everyone wants that to happen. but there is always the fear that it won't
On November 23 2011 14:04 Korste wrote: I'm interested to see how sc2 games will change when/if the bw players come over.
What are Flash,Jaedong,Bisu is going to do with the extra 300 apm ? even boxer,nada,july are players with great achievement under their belt can't do much for the game or revolutionize the game to the extend you wanted like Bisu's PvZ revolution against savior . DB with his statement that " If you don't like sc2 play Bw " is not a attitude ,a developer like him should have , At least valve are actually listening to the pro's with the upcoming Dota 2 and CS Global offensive , it's good to see old names like Ksharp,Frod,Nothing back in action .
Given that an individual blink stalker micro is 18apm, I think they will have plenty of things to do. We are nowhere near the cap, plenty of units in the game are not even close to currently being perfectly microed, and there is still huge gaps between certain 'pro' players macro abilities (Startale Bomber vs ESC Goody as an example).
A lot of SC2 players are confusing macro games with passive games, they are mutually exclusive.
In SC2 we had passive 1 base play, then passive 2 base play, and now passive multibase play.
On November 23 2011 14:38 soullogik wrote: i dont know about that
when i see flash do his standard 15cc into death mech march he has the same passive play that terrans do in sc2 once they hit a army size that can match up to the enemy they will consider moving out.
of course, minimal harass via vultures/helions/rine drops is about all they will do
But that's Flash in general, and not many people like his games. The second best Terran is Fantasy, and he is the complete opposite, basically the MMA of BW. Then look at Bisu and Jaedong.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
If you are Z and you like attacking, try hydra,lurker drops. Turn your hydras into eggs at the choke and put lurkers behind it so P can't defend his main. That or develop your muta micro and go mutas.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. In PvZ most people do storm drops and things like that late game. Every time I see a Protoss player try to engage with his army he gets owned that's why they just try doing small harrass like you said.
Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
Which is exactly what he said.
If I make it to late game PvT I never engage Terran ground unless I have the entire map or something and if I choose to do an arbiter recall there's nothing to stop him from screwing up my base so I don't see a difference
Also White-Ra finishes a lot of his games fast and he looks like his games have non stop action.
On November 23 2011 14:38 soullogik wrote: i dont know about that
when i see flash do his standard 15cc into death mech march he has the same passive play that terrans do in sc2 once they hit a army size that can match up to the enemy they will consider moving out.
of course, minimal harass via vultures/helions/rine drops is about all they will do
It's call economic aggression when flash does that he is capitalizing on gaining that extra resources and gas to built a mech army and if he tries to move out during that moment of time without having a solid ground mech army , one mistake and he's dead , hence for flash he usually says okay do what ever you want zerg , I am flash I can turtle and get 200/200 and win you .
However in recent times he doesn't do that any more ,well at least for these current pro league season , he seems to go for 1 rax fe very frequently now days.
Compared to flash if you look at players like Iris who are super aggressive in their games in his younger days in matches like ggplay v iris daum msl . Constant dropping of mnm , getting map control , killing drones at the mineral line , sniping zerg gas . Seldom do we see such passiveness in broodwar games.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
Which is exactly what he said.
Huh? He said BW was passive. o_O
Hurrr
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT.
I don't always see passive play in SC2 but nvm maybe I don't know what I'm talking about
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I'm sorry but I can't see how bigger maps will make games more dynamic. Have you not watched the GSL this season? On the massive maps Calm before the storm and Daybreak, Protoss just sit there for ages and eventually roll over the terran 20 minutes later after one decisive battle. It's not exactly a dynamic match.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
not a fair comparison because you're comparing 2 medicor players to 2 of the best
People needs to take off their nostalgia goggle, because broodwar wasn't really that difference in terms of action on average games
watch MvP vs another top tier terran, TvT is really not that passive
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either. Below is an extremely passive PvZ and what I'm talking about.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either
You said it was passive look at your first quote.
Also what race are you? maybe you get overran because you don't have the mechanics to mobilize your force while macroing and controlling corsairs. If you keep the overlord count down and harass, you can have your army moving attacking bases all the time. You need to look at pro games, not your own games to justify something like that.
And check out my big fat edit, I put a pvz in there.
Edit: Actually just look at any PvZ with Bisu in it.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either
I have a good example of a TvT where early aggression from a player like firebathero nearly won the game ,if not for the brilliance defence from Flash.
I think Dustin Browder said in an interview with Kennigit (right around when blizzcon happened) that if you don't like that aspect of sc2 and want the epic maps, armies, and actions of sc1, just go play bw cuz they designed sc2 to be this way
I mean personally, I think when players become even better, pro play would be much more dynamic and action filled in late game in general but w/e OP is saying seems to be a bit of wishful thinking imo.
On November 23 2011 14:41 Lewan72 wrote: This game is still young, let the meta game flourish and I expect to see advanced action packed games in the future.
everyone wants that to happen. but there is always the fear that it won't
I second this post.
Looking back in history, we could have said everything to defend WC3 at its one year mark, only to find out several years later that time was not the elixir that magically make the game better. We have to realize that there are certain aspects of the game mechanics which will prevent the game to be epic in the long run. As many people already pointed out, smaller army size/more higher pop units/more casters/etc. may have all contributed to the eventual failure of WC3. Sadly, those are also features of SC2 compared to BW. Don't get me wrong, I as all the TLers and esport-fans, want this game to be epic. It's only the way that the small portion of us chose, not to defend it, but to point out possible set-backs of the game with the sole purpose of maybe preventing the wrongs and improving the rights, that is different from the majority.
I also really want to see that with more tactics and strategies figured out, the game will become more balanced and provide us more epic games. But I can't help but ask this question: what if time is not the cure? what if SC2 will follow the same route of WC3, to be very hot for several years and eventually die out due to its inability to attract non-gamers? I figure asking ourselves these question will not hurt the elephant (see the banner) but only make it better.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either
You said it was passive look at your first quote.
Also what race are you? maybe you get overran because you don't have the mechanics to mobilize your force while macroing and controlling corsairs. If you keep the overlord count down and harass, you can have your army moving attacking bases all the time. You need to look at pro games, not your own games to justify something like that.
And check out my big fat edit, I put a pvz in there.
Edit: Actually just look at any PvZ with Bisu in it.
Okay well here's the thing. I am not pro enough to multitask like a pro. I get overran because I lose my army and the Zerg ends up flanking me or he has like two armies and my army dies taking out one of his 5 - 6 bases. Then he just gets his army together a lot quicker and overruns me. So when that happens I will just say fuck it because there's no way to reproduce as fast as a Zerg player.
Maybe I am just not good enough whatever. I really hate that moment when my army gets crushed and all you see are the zerg units moving towards your base and you have a few templar zealots and dragoons bunched up.
That means you're fucked. I've survived for a little bit a few times because on maps like python I like to mass cannons at my far expos.
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.
Such a good post, everyone should read this before they keep arguing about larger maps
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either. Below is an extremely passive PvZ and what I'm talking about.
That is just Nal_ra's style of play. Commentators even called him "shield" in comparison to Yellows "spear", because he is so defensive. Look at Reach, who was around as early as Nal_ra and was a very aggressive player. (Lots of 2 gate and 1 base sair/dts).
Bisu only half a year later played the most exciting and aggressive PvZ in history.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
not a fair comparison because you're comparing 2 medicor players to 2 of the best
People needs to take off their nostalgia goggle, because broodwar wasn't really that difference in terms of action on average games
watch MvP vs another top tier terran, TvT is really not that passive
TvT and TvZ is not bad in SC2, but we are talking about the other matchups which are most often dreadfully dull. I could compare TvZ in both BW and SC2 and while I'd still choose BW, I don't mind SC2. Its mostly because of siege tanks that allow Terran to position his army securely and thus allow him to split his army up without getting run over.
However look at TvP, PvZ, PvP and try say the same thing.
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.
Such a good post, everyone should read this before they keep arguing about larger maps
Nevermind that does sound shitty. I'd hate to lose a game just because I lost a few units o.o
I feel so as well, and it's incredibly frustration to play for me, that's why i don't play much anymore. As a Protoss it's the worst of all the three races, but still. You can't do attacks without investing to much into it, you can't harass without investing too much into the tech. There's no way to sacrifice units at given time, there are no real pressure builds. If you fail to do aggression you'll get incredibly far behind, because you invested so much, and the Macro mechanics throw you back even more. And the worst of all, against the people i play (High Master / GM), i noticed multiple times when i put on pressure with multitasking / constant pressure, they completely fall apart. Their mechanics, their multitask, their crisis control, like everything you have to do at a fast pace, is incredibly bad. It's frustrating you know that you're the better mechanical player, but you can't play it really out, because the game / and your race doesn't provide you with the means to do so.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either
You said it was passive look at your first quote.
Also what race are you? maybe you get overran because you don't have the mechanics to mobilize your force while macroing and controlling corsairs. If you keep the overlord count down and harass, you can have your army moving attacking bases all the time. You need to look at pro games, not your own games to justify something like that.
And check out my big fat edit, I put a pvz in there.
Edit: Actually just look at any PvZ with Bisu in it.
Okay well here's the thing. I am not pro enough to multitask like a pro. I get overran because I lose my army and the Zerg ends up flanking me or he has like two armies and my army dies taking out one of his 5 - 6 bases. Then he just gets his army together a lot quicker and overruns me. So when that happens I will just say fuck it because there's no way to reproduce as fast as a Zerg player.
Maybe I am just not good enough whatever. I really hate that moment when my army gets crushed and all you see are the zerg units moving towards your base and you have a few templar zealots and dragoons bunched up.
That means you're fucked. I've survived for a little bit a few times because on maps like python I like to mass cannons at my far expos.
Looking at the bold words, I am not sure whether you are a zerg , terran or protoss , because if you are a zerg and it's a zvz rarely does it go to a 5 hatch v 5 hatch hive tech swarm fest , On the other hand , maybe you are playing terran and played really passively because the muta micro contained you really well in your base for a very long time and he was able to take multiple expansion hence the reason why he was able to macro up after you destroying one of his base , usually zerg's bank would be like 4k mineral and 4k gas and killing one hatch won't make a difference at that point except if you have good upgrade and map control .
Maybe it's because your inexperience ? what rank are you in iccup ? Terran i suppose you play ?
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.
What you say makes a lot of sense.
So overall, they should improve defensive capability and reduce offensive capability?
This would certainly promote harassment and other small sorties, with a risk that turtling will become very powerful.
On the other hand, larger maps help to negate this by spreading the defense over a larger area, allowing the possibility of overwhelming weak spots and making harassment more effective due it being more difficult to stop.
I think the largest obstacle to your suggestion is the current power of each race's macro mechanics.
So I hope Blizzard has a look at each race's macro mechanics and change them up a bit for HOTS. I see the current macro mechanics as an issue because they will make it very difficult to balance the larger maps. They act as a kind of multiplier: the more powerful the mechanics, the more they magnify the effect of one small change in a map and make it a bigger change, which makes fine-tuning very difficult.
For example, it doesn't take much imagination to see how powerful warpgate mechanics become as map sizes increase. Any small change that Blizzard makes to gateway units without warpgate would have a smaller effect on the game than the same change with warpgate. It becomes very hard to find a balance because the multiplier means that even the tiniest change could tip the scales way over.
With only 2 more games currently in the pipeline, I hope Blizzard takes advantage of the freedom HOTS will give them to experiment a bit. It will be easier to tone down the experimentation with LOTV after experimenting a lot with HOTS than it would be to do little with HOTS and then regret that they can't afford to take risks with LOTV.
Have been talking about it since the beginning of SC2.
There are two things in sc2 which in my opinion decide who wins the game. 1. First 10 min - "Lucky build order/opening" 2. Rest of the game - "Stronger ball and positioning".
Issues I think causing problems: a) There is little to no defender's advantage. Terrans have somewhat a defender's advantage. Most games are decided in one battle. Little chance to comeback after you lose your ball. bw had mines, lurkers, dark swarm, statis, reaver and so on. b) Resources are gathered too fast. Mules, chronoboosted probes, larva inject, double gas makes possible to crank out 200/200 army by 12 min mark. Which is why I think units have low hp and high damage, in order to keep up with income units need to die quickly.
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've also noticed the dancing of armies and jockeying for position in SC2. I also agree that this "decisive clash" is vital in SC2. However, there is still definitely a defenders advantage and my reasoning why players don't devote supply to a secondary maneuver is more their inability to multi-task. Because of this, the risk/reward is to jockey for position to win this decisive battle.
However, I do suggest to increase the supply from 200/200 to maybe 300/300 in 1v1 to help alleviate this army jockeying.
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either
You said it was passive look at your first quote.
Also what race are you? maybe you get overran because you don't have the mechanics to mobilize your force while macroing and controlling corsairs. If you keep the overlord count down and harass, you can have your army moving attacking bases all the time. You need to look at pro games, not your own games to justify something like that.
And check out my big fat edit, I put a pvz in there.
Edit: Actually just look at any PvZ with Bisu in it.
Okay well here's the thing. I am not pro enough to multitask like a pro. I get overran because I lose my army and the Zerg ends up flanking me or he has like two armies and my army dies taking out one of his 5 - 6 bases. Then he just gets his army together a lot quicker and overruns me. So when that happens I will just say fuck it because there's no way to reproduce as fast as a Zerg player.
Maybe I am just not good enough whatever. I really hate that moment when my army gets crushed and all you see are the zerg units moving towards your base and you have a few templar zealots and dragoons bunched up.
That means you're fucked. I've survived for a little bit a few times because on maps like python I like to mass cannons at my far expos.
Looking at the bold words, I am not sure whether you are a zerg , terran or protoss , because if you are a zerg and it's a zvz rarely does it go to a 5 hatch v 5 hatch hive tech swarm fest , On the other hand , maybe you are playing terran and played really passively because the muta micro contained you really well in your base for a very long time and he was able to take multiple expansion hence the reason why he was able to macro up after you destroying one of his base , usually zerg's bank would be like 4k mineral and 4k gas and killing one hatch won't make a difference at that point except if you have good upgrade and map control .
Maybe it's because your inexperience ? what rank are you in iccup ? Terran i suppose you play ?
I was a D+ max P player. I was never that amazing. I played PvZ and would lose because of what I said. Even if I overlord harrass it doesn't change the fact that once I attack and get smashed I lose the game.
EVen if I have reinforcements building if the zerg manages to stop me at one choke I cant win anymore or if he kills me out in the open so yeah I was always really passive about that.
PvP was my least passive match up because I found it the easiest to make a comeback in.
I think that it's really shitty how you cant do harrassment attacks in sc2 and if you're behind you have to dance around to get your army as strong as your enemies.
I thought people were already good at doing harrassment techniques
To be honest I think WarpGates fucked SC2 up, there was an article about something like this explaining it. Remove warpgate, buff Gateway units to compensate, PROBLEM SOLVED. That mechanic just causes too many problems that they have to balance. Try playing BGH-customs in SC2, warpgate really screws up how things felt in BW. A lot of protoss complain about how WarpGate removes defenders advantage for protoss, and it's true because warpgate at home provides very little benefit, and Blizz hard to nerf gateway units slightly to compensate for Protoss being able to warp in all over the map, putting a lot of pressure on an enemy with reinforcements, to keep it fair Gateways units are in general weaker cost for cost. Wonder if anyone agrees?
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either. Below is an extremely passive PvZ and what I'm talking about.
In the case of PvZ, that's just flat out false. Even if a zerg destroys most of the protoss army, it's nearly impossible to take out a protoss expo defended by cannons/reavers/storms. The zerg's best option in that scenario is to just get complete map control, expand, deny further expos for the protoss and just try to starve the opponent. Trying to bruteforce a protoss (even when you're ahead) is the perfect way to hand the game to your opponent
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've also noticed the dancing of armies and jockeying for position in SC2. I also agree that this "decisive clash" is vital in SC2. However, there is still definitely a defenders advantage and my reasoning why players don't devote supply to a secondary maneuver is more their inability to multi-task. Because of this, the risk/reward is to jockey for position to win this decisive battle.
However, I do suggest to increase the supply from 200/200 to maybe 300/300 in 1v1 to help alleviate this army jockeying.
They could just make it easier to kill armies. In SC BW armies die in a few seconds. I played a few PVZ where I was doing really good but the second they attacked my army and I wasn't paying attention half my units were dead before I could storm. lol
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either. Below is an extremely passive PvZ and what I'm talking about.
In the case of PvZ, that's just flat out false. Even if a zerg destroys most of the protoss army, it's nearly impossible to take out a protoss expo defended by cannons/reavers/storms. The zerg's best option in that scenario is to just get complete map control, expand, deny further expos for the protoss and just try to starve the opponent. Trying to bruteforce a protoss (even when you're ahead) is the perfect way to hand the game to your opponent
Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
On November 23 2011 14:50 sluggaslamoo wrote:[quote]
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either
You said it was passive look at your first quote.
Also what race are you? maybe you get overran because you don't have the mechanics to mobilize your force while macroing and controlling corsairs. If you keep the overlord count down and harass, you can have your army moving attacking bases all the time. You need to look at pro games, not your own games to justify something like that.
And check out my big fat edit, I put a pvz in there.
Edit: Actually just look at any PvZ with Bisu in it.
Okay well here's the thing. I am not pro enough to multitask like a pro. I get overran because I lose my army and the Zerg ends up flanking me or he has like two armies and my army dies taking out one of his 5 - 6 bases. Then he just gets his army together a lot quicker and overruns me. So when that happens I will just say fuck it because there's no way to reproduce as fast as a Zerg player.
Maybe I am just not good enough whatever. I really hate that moment when my army gets crushed and all you see are the zerg units moving towards your base and you have a few templar zealots and dragoons bunched up.
That means you're fucked. I've survived for a little bit a few times because on maps like python I like to mass cannons at my far expos.
Looking at the bold words, I am not sure whether you are a zerg , terran or protoss , because if you are a zerg and it's a zvz rarely does it go to a 5 hatch v 5 hatch hive tech swarm fest , On the other hand , maybe you are playing terran and played really passively because the muta micro contained you really well in your base for a very long time and he was able to take multiple expansion hence the reason why he was able to macro up after you destroying one of his base , usually zerg's bank would be like 4k mineral and 4k gas and killing one hatch won't make a difference at that point except if you have good upgrade and map control .
Maybe it's because your inexperience ? what rank are you in iccup ? Terran i suppose you play ?
I was a D+ max P player. I was never that amazing. I played PvZ and would lose because of what I said. Even if I overlord harrass it doesn't change the fact that once I attack and get smashed I lose the game.
EVen if I have reinforcements building if the zerg manages to stop me at one choke I cant win anymore or if he kills me out in the open so yeah I was always really passive about that.
PvP was my least passive match up because I found it the easiest to make a comeback in.
I think that it's really shitty how you cant do harrassment attacks in sc2 and if you're behind you have to dance around to get your army as strong as your enemies.
I thought people were already good at doing harrassment techniques
Maybe that's why I prefer terran , I get a lot of opportunity play defensively and yet being offensive with drops and take advantage of zergs having multiple bases because they can't protect every base , some where has to be left undefended .
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.
Wow pure logic! Thumb up!
Aside from making spec. featured maps, how can we change the fundamental game mechanics to make it more viable to gain advantage other than the big battle? Do you have some advice on this? E.g., making turrets less powerful. However, won't this contradict with the defender advantage aspect? It's probably too hard for me to think of a solution
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
On November 23 2011 13:12 Nizzy wrote: 1. Bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps. Stuff like twice the size of metalopolis. A map like Tal darim alter should be one of the smallest maps out there. This way 'ball armies' will simply fail, because you can only hit one part of their base, while if they hit you at multiple locations at once you'll probably lose. Because of big maps you would bring back the seige/perimeter lines. You would have zergs placing burrow banelings in areas to block off paths/swarm hosts for this as well. Warp gate for Protoss would be great here for them to warp into any base to protect it. The game would be so much better.
2. Take away the mass multi section of units. You don't have to limit it to 12 like in BW, however everything is in one big ball/ 1-3 control groups only. Maybe cap it at like 24-32 units or something. Units/armies would be WAY harder to control if you had to use like 6 hotkeys for a 200/200 army. It would put more skill back into the game. Way more IMO. Being able to select all of your units in 1 control group is so noob-ish. Even bad players might even agree to that.
3. Like TT1 kind of said in his post. The less casting units the better. Take away that stupid "get over here" thing from the viper. Less spells actually = more action. Having just 2-3 total spells per race actually makes them more exciting. TT1 also said each race having few spells to support the army, even though they're strong. They won't be as strong with armies separated around the map instead of a big ball.
Dumb Dustin Browder fails to realize. Sorry I'm calling him dumb, it's just I feel a sense of ignorance with his logic of 'this is the game I made, not the game you want' Dustin, we don't want these changes because it will be like BW. We want these changes because it will make the game a better RTS. It's already not like BW. The units are so much more fast paced IMO.
He said he's looking at ways to split those balls up. Start with those basic ones.
I am pretty sure 95% of the ball thing is due to the AI, not unit selection. Players didn't split up units in BW because of unit selection, they split them up because otherwise they would run in a straight line to their death regardless of whats happening.
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
BGH 2v2v2v2 games are the most passive thing in history and that is SC BW.
It was so passive people made a nuke hack because they could get like 12 nukes and not even be attacked.
I remember watching everyone have their minerals nuked. My favorite thing about SC BW was being an asshole with hacks. Nothing more fun really.
Map hacking, selection hacking, drop spamming. Those days were a lot of fun. I remember when someone said they weren't a hacker but I was hacking too and I moved my dragoons to counter their overlords and saw them moving out of vision to avoid with my own hack. It was pretty hilarious.
One of my AKA's was auto banned for being a known game dropper. Selection hacking max corsair armies and going after everyone's overlords was fun too.
Saying you are going to be an observer and doing a slayers boxer style nuke on peoples tech like I did to Bongmicro.
Hacking in Team Micro Arena games.
Hacking in 1v1 and going for a 4 pool with multiple hatcheries vs unsuspecting victims. Once on Asia vs a Korean and I had no idea what he was saying as I rolled over his unfinished barracks with 6 zerglings.
My #1 favorite thing of all time was the nuke hack though. That must have been a lot of fun. I could imagine destroying someones entire base about 40 minutes into the match and watch them get pissed and leave while I can't stop laughing and then do something stupid like ally vision everyone and leave. haha
Or scv rushing at 11 o clock vs 12 o clock and winning with stack.
Or going into Crash RPG and locking down peoples mech heroes and leaving after I ruin the game.
BSing in Strip Sakura.
Backstabbing allies by sending your entire army to their base and claiming protection. Although I only got a few chances ever.
Trick maps where you freeze peoples Starcraft or have a mini map picture of a dude with a huge Pnis or his B's hanging out or both. I remember making fake python maps and faking other maps with OSmap. I would unprotect them and get the exact name for the map out of the file so no one could tell and then I would host the game and LOL as people go "WTF" and leave.
I was one immature person at the time. I actually had 0 respect for BGH players and was always being a dickhead every game. I still find it funny. I remember laughing so hard I actually had to put my head down and finish before I could do anything.
On November 23 2011 13:12 Nizzy wrote: 1. Bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps. Stuff like twice the size of metalopolis. A map like Tal darim alter should be one of the smallest maps out there. This way 'ball armies' will simply fail, because you can only hit one part of their base, while if they hit you at multiple locations at once you'll probably lose. Because of big maps you would bring back the seige/perimeter lines. You would have zergs placing burrow banelings in areas to block off paths/swarm hosts for this as well. Warp gate for Protoss would be great here for them to warp into any base to protect it. The game would be so much better.
2. Take away the mass multi section of units. You don't have to limit it to 12 like in BW, however everything is in one big ball/ 1-3 control groups only. Maybe cap it at like 24-32 units or something. Units/armies would be WAY harder to control if you had to use like 6 hotkeys for a 200/200 army. It would put more skill back into the game. Way more IMO. Being able to select all of your units in 1 control group is so noob-ish. Even bad players might even agree to that.
3. Like TT1 kind of said in his post. The less casting units the better. Take away that stupid "get over here" thing from the viper. Less spells actually = more action. Having just 2-3 total spells per race actually makes them more exciting. TT1 also said each race having few spells to support the army, even though they're strong. They won't be as strong with armies separated around the map instead of a big ball.
Dumb Dustin Browder fails to realize. Sorry I'm calling him dumb, it's just I feel a sense of ignorance with his logic of 'this is the game I made, not the game you want' Dustin, we don't want these changes because it will be like BW. We want these changes because it will make the game a better RTS. It's already not like BW. The units are so much more fast paced IMO.
He said he's looking at ways to split those balls up. Start with those basic ones.
I largely agree with 1 & 3. Bigger Maps, and LESS SPELLS. The new "Get OVER HERE" ability is completely out of whack and does NOT belong in fine RTS like SC2. Why don't they just fix what they already have instead of introduce new GIMMICKY spells that they borrowed from WoW. They're messing with the micro-aspect of the game and although I admit it's a very cool ability, but it's only that cool, doesn't mean it belongs in SC2.
Dustin Browder is definitely a tool in that he doesn't understand people don't want BW, just want certain aspects of it that will improve the play and make it more exciting from a viewer standpoint.
How much do people already whine about things like forcefield and fungal takign away micro opportunities, now he wants to add "GET OVER HERE" to the list, where is the sense in that?
I'll start off by saying I really, really like this post.
I'm hoping some of these design flaws are addressed in the final expansion because its obvious nothing fundamental is changing with Hots, they are just changing up the units trying for micro based battles and more harrassment/unit choice opportunities (which is a good thing and I like where they're going)
Just because this game is not BW does not mean that the new design is really all that acceptable. Yes SC2 is a great game and as a sequel to the best game ever made it holds its own. But as said already the changes to Unit Health/Damage/Supply of Units/Workers Needed for good economy/Hard counters(especially the Tempest, wtf is that??) has shifted the game to be these 200vs200 (60-80vs60-80unit count) army battles that decide the outcome of the game. Worker scouting is ended in 4 minutes and offer no interesting early game micro opportunities. Overall the game is very stale in its possibilities, and all of these fundamental changes have caused a volatile balance between the races where even a minor change to the (lets say bunker/barracks build time) causes an eruption in the balance of all TvX matches.
I know I'm rambling but I liked this post so much that I had to put my 2 cents in, in the short time I had to write this. I love SC2, but I miss the old epicness of a BW game at ANY level.
On November 23 2011 15:28 Larsa23 wrote: Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
If we're considering low skilled players, then a-moving and overrunning your opponent is possible in every matchup. If a player is incapable of properly utilizing the tools available to his race, then that's just an aspect of his game he needs to improve. It's not a flaw of the game itself.
Mass hydras can only work in the early midgame portion and mass ultras are only possible in late, late game. You said they can just overrun your base once they've killed your army. Where exactly is the zerg gonna pull 50 ultras from? And even with mass ultras, it's generally not a good idea to a-move into a protoss base defended by mass cannons + 2/3 reavers.
Supply in workers ins't the problem at all, it's a product of the improved pathing of SC2 making deathballs so effective. If anything we need to take supply out of them not add it.
While I am (was?) a give SC2 time defender, there are some complaints in this thread that will never be fixed no matter how many years we wait.
The number of workers tied up in mining (particularly gas) will not change and the smaller army size due to high unit supply (all the way up to 6 and no 1 supply unit for Zergs) will never change given time.
Unit clumping will also not change, though perhaps people will get better at spreading them apart. But it would be nice if Blizzard increased the spacing between units without bugging it out like the dragoon. I don't know why we can't have one and not the other.
But I wonder if we ever will see deathballs disappear. On one hand, spells punish packed units. On the otherhand, unit clumping encourages deathballs because it is the most efficient method of gaining a superiority in firepower. It's the criticial mass of focus firing/ one shotting units. Something like stalker-collosi, you might spread out temporarily to avoid a spell, but quickly the best use of firepower is to gather them all together, collosi on top and a-move in.
Browder talks about not going backwards, but I don't know if clumped unit movement is necessarily forward or better. Smooth movement, sure. Non-buggy, yes. But is clumped vs spread out better? Could we not at least have magic box selection for the ground like in bw?
I do agree that the cost of harassment just seems to kill the strength of the main army and I would certainly love to unit selection limit. Perhaps not as draconian as BW, but perhaps with a unit selection, proper muta micro could be introduced- that certainly creates far more aggression.
It's funny in Ver's post that he talks about the solution to passive play is adding in units that are more defensive (lurker, reaver, (and I would argue a more powerful high templar). But I think it's probably true. Stronger defensive units allow you to leave your bases guarded by a few units, while you poke around or harass with another group.
Without strong defensive units and better defense features like BW defensive cliffs, players find it difficult to move out without exposing their entire base. But they can't split up their army so well or the different parts will get rolled, so you have the dancing deathball. Which admittedly you sometimes got the equivalent in BW, Destination PvT or PvP as one side tried to gain an advantage without funnelling their troops through the bridges. The difference is the armies ranged across the entire map. Actually thinking about cliffs and defenders advantage, how much damage does cliff walkers do to the notion of defensive play. As cool as it seems, I wonder how SC2 would've developed without cliff walkers.
I've also been wondering about some of the macro mechanics and whether they actually promote interesting play- warp-gates, mules, larvae injects all seem to create so many game play problems that I wonder if they are worth having in. Protoss units and zerg units get nerfed to hell because of their mechanics for sure (poor zerglings.) Stockpiled larvae, insta reinforcing the front, and flooding gold mineral with mules all seem very awkward to deal with and cause detriment elsewhere. Warpgates screws up defenders advantage for certain.
My musings have rambled beyond what I intended to post. However, the main thing is be careful about dismissing everything with the "give it time." That might be true for some things, some things it might be not be true just based on good predictions. However, some things we are stuck with and will never change (high worker use and high supply cutting down on army numbers as well as unit pathing.)
On November 23 2011 15:28 Larsa23 wrote: Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
If we're considering low skilled players, then a-moving and overrunning your opponent is possible in every matchup. If a player is incapable of properly utilizing the tools available to his race, then that's just an aspect of his game he needs to improve. It's not a flaw of the game itself.
Mass hydras can only work in the early midgame portion and mass ultras are only possible in late, late game. You said they can just overrun your base once they've killed your army. Where exactly is the zerg gonna pull 50 ultras from? And even with mass ultras, it's generally not a good idea to a-move into a protoss base defended by mass cannons + 2/3 reavers.
By outmicroing the shit out of me with mass hydra that's how.
They basically figure out they can beat me with hydra and ling so they reserve their ultralisks while pumping more lings and then they overrun me when my army size is low and my main choke is vulnerable to an ultralisk ling attack.
So instead I like to dance around a lot in the middle of the map and try to get as much economy as I can.
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've also noticed the dancing of armies and jockeying for position in SC2. I also agree that this "decisive clash" is vital in SC2. However, there is still definitely a defenders advantage and my reasoning why players don't devote supply to a secondary maneuver is more their inability to multi-task. Because of this, the risk/reward is to jockey for position to win this decisive battle.
However, I do suggest to increase the supply from 200/200 to maybe 300/300 in 1v1 to help alleviate this army jockeying.
They could just make it easier to kill armies. In SC BW armies die in a few seconds. I played a few PVZ where I was doing really good but the second they attacked my army and I wasn't paying attention half my units were dead before I could storm. lol
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either. Below is an extremely passive PvZ and what I'm talking about.
In the case of PvZ, that's just flat out false. Even if a zerg destroys most of the protoss army, it's nearly impossible to take out a protoss expo defended by cannons/reavers/storms. The zerg's best option in that scenario is to just get complete map control, expand, deny further expos for the protoss and just try to starve the opponent. Trying to bruteforce a protoss (even when you're ahead) is the perfect way to hand the game to your opponent
Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
There is no freaking way you are D+ I'm sorry. Try playing Zerg and see how many times Protoss can just a-move his army and win at any point in the game.
On November 23 2011 15:28 Larsa23 wrote: Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
If we're considering low skilled players, then a-moving and overrunning your opponent is possible in every matchup. If a player is incapable of properly utilizing the tools available to his race, then that's just an aspect of his game he needs to improve. It's not a flaw of the game itself.
Mass hydras can only work in the early midgame portion and mass ultras are only possible in late, late game. You said they can just overrun your base once they've killed your army. Where exactly is the zerg gonna pull 50 ultras from? And even with mass ultras, it's generally not a good idea to a-move into a protoss base defended by mass cannons + 2/3 reavers.
By outmicroing the shit out of me with mass hydra that's how.
They basically figure out they can beat me with hydra and ling so they reserve their ultralisks while pumping more lings and then they overrun me when my army size is low and my main choke is vulnerable to an ultralisk ling attack.
So instead I like to dance around a lot in the middle of the map and try to get as much economy as I can.
That is a style that works and some protoss players do that. But just because an aggressive style doesn't work for you, doesn't mean it that is the entire metagame of PvZ.
Aggressive PvZ involves attacking from the time your first zealot is made, and constantly keeping drone count down extremely low by attacking and harassing all the time. If he out microes you with hydras then you need to outmicro him with either speedlots or reavers. If you just let Zerg do what he wants because you just sit back and macro then you are stuck having to do your style of play.
On November 23 2011 15:57 Falling wrote: While I am (was?) a give SC2 time defender, there are some complaints in this thread that will never be fixed no matter how many years we wait.
The number of workers tied up in mining (particularly gas) will not change and the smaller army size due to high unit supply (all the way up to 6 and no 1 supply unit for Zergs) will never change given time.
Unit clumping will also not change, though perhaps people will get better at spreading them apart. But it would be nice if Blizzard increased the spacing between units without bugging it out like the dragoon. I don't know why we can't have one and not the other.
But I wonder if we ever will see deathballs disappear. On one hand, spells punish packed units. On the otherhand, unit clumping encourages deathballs because it is the most efficient method of gaining a superiority in firepower. It's the criticial mass of focus firing/ one shotting units. Something like stalker-collosi, you might spread out temporarily to avoid a spell, but quickly the best use of firepower is to gather them all together, collosi on top and a-move in.
Browder talks about not going backwards, but I don't know if clumped unit movement is necessarily forward or better. Smooth movement, sure. Non-buggy, yes. But is clumped vs spread out better? Could we not at least have magic box selection for the ground like in bw?
I do agree that the cost of harassment just seems to kill the strength of the main army and I would certainly love to unit selection limit. Perhaps not as draconian as BW, but perhaps with a unit selection, proper muta micro could be introduced- that certainly creates far more aggression.
It's funny in Ver's post that he talks about the solution to passive play is adding in units that are more defensive (lurker, reaver, (and I would argue a more powerful high templar). But I think it's probably true. Stronger defensive units allow you to leave your bases guarded by a few units, while you poke around or harass with another group.
Without strong defensive units and better defense features like BW defensive cliffs, players find it difficult to move out without exposing their entire base. But they can't split up their army so well or the different parts will get rolled, so you have the dancing deathball. Which admittedly you sometimes got the equivalent in BW, Destination PvT or PvP as one side tried to gain an advantage without funnelling their troops through the bridges. The difference is the armies ranged across the entire map. Actually thinking about cliffs and defenders advantage, how much damage does cliff walkers do to the notion of defensive play. As cool as it seems, I wonder how SC2 would've developed without cliff walkers.
I've also been wondering about some of the macro mechanics and whether they actually promote interesting play- warp-gates, mules, larvae injects all seem to create so many game play problems that I wonder if they are worth having in. Protoss units and zerg units get nerfed to hell because of their mechanics for sure (poor zerglings.) Stockpiled larvae, insta reinforcing the front, and flooding gold mineral with mules all seem very awkward to deal with and cause detriment elsewhere. Warpgates screws up defenders advantage for certain.
My musings have rambled beyond what I intended to post. However, the main thing is be careful about dismissing everything with the "give it time." That might be true for some things, some things it might be not be true just based on good predictions. However, some things we are stuck with and will never change (high worker use and high supply cutting down on army numbers as well as unit pathing.)
I feel the same way as i wrote before on warpgates...
To be honest I think WarpGates fucked SC2 up, there was an article about something like this explaining it. Remove warpgate, buff Gateway units to compensate, PROBLEM SOLVED. That mechanic just causes too many problems that they have to balance. Try playing BGH-customs in SC2, warpgate really screws up how things felt in BW.
A lot of protoss complain about how WarpGate removes defenders advantage for protoss, and it's true because warpgate at home provides very little benefit, and Blizz had to nerf gateway units slightly to compensate for Protoss being able to warp in all over the map, putting a lot of pressure on an enemy with reinforcements, to keep it fair Gateways units are in general weaker cost for cost. Wonder if anyone agrees?
I've opened a thread once explaining why I think WarpGates destroyed SC2, but mods deleted it. They simply RUINED the whole Protoss race. When you add ChronoBoost to the mix, you see how fucked up the Protoss race is: gateway units? nerfed. gateway time? nerfed. pylon range(!!!!)? nerfed. blink? nerfed. All the nerfs Protoss received were motivated by the horrible warp mechanic. Charge takes forever to research, as well as Protoss upgrades. When you look at the ridiculous amount of time needed for building a Carrier, you gotta hate Chrono Boost. When you look at how STUPID AND FUCKING WEAK Immortals and Stalkers are, you gotta hate Warp AND Chrono Boost. WHY THE HELL take away the Dragoon? Holy Tassadar, man...
remove the damn xelnaga towers, it will enrich army movements and uncertainty, so you will have to move your armies non-stop or you may get into trap, its to easy to track movements with xelnaga tower, also players are afraid to move their army into tower radius also you cant really move your drops throughout the map because of it... i dont like the idea of xel naga towers to be on EVERY competition map. Bring us variety, in BW there were mineral walls, temple(rocks) walls that require DIFFERENT strategies and different timings.
I dont like that SC2 is all about being omniscient, a little bit of uncertainty would enrich the play, and possible new strategy/tactics.
Control groups got bigger and unit density got higher, resulting in 'deathball vs. deathball' being the most standard type of SC2 game, even at the pro level. Along with improved pathing that allows units to pack way more tightly than they did in BW, we have units like colossi and medivacs which greatly add to army power without taking up space.
The end result of this is that any time you divide your army on the map, there's a huge risk that your opponent will simply ball up every combat unit he has and crush his way through your base with incredible efficiency. This was possible in BW, but not as easy, and having smaller control groups encouraged squad-based gameplay over the 'deathball.'
I imagine that if the 12-unit limit was enforced in SC2, the game would overall become a lot more active. Just my 2¢.
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've also noticed the dancing of armies and jockeying for position in SC2. I also agree that this "decisive clash" is vital in SC2. However, there is still definitely a defenders advantage and my reasoning why players don't devote supply to a secondary maneuver is more their inability to multi-task. Because of this, the risk/reward is to jockey for position to win this decisive battle.
However, I do suggest to increase the supply from 200/200 to maybe 300/300 in 1v1 to help alleviate this army jockeying.
They could just make it easier to kill armies. In SC BW armies die in a few seconds. I played a few PVZ where I was doing really good but the second they attacked my army and I wasn't paying attention half my units were dead before I could storm. lol
On November 23 2011 15:26 DarkMatter_ wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:03 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:02 Sawamura wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:59 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:58 sluggaslamoo wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:54 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:50 sluggaslamoo wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:49 Larsa23 wrote: In BW late game is passive too.
I lost a couple games just by being the one who attacked. Mainly PvZ and I beat someone for doing the same to me.
It sounds exactly the same to me but looks easier.
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either. Below is an extremely passive PvZ and what I'm talking about.
In the case of PvZ, that's just flat out false. Even if a zerg destroys most of the protoss army, it's nearly impossible to take out a protoss expo defended by cannons/reavers/storms. The zerg's best option in that scenario is to just get complete map control, expand, deny further expos for the protoss and just try to starve the opponent. Trying to bruteforce a protoss (even when you're ahead) is the perfect way to hand the game to your opponent
Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
There is no freaking way you are D+ I'm sorry. Try playing Zerg and see how many times Protoss can just a-move his army and win at any point in the game.
On November 23 2011 15:28 Larsa23 wrote: Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
If we're considering low skilled players, then a-moving and overrunning your opponent is possible in every matchup. If a player is incapable of properly utilizing the tools available to his race, then that's just an aspect of his game he needs to improve. It's not a flaw of the game itself.
Mass hydras can only work in the early midgame portion and mass ultras are only possible in late, late game. You said they can just overrun your base once they've killed your army. Where exactly is the zerg gonna pull 50 ultras from? And even with mass ultras, it's generally not a good idea to a-move into a protoss base defended by mass cannons + 2/3 reavers.
By outmicroing the shit out of me with mass hydra that's how.
They basically figure out they can beat me with hydra and ling so they reserve their ultralisks while pumping more lings and then they overrun me when my army size is low and my main choke is vulnerable to an ultralisk ling attack.
So instead I like to dance around a lot in the middle of the map and try to get as much economy as I can.
That is a style that works and some protoss players do that. But just because an aggressive style doesn't work for you, doesn't mean it that is the entire metagame of PvZ.
Aggressive PvZ involves attacking from the time your first zealot is made, and constantly keeping drone count down extremely low by attacking and harassing all the time. If you just let Zerg do what he wants because you just sit back and macro then you are stuck having to do your style of play.
I was easily D+. When I was probably at my best I was beating D people and D- like they were nothing. I would purposely play sloppy vs the D- at one point. I was D+ it would have taken a bit but it's not like D+ is harder than beating D and D-. Problem solved.
It's not like it takes much except really good efficiency and basic knowledge which I have.
By the way you didn't ask me against who. Most of those losses were on fish server vs koreans who had the entire map by the time I attacked or hackers on USEast. I know exactly when people are hacking? Why? I was a pretty avid one myself just not in 1v1. Vs D- kids I used to just get an army and win. There were pvps where I just a clicked and won. The max I did was drop reavers behind my dragoons.
In ZvP all it takes is a good defense and a flank from behind and the protoss cant do anything. You then dodge the storms and when their army is overwhelmed and cant retreat because you burrowed lurkers behind all my shit and by the time my units get back to base they are mostly gone you just send all your ultralisks that were waiting at 9 o clock when I attacked 11 o clock and all the lings you had hatching at the time and I am dead.
Happened to me a lot.
There were also the times when they just had a much superior game play to mine and when I'd attack they wouldn't even need their entire army to steam roll mine and then just attack.
The fact that armies are harder to kill you'd think would make it easier to just do attacks because in SC1 there are a lot of situations where you can't afford to lose what you have and when that happens you are done. So like in SC2 I thought that it was because you could just have a really strong army and send some men to harrass but I guess the battles take a million years and so it actually matters or something even though I could see ways of sending reinforcements with a pylon.
I just made the mistake of thinking that since they are stronger armies you would have an easier time sacrificing.
Because in SC1 if you're terran and you lose everything you're fucked too and the same for protoss most of the time like in PVT and PVP
I PVZ'd with bongmicro and only lost due to a strategic mistake because he was a lot better and I was being cautious.
I also had a really hard time recovering in PVT when I would make an attack and get raped by terran tank lines and then he would just come over and steam roll me.
It was actually when I was passive with a 12 nexus that I did good enough to just throw away units until they gave in.
I am not that great at micro unless it's all I focus on so that's why I wouldn't try it with zerg. Zerg has a huge advantage if you know how to flank all over the place and macro better.
I think that psi storm is basically useless unless you're really good or defending anyway. I saw most people just lose their templars or kill practically nothing regularly when I played BW.
In PvP once I was behind unless they didn't attack I was also screwed when I would retreat and they would just follow me all the way home and then it was domination. Because they would be macroing just as hard as me except they wouldn't be worried about retreating and having to recover enough forces to match the enemy. Got owned a lot that way too.
I bet if they increased the production rate of units and made them easier to kill sc2 would be better for sacrificing units whenever.
In SC1 people didn't even play Terran because of how easy they were to kill. They would turtle the whole time and I think that if they made everything weaker in SC2 it would be just like that but then it would have to develop a lot over about 10 years.
remove the damn xelnaga towers, it will enrich army movements and uncertainty, so you will have to move your armies non-stop or you may get into trap, its to easy to track movements with xelnaga tower, also players are afraid to move their army into tower radius also you cant really move your drops throughout the map because of it... i dont like the idea of xel naga towers to be on EVERY competition map. Bring us variety, in BW there were mineral walls, temple(rocks) walls that require DIFFERENT strategies and different timings.
I dont like that SC2 is all about being omniscient, a little bit of uncertainty would enrich the play, and possible new strategy/tactics.
Anyone else thought gameplay wise? (How YOU feel it wehn you play) Ver said basically it's harder to gain adventage.. Frequent playing and I still feel like it's hard to get advengate over my bad opponent OTHER than that my opponent gets disadventage only because he can't execute anything . My executing isn't bad but it's like near perfection allowing me to take down superior opponents while I'm tons worse.
That, I belive is something that might change. Dustin already said they wanted units (atleast for protoss) that are efficient away from the army. (Shredder may be one of these too by philosophical side, no1 knows how it's going to be used 2month after release).
On November 23 2011 16:42 sevia wrote: Control groups got bigger and unit density got higher, resulting in 'deathball vs. deathball' being the most standard type of SC2 game, even at the pro level. Along with improved pathing that allows units to pack way more tightly than they did in BW, we have units like colossi and medivacs which greatly add to army power without taking up space.
The end result of this is that any time you divide your army on the map, there's a huge risk that your opponent will simply ball up every combat unit he has and crush his way through your base with incredible efficiency. This was possible in BW, but not as easy, and having smaller control groups encouraged squad-based gameplay over the 'deathball.'
I imagine that if the 12-unit limit was enforced in SC2, the game would overall become a lot more active. Just my 2¢.
It's easy to point fingers at engine mechanics but no one forces you to play with 1 army hotkey or even MBS, it's just the easy way. Also if for example you have 1/3 of your army off killing an expo why shouldn't his full army be allowed to take out your 2/3 army (given similar army sizes)?
One of the reasons I like Stephano so much is his harassment based style. Instead of being defensive and turtle up to 200 supply he is always putting pressure on to his opponent. He plays a relative safe game and instead of being greedy like we see most players are atm, he makes units and go to his opponent to punish greed. When you see Stephano play he always goes to his opponent asking his opponent " Do you have the defensive meassures too defend this expo?" And a lot of times they dont, he gets in lots of economic damage and wins the game there with taking a massive lead.
I believe the game is going this way more and more. When the game first came out everything was about 1 base all-in, people learned how to defend and then the game went too very greedy, economic based, games. Now it is becoming more that players dont react too greed by being more greedy but by being safe and punishing the greed, creating more action through the game.
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I really wish these kinds of posts could be made with
1. Less "Brood War was better" rhetoric. 2. Less "SC2 is 1a vs 1a" hyperbole.
The former just serves as flamebait, and the latter is just demonstrably wrong. The only matchup that almost always degenerates into 1a vs 1a is ZvZ, although even then it's never quite so cut and dry. Think of the Idra vs Nestea G1 at MLG Providence. After early game ling/bling wars, and midgame muta harass/defense, the climax ended up being roach/hydra ball vs roach ball in Nestea's natural. But the reason Idra won that was that he got a creep highway with ovies with the opponent having mutas on the map.
Same goes for the "players are punished for putting food into forces outside their main army" argument. Well, yes. As well they should. There should be risk involved in devoting some of your army to harass or economic damage.
The only argument I partially agree with is the TT1 "casters are too strong" one. I think the only caster that's in the right place right now is the High Templar. Sentries and ghosts are too strong for too little investment. Infestors are just too versatile. I wouldn't mind seeing gateway units re-balanced around fewer forcefields, and EMP doing far less shield damage.
But these are minor complaints, and I could quite possibly be wrong about all of this in 6 months when the metagame has evolved to deal with these things.
On November 23 2011 16:42 sevia wrote: Control groups got bigger and unit density got higher, resulting in 'deathball vs. deathball' being the most standard type of SC2 game, even at the pro level. Along with improved pathing that allows units to pack way more tightly than they did in BW, we have units like colossi and medivacs which greatly add to army power without taking up space.
The end result of this is that any time you divide your army on the map, there's a huge risk that your opponent will simply ball up every combat unit he has and crush his way through your base with incredible efficiency. This was possible in BW, but not as easy, and having smaller control groups encouraged squad-based gameplay over the 'deathball.'
I imagine that if the 12-unit limit was enforced in SC2, the game would overall become a lot more active. Just my 2¢.
It's easy to point fingers at engine mechanics but no one forces you to play with 1 army hotkey or even MBS, it's just the easy way. Also if for example you have 1/3 of your army off killing an expo why shouldn't his full army be allowed to take out your 2/3 army (given similar army sizes)?
Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
In addition, other benefits of position have also been reduced; in particular high ground means a LOT less than it used to. The result has been the inability to hold a position without having equal or greater supply than your opponent. This was critical in the creation of brood war harass: you could turtle while dropping or hold the middle of the map even with minimal sieged tanks. Essentially, defenders constantly had the advantage in the truest sense. Even if you were not at your base, the static player tended to have an advantage.
Also: People have been complaining about the choice of games. Very well. I have chosen, at random, games from the TL Nevake channel. The following is Ganzi vs Frozen, two very mediocre BW pros.
A few dynamics I noticed: without Mules, people scout more; there's no other reason to have a comsat, and a comsat is a pretty small investment. Promotion of scouting creates more open information. This makes it easier to be reactive, and thus more easy to harass overall.
Second, sieges feel like sieges. Well positioned tanks were just harder to break.
Third, cloaked air units with no detection were not the end of the game. Surprise cloaked wraiths were pretty minimally effective.
The most relevant is the second. Even in this low level TvT, it is really apparent the power of position and the reduced power of totally surprise strats.
edit: worth noting: despite all the possibility people say BW lends to a comeback, one player is clearly losing for the entire game...and then loses.
As time goes on we are starting to see more active play with pokes and pushes in the early game with small amounts of units, so I don't think that it's the game itself that brings this style of play but the fact that strategy and gameplans aren't fully developed yet.
I also think that blizzard monitoring map making is gay.
What if you want to make a porn collection in starcraft 2 maps.
If I want to make something extremely disgusting I cant and that takes a bit of the fun out or if I make something awesome and have to worry about the content or something gay.
I thought a lot of the fun of SC1 was the lack of moderation aside from spam bots.
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
I must be watching a different Starcraft 2 than you are. I spent all weekend watching MLG, and I can't for the life of me remember any macro balls rolling into each other.
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
I must be watching a different Starcraft 2 than you are. I spent all weekend watching MLG, and I can't for the life of me remember any macro balls rolling into each other.
Perhaps it is a fallacy to say that SC2 does not have a lot of position jockeying; it definitely does, and some of Leenock vs Nani really demonstrated it. But there are few advantages to the "entrenched" player which leads to the inability to divert resources for fear of just being rolled over. Yes, there are counter examples. And yes there are examples of boring BW games. But overally, I think this is why people tend to see the game as one main army vs another main army. edit: I might be wrong in calling them "macro balls", but I watched a lot of Army vs Another Army.
edit: @Arush, I don't think the micro in sc2 is bad, actually. In fact, I think it's pretty damn good, at the highest level. 'That's not really the problem people see.
i also think a big problem is no1 really ever disengages.(we're starting to see some more of it) Its like once someone has engaged they will not run away any of their units even if its a lost cause, which makes the deathball vs deathball even worse because when 1 deathball dies its game over.
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've also noticed the dancing of armies and jockeying for position in SC2. I also agree that this "decisive clash" is vital in SC2. However, there is still definitely a defenders advantage and my reasoning why players don't devote supply to a secondary maneuver is more their inability to multi-task. Because of this, the risk/reward is to jockey for position to win this decisive battle.
However, I do suggest to increase the supply from 200/200 to maybe 300/300 in 1v1 to help alleviate this army jockeying.
They could just make it easier to kill armies. In SC BW armies die in a few seconds. I played a few PVZ where I was doing really good but the second they attacked my army and I wasn't paying attention half my units were dead before I could storm. lol
On November 23 2011 15:26 DarkMatter_ wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:03 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:02 Sawamura wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:59 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:58 sluggaslamoo wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:54 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:50 sluggaslamoo wrote:[quote]
I have to just o_O at this. With PvZ you have to attack all the time, tonnes of zealot pressure, harass with corsairs, drop DT's, storm drops, reaver drops, etc, or else you will just lose.
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either. Below is an extremely passive PvZ and what I'm talking about.
In the case of PvZ, that's just flat out false. Even if a zerg destroys most of the protoss army, it's nearly impossible to take out a protoss expo defended by cannons/reavers/storms. The zerg's best option in that scenario is to just get complete map control, expand, deny further expos for the protoss and just try to starve the opponent. Trying to bruteforce a protoss (even when you're ahead) is the perfect way to hand the game to your opponent
Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
There is no freaking way you are D+ I'm sorry. Try playing Zerg and see how many times Protoss can just a-move his army and win at any point in the game.
(I used to be a D+ race picker)
On November 23 2011 16:06 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:53 DarkMatter_ wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:28 Larsa23 wrote: Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
If we're considering low skilled players, then a-moving and overrunning your opponent is possible in every matchup. If a player is incapable of properly utilizing the tools available to his race, then that's just an aspect of his game he needs to improve. It's not a flaw of the game itself.
Mass hydras can only work in the early midgame portion and mass ultras are only possible in late, late game. You said they can just overrun your base once they've killed your army. Where exactly is the zerg gonna pull 50 ultras from? And even with mass ultras, it's generally not a good idea to a-move into a protoss base defended by mass cannons + 2/3 reavers.
By outmicroing the shit out of me with mass hydra that's how.
They basically figure out they can beat me with hydra and ling so they reserve their ultralisks while pumping more lings and then they overrun me when my army size is low and my main choke is vulnerable to an ultralisk ling attack.
So instead I like to dance around a lot in the middle of the map and try to get as much economy as I can.
That is a style that works and some protoss players do that. But just because an aggressive style doesn't work for you, doesn't mean it that is the entire metagame of PvZ.
Aggressive PvZ involves attacking from the time your first zealot is made, and constantly keeping drone count down extremely low by attacking and harassing all the time. If you just let Zerg do what he wants because you just sit back and macro then you are stuck having to do your style of play.
I was easily D+. When I was probably at my best I was beating D people and D- like they were nothing. I would purposely play sloppy vs the D- at one point. I was D+ it would have taken a bit but it's not like D+ is harder than beating D and D-. Problem solved.
It's not like it takes much except really good efficiency and basic knowledge which I have.
By the way you didn't ask me against who. Most of those losses were on fish server vs koreans who had the entire map by the time I attacked or hackers on USEast. I know exactly when people are hacking? Why? I was a pretty avid one myself just not in 1v1. Vs D- kids I used to just get an army and win. There were pvps where I just a clicked and won. The max I did was drop reavers behind my dragoons.
In ZvP all it takes is a good defense and a flank from behind and the protoss cant do anything. You then dodge the storms and when their army is overwhelmed and cant retreat because you burrowed lurkers behind all my shit and by the time my units get back to base they are mostly gone you just send all your ultralisks that were waiting at 9 o clock when I attacked 11 o clock and all the lings you had hatching at the time and I am dead.
Happened to me a lot.
There were also the times when they just had a much superior game play to mine and when I'd attack they wouldn't even need their entire army to steam roll mine and then just attack.
The fact that armies are harder to kill you'd think would make it easier to just do attacks because in SC1 there are a lot of situations where you can't afford to lose what you have and when that happens you are done. So like in SC2 I thought that it was because you could just have a really strong army and send some men to harrass but I guess the battles take a million years and so it actually matters or something even though I could see ways of sending reinforcements with a pylon.
I just made the mistake of thinking that since they are stronger armies you would have an easier time sacrificing.
Because in SC1 if you're terran and you lose everything you're fucked too and the same for protoss most of the time like in PVT and PVP
I PVZ'd with bongmicro and only lost due to a strategic mistake because he was a lot better and I was being cautious.
I also had a really hard time recovering in PVT when I would make an attack and get raped by terran tank lines and then he would just come over and steam roll me.
It was actually when I was passive with a 12 nexus that I did good enough to just throw away units until they gave in.
I am not that great at micro unless it's all I focus on so that's why I wouldn't try it with zerg. Zerg has a huge advantage if you know how to flank all over the place and macro better.
I think that psi storm is basically useless unless you're really good or defending anyway. I saw most people just lose their templars or kill practically nothing regularly when I played BW.
In PvP once I was behind unless they didn't attack I was also screwed when I would retreat and they would just follow me all the way home and then it was domination. Because they would be macroing just as hard as me except they wouldn't be worried about retreating and having to recover enough forces to match the enemy. Got owned a lot that way too.
I bet if they increased the production rate of units and made them easier to kill sc2 would be better for sacrificing units whenever.
In SC1 people didn't even play Terran because of how easy they were to kill. They would turtle the whole time and I think that if they made everything weaker in SC2 it would be just like that but then it would have to develop a lot over about 10 years.
remove the damn xelnaga towers, it will enrich army movements and uncertainty, so you will have to move your armies non-stop or you may get into trap, its to easy to track movements with xelnaga tower, also players are afraid to move their army into tower radius also you cant really move your drops throughout the map because of it... i dont like the idea of xel naga towers to be on EVERY competition map. Bring us variety, in BW there were mineral walls, temple(rocks) walls that require DIFFERENT strategies and different timings.
I dont like that SC2 is all about being omniscient, a little bit of uncertainty would enrich the play, and possible new strategy/tactics.
Why not make maps and remove them.
Sc1 or broodwar , because on the korean level terran is really strong and not easy to kill at all, who would want to turtle all the time ? If i did that the zergs,protoss will take multi expansions like no tomorrow and steam roll me -_- , besides high templar psi storm useless ? Dropping a few of them on a zerg expo's and watch them melt to psi storms , I think from your standard , it's mostly Low D not even a D+ on iccup , Rarely Do i see people messed up their high templars storm unless they are really bad at predicting zerg's attack movement .
When I think of psi storm , I think of JangBi and for you to call it useless , it's unacceptable .Basing on the bolded parts of your statement , so just because you can warp in units from pylon makes it more easy to reinforce huh ? If i want to reinforce my units , I would rally all my factories to the designated area simple as that no need fancy pylon warping mechanics ,.
Other than that the only time , Terran usually die is in a TvP where they get out of position and they are on two base without a third , if they have a third and so , they can turtle to kingdom come and protoss can't do anything except if they have carriers and ground army ,plus high templars to storm the hell at the tank line .
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.
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
<embed id=VideoPlayback src=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-1540187220819592210&hl=en&fs=true style=width:400px;height:326px allowFullScreen=true allowScriptAccess=always type=application/x-shockwave-flash> </embed> There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I don't really see the point of this though. Aren't we talking about general tendencies in games?
I go to barcrafts sometimes, and they are interesting (Random SC2). However I can just open up a BW stream (even from some random C+ player) and find it exciting for the most part.
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
In addition, other benefits of position have also been reduced; in particular high ground means a LOT less than it used to. The result has been the inability to hold a position without having equal or greater supply than your opponent. This was critical in the creation of brood war harass: you could turtle while dropping or hold the middle of the map even with minimal sieged tanks. Essentially, defenders constantly had the advantage in the truest sense. Even if you were not at your base, the static player tended to have an advantage.
Also: People have been complaining about the choice of games. Very well. I have chosen, at random, games from the TL Nevake channel. The following is Ganzi vs Frozen, two very mediocre BW pros.
A few dynamics I noticed: without Mules, people scout more; there's no other reason to have a comsat, and a comsat is a pretty small investment. Promotion of scouting creates more open information. This makes it easier to be reactive, and thus more easy to harass overall.
Second, sieges feel like sieges. Well positioned tanks were just harder to break.
Third, cloaked air units with no detection were not the end of the game. Surprise cloaked wraiths were pretty minimally effective.
The most relevant is the second. Even in this low level TvT, it is really apparent the power of position and the reduced power of totally surprise strats.
edit: worth noting: despite all the possibility people say BW lends to a comeback, one player is clearly losing for the entire game...and then loses.
When I think about bw come back , first thing that comes up to me was these game , What leta did was brilliant and suddenly counter attacking flash although flash had the advantage at the point , Flash defence started to fall apart from that amazing attack, So even though it's a high level game that doesn't mean the game is already figured out and if my move units to x,y,z the player auto wins . There's tons of dynamic game to watch if only you look for them . It's weird that you pick games that are like in the 2009 huh ?
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
I must be watching a different Starcraft 2 than you are. I spent all weekend watching MLG, and I can't for the life of me remember any macro balls rolling into each other.
Perhaps it is a fallacy to say that SC2 does not have a lot of position jockeying; it definitely does, and some of Leenock vs Nani really demonstrated it. But there are few advantages to the "entrenched" player which leads to the inability to divert resources for fear of just being rolled over.
And I personally think that makes for more entertaining games. The one matchup where "entrenchment" is often rewarded is TvT, and it often leads to boring stalemates. Aside from the pretty lightshow at the end, Boxer vs Rain was just amazingly dull.
I don't think it's true that there's an inability to divert resources. Good players will find the timings and the resources, and they will drop/do runbys. Even in deathball vs deathball we've seen innovation, like Kiwikaki using a mothership to turn his deathball into highly mobile attack force.
At any rate, it looks like you'll get your wish in HotS, as Terran/Zerg get more space control and Protoss will get recall in every single game.
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
I must be watching a different Starcraft 2 than you are. I spent all weekend watching MLG, and I can't for the life of me remember any macro balls rolling into each other.
Perhaps it is a fallacy to say that SC2 does not have a lot of position jockeying; it definitely does, and some of Leenock vs Nani really demonstrated it. But there are few advantages to the "entrenched" player which leads to the inability to divert resources for fear of just being rolled over.
And I personally think that makes for more entertaining games. The one matchup where "entrenchment" is often rewarded is TvT, and it often leads to boring stalemates. Aside from the pretty lightshow at the end, Boxer vs Rain was just amazingly dull.
I don't think it's true that there's an inability to divert resources. Good players will find the timings and the resources, and they will drop/do runbys. Even in deathball vs deathball we've seen innovation, like Kiwikaki using a mothership to turn his deathball into highly mobile attack force.
At any rate, it looks like you'll get your wish in HotS, as Terran/Zerg get more space control and Protoss will get recall in every single game.
This is more pointing out why the games are different. I think you think I prefer BW. I think SC2 is actually sometimes more fun to watch, although BW is also awesome simply because it's more developed.
@The guy above. The game was chosen at random. I did not "pick" it. It was one of the first on the Nevake page, the games happened to be a bit old, but BW in '09 was fairly developed as a game. There are certainly nuances that I missed, of course. You did exactly what I was trying to avoid doing: picking the very best BW game you could find to fit what you wanted to see.
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
<embed id=VideoPlayback src=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-1540187220819592210&hl=en&fs=true style=width:400px;height:326px allowFullScreen=true allowScriptAccess=always type=application/x-shockwave-flash> </embed> There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I don't really see the point of this though. Aren't we talking about general tendencies in games?
I go to barcrafts sometimes, and they are interesting (Random SC2). However I can just open up a BW stream (even from some random C+ player) and find it exciting for the most part.
I know this logic is hated, but the fundamental BW mechanics and strategies are so deeply worked out that a C+ player today in BW could have been Pro-level during the first year of the game. A while many concepts do carry over to SC2, the big picture is different enough that players do not yet need to break the game down a tightly as BW in order to do really well. Even pro's are still figuring out and developing the kind of high level muscle memory macro that is needed to support to the crisp micro play your expecting. For those who have watched SC for ages, becoming accustom to the current state of BW as the average is underselling BW and setting an unrealistic expectation for SC2.
In all likelihood, BW is probably "better" for spectators in the most general of RTS terms, but SC2 has not yet shown the full array of skills it can support. The pressure isn't there yet for pros to need those skills. You can get damn far in amny tournaments with damn good macro and questionable micro still. The same cant be said with BW.
Just wait until better players start playing the game or the existing players get better. Better multitasking = exploit your mechanical advantage over the other player by harassing; also disrupts their gameplan/build etc.
Quite simply, you can't compare the current SC2 pros with BW pros.
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
I must be watching a different Starcraft 2 than you are. I spent all weekend watching MLG, and I can't for the life of me remember any macro balls rolling into each other.
Perhaps it is a fallacy to say that SC2 does not have a lot of position jockeying; it definitely does, and some of Leenock vs Nani really demonstrated it. But there are few advantages to the "entrenched" player which leads to the inability to divert resources for fear of just being rolled over.
And I personally think that makes for more entertaining games. The one matchup where "entrenchment" is often rewarded is TvT, and it often leads to boring stalemates. Aside from the pretty lightshow at the end, Boxer vs Rain was just amazingly dull.
I don't think it's true that there's an inability to divert resources. Good players will find the timings and the resources, and they will drop/do runbys. Even in deathball vs deathball we've seen innovation, like Kiwikaki using a mothership to turn his deathball into highly mobile attack force.
At any rate, it looks like you'll get your wish in HotS, as Terran/Zerg get more space control and Protoss will get recall in every single game.
This is more pointing out why the games are different. I think you think I prefer BW. I think SC2 is actually sometimes more fun to watch, although BW is also awesome simply because it's more developed.
One of the reasons I think you're making a "SC2 sucks" argument is that you use phrases like "the demise of tactics". I'm glad that you actually don't hold that position, but this is one of those threads, and you seemed to be walking like a duck and quacking like a duck
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
<embed id=VideoPlayback src=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-1540187220819592210&hl=en&fs=true style=width:400px;height:326px allowFullScreen=true allowScriptAccess=always type=application/x-shockwave-flash> </embed> There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I don't really see the point of this though. Aren't we talking about general tendencies in games?
I go to barcrafts sometimes, and they are interesting (Random SC2). However I can just open up a BW stream (even from some random C+ player) and find it exciting for the most part.
I know this logic is hated, but the fundamental BW mechanics and strategies are so deeply worked out that a C+ player today in BW could have been Pro-level during the first year of the game. A while many concepts do carry over to SC2, the big picture is different enough that players do not yet need to break the game down a tightly as BW in order to do really well. Even pro's are still figuring out and developing the kind of high level muscle memory macro that is needed to support to the crisp micro play your expecting. For those who have watched SC for ages, becoming accustom to the current state of BW as the average is underselling BW and setting an unrealistic expectation for SC2.
In all likelihood, BW is probably "better" for spectators in the most general of RTS terms, but SC2 has not yet shown the full array of skills it can support. The pressure isn't there yet for pros to need those skills. You can get damn far in amny tournaments with damn good macro and questionable micro still. The same cant be said with BW.
How is it unrealistic to expect a successor of starcraft broodwar to be as good as the old game broodwar which did provide countless joy and fun to many of us who are fans of the original sc1 and broodwar ? It's pretty simple you for example you are a top scholar in your university and you have been producing good grades and so , than suddenly you have been producing quite low grades and almost failed your semester . People who have known you for years will question your actions , what has happen to you , what's wrong , these is the same thing as for sc2 . The analogy do apply in these situation because of expectation of previous high benchmark and entertaining factor from broodwar despite it's simplicity and like you said , Figured out mechanics .
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
I must be watching a different Starcraft 2 than you are. I spent all weekend watching MLG, and I can't for the life of me remember any macro balls rolling into each other.
Perhaps it is a fallacy to say that SC2 does not have a lot of position jockeying; it definitely does, and some of Leenock vs Nani really demonstrated it. But there are few advantages to the "entrenched" player which leads to the inability to divert resources for fear of just being rolled over.
And I personally think that makes for more entertaining games. The one matchup where "entrenchment" is often rewarded is TvT, and it often leads to boring stalemates. Aside from the pretty lightshow at the end, Boxer vs Rain was just amazingly dull.
I don't think it's true that there's an inability to divert resources. Good players will find the timings and the resources, and they will drop/do runbys. Even in deathball vs deathball we've seen innovation, like Kiwikaki using a mothership to turn his deathball into highly mobile attack force.
At any rate, it looks like you'll get your wish in HotS, as Terran/Zerg get more space control and Protoss will get recall in every single game.
This is more pointing out why the games are different. I think you think I prefer BW. I think SC2 is actually sometimes more fun to watch, although BW is also awesome simply because it's more developed.
One of the reasons I think you're making a "SC2 sucks" argument is that you use phrases like "the demise of tactics". I'm glad that you actually don't hold that position, but this is one of those threads, and you seemed to be walking like a duck and quacking like a duck
Well, I meant the demise of a very specific type of tactics, but I can see why that seems pretty pejorative. I only meant the tactics that revolve around "stall'n harass". It would be foolish to say tactics as a whole are absent from SC2; at MLG, particularly, it became apparent to me how far tactics have come.
This is off topic, but one thing that DOES irritate me about SC2 is the tendency to base trade, and I can't figure out why people try to do it so often, or why it's more common than BW....
I have nothing against developing SC2 so that it involves more action, or so that it is more difficult to play, but inputting forced unit limits for control groups is a poor idea in my opinion.
It is an arbitrary and irritating way of making a game more difficult "guess what now you can only select x number of units at a time! gogo!". I think other ideas like increasing the mining rate or lowering the supply of units are both more suitable ways of increasing difficulty. A higher mining rate means faster economic development and requires faster mechanics to be able to keep up with it. Lower supply units doesn't change the 1a 'problem', but it does allow players who have the skill to micro a greater volume of units to do so, effectively raising the skill cap.
Just browsing through this thread, one of the main complaints I'm seeing is that the armies in SC2 aren't as big as in BW... How awesome would it be if HoTS came with a supply increase to 300?
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
I must be watching a different Starcraft 2 than you are. I spent all weekend watching MLG, and I can't for the life of me remember any macro balls rolling into each other.
Perhaps it is a fallacy to say that SC2 does not have a lot of position jockeying; it definitely does, and some of Leenock vs Nani really demonstrated it. But there are few advantages to the "entrenched" player which leads to the inability to divert resources for fear of just being rolled over.
And I personally think that makes for more entertaining games. The one matchup where "entrenchment" is often rewarded is TvT, and it often leads to boring stalemates. Aside from the pretty lightshow at the end, Boxer vs Rain was just amazingly dull.
I don't think it's true that there's an inability to divert resources. Good players will find the timings and the resources, and they will drop/do runbys. Even in deathball vs deathball we've seen innovation, like Kiwikaki using a mothership to turn his deathball into highly mobile attack force.
At any rate, it looks like you'll get your wish in HotS, as Terran/Zerg get more space control and Protoss will get recall in every single game.
This is more pointing out why the games are different. I think you think I prefer BW. I think SC2 is actually sometimes more fun to watch, although BW is also awesome simply because it's more developed.
@The guy above. The game was chosen at random. I did not "pick" it. It was one of the first on the Nevake page, the games happened to be a bit old, but BW in '09 was fairly developed as a game. There are certainly nuances that I missed, of course. You did exactly what I was trying to avoid doing: picking the very best BW game you could find to fit what you wanted to see.
Your expectation to watch every game having a come back is seriously flawed because it isn't , Different players have different skills and players who have much better control of the flow of the game have higher chances to make a come back in to the game and that is why , we do root for players who did the impossible.
I understand the citing of the Boxer vs Rain game at MLG as an example of boring late game TvT but the problem is theyd didnt play it right. I think that was one of the first pro level games where pure mech transitioned into seige tank/sky terran and Boxer honestly did not seems like he had a feel for it(a statement that he would later give in an interview said much the same).
Rain had a slightly better understanding of what to do in the situation but wishing no offense to the man did not execute it very well. The ghost nuke to push back the tanks and gain territory was quite well done and was clearly the correct choice in that situation but the fact that he only did that while turtling an air army instead of for example nuking both fronts and taking the position you gain faster. Though at the time it looked a little like "hmm let me try this...oh its working let me keep doing it" the other late game sky terran TvTs are signifigantly more action packed than there predecessors.
On November 23 2011 17:00 DamageControL wrote: Basically, Ver is right. The reduction of position advantage (i.e. Sieged Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers) have led to the demise of tactics in favor of macro balls rolling into each other.
I must be watching a different Starcraft 2 than you are. I spent all weekend watching MLG, and I can't for the life of me remember any macro balls rolling into each other.
Perhaps it is a fallacy to say that SC2 does not have a lot of position jockeying; it definitely does, and some of Leenock vs Nani really demonstrated it. But there are few advantages to the "entrenched" player which leads to the inability to divert resources for fear of just being rolled over.
And I personally think that makes for more entertaining games. The one matchup where "entrenchment" is often rewarded is TvT, and it often leads to boring stalemates. Aside from the pretty lightshow at the end, Boxer vs Rain was just amazingly dull.
I don't think it's true that there's an inability to divert resources. Good players will find the timings and the resources, and they will drop/do runbys. Even in deathball vs deathball we've seen innovation, like Kiwikaki using a mothership to turn his deathball into highly mobile attack force.
At any rate, it looks like you'll get your wish in HotS, as Terran/Zerg get more space control and Protoss will get recall in every single game.
This is more pointing out why the games are different. I think you think I prefer BW. I think SC2 is actually sometimes more fun to watch, although BW is also awesome simply because it's more developed.
@The guy above. The game was chosen at random. I did not "pick" it. It was one of the first on the Nevake page, the games happened to be a bit old, but BW in '09 was fairly developed as a game. There are certainly nuances that I missed, of course. You did exactly what I was trying to avoid doing: picking the very best BW game you could find to fit what you wanted to see.
Your expectation to watch every game having a come back is seriously flawed because it isn't , Different players have different skills and players who have much better control of the flow of the game have higher chances to make a come back in to the game and that is why , we do root for players who did the impossible.
...I didn't actually expect every game to have a comeback. I suppose this it's more that one player gained an extremely decisive advantage and it was pretty clear who would win. But the game sorta lasted a lot longer.
edit: I was merely pointing out every game wasn't the most extreme wonder of wonders.
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
<embed id=VideoPlayback src=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-1540187220819592210&hl=en&fs=true style=width:400px;height:326px allowFullScreen=true allowScriptAccess=always type=application/x-shockwave-flash> </embed> There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I don't really see the point of this though. Aren't we talking about general tendencies in games?
I go to barcrafts sometimes, and they are interesting (Random SC2). However I can just open up a BW stream (even from some random C+ player) and find it exciting for the most part.
I know this logic is hated, but the fundamental BW mechanics and strategies are so deeply worked out that a C+ player today in BW could have been Pro-level during the first year of the game. A while many concepts do carry over to SC2, the big picture is different enough that players do not yet need to break the game down a tightly as BW in order to do really well. Even pro's are still figuring out and developing the kind of high level muscle memory macro that is needed to support to the crisp micro play your expecting. For those who have watched SC for ages, becoming accustom to the current state of BW as the average is underselling BW and setting an unrealistic expectation for SC2.
In all likelihood, BW is probably "better" for spectators in the most general of RTS terms, but SC2 has not yet shown the full array of skills it can support. The pressure isn't there yet for pros to need those skills. You can get damn far in amny tournaments with damn good macro and questionable micro still. The same cant be said with BW.
How is it unrealistic to expect a successor of starcraft broodwar to be as good as the old game broodwar which did provide countless joy and fun to many of us who are fans of the original sc1 and broodwar ? It's pretty simple you for example you are a top scholar in your university and you have been producing good grades and so , than suddenly you have been producing quite low grades and almost failed your semester . People who have known you for years will question your actions , what has happen to you , what's wrong , these is the same thing as for sc2 . The analogy do apply in these situation because of expectation of previous high benchmark and entertaining factor from broodwar despite it's simplicity and like you said , Figured out mechanics .
Its not unrealistic to expect the game will eventually be as good as BW, but it is unrealistic to expect it to immediately be as good as BW.
This has been talked to death but SC2 is a new game and players need time to adapt and then provide a consistent enough challenge to one another to necessitate the development of SC2 versions of the subtle BW strategies that people love so much.
Using your example, the first student goes through university with amazing grades, and comes hope telling his little brother about what he learned, then the little brother goes to university and doesn't do as well. Two different people, with different but perhaps similar skill sets, that need to develop at their own pace and methodology. Certain things will be easier for the little brother because of what he was told, but other maybe not be useful or possible because while the older brother kicked ass at geology, the little brother is more adept at meteorology...or something.
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
<embed id=VideoPlayback src=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-1540187220819592210&hl=en&fs=true style=width:400px;height:326px allowFullScreen=true allowScriptAccess=always type=application/x-shockwave-flash> </embed> There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I don't really see the point of this though. Aren't we talking about general tendencies in games?
I go to barcrafts sometimes, and they are interesting (Random SC2). However I can just open up a BW stream (even from some random C+ player) and find it exciting for the most part.
I know this logic is hated, but the fundamental BW mechanics and strategies are so deeply worked out that a C+ player today in BW could have been Pro-level during the first year of the game. A while many concepts do carry over to SC2, the big picture is different enough that players do not yet need to break the game down a tightly as BW in order to do really well. Even pro's are still figuring out and developing the kind of high level muscle memory macro that is needed to support to the crisp micro play your expecting. For those who have watched SC for ages, becoming accustom to the current state of BW as the average is underselling BW and setting an unrealistic expectation for SC2.
In all likelihood, BW is probably "better" for spectators in the most general of RTS terms, but SC2 has not yet shown the full array of skills it can support. The pressure isn't there yet for pros to need those skills. You can get damn far in amny tournaments with damn good macro and questionable micro still. The same cant be said with BW.
How is it unrealistic to expect a successor of starcraft broodwar to be as good as the old game broodwar which did provide countless joy and fun to many of us who are fans of the original sc1 and broodwar ? It's pretty simple you for example you are a top scholar in your university and you have been producing good grades and so , than suddenly you have been producing quite low grades and almost failed your semester . People who have known you for years will question your actions , what has happen to you , what's wrong , these is the same thing as for sc2 . The analogy do apply in these situation because of expectation of previous high benchmark and entertaining factor from broodwar despite it's simplicity and like you said , Figured out mechanics .
Its not unrealistic to expect the game will eventually be as good as BW, but it is unrealistic to expect it to immediately be as good as BW.
This has been talked to death but SC2 is a new game and players need time to adapt and then provide a consistent enough challenge to one another to necessitate the development of SC2 versions of the subtle BW strategies that people love so much.
Using your example, the first student goes through university with amazing grades, and comes hope telling his little brother about what he learned, then the little brother goes to university and doesn't do as well. Two different people, with different but perhaps similar skill sets, that need to develop at their own pace and methodology. Certain things will be easier for the little brother because of what he was told, but other maybe not be useful or possible because while the older brother kicked ass at geology, the little brother is more adept at meteorology...or something.
I was using a single established scholar for that example and not two .
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've also noticed the dancing of armies and jockeying for position in SC2. I also agree that this "decisive clash" is vital in SC2. However, there is still definitely a defenders advantage and my reasoning why players don't devote supply to a secondary maneuver is more their inability to multi-task. Because of this, the risk/reward is to jockey for position to win this decisive battle.
However, I do suggest to increase the supply from 200/200 to maybe 300/300 in 1v1 to help alleviate this army jockeying.
They could just make it easier to kill armies. In SC BW armies die in a few seconds. I played a few PVZ where I was doing really good but the second they attacked my army and I wasn't paying attention half my units were dead before I could storm. lol
On November 23 2011 15:26 DarkMatter_ wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:03 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:02 Sawamura wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:59 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:58 sluggaslamoo wrote:
On November 23 2011 14:54 Larsa23 wrote: [quote]
Yeah but that's just small harrassment.
No one actually sends an entire army without risking a counter attack. Also TvT has always been boring from what I remember and ZvT is more mobile and back and forth.
PvZ and PvT are about small harrassments and waiting for your opponent to fuck up a big attack.
I didn't say it's passive I just said it can be late game and if you have a huge army vs a huge army or in TvT
Because it's the nature of TvT , Siege tanks with large attack range and the ability to deal heavy damage to units, stops people from playing full frontal attack , hence the need for dropship play, wraith harassment, map control , dividing the map into two .
I agree and that's why I don't think his examples were any different than BW because in PvZ if I lose my army I get overran in like a few minutes or less. I remember losing a lot of my games that way so I was always more passive about using my army. There's a ton of pro gamer videos for that too.
And that is also how PvT works and so I don't understand what he means. Don't really care either. Below is an extremely passive PvZ and what I'm talking about.
In the case of PvZ, that's just flat out false. Even if a zerg destroys most of the protoss army, it's nearly impossible to take out a protoss expo defended by cannons/reavers/storms. The zerg's best option in that scenario is to just get complete map control, expand, deny further expos for the protoss and just try to starve the opponent. Trying to bruteforce a protoss (even when you're ahead) is the perfect way to hand the game to your opponent
Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
There is no freaking way you are D+ I'm sorry. Try playing Zerg and see how many times Protoss can just a-move his army and win at any point in the game.
(I used to be a D+ race picker)
On November 23 2011 16:06 Larsa23 wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:53 DarkMatter_ wrote:
On November 23 2011 15:28 Larsa23 wrote: Unless you are a D+ at best player who doesn't have reavers and storm everywhere. What about when they come to your expo with 50 ultralisks because they killed your main army with nothing but hydralisks.
If we're considering low skilled players, then a-moving and overrunning your opponent is possible in every matchup. If a player is incapable of properly utilizing the tools available to his race, then that's just an aspect of his game he needs to improve. It's not a flaw of the game itself.
Mass hydras can only work in the early midgame portion and mass ultras are only possible in late, late game. You said they can just overrun your base once they've killed your army. Where exactly is the zerg gonna pull 50 ultras from? And even with mass ultras, it's generally not a good idea to a-move into a protoss base defended by mass cannons + 2/3 reavers.
By outmicroing the shit out of me with mass hydra that's how.
They basically figure out they can beat me with hydra and ling so they reserve their ultralisks while pumping more lings and then they overrun me when my army size is low and my main choke is vulnerable to an ultralisk ling attack.
So instead I like to dance around a lot in the middle of the map and try to get as much economy as I can.
That is a style that works and some protoss players do that. But just because an aggressive style doesn't work for you, doesn't mean it that is the entire metagame of PvZ.
Aggressive PvZ involves attacking from the time your first zealot is made, and constantly keeping drone count down extremely low by attacking and harassing all the time. If you just let Zerg do what he wants because you just sit back and macro then you are stuck having to do your style of play.
I was easily D+. When I was probably at my best I was beating D people and D- like they were nothing. I would purposely play sloppy vs the D- at one point. I was D+ it would have taken a bit but it's not like D+ is harder than beating D and D-. Problem solved.
It's not like it takes much except really good efficiency and basic knowledge which I have.
By the way you didn't ask me against who. Most of those losses were on fish server vs koreans who had the entire map by the time I attacked or hackers on USEast. I know exactly when people are hacking? Why? I was a pretty avid one myself just not in 1v1. Vs D- kids I used to just get an army and win. There were pvps where I just a clicked and won. The max I did was drop reavers behind my dragoons.
In ZvP all it takes is a good defense and a flank from behind and the protoss cant do anything. You then dodge the storms and when their army is overwhelmed and cant retreat because you burrowed lurkers behind all my shit and by the time my units get back to base they are mostly gone you just send all your ultralisks that were waiting at 9 o clock when I attacked 11 o clock and all the lings you had hatching at the time and I am dead.
Happened to me a lot.
There were also the times when they just had a much superior game play to mine and when I'd attack they wouldn't even need their entire army to steam roll mine and then just attack.
The fact that armies are harder to kill you'd think would make it easier to just do attacks because in SC1 there are a lot of situations where you can't afford to lose what you have and when that happens you are done. So like in SC2 I thought that it was because you could just have a really strong army and send some men to harrass but I guess the battles take a million years and so it actually matters or something even though I could see ways of sending reinforcements with a pylon.
I just made the mistake of thinking that since they are stronger armies you would have an easier time sacrificing.
Because in SC1 if you're terran and you lose everything you're fucked too and the same for protoss most of the time like in PVT and PVP
I PVZ'd with bongmicro and only lost due to a strategic mistake because he was a lot better and I was being cautious.
I also had a really hard time recovering in PVT when I would make an attack and get raped by terran tank lines and then he would just come over and steam roll me.
It was actually when I was passive with a 12 nexus that I did good enough to just throw away units until they gave in.
I am not that great at micro unless it's all I focus on so that's why I wouldn't try it with zerg. Zerg has a huge advantage if you know how to flank all over the place and macro better.
I think that psi storm is basically useless unless you're really good or defending anyway. I saw most people just lose their templars or kill practically nothing regularly when I played BW.
In PvP once I was behind unless they didn't attack I was also screwed when I would retreat and they would just follow me all the way home and then it was domination. Because they would be macroing just as hard as me except they wouldn't be worried about retreating and having to recover enough forces to match the enemy. Got owned a lot that way too.
I bet if they increased the production rate of units and made them easier to kill sc2 would be better for sacrificing units whenever.
In SC1 people didn't even play Terran because of how easy they were to kill. They would turtle the whole time and I think that if they made everything weaker in SC2 it would be just like that but then it would have to develop a lot over about 10 years.
remove the damn xelnaga towers, it will enrich army movements and uncertainty, so you will have to move your armies non-stop or you may get into trap, its to easy to track movements with xelnaga tower, also players are afraid to move their army into tower radius also you cant really move your drops throughout the map because of it... i dont like the idea of xel naga towers to be on EVERY competition map. Bring us variety, in BW there were mineral walls, temple(rocks) walls that require DIFFERENT strategies and different timings.
I dont like that SC2 is all about being omniscient, a little bit of uncertainty would enrich the play, and possible new strategy/tactics.
Why not make maps and remove them.
Sc1 or broodwar , because on the korean level terran is really strong and not easy to kill at all, who would want to turtle all the time ? If i did that the zergs,protoss will take multi expansions like no tomorrow and steam roll me -_- , besides high templar psi storm useless ? Dropping a few of them on a zerg expo's and watch them melt to psi storms , I think from your standard , it's mostly Low D not even a D+ on iccup , Rarely Do i see people messed up their high templars storm unless they are really bad at predicting zerg's attack movement .
When I think of psi storm , I think of JangBi and for you to call it useless , it's unacceptable .Basing on the bolded parts of your statement , so just because you can warp in units from pylon makes it more easy to reinforce huh ? If i want to reinforce my units , I would rally all my factories to the designated area simple as that no need fancy pylon warping mechanics ,.
Other than that the only time , Terran usually die is in a TvP where they get out of position and they are on two base without a third , if they have a third and so , they can turtle to kingdom come and protoss can't do anything except if they have carriers and ground army ,plus high templars to storm the hell at the tank line .
I meant turtling at the start of BW and SC1.
Okay well about the templars that's what I've seen B level players doing with their templars and I meant in battle. When that's all there is to use it's really easy.
Terran can also die if they lose their army and you still have a bunch of zealots to take out mines with.
I don't care about this conversation anymore, they probably were a lot of grinding D-'s. Only a few of the D and D+ I played were actually good enough to make me play for like 30 minutes and I usually started the ladder late.
Someone quote my hacking habits already. They are hilarious ways to spend time you know.
I agree with some of the OP, and strongly disagree with the "lets wait and see" POV.
For one, "lets wait and see" is no longer relevant in today's esports culture. It took years to master wavedashing in SSBM to levels that showed fox was the best character, it took me like 3 days to figure out that metaknight was ridiculously OP. It was basically a mystery what you were going to fight when you first went into Molten Core in Vanilla WoW, now people probably have a bossmod that tells them the script for Deathwing(?how far along is WoW now?) before they set foot inside. The culture is different, its silly to argue that if we have no patches from today until HOTS's release that the game won't be relatively stable for most of that time.
Two, there are too many workers. Lots of people have said this, but damn it changes the game's calculus a lot. You always have to be thinking about workers (arguably the most boring aspect of the game). It makes ridiculous AOE drop strategies that should make no sense (think the old warp-in-storm tactic where you basically sac 1-2 high templars to storm a mineral line) viable, but also random. Storm drops could kill 20 workers (1k minerals) or 0 (and you lost a Prism + 2 Templars), some of that is skill, some of it is luck. Additionally it favors AOE drops over other types (blueflame hellions should not be 10x as good as stalkers at harassing workerlines).
Three warpgates screwed up Protoss (arguably) beyond repair.
And lastly, the "cheese" hate has gone way too far. 1 in 3 TL threads starts with "I generally prefer macro games" and if you don't say that people flame the hell out of you. If you create a way to win games in 6 mins, hate. 12 minute timing push? Hate. I honestly loved when MC was winning GSLs because so much delicious hate was flowing about his builds. "Timing Push" is now just the PC version of "Cheese" honestly I am glad to flame a bit about macro games because there is nothing worse than 5 base Zerg vs. 3 base Protoss.
Whats up with BW fans , and their special need to come to SC2 forums and whine about something that is less good then BW.
If you going to get one thing from this post take this Giving an example does not prove the rule never ever ,that is very stupid thing to do.
given: passive TvT - rain vs boxer counter: Active TvT - MvP vs MMA
given: passive PVt - socke counter: sage / hero
i can do it with Z players as well... with ease
what does it tell me ? more about the style of the players then anything else for now...
why the hell do you link games for BW ? i find tennis quite boring personally , but i can link you from the last 10 years some very interesting games, does it say anything about tennis as a game as a spectator sport for me ?
I think this thread belong with the - "SC2 can never go more then one base" , "Sc2 has very low ceiling - everyone will cap it in half a year" , "SC2 have no micro , AI is too good" "In SC2 everyone will have perfect macro - its too easy!" "I need my units to be unable to go from A to B without babysit each and every one of them , and UI and control and graphics which belong to the stone age in order for a game to it to be any good ,fuck blizzard!" And i have one common though about those threads today - very stupid statements.
If you cannot enjoy SC2 i personally feel truly sorry for you , its a beautiful game and getting better repeatedly I wish BW will be there forever for you , but please less silly threads ...
really i would think that BW will have the most patience and brains to give SC2 its time to grow , but i guess its too hard to expect it from nostalgia vision people to actually see the progress and know that as BW grew , so will SC2. and its very silly to expect sc2 meta game to be at bw level at this age ...
And i think the huge amount of spectators and fans is really the only proof you need that SC2 has great potential and produce some beautiful games.
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
<embed id=VideoPlayback src=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-1540187220819592210&hl=en&fs=true style=width:400px;height:326px allowFullScreen=true allowScriptAccess=always type=application/x-shockwave-flash> </embed> There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I don't really see the point of this though. Aren't we talking about general tendencies in games?
I go to barcrafts sometimes, and they are interesting (Random SC2). However I can just open up a BW stream (even from some random C+ player) and find it exciting for the most part.
I know this logic is hated, but the fundamental BW mechanics and strategies are so deeply worked out that a C+ player today in BW could have been Pro-level during the first year of the game. A while many concepts do carry over to SC2, the big picture is different enough that players do not yet need to break the game down a tightly as BW in order to do really well. Even pro's are still figuring out and developing the kind of high level muscle memory macro that is needed to support to the crisp micro play your expecting. For those who have watched SC for ages, becoming accustom to the current state of BW as the average is underselling BW and setting an unrealistic expectation for SC2.
In all likelihood, BW is probably "better" for spectators in the most general of RTS terms, but SC2 has not yet shown the full array of skills it can support. The pressure isn't there yet for pros to need those skills. You can get damn far in amny tournaments with damn good macro and questionable micro still. The same cant be said with BW.
I kinda agree and disagree. I disagree with the mechanics part for obvious reasons, its not a valid point because basic mechanics have nothing to do with creating exciting battles, it does have a lot to do with skill differentiation, comebacks, and certain tactics however. The second point being that we have 818 apm JulyZerg moving straight into SC2, there were no mechanical monsters pre BW. I agree in that mechanics have dropped down a bit and strategies are less worked out, however this also doesn't affect how games play out that much.
However I'd say a lot of new strategies aren't being developed because of culture as well. Just look at the top foreigners in BW, they were highly creative in comparison to the Koreans. Strategic play is under-valued in Korean Starcraft, and its obvious when a rookie such as Reality played strategic against Titans like Jaedong, Jaedong played like a D rank scrub. Or even look at Jangbi's OSL run.
Now we are getting the clashes of two cultures together, and don't forget the constant patching is also changing the game the way its played a lot. I could imagine if Blizzard never patched, and we only had the GSL, that things would be a lot more stagnant. Its tantamount to BW's game design, that even when the same strategies are being used, it still produces sick games more than 10 years from its inception.
A lot of it has to do with what ver said, I could go further to say there is also a problem with single-role (hence gimmicky) units. You shouldn't need 10 vikings for the sole purpose of taking down colossus, what other purpose does making that many vikings serve? What's worse is that if you decide to do a drop with them, you have to use them all because of warp-in, and if you lose them, you lose the game because you can't snipe colossus.
Lets look at a similar scenario. SKTerran vs Zerg, requires a lot of science vessels to control lurker/defiler/ultra numbers. Already I can use this unit against 3 other units in a normal army comp (I don't include guardians or broodlords), not 1. Second of all if I make too many, I can spread them out and harass bases with erasers (irradiate my vessels and erase drones). Or I can keep them for defense matrix instead of irradiate.
Issue is that Protoss and Zerg struggle to produce viable pokes and prods that don't overcommit. Low damage output of Protoss and Zerg drops relative to the investment necessary to execute them makes them not as popular, and the existence of Fungal, Concussive, and Forcefields means that engagements are always forced. No backing off. Terran doesn't have this issue, what with MM and Hellion drops and Banshees. What this means is that games against Terran turn into the non-Terran race essentially turtling while Terran attacks, and that PvZ is BOTH races holding back until one of them hits a timing. Deathball and all-in play, essentially. Can be very dull.
I kind of agree with you (OP). This is why player like Boxer do not put the results they used to do imo. I think the time and expensions will help but that's just a suposition.
It's true that they were rarely maxed army in BW. And fights all over the place. You can't see some crazy stuff like "allied mines" or "invicible marine" in SC2. But i think we will see some of it later in their own form.
But that's true that i want to watch some SC2BW tournaments because it's horrible to watch BW on a 40" screen. Brood War was just crazier overhall. But i like SC2 too.
On November 23 2011 17:46 Adreme wrote: I understand the citing of the Boxer vs Rain game at MLG as an example of boring late game TvT but the problem is theyd didnt play it right. I think that was one of the first pro level games where pure mech transitioned into seige tank/sky terran and Boxer honestly did not seems like he had a feel for it(a statement that he would later give in an interview said much the same).
Rain had a slightly better understanding of what to do in the situation but wishing no offense to the man did not execute it very well. The ghost nuke to push back the tanks and gain territory was quite well done and was clearly the correct choice in that situation but the fact that he only did that while turtling an air army instead of for example nuking both fronts and taking the position you gain faster. Though at the time it looked a little like "hmm let me try this...oh its working let me keep doing it" the other late game sky terran TvTs are signifigantly more action packed than there predecessors.
But you're discussing their play once they switched to heavy air. I was more referring to the turtle vs turtle mech play that led to them going air, because the ground was entirely locked down.
On November 23 2011 18:06 haflo wrote: Whats up with BW fans , and their special need to come to SC2 forums and whine about something that is less good then BW.
If you going to get one thing from this post take this Giving an example does not prove the rule never ever ,that is very stupid thing to do.
given: passive TvT - rain vs boxer counter: Active TvT - MvP vs MMA
given: passive PVt - socke counter: sage / hero
i can do it with Z players as well... with ease
what does it tell me ? more about the style of the players then anything else for now...
why the hell do you link games for BW ? i find tennis quite boring personally , but i can link you from the last 10 years some very interesting games, does it say anything about tennis as a game as a spectator sport for me ?
I think this thread belong with the - "SC2 can never go more then one base" , "Sc2 has very low ceiling - everyone will cap it in half a year" , "SC2 have no micro , AI is too good" "In SC2 everyone will have perfect macro - its too easy!" "I need my units to be unable to go from A to B without babysit each and every one of them , and UI and control and graphics which belong to the stone age in order for a game to it to be any good ,fuck blizzard!" And i have one common though about those threads today - very stupid statements.
If you cannot enjoy SC2 i personally feel truly sorry for you , its a beautiful game and getting better repeatedly I wish BW will be there forever for you , but please less silly threads ...
really i would think that BW will have the most patience and brains to give SC2 its time to grow , but i guess its too hard to expect it from nostalgia vision people to actually see the progress and know that as BW grew , so will SC2. and its very silly to expect sc2 meta game to be at bw level at this age ...
And i think the huge amount of spectators and fans is really the only proof you need that SC2 has great potential and produce some beautiful games.
It's like saying okay that xxxxx sport is good because every one's playing that game because there is a lot of people ? Point taken maybe that's your standard of what is a good sport is , However for me , I am going on the basis what's my standard and you many not like it and that doesn't mean that everyone has to follow what the majority does just because it's liked by many people . Twilight for example.
Have people watched sc2 lately in this thread? I've yet to see good examples of this "1a vs 1a" syndrome or even super passive play in sc2. BW had a lot more passive play, what with standard PvZ fast expand (Can anyone name the last time a 2 hatch hydra worked out?) TvP gasless expand (Dragoons attacking a bunker while scvs repair forever doesn't count as "action") TvZ 14cc/1 rax expo (When was the last time a terran opened 2 rax?)
For instance in the last GSL finals, MVP vs MMA, were nail biting games of bionic vs mech, of which 2 ended in a base race, as well as 2 games of cheese. Also any zvz game has been ridiculous, with baneling/speedling creating such a volatile matchup. A good example would be Leenock's last ZvZ at MLG. Nowhere have I seen this fabled "Macro to 200/200, a-move, roll dice to decide victor". Even in this thread, no one has shown a good sc2 example of the "problems" the OP is seeing.
So, please, would someone show some good example games where we can see the supposed "problems" in action? Showing brood war games is good and all, but hardly relevant to sc2.
On November 23 2011 18:15 stink123 wrote: Have people watched sc2 lately in this thread? I've yet to see good examples of this "1a vs 1a" syndrome or even super passive play in sc2. BW had a lot more passive play, what with standard PvZ fast expand (Can anyone name the last time a 2 hatch hydra worked out?) TvP gasless expand (Dragoons attacking a bunker while scvs repair forever doesn't count as "action") TvZ 14cc/1 rax expo (When was the last time a terran opened 2 rax?)
For instance in the last GSL finals, MVP vs MMA, were nail biting games of bionic vs mech, of which 2 ended in a base race, as well as 2 games of cheese. Also any zvz game has been ridiculous, with baneling/speedling creating such a volatile matchup. A good example would be Leenock's last ZvZ at MLG. Nowhere have I seen this fabled "Macro to 200/200, a-move, roll dice to decide victor". Even in this thread, no one has shown a good sc2 example of the "problems" the OP is seeing.
So, please, would someone show some good example games where we can see the supposed "problems" in action? Showing brood war games is good and all, but hardly relevant to sc2.
I am in the process of watching CheckPrime going 1a vs 1a, roaches vs stalkers. In a BW PvZ you would be seeing corsairs hunting overlords and scouting, scourges chasing them, mutas taking out HTs, zealot/storm drops, lurkers leapfrogging, zealot micro vs hydra micro, archons vs mutas by now.
Edit: And after a few 1a vs 1a battles, he has just got owned by the Protoss ball of death.
my comment here will probably get ignored by 99% of you out there, but i still want to say what i want to say:
Lets wait for the rest of the expansions, THEN we can talk about how or in which way the game can be more interesting
why you might ask?
because of this: from Starcraft Vanilla to Broodwar: for Protoss: Dark templars got into the game as an über harassment unit / viable from reavers Corsairs (well it did take a damn long time for it to be very useful, even tho it was tried to be used in PvT(web tanks), but with less sucess IMO) Dark Archon, not very used, but used in some epic games, especially vs zerg where you could mealstrom a bunch of zerg units and blast them to death! you kinda only used mind control in the end just to mock your opponent
for zerg: Lurkers, HERES the fact, Lurkers, meaning that the game totally shifted in term of how to play ZvT. Used for er period to contain your protoss opponent as well Devourers: didnt really do shit, but still used in some circumstances as anti air
for terran: Medics: playing without medics in TvZ now thesedays is a surcide (considering not going metal, but bio only). been into the game ever since Valkyrie: not very used, actually i didnt really see anything in them until fantasy build.
but the fact is that this expansion alone made the game not totally different, but different in term how to approach your game. Lets see what SC2 expansions will bring us, because as soon it will be released, ill expect a "different kind of game", if not, then blizzard have IMO failed to make an multiplayerable expansion.
EDIT: not immediately, ofcourse we should give it time to evolve, but i think there will be a timelimit for that as well.
On November 23 2011 18:15 stink123 wrote: Have people watched sc2 lately in this thread? I've yet to see good examples of this "1a vs 1a" syndrome or even super passive play in sc2. BW had a lot more passive play, what with standard PvZ fast expand (Can anyone name the last time a 2 hatch hydra worked out?) TvP gasless expand (Dragoons attacking a bunker while scvs repair forever doesn't count as "action") TvZ 14cc/1 rax expo (When was the last time a terran opened 2 rax?)
For instance in the last GSL finals, MVP vs MMA, were nail biting games of bionic vs mech, of which 2 ended in a base race, as well as 2 games of cheese. Also any zvz game has been ridiculous, with baneling/speedling creating such a volatile matchup. A good example would be Leenock's last ZvZ at MLG. Nowhere have I seen this fabled "Macro to 200/200, a-move, roll dice to decide victor". Even in this thread, no one has shown a good sc2 example of the "problems" the OP is seeing.
So, please, would someone show some good example games where we can see the supposed "problems" in action? Showing brood war games is good and all, but hardly relevant to sc2.
I agree with this guy, partly because all the time games are becoming LESS 1a vs 1a ish, with more and more aggression all game long, with the introduction into styles like warp prisms by almost all protosses now, with the mass drop styles of MMA and Select.
To all the people complaining about infinite unit selection and unit clumping: Undoubtably, at lower levels this makes the game easier, but to be the best, against the power of aoe spells like storm fungal and emp, you need to split your units constantly, just watch streams of players and you see it. Every time you move your army to a new position you need to instead of just using 1 apm that people seem to be saying you actually have to box and split like ten times. Every time you move.
I'm not saying that it is harder than BW. It's not. I have gone back and played a few games of BW recently, i'd almost forgotten how hard it is, but these are different games with different ways to be skillful. Get over it. The game is STILL CHANGING, and i don't mean heart of the swarm.
On November 23 2011 13:37 Jojo131 wrote: I've always found that that the commentators are what make BW seem really exciting all game long. We need that kind of commentary in SC2
The sc2 commentators are already trying hard to pretend to be excited.... and I feel for artosis and Tasteless in these cases. It's their job to make things interesting, so they have to pretend/ exaggerate.
-------------- I played sc2 for some time eventhough I didn't like how it felt so much shallower. Since my friend didn't want to play BW back, I stayed in sc2 too. (Can't play on iccup for some reason).
Then 1 day I came across the sc2bw mod here.... wow I really felt the difference. Despite MBS and Unlimited unit selection, the game still feels so much harder (and as a result, deeper) It was then I asked myself why am I trying hard to like SC2 and be so frustrated when I already have BW.
Actually I got into BW from wc3 about 4 years ago because as I was playing wc3 I watched some BW and I slowly found myself spending more time (and being more eager) watching BW. After several times back and forth because sc was too hard and my friends were playing wc3 (Had a 4-32 score on iccup >_>) I finally made the switch.
Looking where they are heading now and their ..... ridiculous mindset in general makes me feel the same way when I was playing the game.
TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: EsuBuildings xd I posted this like 3 months ago on Gamefaqs. Its basically because everyone is lazy and rather max out before doing any type of harassment. The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa8xMv5fhQo
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
Wow. Wow. The battle in the middle took FOREVER and was epic. Also, I noticed that the battle became epic from the start, with a few hydras + lurkers and zerglings vs a handful of zealots dragoons and templars.So intense and a lot of micro. I have to agree that in SC2 roach vs stalkers look terrible terrible dull.
I've always found that that the commentators are what make BW seem really exciting all game long. We need that kind of commentary in SC2
Agreed. Also, don't know if all the fans are korean boys with girly voices but there was A LOT of female screaming during most of the game. Jangbi must be getting so much pussy.
Watch Liquid`Hero do some macro builds, I guarantee he will be aggressive throughout the game whether it be warp prism, proxy pylon zealot warp in to deny a zergs third some awesome phoenix harassment or fake pushes as the game progresses more it will happen more.
Do people honestly think big maps is the best solution to this? Protoss with their warpgate mechanic would give them such an advantage due to ignoring the rush distance all together. Builds such as T mech for instance will get punished due to the lack of immobility to defend, lack of strong static defense/zone control makes it even harder to defend outlying expansions and will cause even more so "over extending" in SC2. I could see mutas in PvZ having a field day going from base to base.
Basically due to the severely weakened defensive units like tanks and no defenders advantage e.g cliff, along with severely enhanced harassing options, the whole death ball syndrome will not end. Players have NO incentive to split up their units because in SC2 there is hardly any situations where a small amount of units can defend their position or even buy some time against the onslaught of the full enemy army. If they could, then we would see multiple armies with a core army fighting across the map. BW makes this happen, where its successor SC2 does not. The need for so many workers + high supply count doesn't make this help either (im guessing this is mainly due to dumbing down the game + making it easy for alot of computers i.e lowering requirements).
However Ive also been thinking about something that could change the game to be more exciting. What if blizzard got rid of smart cast? The potential behind this could mean more emphasis on units (troops) themselves and less emphasis on spell casters. This means that although spellcasters still do play a support role, they dont play the MAIN role e.g emp in TvP which would determine the fight most of the time. This would reward players that can micro their spell casters (pulling it off would be such an epic moment) while also becoming a risk since they might not even get anything off. It would also allow spells to be more devestating since using them during battle will be difficult WHILE the core army will now consist mainly of fighting troops and not spell casters like WC3.
You wont have ridiculous builds like ling/blings and MASS infestors, or mass ghosts late game + spells wont have to be nerfed right left center.
On November 23 2011 18:59 MrJargon wrote: Watch Liquid`Hero do some macro builds, I guarantee he will be aggressive throughout the game whether it be warp prism, proxy pylon zealot warp in to deny a zergs third some awesome phoenix harassment or fake pushes as the game progresses more it will happen more.
Yeah, but I often wonder if Heros style is providing results just because no one expects a warp prism, or 4 zealots in their base from a protoss, a race that is bad at harassing . It's really,really easy to deny that kind of harass if you practice for it. When he won vs idra the game that he should have lost it was just because that, idra did not expect it and he did no know how to handle it under the pressure. Microing 2 warpprism on other sides of the map great talent toi have.
What i did not like from the start of SC2, but just accommodated with as time went by was, the worker count needed to mine the same number as you would in BW. I was feeling cheated into believing that I have a 200/200 army when in reality I have 70 workers. And many of the army units cost 2 supply or a lot higher. So I really have half of the expected army. And I blame all of this in their fear of the game not running as it should on low end pcs. Fuck that, I want massive armies not small blobs of clumped units.
On November 23 2011 18:06 haflo wrote: Whats up with BW fans , and their special need to come to SC2 forums and whine about something that is less good then BW.
If you going to get one thing from this post take this Giving an example does not prove the rule never ever ,that is very stupid thing to do.
given: passive TvT - rain vs boxer counter: Active TvT - MvP vs MMA
given: passive PVt - socke counter: sage / hero
i can do it with Z players as well... with ease
what does it tell me ? more about the style of the players then anything else for now...
why the hell do you link games for BW ? i find tennis quite boring personally , but i can link you from the last 10 years some very interesting games, does it say anything about tennis as a game as a spectator sport for me ?
I think this thread belong with the - "SC2 can never go more then one base" , "Sc2 has very low ceiling - everyone will cap it in half a year" , "SC2 have no micro , AI is too good" "In SC2 everyone will have perfect macro - its too easy!" "I need my units to be unable to go from A to B without babysit each and every one of them , and UI and control and graphics which belong to the stone age in order for a game to it to be any good ,fuck blizzard!" And i have one common though about those threads today - very stupid statements.
If you cannot enjoy SC2 i personally feel truly sorry for you , its a beautiful game and getting better repeatedly I wish BW will be there forever for you , but please less silly threads ...
really i would think that BW will have the most patience and brains to give SC2 its time to grow , but i guess its too hard to expect it from nostalgia vision people to actually see the progress and know that as BW grew , so will SC2. and its very silly to expect sc2 meta game to be at bw level at this age ...
And i think the huge amount of spectators and fans is really the only proof you need that SC2 has great potential and produce some beautiful games.
It's like saying okay that xxxxx sport is good because every one's playing that game because there is a lot of people ? Point taken maybe that's your standard of what is a good sport is , However for me , I am going on the basis what's my standard and you many not like it and that doesn't mean that everyone has to follow what the majority does just because it's liked by many people . Twilight for example.
I think curling is a terrible sport and I don't enjoy it. Should I now go to broomliquid.net and tell them I think curling sucks, and if people like it it's because they have no taste, just like Twilight fans?
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
I don't care for the comparisons with bw, but if sc2 were to evolved, less max army fights would be fun, though i don't know how that can happen because 1 failed anything results in a bit of turtling until a random fight and if there isn't an advantage for one side, then it will go into a turtleish game.
On November 23 2011 13:12 Nizzy wrote: Bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps.
I strongly believe this is what SC2 needs. The "Big" maps aren't very big at all.
But there is aproblem with bigger maps: Nydus and Warpgate completly destroy the distance and terrans are left behind with dropships and airplay to shorten the attackpaths.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
To be honest, that's because Metalopolis is so stupid for TvT. If one player is mech or even both of them, since there's only 2 places to push it's too hard to bother. better to just go Air.
On November 23 2011 18:06 haflo wrote: Whats up with BW fans , and their special need to come to SC2 forums and whine about something that is less good then BW.
If you going to get one thing from this post take this Giving an example does not prove the rule never ever ,that is very stupid thing to do.
given: passive TvT - rain vs boxer counter: Active TvT - MvP vs MMA
given: passive PVt - socke counter: sage / hero
i can do it with Z players as well... with ease
what does it tell me ? more about the style of the players then anything else for now...
why the hell do you link games for BW ? i find tennis quite boring personally , but i can link you from the last 10 years some very interesting games, does it say anything about tennis as a game as a spectator sport for me ?
I think this thread belong with the - "SC2 can never go more then one base" , "Sc2 has very low ceiling - everyone will cap it in half a year" , "SC2 have no micro , AI is too good" "In SC2 everyone will have perfect macro - its too easy!" "I need my units to be unable to go from A to B without babysit each and every one of them , and UI and control and graphics which belong to the stone age in order for a game to it to be any good ,fuck blizzard!" And i have one common though about those threads today - very stupid statements.
If you cannot enjoy SC2 i personally feel truly sorry for you , its a beautiful game and getting better repeatedly I wish BW will be there forever for you , but please less silly threads ...
really i would think that BW will have the most patience and brains to give SC2 its time to grow , but i guess its too hard to expect it from nostalgia vision people to actually see the progress and know that as BW grew , so will SC2. and its very silly to expect sc2 meta game to be at bw level at this age ...
And i think the huge amount of spectators and fans is really the only proof you need that SC2 has great potential and produce some beautiful games.
It's like saying okay that xxxxx sport is good because every one's playing that game because there is a lot of people ? Point taken maybe that's your standard of what is a good sport is , However for me , I am going on the basis what's my standard and you many not like it and that doesn't mean that everyone has to follow what the majority does just because it's liked by many people . Twilight for example.
I think curling is a terrible sport and I don't enjoy it. Should I now go to broomliquid.net and tell them I think curling sucks, and if people like it it's because they have no taste, just like Twilight fans?
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
Nice try in putting the word "suck" in to my statement , but I am not going to respond any further.
On November 23 2011 18:06 haflo wrote: Whats up with BW fans , and their special need to come to SC2 forums and whine about something that is less good then BW.
If you going to get one thing from this post take this Giving an example does not prove the rule never ever ,that is very stupid thing to do.
given: passive TvT - rain vs boxer counter: Active TvT - MvP vs MMA
given: passive PVt - socke counter: sage / hero
i can do it with Z players as well... with ease
what does it tell me ? more about the style of the players then anything else for now...
why the hell do you link games for BW ? i find tennis quite boring personally , but i can link you from the last 10 years some very interesting games, does it say anything about tennis as a game as a spectator sport for me ?
I think this thread belong with the - "SC2 can never go more then one base" , "Sc2 has very low ceiling - everyone will cap it in half a year" , "SC2 have no micro , AI is too good" "In SC2 everyone will have perfect macro - its too easy!" "I need my units to be unable to go from A to B without babysit each and every one of them , and UI and control and graphics which belong to the stone age in order for a game to it to be any good ,fuck blizzard!" And i have one common though about those threads today - very stupid statements.
If you cannot enjoy SC2 i personally feel truly sorry for you , its a beautiful game and getting better repeatedly I wish BW will be there forever for you , but please less silly threads ...
really i would think that BW will have the most patience and brains to give SC2 its time to grow , but i guess its too hard to expect it from nostalgia vision people to actually see the progress and know that as BW grew , so will SC2. and its very silly to expect sc2 meta game to be at bw level at this age ...
And i think the huge amount of spectators and fans is really the only proof you need that SC2 has great potential and produce some beautiful games.
It's like saying okay that xxxxx sport is good because every one's playing that game because there is a lot of people ? Point taken maybe that's your standard of what is a good sport is , However for me , I am going on the basis what's my standard and you many not like it and that doesn't mean that everyone has to follow what the majority does just because it's liked by many people . Twilight for example.
I think curling is a terrible sport and I don't enjoy it. Should I now go to broomliquid.net and tell them I think curling sucks, and if people like it it's because they have no taste, just like Twilight fans?
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
Nice try in putting the word "suck" in to my statement , but I am not going to respond any further.
I didn't put any words into your statement, I quoted your post and then satirized it. But feel free to change around any words that you feel are too strong.
Your statement would be fine if you were honestly attempting to say that "this is just my personal preference". But you used inflammatory language like "standard of what a good sport is", and then compared everyone who doesn't have the same standard as you to Twilight fans.
On November 23 2011 18:06 haflo wrote: Whats up with BW fans , and their special need to come to SC2 forums and whine about something that is less good then BW.
If you going to get one thing from this post take this Giving an example does not prove the rule never ever ,that is very stupid thing to do.
given: passive TvT - rain vs boxer counter: Active TvT - MvP vs MMA
given: passive PVt - socke counter: sage / hero
i can do it with Z players as well... with ease
what does it tell me ? more about the style of the players then anything else for now...
why the hell do you link games for BW ? i find tennis quite boring personally , but i can link you from the last 10 years some very interesting games, does it say anything about tennis as a game as a spectator sport for me ?
I think this thread belong with the - "SC2 can never go more then one base" , "Sc2 has very low ceiling - everyone will cap it in half a year" , "SC2 have no micro , AI is too good" "In SC2 everyone will have perfect macro - its too easy!" "I need my units to be unable to go from A to B without babysit each and every one of them , and UI and control and graphics which belong to the stone age in order for a game to it to be any good ,fuck blizzard!" And i have one common though about those threads today - very stupid statements.
If you cannot enjoy SC2 i personally feel truly sorry for you , its a beautiful game and getting better repeatedly I wish BW will be there forever for you , but please less silly threads ...
really i would think that BW will have the most patience and brains to give SC2 its time to grow , but i guess its too hard to expect it from nostalgia vision people to actually see the progress and know that as BW grew , so will SC2. and its very silly to expect sc2 meta game to be at bw level at this age ...
And i think the huge amount of spectators and fans is really the only proof you need that SC2 has great potential and produce some beautiful games.
It's like saying okay that xxxxx sport is good because every one's playing that game because there is a lot of people ? Point taken maybe that's your standard of what is a good sport is , However for me , I am going on the basis what's my standard and you many not like it and that doesn't mean that everyone has to follow what the majority does just because it's liked by many people . Twilight for example.
I think curling is a terrible sport and I don't enjoy it. Should I now go to broomliquid.net and tell them I think curling sucks, and if people like it it's because they have no taste, just like Twilight fans?
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
Success has nothing to do with inferior/superior.
BW was a resounding success too. It averaged 9/10 in all game reviews, got game of the year in nearly all magazines (the expansion did as well) and sold 11 million copies. The best players are earning up to 400,000 USD a year.
What about SC2, less than 3 mill sold?, that's less than 1/3rd. For a sequel of a best selling game, that's actually kind of poor, usually the next release is more popular (see halo vs halo 2 vs halo 3). We don't know how long sc2 will be popular as an esport or as a game. Of course, we should give it time, but you are jumping the gun a bit. Pure stats alone, BW trumps it.
I will call SC2 a resounding success when I see new people still buying the game 10 years after the last expansion.
I was thinking this myself during MLG. Some games just felt very passive for large parts of some games. I'm not convinced it's a flaw in the game as much it's about the current skill level and strategies though.
On November 23 2011 18:06 haflo wrote: Whats up with BW fans , and their special need to come to SC2 forums and whine about something that is less good then BW.
If you going to get one thing from this post take this Giving an example does not prove the rule never ever ,that is very stupid thing to do.
given: passive TvT - rain vs boxer counter: Active TvT - MvP vs MMA
given: passive PVt - socke counter: sage / hero
i can do it with Z players as well... with ease
what does it tell me ? more about the style of the players then anything else for now...
why the hell do you link games for BW ? i find tennis quite boring personally , but i can link you from the last 10 years some very interesting games, does it say anything about tennis as a game as a spectator sport for me ?
I think this thread belong with the - "SC2 can never go more then one base" , "Sc2 has very low ceiling - everyone will cap it in half a year" , "SC2 have no micro , AI is too good" "In SC2 everyone will have perfect macro - its too easy!" "I need my units to be unable to go from A to B without babysit each and every one of them , and UI and control and graphics which belong to the stone age in order for a game to it to be any good ,fuck blizzard!" And i have one common though about those threads today - very stupid statements.
If you cannot enjoy SC2 i personally feel truly sorry for you , its a beautiful game and getting better repeatedly I wish BW will be there forever for you , but please less silly threads ...
really i would think that BW will have the most patience and brains to give SC2 its time to grow , but i guess its too hard to expect it from nostalgia vision people to actually see the progress and know that as BW grew , so will SC2. and its very silly to expect sc2 meta game to be at bw level at this age ...
And i think the huge amount of spectators and fans is really the only proof you need that SC2 has great potential and produce some beautiful games.
It's like saying okay that xxxxx sport is good because every one's playing that game because there is a lot of people ? Point taken maybe that's your standard of what is a good sport is , However for me , I am going on the basis what's my standard and you many not like it and that doesn't mean that everyone has to follow what the majority does just because it's liked by many people . Twilight for example.
I think curling is a terrible sport and I don't enjoy it. Should I now go to broomliquid.net and tell them I think curling sucks, and if people like it it's because they have no taste, just like Twilight fans?
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
Success has nothing to do with inferior/superior.
BW was a resounding success too. It averaged 9/10 in all game reviews, got game of the year in nearly all magazines (the expansion did as well) and sold 11 million copies. The best players are earning up to 400,000 USD a year.
What about SC2, less than 3 mill sold?, that's less than 1/3rd, and how much do the players earn. We don't know how long sc2 will be popular as an esport or as a game. Of course, we should give it time, but you are jumping the gun a bit. Pure stats alone, BW trumps it.
I will call SC2 a resounding success when I see new people still buying the game 10 years after the last expansion.
Wouldn't that mean you'd have to wait 20 years to call it?
On November 23 2011 19:05 YyapSsap wrote: Basically due to the severely weakened defensive units like tanks and no defenders advantage e.g cliff, along with severely enhanced harassing options, the whole death ball syndrome will not end. Players have NO incentive to split up their units because in SC2 there is hardly any situations where a small amount of units can defend their position or even buy some time against the onslaught of the full enemy army. If they could, then we would see multiple armies with a core army fighting across the map. BW makes this happen, where its successor SC2 does not. The need for so many workers + high supply count doesn't make this help either (im guessing this is mainly due to dumbing down the game + making it easy for alot of computers i.e lowering requirements).
Is this a typo? If not, could you elaborate on why enhanced harassment options encourages deathballs?
Everytime I see this kind of thread pop up, I die a little inside. It's just sad to see that nobody seems to realize how bad BW gameplay was in it's earliest days and how far it has come in the last 12 years. The players and the gameplay are still in their developing phase, but if you have watched some of the recent games (which I think not many people in this thread did), you see a movement towards much more active games, especially on maps like daybreak. I agree that the maps play a large factor in how action-packed the games will turn out, as they did in bw, but it's not all to blame on that. The highest level of SC2 play right now isn't even remotely close to what it could be. It's too early to give any predictions for SC2. What you do is judging a baby.
I don't think huge changes are needed, really. Protoss and Zerg armies just need to be able to control space better / have a stronger defenders advantage.
On November 23 2011 18:06 haflo wrote: Whats up with BW fans , and their special need to come to SC2 forums and whine about something that is less good then BW.
If you going to get one thing from this post take this Giving an example does not prove the rule never ever ,that is very stupid thing to do.
given: passive TvT - rain vs boxer counter: Active TvT - MvP vs MMA
given: passive PVt - socke counter: sage / hero
i can do it with Z players as well... with ease
what does it tell me ? more about the style of the players then anything else for now...
why the hell do you link games for BW ? i find tennis quite boring personally , but i can link you from the last 10 years some very interesting games, does it say anything about tennis as a game as a spectator sport for me ?
I think this thread belong with the - "SC2 can never go more then one base" , "Sc2 has very low ceiling - everyone will cap it in half a year" , "SC2 have no micro , AI is too good" "In SC2 everyone will have perfect macro - its too easy!" "I need my units to be unable to go from A to B without babysit each and every one of them , and UI and control and graphics which belong to the stone age in order for a game to it to be any good ,fuck blizzard!" And i have one common though about those threads today - very stupid statements.
If you cannot enjoy SC2 i personally feel truly sorry for you , its a beautiful game and getting better repeatedly I wish BW will be there forever for you , but please less silly threads ...
really i would think that BW will have the most patience and brains to give SC2 its time to grow , but i guess its too hard to expect it from nostalgia vision people to actually see the progress and know that as BW grew , so will SC2. and its very silly to expect sc2 meta game to be at bw level at this age ...
And i think the huge amount of spectators and fans is really the only proof you need that SC2 has great potential and produce some beautiful games.
It's like saying okay that xxxxx sport is good because every one's playing that game because there is a lot of people ? Point taken maybe that's your standard of what is a good sport is , However for me , I am going on the basis what's my standard and you many not like it and that doesn't mean that everyone has to follow what the majority does just because it's liked by many people . Twilight for example.
I think curling is a terrible sport and I don't enjoy it. Should I now go to broomliquid.net and tell them I think curling sucks, and if people like it it's because they have no taste, just like Twilight fans?
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
Success has nothing to do with inferior/superior.
Notice the paragraph break between saying "SC2 is a resounding success" and "stop calling SC2 inferior".
Those are in fact two separate responses to the person I quoted.
As to your other points, I am not talking about units sold. I am talking about SC2 as an esport in the west.
EDIT: I realize that Brood War is/was bigger in Korea, but honestly I don't give a crap about Korea. There were zero Brood War professional foreigners who could actually live off their winnings and salaries. Western BW spectators were stuck watching VODs from Korea, because other than WCG, there were no big tournaments. Starcraft 2 has changed all of that, and for me that is what's relevant. There's a major SC2 event being broadcast in English nearly every weekend.
It all comes down to the pathing. As people have said making defense more powerful would improve things, but how do you do that? One way is with spells like forcefield and dark swarm, but is that really a solution you want to see? The other obvious way is to make aoe attacks more powerful so a few units in a good position can hold off an entire army, but that won't really work for various reasons. Consider mines in BW: they did 125 damage and were basically free. A really good mine hit could kill maybe 8 units at once. Compare that to baneling mines in SC2. A well timed baneling hit can kill 20 marines in an instant. BW level aoe damage would completely erase SC2 armies because of how they clump up. It's basically impossible to make defense better without removing unit clumping, and Blizzard is dead set against that. Unless you're waiting for Dustin Browder to hit his head and get amnesia waiting is not going to fix this problem.
On November 23 2011 13:21 Praetorial wrote: This is a BW vs SC2 thread. There is little need to compare the two or suggest that one is superior to the other.
This is a completely ridiculous idea. Every RTS that's come out in the last decade has been compared with BW. Why should SC2 get a pass? The fact that SC2 is supposed to be the successor for BW makes in-depth comparison even more important.
The "game is still new" argument is stupid too. If the game isn't developed enough then why don't we just keep watching BW until SC2 is ready to take its place? Unless your kid is playing it doesn't make sense to watch middle schoolers play basketball when you could be watching the NBA. I'm really tired of hearing these excuses that don't even make sense. People just want to shut discussion down because their afraid their game will come out looking bad.
Remove forcefield, concussive shell, and fungal growth so that you can poke and leave if the timming wasn't good. In SC2, if you go into a fight you shouldnt take,you lose, that's it. So, ppl are affraid and they just macro, hoping having a better macro than opponent.
Sc2 is too volatile, and minor mistakes can cost you the game, which ,in turn gives, advantage to passive play... just wait for the opponent to make a mistake, never commit while keeping your macro going and you will eventually win.
I think that's why some players go for the all-in mode, they must say :" wth every time i try to play solid and perfect, eventually will make 1 mistake and either be at an unrecoverable disadvantage or have to go all-in, better go stright for the all in now "
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
<embed id=VideoPlayback src=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-1540187220819592210&hl=en&fs=true style=width:400px;height:326px allowFullScreen=true allowScriptAccess=always type=application/x-shockwave-flash> </embed> There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I don't really see the point of this though. Aren't we talking about general tendencies in games?
I go to barcrafts sometimes, and they are interesting (Random SC2). However I can just open up a BW stream (even from some random C+ player) and find it exciting for the most part.
I know this logic is hated, but the fundamental BW mechanics and strategies are so deeply worked out that a C+ player today in BW could have been Pro-level during the first year of the game. A while many concepts do carry over to SC2, the big picture is different enough that players do not yet need to break the game down a tightly as BW in order to do really well. Even pro's are still figuring out and developing the kind of high level muscle memory macro that is needed to support to the crisp micro play your expecting. For those who have watched SC for ages, becoming accustom to the current state of BW as the average is underselling BW and setting an unrealistic expectation for SC2.
In all likelihood, BW is probably "better" for spectators in the most general of RTS terms, but SC2 has not yet shown the full array of skills it can support. The pressure isn't there yet for pros to need those skills. You can get damn far in amny tournaments with damn good macro and questionable micro still. The same cant be said with BW.
How is it unrealistic to expect a successor of starcraft broodwar to be as good as the old game broodwar which did provide countless joy and fun to many of us who are fans of the original sc1 and broodwar ? It's pretty simple you for example you are a top scholar in your university and you have been producing good grades and so , than suddenly you have been producing quite low grades and almost failed your semester . People who have known you for years will question your actions , what has happen to you , what's wrong , these is the same thing as for sc2 . The analogy do apply in these situation because of expectation of previous high benchmark and entertaining factor from broodwar despite it's simplicity and like you said , Figured out mechanics .
Its not unrealistic to expect the game will eventually be as good as BW, but it is unrealistic to expect it to immediately be as good as BW.
This has been talked to death but SC2 is a new game and players need time to adapt and then provide a consistent enough challenge to one another to necessitate the development of SC2 versions of the subtle BW strategies that people love so much.
Using your example, the first student goes through university with amazing grades, and comes hope telling his little brother about what he learned, then the little brother goes to university and doesn't do as well. Two different people, with different but perhaps similar skill sets, that need to develop at their own pace and methodology. Certain things will be easier for the little brother because of what he was told, but other maybe not be useful or possible because while the older brother kicked ass at geology, the little brother is more adept at meteorology...or something.
I was using a single established scholar for that example and not two .
I know, and I was pointing out the flaw in the usage of a single established scholar as a metaphor for two different games.
On November 23 2011 14:33 raf3776 wrote: Im sure i could find examples of a random early Sc1 game that doesnt have that much aggression compared to a random game in sc2
Please do.
<embed id=VideoPlayback src=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-1540187220819592210&hl=en&fs=true style=width:400px;height:326px allowFullScreen=true allowScriptAccess=always type=application/x-shockwave-flash> </embed> There you go. Stork vs Nada from the 2007 proleague. I didn't really pick this game at random, as I chose it because the calibre of the players illustrates that SC1 can be just as boring as SC2 at the highest level. It's really easy to dig up examples =/
I don't really see the point of this though. Aren't we talking about general tendencies in games?
I go to barcrafts sometimes, and they are interesting (Random SC2). However I can just open up a BW stream (even from some random C+ player) and find it exciting for the most part.
I know this logic is hated, but the fundamental BW mechanics and strategies are so deeply worked out that a C+ player today in BW could have been Pro-level during the first year of the game. A while many concepts do carry over to SC2, the big picture is different enough that players do not yet need to break the game down a tightly as BW in order to do really well. Even pro's are still figuring out and developing the kind of high level muscle memory macro that is needed to support to the crisp micro play your expecting. For those who have watched SC for ages, becoming accustom to the current state of BW as the average is underselling BW and setting an unrealistic expectation for SC2.
In all likelihood, BW is probably "better" for spectators in the most general of RTS terms, but SC2 has not yet shown the full array of skills it can support. The pressure isn't there yet for pros to need those skills. You can get damn far in amny tournaments with damn good macro and questionable micro still. The same cant be said with BW.
I kinda agree and disagree. I disagree with the mechanics part for obvious reasons, its not a valid point because basic mechanics have nothing to do with creating exciting battles, it does have a lot to do with skill differentiation, comebacks, and certain tactics however. The second point being that we have 818 apm JulyZerg moving straight into SC2, there were no mechanical monsters pre BW. I agree in that mechanics have dropped down a bit and strategies are less worked out, however this also doesn't affect how games play out that much.
However I'd say a lot of new strategies aren't being developed because of culture as well. Just look at the top foreigners in BW, they were highly creative in comparison to the Koreans. Strategic play is under-valued in Korean Starcraft, and its obvious when a rookie such as Reality played strategic against Titans like Jaedong, Jaedong played like a D rank scrub. Or even look at Jangbi's OSL run.
Now we are getting the clashes of two cultures together, and don't forget the constant patching is also changing the game the way its played a lot. I could imagine if Blizzard never patched, and we only had the GSL, that things would be a lot more stagnant. Its tantamount to BW's game design, that even when the same strategies are being used, it still produces sick games more than 10 years from its inception.
A lot of it has to do with what ver said, I could go further to say there is also a problem with single-role (hence gimmicky) units. You shouldn't need 10 vikings for the sole purpose of taking down colossus, what other purpose does making that many vikings serve? What's worse is that if you decide to do a drop with them, you have to use them all because of warp-in, and if you lose them, you lose the game because you can't snipe colossus.
Lets look at a similar scenario. SKTerran vs Zerg, requires a lot of science vessels to control lurker/defiler/ultra numbers. Already I can use this unit against 3 other units in a normal army comp (I don't include guardians or broodlords), not 1. Second of all if I make too many, I can spread them out and harass bases with erasers (irradiate my vessels and erase drones). Or I can keep them for defense matrix instead of irradiate.
Isn't the reason though that units are needed to be used in multiple capacities for BW because the fundamental expectations are at such a level that you cannot just make a mass quantity of units with a single purpose for them in mind. You need to make them worth as much as possible to obtain that little edge after little edge until hopefully you win the game. I guarantee Blizzard didn't have 90% of the situations planned out for many of the BW units and how they are effectively applied to today. Those units met a need that players demanded from them.
This all derived from the base mechanical skill for the competition rising overtime. This is a generalization, but initially you could have great macro and focus more of just out producing your opponent to win. Then the macro game developed such that it produced diminishing returns, so stronger micro was needed to make each unit worth more then the units your opponent made. All the while strategy was being developed and turned over as the expected capabilities of the competition increased. If you no longer can differentiate yourself in a tournament based on raw mechanical skill, that is when players are backed into a corner and forced to improvise.
People just don't sit down a make up builds or unit uses in a bubble, those are usually called gimmicks. Skill develops in response to a specific need. And at the moment, the need is to improve your core game skills, crisper timings, and more innate unit control. People are still exploring primary unit uses (i.e. Warp Prism). Advanced unit tactics will eventually come when the current need becomes the standard expectation.
BW was a resounding success too. It averaged 9/10 in all game reviews, got game of the year in nearly all magazines (the expansion did as well) and sold 11 million copies. The best players are earning up to 400,000 USD a year.
What about SC2, less than 3 mill sold?, that's less than 1/3rd. For a sequel of a best selling game, that's actually kind of poor, usually the next release is more popular (see halo vs halo 2 vs halo 3). We don't know how long sc2 will be popular as an esport or as a game. Of course, we should give it time, but you are jumping the gun a bit. Pure stats alone, BW trumps it.
I will call SC2 a resounding success when I see new people still buying the game 10 years after the last expansion.
Jesus talk about misinformation :
SC and BROOD together sold 11mil copys (10 years time)
SC2 sold on the first day 1.5 million copys 3 mil on the first month . the estimate selling for today date is 15 million copys (a year) . it look good to me...
And you know what , if you are at it . How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL . Only place BW still alive is Korea , and thats in decline as well . you know time is a harsh mistress .
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: And you know what , if you are at it . How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL . Only place BW still alive is Korea , and thats in decline as well . you know time is a harsh mistress .
How much money do you think Blizzard has spent promoting SC2 compared to BW?
What did Destiny say on StoG a few weeks back? Nostalgia something.... probably too harsh to say right now.
Anyway stop comparing the games! There's still a lot of potential in SC2. Are BW people jealous/bitter of SC2's popularity?! Or just trolling the SC2 crowd? I'm very hopeful that they're just passionate about helping SC2 in promoting BW play into SC2.
Deathballs occur due to huge group selections are possible in SC2. To cap the group selection, would be a step backwards. Can people try and discuss other aspects of the SC2 play, rather than showboating matches. I'd rather hear suggestions as to how to break off from the deathball play. Potential untapped strategies/improvements. Dustin Browder said it exactly right. If you love BW stick with BW, it's a fantastic game. Let SC2 evolve by itself and see what happens. If SC2 is a death ball vs deathball type game then so be it.
Questions I'd rather like to discuss:
Would more AOE spells/units help decrease the number of mass units clumping? Say take an army with more AOE spell unit casters to battle against the deathball, and have another army else where away from the death ball to do damage?
Increase the strength of drop-play/small army harassment? But by doing so will this affect the deathball, in a way that you may as well keep those strengths with your deathball?
If deathball to deathball is the only way, is there ways to make deathball battles more interesting?
I would like to see bigger maps as an experiment, maybe in HOTS. If a race is severely disavantaged in bigger maps, maybe a buff is necessary.
for me teh comparison sc2<>bw is like icehockey<>football
i LOVE watching ice hockey, because it's almost every game a good and interesting game in footbal there is like 1/2 max. good games, the rest is boring as hell
BW was a resounding success too. It averaged 9/10 in all game reviews, got game of the year in nearly all magazines (the expansion did as well) and sold 11 million copies. The best players are earning up to 400,000 USD a year.
What about SC2, less than 3 mill sold?, that's less than 1/3rd. For a sequel of a best selling game, that's actually kind of poor, usually the next release is more popular (see halo vs halo 2 vs halo 3). We don't know how long sc2 will be popular as an esport or as a game. Of course, we should give it time, but you are jumping the gun a bit. Pure stats alone, BW trumps it.
I will call SC2 a resounding success when I see new people still buying the game 10 years after the last expansion.
Jesus talk about misinformation :
SC and BROOD together sold 11mil copys (10 years time)
SC2 sold on the first day 1.5 million copys 3 mil on the first month . the estimate selling for today date is 15 million copys (a year) . it look good to me...
And you know what , if you are at it . How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL . Only place BW still alive is Korea , and thats in decline as well . you know time is a harsh mistress .
so much bullshit, really gets tiresome .
I know typing properly is really tiresome , so let me edit it for you, besides broodwar solely in korea the sales reach up to the figure of 3 million , and that figure not even taking into account of sales made globally. You think is not a great idea, why don't we email ogn and ask how many viewers actually are watching the osl ? . Taking tl.net account of viewers isn't just sufficient bw is a global phenomenon and gamers in china still watches broodwar and take the game seriously .
If we add up all the figures of china,korean and tl.net bw audience , let's just say idra view's which you think is substantial may be relatively small in number.
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: And you know what , if you are at it . How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL . Only place BW still alive is Korea , and thats in decline as well . you know time is a harsh mistress .
How much money do you think Blizzard has spent promoting SC2 compared to BW?
I don't think that's very relevant. Impossible to say but starcraft is such a strong brand in itself that sc2 would probably done fine without very much pr from Blizzard.
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL .
Just so you know, the PL finals and the OSL finals both filled up stadiums. And just so you know, the chinese stream for the OSL final had over one million live viewers.
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: And you know what , if you are at it . How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL . Only place BW still alive is Korea , and thats in decline as well . you know time is a harsh mistress .
How much money do you think Blizzard has spent promoting SC2 compared to BW?
I don't think that's very relevant. Impossible to say but starcraft is such a strong brand in itself that sc2 would probably done fine without very much pr from Blizzard.
That's right. It's impossible to deny that a BIG part of SC2's success is because it has SC in it's name.
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL .
Just so you know, the PL finals and the OSL finals both filled up stadiums. And just so you know, the chinese stream for the OSL final had over one million live viewers.
Just so you know.
So that has obviously nothing to do with the fact that BW has been out there fo a while and that the skill level is ridiculous. Now please tell me: how many live viewers did the Hanaro OSL have?
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL .
Just so you know, the PL finals and the OSL finals both filled up stadiums. And just so you know, the chinese stream for the OSL final had over one million live viewers.
Just so you know.
So that has obviously nothing to do with the fact that BW has been out there fo a while and that the skill level is ridiculous. Now please tell me: how many live viewers did the Hanaro OSL have?
Hanaro Osl was in the year 2000 , did you think twitch tv existed back than ? or ppstream ?
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL .
Just so you know, the PL finals and the OSL finals both filled up stadiums. And just so you know, the chinese stream for the OSL final had over one million live viewers.
Just so you know.
So that has obviously nothing to do with the fact that BW has been out there fo a while and that the skill level is ridiculous. Now please tell me: how many live viewers did the Hanaro OSL have?
Hanaro Osl was in the year 2000 , did you think twitch tv existed back than ? or ppstream ?
I was talking about live attendance, not stream/TV viewers.
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL .
Just so you know, the PL finals and the OSL finals both filled up stadiums. And just so you know, the chinese stream for the OSL final had over one million live viewers.
Just so you know.
So that has obviously nothing to do with the fact that BW has been out there fo a while and that the skill level is ridiculous. Now please tell me: how many live viewers did the Hanaro OSL have?
I'm not really here to debate or argue about SC2 vs BW or anything like that, I just noticed that kind of ignorant comment ("i think idra streaming has more viewers than osl") and wanted to point out how wrong it was.
The game is to new. In BW they know everything like times to push and how to abuse certain areas. Making it more exciting yes, but how many years did it take? You can not expect SC2 to just be like it straight away, it is still a baby. And still has expansions to come out yet.
On November 23 2011 16:41 bgx wrote: remove the damn xelnaga towers, it will enrich army movements and uncertainty, so you will have to move your armies non-stop or you may get into trap, its to easy to track movements with xelnaga tower, also players are afraid to move their army into tower radius also you cant really move your drops throughout the map because of it... i dont like the idea of xel naga towers to be on EVERY competition map. Bring us variety, in BW there were mineral walls, temple(rocks) walls that require DIFFERENT strategies and different timings.
I dont like that SC2 is all about being omniscient, a little bit of uncertainty would enrich the play, and possible new strategy/tactics.
I have to agree about the xelnaga towers.
TvT is actually kinda derpy. Let's just seige our tanks at the xelnaga towers so we can't really even move it forward even if we wanted to or the tank just dies
I expect maps to get bigger and bigger, and maybe the base saturation might be changed or something... max food armies are just not scary looking at all. Especially for Zerg, when we have like 60+ supply in workers ALWAYS.
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL .
Just so you know, the PL finals and the OSL finals both filled up stadiums. And just so you know, the chinese stream for the OSL final had over one million live viewers.
Just so you know.
This is exactly how our parents/ grandparents must feel when we say dumb shit about the past or whatever.
"Dad do you know how many people listen to Rhianna? The Beatles had what, like one thousand hipsters in a good concert?" Dad picks his jaw from the floor and writes me off his will.
i pretty sure that i said international there for a reason , simply because i saw the amount of viewers at TL bar , I probebly should have worded it as TL viewers instead of internetional to be accurate , my apologies .
i have No idea what is the Chinese numbers , and sadly Google fail to know them as well and also OSL wikipedia.
I wonder where you got that number , and if its the recently OSL ? please link me , because i am usually quite good at finding information , and i failed totally .
How many times are people going to start threads that say:
Brood War was like this, Starcraft 2 is like this, Brood War did it better.
Seriously, can we just move on from this stuff? =/ I don't see the value in these discussions. Yes they're different games, yes they play differently - you think BW is better? Okay that's cool. You think SC2 is better? That's cool too. Why do we need to compare them constantly, when it always resorts to people saying one is better than the other day.
It didn't even get to two pages before the Youtube links started.
On November 23 2011 21:39 Subversion wrote: How many times are people going to start threads that say:
Brood War was like this, Starcraft 2 is like this, Brood War did it better.
Seriously, can we just move on from this stuff? =/ I don't see the value in these discussions. Yes they're different games, yes they play differently - you think BW is better? Okay that's cool. You think SC2 is better? That's cool too. Why do we need to compare them constantly, when it always resorts to people saying one is better than the other day.
It didn't even get to two pages before the Youtube links started.
=/
people want churches to merge and not do like what happened to other monotheisms
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.
This man speaks the truth.
SC2 won't change until Blizzard actually changes how parts of the game work, rather than just a few unit numbers and stats.
On November 23 2011 21:39 Subversion wrote: How many times are people going to start threads that say:
Brood War was like this, Starcraft 2 is like this, Brood War did it better.
Seriously, can we just move on from this stuff? =/ I don't see the value in these discussions. Yes they're different games, yes they play differently - you think BW is better? Okay that's cool. You think SC2 is better? That's cool too. Why do we need to compare them constantly, when it always resorts to people saying one is better than the other day.
It didn't even get to two pages before the Youtube links started.
=/
Because all of the "oldschool BW fans/SC2 haters" don't actually "hate" SC2, they just want it to be an even better game than it already is. And every SC2 fan seems to take that as an insult.
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL .
Call of Duty and League of Legends are both way more popular than SC2. They must be superior games.
Just reading the thread title i could more or less figure out who would post in the thread and exactly what the arguments would be. Repeating the same tired old shit on this forum really wont change anything.
On November 23 2011 21:57 karpo wrote: Just reading the thread title i could more or less figure out who would post in the thread and exactly what the arguments would be. Repeating the same tired old shit on this forum really wont change anything.
That's an awfully stubborn viewpoint. You don't want SC2 to improve as a game?
On November 23 2011 21:39 Subversion wrote: How many times are people going to start threads that say:
Brood War was like this, Starcraft 2 is like this, Brood War did it better.
Seriously, can we just move on from this stuff? =/ I don't see the value in these discussions. Yes they're different games, yes they play differently - you think BW is better? Okay that's cool. You think SC2 is better? That's cool too. Why do we need to compare them constantly, when it always resorts to people saying one is better than the other day.
It didn't even get to two pages before the Youtube links started.
=/
Because all of the "oldschool BW fans/SC2 haters" don't actually "hate" SC2, they just want it to be an even better game than it already is. And every SC2 fan seems to take that as an insult.
I guess it's because many points the BW community brings up are highly subjective (don't get me started on the MBS/control groups/smart casting/whatever debate). They are right with some arguments objectively, but negative elements of the discussion tend to outweigh their productive counterparts, especially as everybody is so easily offended. Also, the whole debate is just so old. As somebody who enjoys watching both games, I can't understand why such subjective things as enjoyability have to be discussed. I wasn't a big fan of SC2 until a friend of mine showed me a Dreamhack game between Kas and Naama that was unbelievably intense. Many of the more hardcore BW (and even SC2) fans would argue that it wasn't the highest level of play, but I really liked it. What I want to say: there are actually people that enjoy SC2 and are sick of hearing that their game is crap (which is essentially what some of the posts in here are saying). Blizzard won't change anything. They made the game the way it is (i think Justin Browders comment on the Blizzcon said it all), and theorycrafting will only enrage everybody. Let's just end this stupid discussion already.
On November 23 2011 21:39 Subversion wrote: How many times are people going to start threads that say:
Brood War was like this, Starcraft 2 is like this, Brood War did it better.
Seriously, can we just move on from this stuff? =/ I don't see the value in these discussions. Yes they're different games, yes they play differently - you think BW is better? Okay that's cool. You think SC2 is better? That's cool too. Why do we need to compare them constantly, when it always resorts to people saying one is better than the other day.
It didn't even get to two pages before the Youtube links started.
=/
Because all of the "oldschool BW fans/SC2 haters" don't actually "hate" SC2, they just want it to be an even better game than it already is. And every SC2 fan seems to take that as an insult.
Hey man, all the "SC2 noobs" don't actually hate BW either, they just want the best possible players playing the game they follow. And every BW fan seems to take that as an insult.
BW fans get extremely sick and tired of hearing "x should switch to SC2" and have now become aggressive against that sort of thinking. Every other day we have a thread complaining that SC2 isn't BW and I can see how some people might get just as annoyed with the same threads with the same arguments with the same comparisons repeated until a new thread pops up.
I think his point is it's starting to get really annoying how often these things pop up when nothing productive ever comes out of them. People like BW? Fine and dandy. People like SC2? Great for you too! Like both like me? Even more awesome. Want to start a comparison thread wishing SC2 was more BW like? It's been done at least 10x already in the past month, you won't add anything new and you won't convince Blizzard to change anything by ranting about it on TL.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
To be honest this game is not the norm rather than the exception and in my opinion it only shows that Metalopolis can be a problematic map because how easy it is to control the mid so that the only viable alternative to attack your opponent is by dropping which can also be denied rather easily once the defense is setup properly.
There are games which are very turtle heavy in some matchups and for the most part this happens on problematic maps like shakuras and metal where only one attack path exists but for that to happen the game has to go in a certain direction and this doesn't happen way too often in my opinion. In fact I think the majority of macro games are decided by aggression. Maybe people are not playing as aggressively as in Broodwar but I think there is still much room left to improve this and we see this already happening. Think back on how MMA's playstyle against Zerg at MLG Columbus had an eyeopening effect on many Terran players because they realized that you can use drops as an effective way to gain positional advantage not just to do economic damage which is why it's viable to drop even if you run the risk of Mutalisks denying your drop.
On November 23 2011 21:57 karpo wrote: Just reading the thread title i could more or less figure out who would post in the thread and exactly what the arguments would be. Repeating the same tired old shit on this forum really wont change anything.
That's an awfully stubborn viewpoint. You don't want SC2 to improve as a game?
I want it to improve but i don't really see the benefit of complaining time and time again about the same stuff in this forum. Add to that the fact that many BW fans are very rigid in what they want and how things should be and we have this SC2 vs BW debate over and over. Neither SC2 or BW fans are being objective and people want different things so there's no progress to be had.
Just want to say Ver is absolutely right about this. There is so much truth in his statement that blizzard should really be mailed a copy of it.
BW is like real war. Huge armies, many battles, many fronts. You don't get clusterfucks of units going at it once, and then the winner emerges (and it's usually gg). That is because in BW most of your units will end up sitting at the back doing nothing at all if you do so.
So the idea is to get as large a concave as possible...if someone tried to deathball their army against a person concaving on many fronts, they will get owned. And if it's impossible to break that deathball due to insane range/high ground by concaving you can always send task forces to take out their expansions.
Deathballing may possibly win you the battle but will lose the war - the enemy will simply remacro and own your deathball in the time it takes to cross the map.
I honestly fail to understand who enjoys this ball vs ball combat. Extreme lethality + smaller maps + low number of bases (well, not for zerg, but you can march into his main...) = boring game.
On November 23 2011 22:29 shadymmj wrote: I honestly fail to understand who enjoys this ball vs ball combat.
I honestly fail to understand who watches professional SC2 in late 2011 and sees ball vs ball combat.
Why is it that SC2 players are expected to put up with pages and pages of terrible BW comparisons and vitriol calling SC2 a "lower standard" and "inferior" and "boring"? Because it seems anyone doing the same in the BW forums concerning SC2 would be verbally disemboweled within seconds.
I think these always end up being terrible threads that are nothing more than subjective opinion being rationalized with nonsensical argumentation and faux evidence. They are nothing but flamebait and result in nothing but circular arguments.
Post your subjective thoughts on the game on your blog, please.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
starcraft still has years and years to get to that level where people will know that they can do to be active and not get in a disadvantage because of it
On November 23 2011 13:00 memcpy wrote: There's always something each player can do to gain advantages during a game, even during late game stalemates. For example, in ZvZ player can use burrowed infestors to sneak into mineral lines and in TvT players can use cloaked ghosts and drops to bypass tank lines. As Starcraft 2 continues to develop, players who are able to use harassment and small engagements will come out on top. The current style of sitting back and macroing while waiting for a large engagement works because both players are playing passively. As overall player skill and game understanding rises I feel like we will see more engagements and harass from both sides in order to gain minor advantages which will eventually snowball into a victory. Just remember how people played back in beta. No drops in TvP, basically every game was a 1 base timing attack, no infestor harass, etc.
Basically, once the matchups are more developed and players can no longer win by turtling all game long there will be more action.
This wins the thread (having read like 10 replies!).
This "issue" is related to the one where people claim apm doesn't really matter in SC2. To grasp why it does matter as much as in BW, you need to understand how many different, often small, things you can do during a game to gain an advantage of varying magnitude. The reason we aren't seeing as many small skirmishes etc. at this point can be attributed to: 1. Lack of complete knowledge of the game. People believe they'll fall behind too much to win if they screw up some harassment by falling behind in macro while doing it or just performing it poorly in general. This leads to many people afraid of doing anything at all. 2. People don't know which harassment styles are cost effective or they can't make them cost effective. For instance we're starting to see a lot more sentry drops now which was believed to be too risky/ineffective before. 3. Too low apm to perform effective harassment while still maintaining perfect macro. Only a select few players master this in SC2 at the moment.
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa8xMv5fhQo
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
Idra vs Puma (ZvT), (who both played BW) on Tal'Darim Altar at IEM had a lot of drops and action around the map. I wish I could find the Live VOD rather than this re-broadcast:
On November 23 2011 22:29 shadymmj wrote: I honestly fail to understand who enjoys this ball vs ball combat.
I honestly fail to understand who watches professional SC2 in late 2011 and sees ball vs ball combat.
Why is it that SC2 players are expected to put up with pages and pages of terrible BW comparisons and vitriol calling SC2 a "lower standard" and "inferior" and "boring"? Because it seems anyone doing the same in the BW forums concerning SC2 would be verbally disemboweled within seconds.
I think these always end up being terrible threads that are nothing more than subjective opinion being rationalized with nonsensical argumentation and faux evidence. They are nothing but flamebait and result in nothing but circular arguments.
Post your subjective thoughts on the game on your blog, please.
I watch sc2 streams all the time, and I still see it. I think SC2 players just compare it to how SC2 was before. Its mostly still ball vs ball, just not as much. You really need to look at BW games as see how substantially different we are talking about.
Can people post some SC2 vods and I bet I can point out what people mean. (Would prefer TvP, PvP, ZvP, ZvZ as this is what we are mostly referring to)
EDIT: Watching above. (Although TvT and TvZ is an exception due to tanks/banelings)
On November 23 2011 22:29 shadymmj wrote: I honestly fail to understand who enjoys this ball vs ball combat.
I honestly fail to understand who watches professional SC2 in late 2011 and sees ball vs ball combat. .
just about every game of sc2 i've seen has resulted in tightly packed hordes of units going at it, maybe with 1 drop happening on the side. of course the number of units may vary, but they are nevertheless tightly packed. this is of course discounting a player attacking into a perfectly set up defensive position.
The problem with SC2 lies more fundemental then expansions will fix it, the macro mechanics(such as warp gate,inject larvae, queens, double gasses, mules) and clumping AI are all reasons why the fights are looking as they are right now. These mechanics are not going to be removed, which is why I am skeptical.
On November 23 2011 22:29 shadymmj wrote: I honestly fail to understand who enjoys this ball vs ball combat.
I honestly fail to understand who watches professional SC2 in late 2011 and sees ball vs ball combat.
Why is it that SC2 players are expected to put up with pages and pages of terrible BW comparisons and vitriol calling SC2 a "lower standard" and "inferior" and "boring"? Because it seems anyone doing the same in the BW forums concerning SC2 would be verbally disemboweled within seconds.
I think these always end up being terrible threads that are nothing more than subjective opinion being rationalized with nonsensical argumentation and faux evidence. They are nothing but flamebait and result in nothing but circular arguments.
Post your subjective thoughts on the game on your blog, please.
I watch sc2 streams all the time, and I still see it. I think SC2 players just compare it to how SC2 was before. Its mostly still ball vs ball, just not as much. You really need to look at BW games as see how substantially different we are talking about.
Can people post some SC2 vods and I bet I can point out what people mean. (Would prefer TvP, PvP, ZvP, ZvZ as this is what we are mostly referring to)
EDIT: Watching above. (Although TvT and TvZ is an exception due to tanks/banelings)
Cherry picking matchups are we. Look at the common factor in most of the matchups you want, PROTOSS. One could say it's more of a problem with the race but you extrapolate it to extend to all races?
I really really hate it when people compare the obviously more balanced and figured out BW with the new SC2. SC2 has also great aggressive play but even if it's not that good you always have to differ BW which has been played for a decade now AND is a completely other game than SC2 which is not even 1 1/2 years old. It's just stupid.
On November 23 2011 20:23 haflo wrote: And you know what , if you are at it . How many international viewers does BW has ? how many international pro-gamers ? I think idra streaming has more viewers then OSL . Only place BW still alive is Korea , and thats in decline as well . you know time is a harsh mistress .
How much money do you think Blizzard has spent promoting SC2 compared to BW?
I don't think that's very relevant. Impossible to say but starcraft is such a strong brand in itself that sc2 would probably done fine without very much pr from Blizzard.
It's hugely relevant. Do you think SC2 would be nearly as popular if GSL was Korean only with no outside promotion like OSL? Would the GSL even exist in the same form it does today without support from Blizzard? Money talks and ignoring that factor is just as ridiculous as any of the other biased comparisons people like to make.
On November 23 2011 23:02 Fleshcut wrote: I really really hate it when people compare the obviously more balanced and figured out BW with the new SC2. SC2 has also great aggressive play but even if it's not that good you always have to differ BW which has been played for a decade now AND is a completely other game than SC2 which is not even 1 1/2 years old. It's just stupid.
I disagree that SC2 is more passive, or that BW is more aggressive, but I think that the battles just last much longer in BW. With very good micro and smart tactics you can make units last for a ridiculous amount of time against strong opponents. This may be a reason why BW may feel more "aggressive".
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: Idra vs Puma (ZvT), (who both played BW) on Tal'Darim Altar at IEM had a lot of drops and action around the map. I wish I could find the Live VOD rather than this re-broadcast: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIw4lz6ka7o
Fast forwarded to 27 mins and what do I see...yes, the infamous broodlord/infestor ball going against the terran marine tank viking ball. The winner of this battle...
...surprise, goes on to win the game shortly after.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
Absolutely vital mistake to make, flash and fantasy have been playing / played BW for 10+ years, whereas boxer and rain have only played sc2 for 1. When sc2 is 10 years old you will see even more harassment / moving about that flash and fantasy did in this game.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
Absolutely vital mistake to make, flash and fantasy have been playing / played BW for 10+ years, whereas boxer and rain have only played sc2 for 1. When sc2 is 10 years old you will see even more harassment / moving about that flash and fantasy did in this game.
Kobe Bryant has been playing basketball for years. Little Timmy on his 7th grade basketball team has only been playing for a few months. Timmy might be amazing in 10 years but for now he can't even dunk. In what universe does it make sense for more people to be watching Timmy than Kobe?
you can throw away your army fairly easy in bw with it looking awesome if the opponent isn't paying attention, and even if you lose your army you had reproduced alot by then to hold up the push at the next ramp, since the opponent reinforcement took a long time. Sc2 is faster, throwing away your army less effective and reproducing is a bit faster as well. And your opponent not paying attention to the army is almost never gonna happen in sc2. So you want to get the opponent off guard. Because the attacker is clumping and well aoes beat that sort of move pretty heavily attacking directly is often not a wise idea. In bw it was no problem to hold a good position against a full army with only half of your units. In sc2 well unit army is 1/2 of that of bw. (tank for example is 1/3 as good as in bw x3 supply wise against light units).
Basically a moving units and hoping them to hit something undefended like in bw doesn't work to get the opponent away from the main army long enough.
And i have seen alot of foreign bw tournaments, when sc2 was announced and gave bw another boost. Most of the games went cut the map in half and mine out. Try a bit of harass etc, but the frontline never really moved, though one side threw their whole army into an attack pushed the opponent back then got cleared and pushed away again. The maps effectively did that sort of map divide, because you could split the map in half with all your units, leaving no path past the army. Bit hard to do that in sc2. Well bw mapmakers managed to make maps though where its almost impossible to defend everything, you basically have your save expansions, but then there are those that are not save and you can't let the opponent take them (so they always send their reproduction around knowing they will always do enough damage and trade atleast enough to not get overrun). In sc2 you can have 70 workers on 3 bases and its still quiet okay for mining, in bw it was a lil different especially for the utterly needed gas. Gold expansions should lurr players outside on the map for an advantage, but sadly they are to strong early game in a few matchups.
So in bw basically the maps made bw look that way, while the first maps made bw look like sc2 and even more extreme. (especially blue storm was a map that was mined out before any engagement happened lol)
Maybe it will happen in sc2 too. Maybe we will end up with 1 geyir and 6 patches as normal expansions (even the main). Saying: go out there and take the damned 4th or you are screwed eco wise. (don't scream about gas starvation, i even see alot of toss with overgas in macro games). Mules would have to get 3/4 times effective, which would mean mapmaker made nerf, which is pretty scary ground. Though in bw people changed the editor as well so they could make large ramps and minerals on minerals or more the one destructable building on top of each other..
Lets just wait and see. One change is removing golds that has happened lately, though adding rocks there would have solved the problem with them. Its a try and error system the maps go through, every try revealing new information <3.
PS: i play more bw, then sc2 and i like bw for how it works. But sc2 is also really interesting for how it works and for me personally more challenging then bw. (except eco wise, eco wise sc2 is a bit too simply, but maybe thats why the rest is so much more challenging and fun)
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
Absolutely vital mistake to make, flash and fantasy have been playing / played BW for 10+ years, whereas boxer and rain have only played sc2 for 1. When sc2 is 10 years old you will see even more harassment / moving about that flash and fantasy did in this game.
Kobe Bryant has been playing basketball for years. Little Timmy on his 7th grade basketball team has only been playing for a few months. Timmy might be amazing in 10 years but for now he can't even dunk. In what universe does it make sense for more people to be watching Timmy than Kobe? That's basically the situation you're describing.
just pointing out, this analogy would only make sense if starcraft 2 and brood war were the same games, just as Kobe and Timmy are playing the same sport (basketball).
Fast forwarded to 27 mins and what do I see...yes, the infamous broodlord/infestor ball going against the terran marine tank viking ball. The winner of this battle...
...surprise, goes on to win the game shortly after.
Holy shit, you fast forwarded to minute 27 of a 30 minute game and saw the final battle? Amazing!
It's great that no other engagements happened in the preceding 27 minutes, or otherwise your point would be really dumb.
On November 23 2011 22:29 shadymmj wrote: I honestly fail to understand who enjoys this ball vs ball combat.
I honestly fail to understand who watches professional SC2 in late 2011 and sees ball vs ball combat.
Why is it that SC2 players are expected to put up with pages and pages of terrible BW comparisons and vitriol calling SC2 a "lower standard" and "inferior" and "boring"? Because it seems anyone doing the same in the BW forums concerning SC2 would be verbally disemboweled within seconds.
I think these always end up being terrible threads that are nothing more than subjective opinion being rationalized with nonsensical argumentation and faux evidence. They are nothing but flamebait and result in nothing but circular arguments.
Post your subjective thoughts on the game on your blog, please.
I watch sc2 streams all the time, and I still see it. I think SC2 players just compare it to how SC2 was before. Its mostly still ball vs ball, just not as much. You really need to look at BW games as see how substantially different we are talking about.
Can people post some SC2 vods and I bet I can point out what people mean. (Would prefer TvP, PvP, ZvP, ZvZ as this is what we are mostly referring to)
EDIT: Watching above. (Although TvT and TvZ is an exception due to tanks/banelings)
Cherry picking matchups are we. Look at the common factor in most of the matchups you want, PROTOSS. One could say it's more of a problem with the race but you extrapolate it to extend to all races?
Huh? Go read the first post in this thread, or Ver's post (who made a similar statement, but much better written). To re-iterate I never really had a problem with TvZ, TvT, obviously I don't think it is as good as BW though.
The common factor is matchups without tanks, hence defenders advantage, secure positioning allowing you to make risky investments such as drops, pressure and odd tech play without getting 1a steamrolled. Most games in SC2 devolve into very passive play in every other matchup other than TvZ and TvT, which is what I said to not give me replays of.
Go look at the developed matchups poll, have you noticed that the only voted matchups are TvZ and TvT? But look at the reasoning, it is less of a poll of development (because seriously what does that mean?), than volatility and boringness.
Fast forwarded to 27 mins and what do I see...yes, the infamous broodlord/infestor ball going against the terran marine tank viking ball. The winner of this battle...
...surprise, goes on to win the game shortly after.
Holy shit, you fast forwarded to minute 27 of a 30 minute game and saw the final battle? Amazing!
It's great that no other engagements happened in the preceding 27 minutes, or otherwise your point would be really dumb.
Sounds like the video of someone doing something really nice, but they don't show the part where this someone wakes up from this nightmare and beats up the one responsible for the bad dream. And i know this is stolen.
Can someone show me a game where a TvP, PvZ, PvP or ZvZ didn't end in a single decisive engagement? Very rarely do we get even trades. Very rarely does the person winning the engagement decisively lose the game.
On November 23 2011 23:24 Micket wrote: Can someone show me a game where a TvP, PvZ, PvP or ZvZ didn't end in a single decisive engagement? Very rarely do we get even trades. Very rarely does the person winning the engagement decisively lose the game.
TvP you can watch any game on Calm before the storm, Thorzain vs MC on Tal'Darim in TSL3 ZvP you can watch any Stephano games
Fast forwarded to 27 mins and what do I see...yes, the infamous broodlord/infestor ball going against the terran marine tank viking ball. The winner of this battle...
...surprise, goes on to win the game shortly after.
Holy shit, you fast forwarded to minute 27 of a 30 minute game and saw the final battle? Amazing!
It's great that no other engagements happened in the preceding 27 minutes, or otherwise your point would be really dumb.
u can watch a lot of other engagements (but i do not have the time), but really the single, decisive engagement is the most infamous ball in the game vs the 2nd most infamous ball in the game...
i did not say sc2 lacks harassment or all game action. clearly that is possible the way the game is built. it's just such that the key battles are usually ball vs ball combat.
Fast forwarded to 27 mins and what do I see...yes, the infamous broodlord/infestor ball going against the terran marine tank viking ball. The winner of this battle...
...surprise, goes on to win the game shortly after.
Holy shit, you fast forwarded to minute 27 of a 30 minute game and saw the final battle? Amazing!
It's great that no other engagements happened in the preceding 27 minutes, or otherwise your point would be really dumb.
I watched the whole vod, honestly if this is how much SC2 has developed its not that much different to how I remember it. Its actually more passive than when I remember watching MKP during his Foxer days (coz that was awesome). I made a mistake mentioning ball vs ball play (getting confused here), I mean the whole vod was mostly ball vs ball, but that's offtopic.
I should be talking about the OP's point on passiveness so I will do that.
I think this is more of a misunderstanding, no matter what we say it really requires SC2 players to watch BW vods to understand what we mean. Most of us have watched lots of SC2, I have because my friends talk about it all the time. I initially played BW after first hearing about SC2, I then played SC2 for a while and was taking games off GM players on SEA at the time, then went back to BW.
However the passiveness is inherent in the game design. In simple terms, without more immobile area locking units, we won't get squad based play because as soon as you lose a small supply of units that gives a massive advantage to the other player.
Without units with high utility, we won't get cool aggressive strategies like the bisu build or skterran, just gimmicky ones mostly that only work a few times when the other player doesn't expect it. TvZ is always marine/tank, TvZ in BW comes in many different flavours even at the highest level (and they all work effectively), skterran (just bio units), 2 port wraith (Open with Wraiths into SKTerran), +1 marine goliath, bionic (marine tank), heavy metal (pure mech), fantasy (valkyrie + mech), Valkonic (Valkyrie + SKTerran). Its not like there's a standard that everyone plays, it depends on metagame (Flash switches it up A LOT), and the players (Fantasy prefers meching a lot more than other Terrans).
Without BW/Warcraft III pathing, tactics will be extremely limited because your army is almost 100% efficient at most stages of the game, and declumping while moving across the map is almost impossible and also pointless when that leaves you open to be flanked when you aren't paying attention. When you see banelings or storms you split, sure, but as soon as that's over you clump again.
Its just in the game design, I think Hots has the right idea, but they executed it wrong. I don't see the value of a swarm host as a defensive area locking unit. Its attack doesn't make sense in order to achieve that. Protoss needs air control to execute drops, fine, but having an air colossus with a very tight role is the wrong way to go about it. I don't see the point in shredders having supply, now Terran armies will be even tinier and be less inclined to attack. Nothing wrong with infinite shredders, spidermines did 125 damage and were basically free.
Fine, fine, I enjoy watching BW more than watching SC2. But that doesn't stop me from watching MLG streams or going to Barcrafts (which have been all SC2 events so far around where I live), because SC2 is fun to watch too. It's a similar but different game.
I'm not even going to dare comment about game mechanics or design any more. Quoting a couple videos prove nothing against a pool of other million videos. I have my personal opinions regarding each issue, but there's no point trying to fully defend myself against extremely narrow minded people ready to nitpick at the smallest flaw in argument or even grammar mistakes. You can't even compare these games together on "statistics" unless you take into account the population difference, cultural shifts in multiple regions around the world, change in public perception, rise in popularity, etc. See? Why bother arguing with a little video as your "universal proof?" + Show Spoiler +
All that being said, I'm just going to say this. OGN is casting BW, so I will watch BW. If OGN starts casting SC2, I will watch SC2. Commentating is critical to my spectator experience, and no other caster/duo/combo/rotation comes remotely near the quality and excitement provided by OGN commentators.
Kivikaki vs stephano is not your average game of sc2 so please don't show such games to make a point. The average game is ball vs ball with one 200/200 battle and after that the game ends.
However, in TVP things are not exactly like this anymore. Just watch some games of Killer and see his awesome pvt with multiple 200/200 battles.
On November 23 2011 23:15 FeyFey wrote: you can throw away your army fairly easy in bw with it looking awesome if the opponent isn't paying attention, and even if you lose your army you had reproduced alot by then to hold up the push at the next ramp, since the opponent reinforcement took a long time. Sc2 is faster, throwing away your army less effective and reproducing is a bit faster as well. And your opponent not paying attention to the army is almost never gonna happen in sc2. So you want to get the opponent off guard. Because the attacker is clumping and well aoes beat that sort of move pretty heavily attacking directly is often not a wise idea. In bw it was no problem to hold a good position against a full army with only half of your units. In sc2 well unit army is 1/2 of that of bw. (tank for example is 1/3 as good as in bw x3 supply wise against light units).
Basically a moving units and hoping them to hit something undefended like in bw doesn't work to get the opponent away from the main army long enough.
And i have seen alot of foreign bw tournaments, when sc2 was announced and gave bw another boost. Most of the games went cut the map in half and mine out. Try a bit of harass etc, but the frontline never really moved, though one side threw their whole army into an attack pushed the opponent back then got cleared and pushed away again. The maps effectively did that sort of map divide, because you could split the map in half with all your units, leaving no path past the army. Bit hard to do that in sc2. Well bw mapmakers managed to make maps though where its almost impossible to defend everything, you basically have your save expansions, but then there are those that are not save and you can't let the opponent take them (so they always send their reproduction around knowing they will always do enough damage and trade atleast enough to not get overrun). In sc2 you can have 70 workers on 3 bases and its still quiet okay for mining, in bw it was a lil different especially for the utterly needed gas. Gold expansions should lurr players outside on the map for an advantage, but sadly they are to strong early game in a few matchups.
So in bw basically the maps made bw look that way, while the first maps made bw look like sc2 and even more extreme. (especially blue storm was a map that was mined out before any engagement happened lol)
Maybe it will happen in sc2 too. Maybe we will end up with 1 geyir and 6 patches as normal expansions (even the main). Saying: go out there and take the damned 4th or you are screwed eco wise. (don't scream about gas starvation, i even see alot of toss with overgas in macro games). Mules would have to get 3/4 times effective, which would mean mapmaker made nerf, which is pretty scary ground. Though in bw people changed the editor as well so they could make large ramps and minerals on minerals or more the one destructable building on top of each other..
Lets just wait and see. One change is removing golds that has happened lately, though adding rocks there would have solved the problem with them. Its a try and error system the maps go through, every try revealing new information <3.
PS: i play more bw, then sc2 and i like bw for how it works. But sc2 is also really interesting for how it works and for me personally more challenging then bw. (except eco wise, eco wise sc2 is a bit too simply, but maybe thats why the rest is so much more challenging and fun)
But no one is listening, everyone does like blizz says, whats the problem of cutting 1 gayser and putting rich vespene instead of 2? whats the problem of taking out the towers to make the game more exciting for everyone (at least try and show us results).
On November 23 2011 23:15 FeyFey wrote: you can throw away your army fairly easy in bw with it looking awesome if the opponent isn't paying attention, and even if you lose your army you had reproduced alot by then to hold up the push at the next ramp, since the opponent reinforcement took a long time. Sc2 is faster, throwing away your army less effective and reproducing is a bit faster as well. And your opponent not paying attention to the army is almost never gonna happen in sc2. So you want to get the opponent off guard. Because the attacker is clumping and well aoes beat that sort of move pretty heavily attacking directly is often not a wise idea. In bw it was no problem to hold a good position against a full army with only half of your units. In sc2 well unit army is 1/2 of that of bw. (tank for example is 1/3 as good as in bw x3 supply wise against light units).
Basically a moving units and hoping them to hit something undefended like in bw doesn't work to get the opponent away from the main army long enough.
And i have seen alot of foreign bw tournaments, when sc2 was announced and gave bw another boost. Most of the games went cut the map in half and mine out. Try a bit of harass etc, but the frontline never really moved, though one side threw their whole army into an attack pushed the opponent back then got cleared and pushed away again. The maps effectively did that sort of map divide, because you could split the map in half with all your units, leaving no path past the army. Bit hard to do that in sc2. Well bw mapmakers managed to make maps though where its almost impossible to defend everything, you basically have your save expansions, but then there are those that are not save and you can't let the opponent take them (so they always send their reproduction around knowing they will always do enough damage and trade atleast enough to not get overrun). In sc2 you can have 70 workers on 3 bases and its still quiet okay for mining, in bw it was a lil different especially for the utterly needed gas. Gold expansions should lurr players outside on the map for an advantage, but sadly they are to strong early game in a few matchups.
So in bw basically the maps made bw look that way, while the first maps made bw look like sc2 and even more extreme. (especially blue storm was a map that was mined out before any engagement happened lol)
Maybe it will happen in sc2 too. Maybe we will end up with 1 geyir and 6 patches as normal expansions (even the main). Saying: go out there and take the damned 4th or you are screwed eco wise. (don't scream about gas starvation, i even see alot of toss with overgas in macro games). Mules would have to get 3/4 times effective, which would mean mapmaker made nerf, which is pretty scary ground. Though in bw people changed the editor as well so they could make large ramps and minerals on minerals or more the one destructable building on top of each other..
Lets just wait and see. One change is removing golds that has happened lately, though adding rocks there would have solved the problem with them. Its a try and error system the maps go through, every try revealing new information <3.
PS: i play more bw, then sc2 and i like bw for how it works. But sc2 is also really interesting for how it works and for me personally more challenging then bw. (except eco wise, eco wise sc2 is a bit too simply, but maybe thats why the rest is so much more challenging and fun)
But no one is listening, everyone does like blizz says, whats the problem of cutting 1 gayser and putting rich vespene instead of 2? whats the problem of taking out the towers to make the game more exciting for everyone (at least try and show us results).
Xel Naga towers will never disappear. Dustin Browder came up with it, and you could tell he loved them because he would talk about them constantly in the Alpha casts when they didn't affect the game at all.
"And now... these are the Xel Naga watchtowers... they are key in battle, oh look hes using the xel naga watchtowers, if he doesn't use the xel naga watchtowers, blah blah blah" and I'm like "dude, nobody cares".
I'm not so sure that passiveness directly coordinates with lack of fighting. To me, passiveness is turtling up, and showing no attempts to expand, drop, or poke at your opponent. I'd say a game is passive when both players sit on 2 base and eventually taking a 3rd. All the while not moving about scouting or harrasing. Even if a game doesn't have major battles all the time, personally I feel as if there can still be aggression.
What interests me most in these debates is the attempts to compare date/times when it comes to the respective games. People saying you can't compare because BW has been played for 10 years, and SC2 needs to develop, or you can't compare before the first expansion, etc, or they need a similar number of balance patches (even though I'm pretty sure sc2 has already had more than bw)
SC2 was announced in 2007. They started planning SC2 after War3, but according to Blizzard was put on hold in 2005 for WoW. So it's reasonable to assume that the real development began in 2006 and finished in 2009/10.
At this point BW was at the height of its esport popularity. Everything during the design of SC2 and everything that preceded it are things they could have drawn on in the development of the sequel. For that reason I would never compare any previous version of Starcraft to SC2 as if they had to restart from point A, because that's a lie. You don't take multiple steps back when you design a game, were that the case would we compare every FPS game to Wolfenstein? Competitive ones would surely be compared to Quake 3 at the height if its popularity. They wouldn't be expected to be released in a worse state and then have people defend its honor and say it needs several years to go from Q3test or even before that to Q3 at whatever point it was at its most competitive.
The first Korean tournaments and leagues popped up in 2000, 1.5 years after BW was even released. Comparatively SC2 tournaments began before the game was even released. For some reason this never factors into discussion either. At what point did all our gaming minds turn to figuring out the most optimal builds and when did competition factor into how we look at the game and the drive to be better? People certainly played SC1 competitively before that, if only for honor and to settle shit talking on disputes on bnet. You can find battlereports of people playing vanilla, but when did "esports" for Starcraft truly begin? Isn't that a good timeline to use in comparing the games? Apparently that's how many people think SC2 works, at some point we will have played enough hours of the highest level play that it will evolve to a similar level of brood war, as if it's foregone that that capacity is already built into the game and we haven't unlocked it yet.
If someone wanted to really plot the games they could look at the number of high level competitions in BW over the years (starting at maybe the kor scene start in the 2000s) and the number we've had in SC2. With the sheer volume of tournaments in SC2 I think we would be surprised where their timelines would match up. A couple events every year vs a couple events every month. Does the amount of competition in a game drive innovation in how it's played? Would we catch up that way?
Ultimately I think the timeline debate and when/how SC2 will magically catch up to BW is a stupid one, there might be something to be gleaned from it but it seems like no one is really interested in tackling it with any sort of logical approach. They simply say "BW is older, therefore SC2 will become better when it's as old" which just makes no sense to me at all. To me that's willful ignorance, expecting everything to sort itself out after a given amount of time.
On November 23 2011 23:47 ronpaul012 wrote: I'm not so sure that passiveness directly coordinates with lack of fighting. To me, passiveness is turtling up, and showing no attempts to expand, drop, or poke at your opponent. I'd say a game is passive when both players sit on 2 base and eventually taking a 3rd. All the while not moving about scouting or harrasing. Even if a game doesn't have major battles all the time, personally I feel as if there can still be aggression.
You should argue within the context of the OP though, its not about definition, its about the concept itself.
why do people compare a 10year old game with a 1year old game? it's obvios the younger one can't be played as spectacular like the older one ... in a few years we'll see, if SC2 can prove itself as the best RTS or not
On November 23 2011 23:52 gulden wrote: why do people compare a 10year old game with a 1year old game? it's obvios the younger one can't be played as spectacular like the older one ... in a few years we'll see, if SC2 can prove itself as the best RTS or not
I think this is what the majority of posters are doing. Not even following the discussion (seriously read the post 2 above yours). Which is partly why nothing ever comes out of it.
If you ask me, the problem is protoss warpin/cliffwalk/etc messing up with defender's advantage. As for ZvZ, it is infinitely better then Muta balls already and is not too far from sc1 pvp (which IS mostly ball vs ball one battle game, plus perhaps a dropped revear)....
On November 23 2011 23:52 gulden wrote: why do people compare a 10year old game with a 1year old game? it's obvios the younger one can't be played as spectacular like the older one ... in a few years we'll see, if SC2 can prove itself as the best RTS or not
I bet that when sc2 will have 9 years and people (may) complain about it there will be one dude like you that will say, "hey, why do you compare a 10 year old game with a 9 year old one".
Also, IF NO ONE IS COMPLAINING NOTHING WILL GET FIXED. so shut the f up, it's called feedback.
When blizzard said "we did not get anyone complaining that they want name changing enabled so we did not see any reason to do so" you were all "WTF?"
So, it's a good thing that people talk about what can be done better in this game, because this is how it can evolve. I don't want the community to listen to Dustin Bowder but vicerversa since we are the ones that make esports happen.
On November 23 2011 23:52 gulden wrote: why do people compare a 10year old game with a 1year old game? it's obvios the younger one can't be played as spectacular like the older one ... in a few years we'll see, if SC2 can prove itself as the best RTS or not
I think this is what the majority of posters are doing. Not even following the discussion (seriously read the post 2 above yours). Which is partly why nothing ever comes out of it.
There is a point, where every point was made 100times. It's everytime the same, "we missing this, and that from BW". It's good to give a feedback to the developers, so they know, what the community wants, but whining all the time will never make SC2 a better game. It's just a lack of acceptance and patience. I'm very optimistic and see SC2 esport be a lot better in a few years.
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa8xMv5fhQo
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
Idra vs Puma (ZvT), (who both played BW) on Tal'Darim Altar at IEM had a lot of drops and action around the map. I wish I could find the Live VOD rather than this re-broadcast: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIw4lz6ka7o
Watching how sick both games were (the bw still was much better, and i'm a sc2 guy, barelly saw some bw pro games), i do not get how the hell we still using small maps like metalopolis, shattered temple or xel naga caverns (ok for beta, but we have to evolve into serious back and forth games).
Btw, i again say it. I'm a Sc2 player, barelly saw some bw pro games, and still im amazed by how superior bw is; and also makes me so sad how Dustin Browder seems to hate the comparison (tl interview) and do not want to take the best design facts from bw into sc2.
The mechanics of the game are still far from finished. WoL hasn't even been fully balanced yet and HotS is coming along to throw that all up in the air again, so we'll see how things go on that front if it makes or breaks what's up right now. Furthermore, there is still LotV to toss is all up again! (Excuse the pun.) Also, the time thing is still too young for the game. It's just not a trope that we fall back on, it's an actual fact on the level of play and the type of play that the meta game hold for the pro at the moment. I'm sure at lower level play(eg. my level) it's plenty active and crazy, but just because we haven't shifted that meta game yet either and don't know what the fuck we're doing. Some pro play is still being conservative on the fact that foreigners don't have a safety net salary if they lose a game or rank low in a tournament so taking risks like that lead to epic but these kind of toss up games is out of the question in some play mentality. IMO
I wouldn't say the game itself is very passive. There are plenty of opportunities for aggression in every race for every player. I would probably rectify the question by answering that it would depend on the player. Are some players passive and like to turtle? Yes, most definitely. But there are plenty of players that live off hyper aggression, harassment, and frontal assault.
The more figured out a match-up gets the more attacking that will happen. Therefore the longer we play the game the more interesting the matches will become. Broodwar had 10 years, we have had 1 so give starcraft 2 a break. A child doesn't become an adult even if they have equivalent knowledge, it takes time.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
Please don't cite a TvT as a counter-point. It is well known that TvT is the most passive of all matchups because seige tanks kill ANYTHING within a massive range. Not refuting your point or anything, would just like to see a better example.
On November 23 2011 23:52 gulden wrote: why do people compare a 10year old game with a 1year old game? it's obvios the younger one can't be played as spectacular like the older one ... in a few years we'll see, if SC2 can prove itself as the best RTS or not
I bet that when sc2 will have 9 years and people (may) complain about it there will be one dude like you that will say, "hey, why do you compare a 10 year old game with a 9 year old one".
Also, IF NO ONE IS COMPLAINING NOTHING WILL GET FIXED. so shut the f up, it's called feedback.
When blizzard said "we did not get anyone complaining that they want name changing enabled so we did not see any reason to do so" you were all "WTF?"
So, it's a good thing that people talk about what can be done better in this game, because this is how it can evolve. I don't want the community to listen to Dustin Bowder but vicerversa since we are the ones that make esports happen.
Then how about giving feedback to blizzard instead of posting on teamliquid? Posting it to them directly has way more chance they actually read it. But nooooo, every week we get a thread how starcraft 2 sux compared to brood war and while i don't really disagree we know it by now and go tell it to blizzard for a change.
Coming from very low level to a reasonable one in sc2, the game gets less and less passive the better I get, so I don't have any doubt that in 10years if the game is still going strong like BW did people will evolve.
On November 23 2011 23:49 floor exercise wrote: What interests me most in these debates is the attempts to compare date/times when it comes to the respective games. People saying you can't compare because BW has been played for 10 years, and SC2 needs to develop, or you can't compare before the first expansion, etc, or they need a similar number of balance patches (even though I'm pretty sure sc2 has already had more than bw)
SC2 was announced in 2007. They started planning SC2 after War3, but according to Blizzard was put on hold in 2005 for WoW. So it's reasonable to assume that the real development began in 2006 and finished in 2009/10.
At this point BW was at the height of its esport popularity. Everything during the design of SC2 and everything that preceded it are things they could have drawn on in the development of the sequel. For that reason I would never compare any previous version of Starcraft to SC2 as if they had to restart from point A, because that's a lie. You don't take multiple steps back when you design a game, were that the case would we compare every FPS game to Wolfenstein? Competitive ones would surely be compared to Quake 3 at the height if its popularity. They wouldn't be expected to be released in a worse state and then have people defend its honor and say it needs several years to go from Q3test or even before that to Q3 at whatever point it was at its most competitive.
The first Korean tournaments and leagues popped up in 2000, 1.5 years after BW was even released. Comparatively SC2 tournaments began before the game was even released. For some reason this never factors into discussion either. At what point did all our gaming minds turn to figuring out the most optimal builds and when did competition factor into how we look at the game and the drive to be better? People certainly played SC1 competitively before that, if only for honor and to settle shit talking on disputes on bnet. You can find battlereports of people playing vanilla, but when did "esports" for Starcraft truly begin? Isn't that a good timeline to use in comparing the games? Apparently that's how many people think SC2 works, at some point we will have played enough hours of the highest level play that it will evolve to a similar level of brood war, as if it's foregone that that capacity is already built into the game and we haven't unlocked it yet.
If someone wanted to really plot the games they could look at the number of high level competitions in BW over the years (starting at maybe the kor scene start in the 2000s) and the number we've had in SC2. With the sheer volume of tournaments in SC2 I think we would be surprised where their timelines would match up. A couple events every year vs a couple events every month. Does the amount of competition in a game drive innovation in how it's played? Would we catch up that way?
Ultimately I think the timeline debate and when/how SC2 will magically catch up to BW is a stupid one, there might be something to be gleaned from it but it seems like no one is really interested in tackling it with any sort of logical approach. They simply say "BW is older, therefore SC2 will become better when it's as old" which just makes no sense to me at all. To me that's willful ignorance, expecting everything to sort itself out after a given amount of time.
Things will always evolve in a certain way if "everything will sort itself out" is just a question of definition. I agree that Sc2 will not magically become like BW given enough time because it's a different game with some marginal and some huge differences regarding game design. The argument of this thread is basically that Sc2 is too passive because of game design and it will never change in that regard but I think there is a fair chance that this might be wrong and others do as well that's why they refer to the time line of BW compared to Sc2. There is no way in denying the fact that Sc2 is still evolving strategy wise, balancing wise and map wise. We have seen a lot of improvement and a lot of the preconceptions people had about Sc2 were proven to be incorrect. We have seen a lot of threads of this nature in this forum: People were complaining that Starcraft 2 was too much about one basing, didn't require micro nor good mechanics. It's no good comparing two games in completely different states to one another without acknowledging the fact that those are two different games. If you want to make judgments about a game's perspective you have to look at the development going on and not just at it's current state compared to it's predecessor.
On November 23 2011 23:52 gulden wrote: why do people compare a 10year old game with a 1year old game? it's obvios the younger one can't be played as spectacular like the older one ... in a few years we'll see, if SC2 can prove itself as the best RTS or not
I bet that when sc2 will have 9 years and people (may) complain about it there will be one dude like you that will say, "hey, why do you compare a 10 year old game with a 9 year old one".
Also, IF NO ONE IS COMPLAINING NOTHING WILL GET FIXED. so shut the f up, it's called feedback.
When blizzard said "we did not get anyone complaining that they want name changing enabled so we did not see any reason to do so" you were all "WTF?"
So, it's a good thing that people talk about what can be done better in this game, because this is how it can evolve. I don't want the community to listen to Dustin Bowder but vicerversa since we are the ones that make esports happen.
Then how about giving feedback to blizzard instead of posting on teamliquid? Posting it to them directly has way more chance they actually read it. But nooooo, every week we get a thread how starcraft 2 sux compared to brood war and while i don't really disagree we know it by now and go tell it to blizzard for a change.
Why should we force ourselves to post on there website? Blizzard is the one that needs to catch up with the times and read fansites more instead of just there own website. Many developers are already doing that but Blizzard is the only one that is still just sticking to there forums for feedback which is generally a bad idea.
Ver has posted possibly the best post in all of this topic and should be commended as a quality poster because he did a wonderful job of bringing what everyone is talking about in SC2 that needs improvement into one neat post and clearly stated the facts and issues of what SC2 is currently experiencing.
On November 23 2011 12:52 neobowman wrote: All the matchups in SC2 tend to last until 200/200 in a macro game. This is because of various elements. You need more workers to saturate to a decent level, and there's 2 gas instead of one (twice as many gas miners). Units in SC2 also tend to cost more supply. Tanks cost 3 supply, Immortals cost 4, roaches cost 2. In BW, tanks costed 2 supply, I don't recall a massable 4 supply unit and the equivalent to roaches, hydras, were 1 supply.
In BW, the only matchup that regularly went to 200/200 is TvP.
I also think it has to do with the fact that units are just produced faster and supply is more inefficient. One of the fundamental flaws of sc2 IMO
Im happy that SC2 continues to evolve. A year ago i wasn't sure it would have the lasting power. I now believe it has the power to stay unless blizzard majorly screws it up in the expansions.
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.
This guy knows what's up. This is also why we see so many base trades in sc2, there's no reason to turn back when the army will kill a base in 5 seconds and the defender barely has an advantage.
Really good rule to follow like after I 3gate expand I push out with what I got send a zealot ahead of the army to see if I can get something done, if I can yay, if I can't retreat and push again soon when you have more units/tech.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
Funny that you are taking one of the most passive games in Sc2 history and comparing it to a action packed BW game.
Also the maps have a lot to do with how the game is played out. TvT on meta can easily become a map split (as seen in this game) While other maps allows for more multiharass play
Also if you want action packed games. Just watch any ZvZ out there. There's not much passivity in that matchup...
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
Please don't cite a TvT as a counter-point. It is well known that TvT is the most passive of all matchups because seige tanks kill ANYTHING within a massive range. Not refuting your point or anything, would just like to see a better example.
watch the game before you say anything.
a ball of siege tanks moving brainlessly across the map, or securing only one position, is asking to get owned. too many sieged tanks in one spot become vulnerable to doom drops of vultures+unsieged tanks, which forces you to mix in some goliaths. which are horrendous against tanks, but a necessity nonetheless.
this means that you have to spread out your tanks on several fronts, especially at chokes near expansions, and know when to drop correctly. this is one of the greatest positional games ever played by flash. i'm not really sure how he even won that...just chipping away at the southwest base while defending other areas seemed to take its toll on fantasy.
I think its because we are reaching SC2 skill ceiling and apart from positioning and small micro advantages there isn't much to distinguish the players.
On November 23 2011 23:52 gulden wrote: why do people compare a 10year old game with a 1year old game? it's obvios the younger one can't be played as spectacular like the older one ... in a few years we'll see, if SC2 can prove itself as the best RTS or not
I bet that when sc2 will have 9 years and people (may) complain about it there will be one dude like you that will say, "hey, why do you compare a 10 year old game with a 9 year old one".
Also, IF NO ONE IS COMPLAINING NOTHING WILL GET FIXED. so shut the f up, it's called feedback.
When blizzard said "we did not get anyone complaining that they want name changing enabled so we did not see any reason to do so" you were all "WTF?"
So, it's a good thing that people talk about what can be done better in this game, because this is how it can evolve. I don't want the community to listen to Dustin Bowder but vicerversa since we are the ones that make esports happen.
Then how about giving feedback to blizzard instead of posting on teamliquid? Posting it to them directly has way more chance they actually read it. But nooooo, every week we get a thread how starcraft 2 sux compared to brood war and while i don't really disagree we know it by now and go tell it to blizzard for a change.
Why should we force ourselves to post on there website? Blizzard is the one that needs to catch up with the times and read fansites more instead of just there own website. Many developers are already doing that but Blizzard is the only one that is still just sticking to there forums for feedback which is generally a bad idea.
Ver has posted possibly the best post in all of this topic and should be commended as a quality poster because he did a wonderful job of bringing what everyone is talking about in SC2 that needs improvement into one neat post and clearly stated the facts and issues of what SC2 is currently experiencing.
Why should you "force yourself"? Cause that is maybe how feedback works? give feedback to the people that can change, not the ones that can't. This is like yelling against a bus driver to change the traffic rules, sure the driver uses them but he can't do anything about it. Also, the reason that they should post there is because this thread is gone within a week and i doubt blizzard checks TL every single day. If you like Ver's post so much, make sure the actual developers can see it before it vanishes to the depths of the internet.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
lol i know what you are saying but there have been so many sc2 tvts where the action was crazy all game long. do you remember mvp vs bomber?
auto clumping and aoe feel like the biggest differences since you can move your entire army at once everything groups together an one or two well placed storms means it's gg as well it feels like there is a way bigger disparity in speed among units in sc2 from what I've seen of BW the players are constantly moving their armies around and fighting for position if one of them is in a bad position they can pull back and the other player can't charge in/blink in/surround with speedlings and prevent you from running since the units move at similar speeds. The worker gather rate is about the same between the two games since pathing and mineral placement is inferior in BW the works get to and from mineral patches quicker but macro occurs so much faster with warp in/reactor/injects and hot keying all your hatches etc to one key the players in some of the posted games were sitting at 150/200 with 2k/2k now you can spend 2k on 50 supply in seconds.
So why can BW posters get away with making these threads in our forums lambasting our game, but if we made the same threads complaining about how primitive the ai, ui and engine is in BW we'll get laughed out, our thread closed and thread deleted?
I think it's a combination of 1) metagame 2) unit availability 3) maps
1) The metagame is simple not figured out enough. People sort of know the 'timings' to pressure but if they get it wrong they pretty much lose the game, so most players are content to just sit back, macro up, and rely on their micro for the big battle, instead of risking a pressure timing. Most of the time things get thrown off in the early game, and people don't know how much they get thrown off yet, so any timing is a risk. As the metagame develops, people will start to figure out exactly how the timings play out for different styles a play and know what they can get away with, so the game will become more aggressive- and by aggressive I mean both offensively and economically.
2) Right now, they're is simply not that many units to work with in the early game. I mean, Terran does have a lot of unit, and they are pretty much the only race that can do cost effective pressure (no matter what) on one base. Think of TvT. It could be a 2rax or hellion drop or banshee ect... ZvZ and PvP is much more one dimensional. I think in the late game there's more options, and things get really interesting. The problem though is that:
3) the maps are really small compared to BW. Even Tal'darim altar, the main, natural, and third are so easy to defend and the attack paths are so small. It's hard to attack in different locations on, for example, metalopolis, when you contol the only two attack paths from the gold base. Sure you can do drops, but it doesn't take very long for units to go from the center to the bottom base (lings are fast, stimmed marines are fast, blink stalker/collo is fast...) so if you try to attack a location with a small force, you basically get killed by his entire army. In BW, sending a small portion of your army meant that the rest of your army could attack elsewhere, and it was IMPOSSIBLE for your opponent to send his entire army to deal with your small force, and then come back and deal with the rest of your army before you do too much damage. Attacking in multiple locations is so strong in BW that your opponent must defend in multiple locations at once by splitting his army. This creates a scenario where there are many small fights going on, and micro/macro/multitasking is much more rewarding.
SC2 is definitely going in the right direction though. Give it time.
EDIT: Everyone needs to chill out. CLEARLY a lot of you people didn't play/watch Brood War enough to know how awesome it was. I don't think OP was incredibly offensive towards SC2..he's just concerned. BW people need to RELAX about SC2 not being as awesome as BW because we're getting there, and it's not going to take the time it took for BW to become awesome and popular. Give it time folks...and enjoy the games that are still very entertaining. Like go watch MMA vs Oz, it was an amazingly diverse series.
On November 24 2011 01:19 Sandro wrote: So why can BW posters get away with making these threads in our forums lambasting our game, but if we made the same threads complaining about how primitive the ai, ui and engine is in BW we'll get laughed out, our thread closed and thread deleted?
because bw was made a decade ago using decade old technology. if we had a way to travel back in time and fix it, you might have a point. in comparison, almost all the major flaws in sc2 can be fixed quite easily using the powerful editor.
Can we please stop away from comparing a one year young sc2 that is only 1 3rd from the game it should be atm to a game that had soooo much time to get figured out. I still don't get why we talk so much about matchups getting figured out and people becoming good. At this point everyone still pretty much sucks and the game is still far away from being figured out. If you really want to compare to BW, atleast use BW games that were played a year after release, and not after years and years and a fully developed metagame. Wait till about 3 years after the fucking void is out, take a recent game and then you may start comparing bw, and even then I don't really get the point. Why is it so important that sc2 is like bw, it's a different game and should be treated as such. SC2 still has such a long road ahead of it, and it has developed much quicker thus far than bw. At this point a lot of makro games do look like maxing till 200 without a lot of action, go back one year and that looked different, jump ahead a year and it will look different as well. The beauty of a game like sc2 is a constantly evolving metagame, that even changes without any patch whatsoever. Give sc2 time, wait till we have the remaining 2 3rds of the full game and the matchups have actually been figured out and we have more than a bunch of players who actually look like they even know what they are doing most of the time.
On November 24 2011 01:19 Sandro wrote: So why can BW posters get away with making these threads in our forums lambasting our game, but if we made the same threads complaining about how primitive the ai, ui and engine is in BW we'll get laughed out, our thread closed and thread deleted?
Because the BW folks actually want SC2 to succeed and try to find issues with the current game that, when fixed, will make SC2 much more exciting and force BW out of the picture (at least, that would be my goal if I had the insight to make these threads). At this time I find BW much more exciting and most of these posts I find really interesting in finding out what core elements changed between the games and then debate if it would make SC2 better or if we can do without. What I dislike however is people not being open minded enough to consider it and just dismiss it saying BW is inferior, dead and old and that SC2 is so much better. Both games are great, different and SC2 could (and should) learn from its big brother to become a better game because that is what I want, a good game to take off where BW left.
On November 24 2011 01:06 TheBomb wrote: I think its because we are reaching SC2 skill ceiling and apart from positioning and small micro advantages there isn't much to distinguish the players.
Bullshit, we aren't remotely close to a skill ceiling and we are unlikely to ever approach one.
The great players are very easily distinguished from the good players.
It seems like everyone forgot the metagame history of BW.
We should keep a meta game history book so that when SC3 comes out we can show it to everyone who will say "SC3 sucks, it's just one base vs. one base! SC2 is so much better".
On November 24 2011 01:30 Steel wrote: EDIT: Everyone needs to chill out. CLEARLY a lot of you people didn't play/watch Brood War enough to know how awesome it was. I don't think OP was incredibly offensive towards SC2..he's just concerned. BW people need to RELAX about SC2 not being as awesome as BW because we're getting there, and it's not going to take the time it took for BW to become awesome and popular. Give it time folks...and enjoy the games that are still very entertaining. Like go watch MMA vs Oz, it was an amazingly diverse series.
I watched some BW, enough to know OP is talking about. However I question if OP watched or remembers what BW was like in 1999/2000.
On November 23 2011 23:52 gulden wrote: why do people compare a 10year old game with a 1year old game? it's obvios the younger one can't be played as spectacular like the older one ... in a few years we'll see, if SC2 can prove itself as the best RTS or not
I bet that when sc2 will have 9 years and people (may) complain about it there will be one dude like you that will say, "hey, why do you compare a 10 year old game with a 9 year old one".
Also, IF NO ONE IS COMPLAINING NOTHING WILL GET FIXED. so shut the f up, it's called feedback.
When blizzard said "we did not get anyone complaining that they want name changing enabled so we did not see any reason to do so" you were all "WTF?"
So, it's a good thing that people talk about what can be done better in this game, because this is how it can evolve. I don't want the community to listen to Dustin Bowder but vicerversa since we are the ones that make esports happen.
Then how about giving feedback to blizzard instead of posting on teamliquid? Posting it to them directly has way more chance they actually read it. But nooooo, every week we get a thread how starcraft 2 sux compared to brood war and while i don't really disagree we know it by now and go tell it to blizzard for a change.
Why should we force ourselves to post on there website? Blizzard is the one that needs to catch up with the times and read fansites more instead of just there own website. Many developers are already doing that but Blizzard is the only one that is still just sticking to there forums for feedback which is generally a bad idea.
Ver has posted possibly the best post in all of this topic and should be commended as a quality poster because he did a wonderful job of bringing what everyone is talking about in SC2 that needs improvement into one neat post and clearly stated the facts and issues of what SC2 is currently experiencing.
Why should you "force yourself"? Cause that is maybe how feedback works? give feedback to the people that can change, not the ones that can't. This is like yelling against a bus driver to change the traffic rules, sure the driver uses them but he can't do anything about it. Also, the reason that they should post there is because this thread is gone within a week and i doubt blizzard checks TL every single day. If you like Ver's post so much, make sure the actual developers can see it before it vanishes to the depths of the internet.
The problem is the drivel that exists on the BattleNet forums due to non-existent moderation.
Vers post would get completely drowned out by a new omfg imba threads that appears every 10 seconds. Not to mention the discourse that would continue from Silver players making stupid offtopic posts. Remember DROPZONE, I saw people actually say listen to this guy because Oooh hes in Gold league, even though he sounds like a guy with down syndrome (no offense to guys with down syndrome though).
On November 24 2011 02:09 Utinni wrote: Reopen this thread when the last expansion comes out please... not now.
This is actually my opInion
A few notes:
Armies aren't going to have their supply changed.
Games can be epic with fast paced aggression, but it relies on the players more than the game at this point.
The above is why the "Broodwar is way older" argument works out.
I think it's interesting that a new argument has come up about how bw people can make threads in our forums complaining but we can't in theirs.
I don't think it's neccesarily true, pathing and control groups is most certainly unnegotiable, there is no point in bringing it up.
Also, i feel that pvt has not been figured out to it's fullest extent, considering toss shud be able to go above 3 bases, but don't seem to be able to. The mirror matchups are all fine as far as I'm concerned, pvp and zvz im fine with microfests, and tvt mvp even said he doesn't think mech will be viable.
Thus, i feel armies to be large enough. We still have yet to see that terran who can safely transition to only mules mining, nor that zerg who, upon reaching a large amount of wealth, has enough apm to make a majority of his workers int spine crawlers, create 20-50 more supply of army and then can cancel the spines, thus giving him the army he needs. These things seem unreasonable, but if you play the game for a living, it could be attempted.
I feel starcraft 2 players are very passive. There are a lot of avenues for aggression and activity that aren't being used to their full potential, and generally they don't get used until blizzard patches it to make it twice as powerful.
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).
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.
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
As someone who doesn't belong to the "people who have spent lot of time with both games" (based on the date you joined and by reading your posts), you aren't getting the point.
Let me redefine what I mean about "success" - not in terms of popularity but quality. In this definition, Justin Bieber won't be considered as a musical "success". Not that SC2 is as bad as him but it's a success (according to your definition), it's dumbed down.
SC2 is popular because of the money put in and the hoards of people who have never seen BW before and all the foreigners from wc3 and bw who follow the money pumped in by -- Blizzard themselves. In BW, it was the korean companies themselves who became sponsors - because a game became something more. One of the reasons BW wasn't very popular outside of Korea is because people care more about graphics. Trust me, I've trie getting a lot of people to watch or play BW and the first thing they comment about is the graphics, before the gameplay.
And when I say SC2 is inferior. I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but, if you actually read what I posted without getting all hurt, as someone who wants SC2 to be better, to be the replacement so that everyone can enjoy something at the level (or even higher) of BW because it reaches a wider audience and has good graphics, instantly appealing to the casual gamer. Thing is, watching the direction they are taking makes me disappointed.
Oh ya and I didn't just waltz into a random SC2 thread and called it inferior like a troll. Read the OP please.
Edit: And I (and most people I'd suppose), will be very happy to be proven wrong that SC2 is inferior when the day comes.
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
The point is, the game is what it is. They designed it to be this way and given the popularity of the game can you say they are wrong? They chose not to make BW v 2.0 but a new game and some elements got left out along the way in favour of new elements.
On November 23 2011 13:12 Nizzy wrote: 1. Bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps. Stuff like twice the size of metalopolis. A map like Tal darim alter should be one of the smallest maps out there. This way 'ball armies' will simply fail, because you can only hit one part of their base, while if they hit you at multiple locations at once you'll probably lose. Because of big maps you would bring back the seige/perimeter lines. You would have zergs placing burrow banelings in areas to block off paths/swarm hosts for this as well. Warp gate for Protoss would be great here for them to warp into any base to protect it. The game would be so much better.
2. Take away the mass multi section of units. You don't have to limit it to 12 like in BW, however everything is in one big ball/ 1-3 control groups only. Maybe cap it at like 24-32 units or something. Units/armies would be WAY harder to control if you had to use like 6 hotkeys for a 200/200 army. It would put more skill back into the game. Way more IMO. Being able to select all of your units in 1 control group is so noob-ish. Even bad players might even agree to that.
3. Like TT1 kind of said in his post. The less casting units the better. Take away that stupid "get over here" thing from the viper. Less spells actually = more action. Having just 2-3 total spells per race actually makes them more exciting. TT1 also said each race having few spells to support the army, even though they're strong. They won't be as strong with armies separated around the map instead of a big ball.
Dumb Dustin Browder fails to realize. Sorry I'm calling him dumb, it's just I feel a sense of ignorance with his logic of 'this is the game I made, not the game you want' Dustin, we don't want these changes because it will be like BW. We want these changes because it will make the game a better RTS. It's already not like BW. The units are so much more fast paced IMO.
He said he's looking at ways to split those balls up. Start with those basic ones.
And those are the pretty much the best ideas I've ever heard of for SC2 (and I didn't even play BW), except #2. The ability to put an unlimited amount of units on a single hot key is important, and the map idea (#1) you have would break up the ball mechanics in itself.
There needs to be more units that control space and HOTS is attempting to address that, adding in the Shredder and the Swarm Host. Still Protoss is left out and the way the Colossus works mechanically and how it is countered. It thrives on ball mechanics and it also doesn't really control space at all. I remember a game between Inca and Nada (I think? I could be wrong but I remember it being the third game between them in a GSL semi finals) where Nada had a decent lead with Tanks + Marines and was slow pushing so Inca just marched around him with Colossus and forced him to unsiege and then wrecked his army with a much inferior force. Colossus are good all the time, but Tanks are a positional unit.
I hate casters too, and they often decide battles very quickly on their own.
As it has been said before. SC2 is still VERY young. I maintain full faith in that a few years, give or take, SC2 will grow much deeper in depth. There will be less ball vs ball battles. There will be new interesting strategies and tactics. And obviously, HOTS and LOTV will help expand the game as well.
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
The point is, the game is what it is. They designed it to be this way and given the popularity of the game can you say they are wrong? They chose not to make BW v 2.0 but a new game and some elements got left out along the way in favour of new elements.
Deserved insult.. whatever
The point is, what it is (currently)- is bad. Objectively by people who want it to be good. If a game that's good gets popular I assure you everyone will be happy about it. As for the elements that got left out in favour of new elements part .... imagine Slamball being a successor to Basketball instead of its current "UMS" status.
"I maintain that slamball is very young and after a few years of rule changing and more trampolines and more powerful trampolines added by Dustin Browder I'm confident that the game will be better."
Starcraft 2 is way more balanced in a general sense than Broodwar. Broodwar purely relies on control inabilities balancing each other out. Therefore the units in SC2 counter each other rather well and control becomes less important.
Starcraft 2 is way less figuered out. Generally you want to pressure an opponent whenever you have more units on the field. But with 90% of the strategies relying on not showing your hand to early right now, it becomes really hard to figure when one can be active.
Starcraft 2 has stronger macro mechanisms for income (mules, more workers, chronoboost, queens, faster flying buildings...) and for production (queens, chronooboost, reactors...). This leads to maxing out faster and that's why often it is better to play the game in the high supply. Also if you cut economy early in favor of units, it often snowballs very fast.
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.
Because people ignore good arguments when it doesn't match the way they want to see things. They also ignore the changes they see (like every successful protoss now using warp prisms and zealot suicide squads to harass bases) and the gameplay that has always been there (terrans using multiple drops to pick off targets with little risk). This thread would have had a point if it had been made 8 months ago when turtling on 2 bases for an invincible colossus/void ray ball won games, but not any longer.
I watched BW for 2 years and the typical game is far worse than the highlight games that people post to support their points in here. If anyone needs to refresh their memory, watch any of Canata's TvTs.
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.
Because people ignore good arguments when it doesn't match the way they want to see things. They also ignore the changes they see (like every successful protoss now using warp prisms and zealot suicide squads to harass bases) and the gameplay that has always been there (terrans using multiple drops to pick off targets with little risk). This thread would have had a point if it had been made 8 months ago when turtling on 2 bases for an invincible colossus/void ray ball won games, but not any longer.
I watched BW for 2 years and the typical game is far worse than the highlight games that people post to support their points in here. If anyone needs to refresh their memory, watch any of Canata's TvTs.
I haven't been following SC2 after losing interest on it but I for one am very happy to hear this if it's true and really taking over. However for now even playing SC2 still feels ... limiting.
And I don't get the scourge part. Harass doesn't stop after scourges are out.
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.
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.
Good question! I'm really not quite sure, everybody posting after Plexa just says "read Ver's post" and doesn't comment on Plexa's well thought out response. I don't think this thread is going anywhere though, we're just rehashing the same arguments over and over again.
It is however making me want to go back and watch some BW matches just to understand what the older folks here are talking about.
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.
Good question! I'm really not quite sure, everybody posting after Plexa just says "read Ver's post" and doesn't comment on Plexa's well thought out response. I don't think this thread is going anywhere though, we're just rehashing the same arguments over and over again.
It is however making me want to go back and watch some BW matches just to understand what the older folks here are talking about.
This thread doesn't make sense anyway. Everyone has random opinions
ZvT, ZvZ and TvT are not at all passive (not counting mech strategies, but I mean those were a part of BW as well). There is always constant harassment all game from (decent) terrans, and there are still a lot of Zerg harassment options as yet unexplored, especially with Heart of the Swarm on its way (assuming the Shredder won't make it in).
I don't think any Protoss matchup will ever really evolve beyond blob vs blob though, just because of the nature of warpgate instant response and instant aggression. When Protoss has mobile production (warp prism/probe building pylon), that raises a huge fucking exception to a lot of basic strategic concepts that dictate how one should defend in a given situation, and the amount of risk you can take offensively. Playing ZvP is why I think warpgate needs to go and honestly the Protoss race should be redesigned. I like the idea of a more diverse Protoss with gateways instead of warpgates and I think it pretty much solves the passivity problem because there's no longer the feeling of "Oh, I hope all his production isn't effectively in my base or at my third, but until I gain complete map control I have to defend as if it's everywhere."
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
The point is, the game is what it is. They designed it to be this way and given the popularity of the game can you say they are wrong? They chose not to make BW v 2.0 but a new game and some elements got left out along the way in favour of new elements.
Deserved insult.. whatever
The point is, what it is (currently)- is bad. Objectively by people who want it to be good. If a game that's good gets popular I assure you everyone will be happy about it. As for the elements that got left out in favour of new elements part .... imagine Slamball being a successor to Basketball instead of its current "UMS" status.
"I maintain that slamball is very young and after a few years of rule changing and more trampolines and more powerful trampolines added by Dustin Browder I'm confident that the game will be better."
No, you think it is bad. Or are all those people playing/watching it masochists? Different people like different things, but apparently 'people who want it to be good' objectively decided its not good.
i think this is something that blizzard is attempting to change with the new expansion. This also probably has a lot to do with the understanding of the game. People don't understand when and how often they can harrass or push timings, so this leads to much more passive games
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
I don't get why so few people understand this either. I come from warcraft 3, NOT from BW and still I think that SC2 lacks dynamic - in warcraft 3 you at the very least had to constantly creep neutral camps and harass, in sc2 there are those times where the best thing you can do is just nothing at all (with "nothing" I mean producing probes, pylons, units).
Since SC2 has no heroes like warcraft 3, there HAS to be something to make it dynamic at each and every point in the game. BW had that gamedesign, that made constant harass/aggression a necessity. SC2 needs something similar, otherwise it will get boring. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not even in the next couple of years. But at some point it will, and then people will be quick to leave the sinking ship.
I agree it's more passive. I think the reason for that is that only one race has any decent early game harassment options, and two of the three races can easily tuck themselves behind walls until they're ready to move out.
All races can pressure early with an all-in sort of build; but really, that's a gamble. Who wants to risk losing a game on the off chance the opponent won't be prepared for your all-in.
I feel that Protoss and Zerg have no decent way to (harass early on) a base that has been walled up; the few options they do have are costly and high-risk. This is why they choose to macro up, and why Terran is compelled to pressure them - which, luckily for Terran, is one of their strengths.
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.
On November 23 2011 23:40 sluggaslamoo wrote: I watched the whole vod, honestly if this is how much SC2 has developed its not that much different to how I remember it.
I really strongly believe that if you are someone who has to reminisce about what SC2 was like last time they bothered following it, you should not be on this particular subforum.
Do you want people in BW forums who don't know jack shit about it, telling everyone why it's so boring to them, and clearly inferior to SC2?
It's reasonable to think BW has something that SC2 has lost but I get annoyed when these threads devolve into rehashing the same points, sometimes contradicting each other. I mean, the most common complaints I see are:
1) SC2 doesn't have enough territory control - like Lurkers and Spider Mines, ways of completely closing areas off to attack until later tech.
2) SC2 is too passive - not enough multi-pronged attacks or harrassment.
But...more hard territory control would result in fewer attack possibilities...?
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.
Excellent post. I already wondered where this week's "BW is better than SC2 will ever be" thread was. Sadly, there seem to be a lot of people prejudiced against SC2 who feel the need to come to a SC2 forum bashing the forum's game (not saying this was true for all who agree with OP, but there are a lot of elitists who do just that).
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.
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.
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.
Amazing read, really interesting and I felt kind of sad reading this, cause you nailed it so well.
I feel DB has alienated himself and "his" product from BW. Sometimes we talk about product ownership, and I sense that DB feel he owns SC2, and dont want to bring in BW to the mix cause that would give credit to something he did not create. In an interview TL had, I felt DB was a bit uneased about BW, like it was DB vs BW, you either play BW or my game(sc2). So have a bad feeling about the development of SC2, but hopefully he just wants to make a great game.
I think its mostly because of how many defensive spells and structures there are that dont cost much money at all and thats why zergs are the only ones who get attacked early because bunkers are refundable with only a 25 mineral loss and forcefields makes it impossible to get up ramps.
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.
Excellent post. I already wondered where this week's "BW is better than SC2 will ever be" thread was. Sadly, there seem to be a lot of people prejudiced against SC2 who feel the need to come to a SC2 forum bashing the forum's game (not saying this was true for all who agree with OP, but there are a lot of elitists who do just that).
Maybe so many people are saying it because they feel it's true. I don't know, man... I played BW like mad since the day it came out, for years and years. There's a big difference between SC2 and BW and I know a lot of people who think that SC2 lacks the tactical depth of BW. It always felt like you could do more with less in BW.
Granted, SC2 is very young. BW had a decade of tweaking to make it what it is, so I remain hopeful that SC2 will receive similar treatment. I thoroughly enjoy both games but I would add my name to the long list of people who think BW is superior in terms of execution.
On November 24 2011 02:33 JieXian wrote: And when I say SC2 is inferior. I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but, if you actually read what I posted without getting all hurt, as someone who wants SC2 to be better, to be the replacement so that everyone can enjoy something at the level (or even higher) of BW
"And when I say your wife is ugly, I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but as someone who wants her to look better".
Do you not understand that telling us that our game is inferior because it's not more like your game is insulting in and of itself?
SC2 has been out for over a year. It has a huge following and a vibrant pro scene. It is not meant to be Brood War HD, it's its own game, and you are not going to convince anyone at all by telling them the game they are passionate about is actually a boring failure.
Things will change in HotS, and some of those changes do seem to address some of the concerns people in this thread have, i.e. better space control and more incentives to move food out of main armies.
On November 23 2011 12:48 eSuBuildings wrote: Starcraft 2 is more like chess where late late game situations tend to become a matter of waiting and unit control rather than tactics.
Since when in chess is unit control and waiting more important than tactics?
I'd like to address something that Plexa and Ver have talked about. Positioning. This thread is about how SC2 seems passive compared to Broodwar, and I'm going to put myself on a limb and say that in SC2 positioning and formation are important, but not as game impacting as in Broodwar.
Positioning in Broodwar let armies that would die horribly in a straight up fight against the force brought against them trade evenly or win. Two early game examples are from mirror matches. 1 gate cy core nexus is a viable PvP build on certain maps with proper chokes at the natural. A good arc and distance allows 1 gate Dragoon production to defend 2 gate Dragoon production. Another example is a ling arc at the top of a ramp in ZvZ. I don't think I've ever seen anything like this in SC2 except for forcefield, which I'd really rather not start dissecting here.
A second thing is the lack of substantial terrain advantage. In BW, units on top of a hill could hold a superior force at all stages of the game, while high ground advantage basically disappears in the midgame of Starcraft 2.
I'm not saying that these are good or bad things. I just think that they are differences that contribute to players being less willing to split their armies and be aggressive in SC2. Despite all of the harass people have pointed out from Broodwar, top BW players were generally very conservative and safe players. This is reasonable, as progamers play to win. It logically follows that in Starcraft 2, where the game is less understood and the familiar defensive options that allowed inferior armies to defend successfully are gone, safe players would be more hesitant to split their army.
A good part of that is because of how much the surviving part of the victorious army changes on just a few units. It seems to function more as an exponential curve than a geometric one, so the difference between a close victory and a slaughter isn't that much, and if part of a player's army is harassing when they are attacked, would could have been an even trade can be a slaughter that the defender loses, and their harassing force is no threat to the enemy's remaining army. I don't think that this is a problem yet, because a good part of defending with a superior force relies on the maps, and SC2 map development is still young.
Even still, I think that Blizzard is doing a decent job of addressing this in Heart of the Swarm. Recall will allow Protoss to return harassing forces to their main army before the engagement, Shredders will give Terran a defensive option that functions extremely well for either delaying the enemy army or damaging a good part of it, and the Swarm Host and burrow-move banelings can make moving into a zerg base without detection a slow loss of units or instant death. The Viper will also provide the ability to hold superior forces while harass does more damage, more units produce, or the harassing force returns home.
I don't think it's perfect, but I do think that it's an improvement.
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: EsuBuildings xd I posted this like 3 months ago on Gamefaqs. Its basically because everyone is lazy and rather max out before doing any type of harassment. The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa8xMv5fhQo
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
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 hope everyone sees Ver's post about this. Very well said. If there was a feature to "recommend" or highlight certain posts in a thread, I would promote this to the top.
I think you're exactly right that Blizzard designed SC2 to be more oriented around offense for entertainment purposes, just like in the NFL, they are promoting passing more than defense with their rule changes. The idea being that offense is more exciting to your typical fan or esport viewer, who may not understand the subtleties of space control or defensive tactics.
I have a question for all the people who don't want to hear about BW. What should we compare SC2 to? Age of Empires? C&C? It's only natural to compare with the best there is and that's broodwar. Just ignoring a legend makes you an idiot.
I did not play a single game of BW since SC2 came out, but I am aware of how far SC2 is from what it can be. Only inexperienced kids can say SC2 is the best there is.
I am a huge fan of SC2 and i would never go back to broodwar, but this is just because SC2 is the future. But i think i have the right to hope for a better future.
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.
Any matchup vs zerg requires specific timing pushes or prolong attacks to trim them down, or you will lose. Look at most recent top tier ZvP. Late game ZvP usually involves protoss successfully multi attack and fight at the correct position, or lose from being overpowered by zerg swarm.
tbh I don't see any point arguing with BW enthusiastic. Alot of them have their goggle on too tight and don't even follow both scene anyway. Because I seriously find this sc2 too passive to be laughable.
TvZ map controls continuously switch side depending on stage of the game. And any matchup vs zerg is a ticking timebomb in which passive play is not possible
On November 24 2011 02:33 JieXian wrote: And when I say SC2 is inferior. I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but, if you actually read what I posted without getting all hurt, as someone who wants SC2 to be better, to be the replacement so that everyone can enjoy something at the level (or even higher) of BW
"And when I say your wife is ugly, I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but as someone who wants her to look better".
Do you not understand that telling us that our game is inferior because it's not more like your game is insulting in and of itself?
SC2 has been out for over a year. It has a huge following and a vibrant pro scene. It is not meant to be Brood War HD, it's its own game, and you are not going to convince anyone at all by telling them the game they are passionate about is actually a boring failure.
Things will change in HotS, and some of those changes do seem to address some of the concerns people in this thread have, i.e. better space control and more incentives to move food out of main armies.
I feel like DB's "taking food out of the army approach" is a much too simple way to put it. Armies are too small already, with most units being above 1 supply apart from the marine and zergling. So already you are looking at armies that are half the size on screen and don't lend itself to more exciting drawn out battles and more complex micro. Now add in the behemoth 6 supply units and your armies are even smaller. Now Browder wants to have 2 supply units (I assume) that can't exist in the core army, so armies are going to be EVEN SMALLER.
The more subtle reason is defenders advantage. Give people a reason to move out without fear of base trading or instant loss, and squad based aggressive play will naturally follow.
As for space control, let me give you an example of the Swarm Host and Lurker. 2 Lurkers above a ramp can stop infinite (that's right infinite) amounts of marines, that is map control.
Now given 24 marines going to attack a third expansion, can we realistically believe Swarm Hosts can achieve even merely close to this?
Blizzard has hit a dilemma, because Swarm Hosts become extremely powerful offensively if the broodlings that spawn out of it are too powerful and Terran doesn't have irradiate. I think Swarm Hosts will go the way of the Brood Lord (nerf after nerf), and Swarm Hosts will cease to become a map control unit, and more of a gimmicky tank splash unit like the BroodLord.
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.
Any matchup vs zerg requires specific timing pushes or prolong attacks to trim them down, or you will lose. Look at most recent top tier ZvP. Late game ZvP usually involves protoss successfully multi attack and fight at the correct position, or lose from being overpowered by zerg swarm.
tbh I don't see any point arguing with BW enthusiastic. Alot of them have their goggle on too tight and don't even follow both scene anyway. Because I seriously find this sc2 too passive to be laughable.
TvZ map controls continuously switch side depending on stage of the game. And any matchup vs zerg is a ticking timebomb in which passive play is not possible
If you "honestly" don't think there's any point in arguing with a BW enthusiastic why post in the first place?
Also you criticize me for not following both scenes when you don't either? Combined I should have a better right to argue a point considering I played and watched a lot of both games.
The "ticking time bomb" concept of zerg matchups has existed since the inception of Starcraft e-sports, the first televised game featured a probe zealot pressure rush to prevent Zerg from being able to make drones and lose too many lings.
How about early pressure forcing Zerg to make too many Sunkens thus losing way too many drones, and then busting the front anyway with epic micro and timing, so Zerg doesn't have anything left?
I'm sorry but if you read the posts in this thread you would understand that there are plenty of SC2 only players who have refuted suggestions like Liquid`Hero's play saying its not normal (which is how also I used to play since beta in PvZ and could still take games of GM SEA players from time to time) is only really powerful because it is out of the norm. Much like how the pure Bisu build rarely used in PvZ anymore once Zerg knew how to defend it.
Sorry but ZvP has predominantly been a Roach/Ling/Infestor ball vs Collossus/Stalker ball matchup. I still watch SC2 from time to time, and always checkout Checks and others streams and attend barcrafts when I can. You simply can't understand without watching any proleague game from Bisu (especially) or Snow or Stork and see aggression for what it really is.
The passivity comes from the game being extremely volotile, a single battle usually decides the game so both players do everything to ensure that they come out on top for that 1 battle.
In sc1 you could have multiple battles before a game is decided because of how much longer each battle took you could reinforce and recover your defenses. It also had more board control with lurkers, siege tanks, vulture mines, reavers/hts/cannons etc.
in BW, due to bad pathing/unit selection limit or both, you can't really engage the way you do in sc2. and you don't usually outright lose your max army. Because of that, both sides need to spend more time managing the units in the fights and that creates a more exciting game to watch. The problem i see in sc2 is that somehow the battle can turn out to be so one sided that one mistake is pretty much game ending. If you don't pay attention and lose 20~30 supplies due to bad positioning, its over. i think sc2 need to be more forgiving in this regard,
...I'm not the smartest man in the world, but maybe it's not that people are not sure when to pressure/harass or how to split up armies. Maybe it's because one ball army works? *GASP*
Blasphemy! We must all strive to play like we are pros!
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
I don't get why so few people understand this either. I come from warcraft 3, NOT from BW and still I think that SC2 lacks dynamic - in warcraft 3 you at the very least had to constantly creep neutral camps and harass, in sc2 there are those times where the best thing you can do is just nothing at all (with "nothing" I mean producing probes, pylons, units).
Since SC2 has no heroes like warcraft 3, there HAS to be something to make it dynamic at each and every point in the game. BW had that gamedesign, that made constant harass/aggression a necessity. SC2 needs something similar, otherwise it will get boring. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not even in the next couple of years. But at some point it will, and then people will be quick to leave the sinking ship.
yeah, I love that thing about starcraft2. You don't always have to be like: "I must attack now. Unit X has no attack command, so it is useless..." The pure presence of stuff makes already sense. No need to always ne on the attack. No need to always use 100apm on micro. More time to make good decisions. More time to play creative!
Sc2 has only just moved into the massive late game area. Alot of timings are still unexplored and the metagame still needs to develop quite a bit. However 200/200 balls are a bit too easy to use because of their raw ranged DPS and a lot of matches kinda stagnate pretty quickly and get boring to watch until they end all of a sudden.
On November 23 2011 13:10 HuHEN wrote: I think this comes down in large part to skill level, I just dont think sc2 pros have learned to utilize agression to its full potential yet. That said, the game is clearly far more dynamic than it was in the eary days, and I think it will continue to progress and improve as players themselves improve and understand the game better.
On November 23 2011 12:52 FragRaptor wrote: Little by little people are figuring out ways to poke at players. Until that research is completed people will be passive as the small pieces of aggression are not effective enough. But do not be mistaken it will come in time(And expansions).
Again this is not a matter of time, its inherent in the game design. Even the worst players on ICCUP have more action packed games than the highest level ladder players in SC2.
The time horse has been beaten to death. When you can just look at the game design and see how it's not possible. The reason TvZ is so developed is that it has Tanks, its a lot like TvP in BW. Where T is always jostling for position and point capture, while P is trying to look for opportunities to exploit Terran weaknesses. Similar applies to TvT, this is why Zerg and Protoss need strong immobile slow-shot siege units (Reaver, Lurker), it creates much better battle dynamics.
On November 23 2011 13:12 Nizzy wrote: 1. Bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps. Stuff like twice the size of metalopolis. A map like Tal darim alter should be one of the smallest maps out there. This way 'ball armies' will simply fail, because you can only hit one part of their base, while if they hit you at multiple locations at once you'll probably lose. Because of big maps you would bring back the seige/perimeter lines. You would have zergs placing burrow banelings in areas to block off paths/swarm hosts for this as well. Warp gate for Protoss would be great here for them to warp into any base to protect it. The game would be so much better.
2. Take away the mass multi section of units. You don't have to limit it to 12 like in BW, however everything is in one big ball/ 1-3 control groups only. Maybe cap it at like 24-32 units or something. Units/armies would be WAY harder to control if you had to use like 6 hotkeys for a 200/200 army. It would put more skill back into the game. Way more IMO. Being able to select all of your units in 1 control group is so noob-ish. Even bad players might even agree to that.
3. Like TT1 kind of said in his post. The less casting units the better. Take away that stupid "get over here" thing from the viper. Less spells actually = more action. Having just 2-3 total spells per race actually makes them more exciting. TT1 also said each race having few spells to support the army, even though they're strong. They won't be as strong with armies separated around the map instead of a big ball.
Dumb Dustin Browder fails to realize. Sorry I'm calling him dumb, it's just I feel a sense of ignorance with his logic of 'this is the game I made, not the game you want' Dustin, we don't want these changes because it will be like BW. We want these changes because it will make the game a better RTS. It's already not like BW. The units are so much more fast paced IMO.
He said he's looking at ways to split those balls up. Start with those basic ones.
His method for splitting those balls up doesn't make any sense though. Hes just trying to make gimmicky units that don't work well within the main army.
There is a fundamental problem to this, the core armies are going to become even SMALLER. In BW the core army looked HUGE, you would just look at an army like that on the minimap in absolute awe, and this is partly due to the huge supply units in SC2. A 200/200 bio ball in BW had a roughly 160 unit blob moving around the map, SC2 is less than half of this.
The second problem is it is the wrong way to tackle the issue. The problem is not synergy of the colossus or MMM or anything like that, its lack of units that benefit hugely from tactical situations. A zerg army with 1 defiler is 10x stronger than one without, you don't see that from the infestor. A lurker in a choke is 10x more powerful than in the open, this is not the same for the baneling. In fact the only thing close to this is split marines and tanks.
About the micro Ai comment, true nobody can ever reach that, but it is impressive how good certain players can do that and the skill is only going to rise: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGJP0BgvUPA
That video just proves what a joke the SC2 graphics and pathing is. Big blobs of stuff shooting at eachother. What you guys also have to remember is that you can't compare BW in 2002 with SC2 today. SC2 today is dominated mostly by players with a lot of experience. MVP and MC trained BW for years on most of their free time. Their overall RTS skills are much better than Boxer's was in 2002, and they probably have double the APM, if not more. The top SC2 players today are really good and there's really not much Flash will be able to add. Whatever Flash did, Nada had already done a few years prior. The only thing Flash brought to the table was strategies, his ability to read games and adept and his flawless macro. If Flash switches, you might be able to see some creative strategies, or brilliant comebacks, but that's it. You will not see him change the standards on micro. Nada could match Flash easily on micro in BW, and what have he done for SC2 micro?
This is Nada's marine micro in BW. That group of mnm did around 10 times more damage than they was worth.
In similar situations, I have personally lost around 30 mnm to half of that amount of lurkers. The BW engagements are intense and requires your immediate attention so that you're not caught off guard. SC2 will never be able to offer that, and on top of that, SC2 will always be plagued by the blobby graphics.
The ppl who are saying it's a natural progression to go from BW to SC2 clearly have no clue what you're talking about since you can't see that there's a huge difference between the games.
The reason why we are angry is because we feel that SC2 is a downgrade. Tell us why our players should switch to a game that is worse? Also tell us why we should watch said game instead? Everybody would have questioned KESPA's sanity if they had transitioned into WC3 a few years ago, so how come BW -> SC2 is taken for granted? Blizzard games are not like Tekken, where there are little to no difference between each new version of the game. If a transition to SC2 is to take place, wouldn't you first have to ask yourself if SC2 actually is a better game? This is a question that the ppl who switched to SC2 never asked themselves. They just hyped it up blindly and assumed that the game would follow the same path as BW.
What happened with BW in Korea was a miracle and it would require a really awesome game if we are to ever see such a great scene again. The fact that KESPA seems open to just disband this scene in favor of SC2, who's future is very uncertain, is quite saddening. BW won't last forever, but I highly doubt that the korean viewers will accept SC2. As ppl have said, the SC2 scene is niched towards gamers. What will happen when the next big RTS is released? I remember WC3 was huge a few years ago, atleast among gamers. Now the game is pretty much dead. But more importantly, the mainstream non gamers in Korea couldn't care less about SC2. BW have transcended to another level. In Korea it's mainstream, a sport. I remember reading a recent interview with the young Samsung KHAN progamer Reality, where he said that the high school he attended was very understanding of his BW career, and that they let him follow a more personalized scheduling plan in school, so that he could more easily focus on both gaming and school. That's how mainstream BW is in Korea. Even grown up parents watch BW with their kids, and teenage girls follow the scene and their players as if they were K-pop stars. I don't think most SC2 fans really understand how huge BW is in Korea, and how many different groups of ppl that SC2 would have to appeal to for a transition to work.
1225 (7 lurker gas cost) / 25 (baneling gas cost) = 49
I think its even more sad that if you could actually micro 11 marines and 1 medivac to kill 49 banelings, 20 zerglings, a Hatchery and an Evo Chamber, there would be mass screams of imba and Blizzard would never let it happen. T_T
Although at the same time other races had equal opportunities to gain huge advantages by exploiting weaknesses in small battles.
Of course to have situations like the above, Blizzard would need to remove auto-clumping. I think this is the biggest issue that needs to be resolved, players are too scared to engage each other because armies are almost 100% efficient at all stages of the game. If you removed clumping, players would be more inclined to be opportunistic and engage when the other player has moved out of position.
The second point I need to make about this is that de-clumping won't cause dragoon AI problems. Remember Warcraft III pathing? That used a very similar algorithm to Broodwar, its just that it wasn't a 13 year old game and pathfinding had gotten better since then.
I wanted to highlight this post from the end of the first page again. I never followed or played BW in a competitive way but when I watch BW games now it's clear to see why SC2 games have less small skirmishes. Armies are too condensed in SC2 so, in conjunction with less microable units (moving shot issue), engaging even a slightly larger force with a detachment from your army is never advisable. This leads to less interesting games because players just wait for their balls to grow to 200/200 before attacking.
You might say that there are drops in SC2 and other harassment options. The difference is that in SC2 your harass is really only effective when you're catching the other player entirely out of position or if your army is already stronger. It's too difficult to engage a section of the opponent's main army and come out ahead because the army is too condensed.
I liked that the quoted post mentioned the WC3 engine. Even though there were way less units on the field in WC3, the engine did a good job at making battles spread out in a way that made them epic. I think it would be interesting to see what SC2 would be like if the collision interactions between units was more like WC3. I remember in WC3 you could completely stop a unit from moving by surrounding it with 4 units in the cardinal directions. In SC2, I believe a unit would simply "squeeze" out of this kind of surround. It's very strange that units in SC2 have smaller collision boxes while they're moving, which ends up making them as close together as possible when they stop moving.
On November 23 2011 13:10 HuHEN wrote: I think this comes down in large part to skill level, I just dont think sc2 pros have learned to utilize agression to its full potential yet. That said, the game is clearly far more dynamic than it was in the eary days, and I think it will continue to progress and improve as players themselves improve and understand the game better.
On November 23 2011 12:52 FragRaptor wrote: Little by little people are figuring out ways to poke at players. Until that research is completed people will be passive as the small pieces of aggression are not effective enough. But do not be mistaken it will come in time(And expansions).
Again this is not a matter of time, its inherent in the game design. Even the worst players on ICCUP have more action packed games than the highest level ladder players in SC2.
The time horse has been beaten to death. When you can just look at the game design and see how it's not possible. The reason TvZ is so developed is that it has Tanks, its a lot like TvP in BW. Where T is always jostling for position and point capture, while P is trying to look for opportunities to exploit Terran weaknesses. Similar applies to TvT, this is why Zerg and Protoss need strong immobile slow-shot siege units (Reaver, Lurker), it creates much better battle dynamics.
On November 23 2011 13:12 Nizzy wrote: 1. Bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps, bigger maps. Stuff like twice the size of metalopolis. A map like Tal darim alter should be one of the smallest maps out there. This way 'ball armies' will simply fail, because you can only hit one part of their base, while if they hit you at multiple locations at once you'll probably lose. Because of big maps you would bring back the seige/perimeter lines. You would have zergs placing burrow banelings in areas to block off paths/swarm hosts for this as well. Warp gate for Protoss would be great here for them to warp into any base to protect it. The game would be so much better.
2. Take away the mass multi section of units. You don't have to limit it to 12 like in BW, however everything is in one big ball/ 1-3 control groups only. Maybe cap it at like 24-32 units or something. Units/armies would be WAY harder to control if you had to use like 6 hotkeys for a 200/200 army. It would put more skill back into the game. Way more IMO. Being able to select all of your units in 1 control group is so noob-ish. Even bad players might even agree to that.
3. Like TT1 kind of said in his post. The less casting units the better. Take away that stupid "get over here" thing from the viper. Less spells actually = more action. Having just 2-3 total spells per race actually makes them more exciting. TT1 also said each race having few spells to support the army, even though they're strong. They won't be as strong with armies separated around the map instead of a big ball.
Dumb Dustin Browder fails to realize. Sorry I'm calling him dumb, it's just I feel a sense of ignorance with his logic of 'this is the game I made, not the game you want' Dustin, we don't want these changes because it will be like BW. We want these changes because it will make the game a better RTS. It's already not like BW. The units are so much more fast paced IMO.
He said he's looking at ways to split those balls up. Start with those basic ones.
His method for splitting those balls up doesn't make any sense though. Hes just trying to make gimmicky units that don't work well within the main army.
There is a fundamental problem to this, the core armies are going to become even SMALLER. In BW the core army looked HUGE, you would just look at an army like that on the minimap in absolute awe, and this is partly due to the huge supply units in SC2. A 200/200 bio ball in BW had a roughly 160 unit blob moving around the map, SC2 is less than half of this.
The second problem is it is the wrong way to tackle the issue. The problem is not synergy of the colossus or MMM or anything like that, its lack of units that benefit hugely from tactical situations. A zerg army with 1 defiler is 10x stronger than one without, you don't see that from the infestor. A lurker in a choke is 10x more powerful than in the open, this is not the same for the baneling. In fact the only thing close to this is split marines and tanks.
About the micro Ai comment, true nobody can ever reach that, but it is impressive how good certain players can do that and the skill is only going to rise: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGJP0BgvUPA
That video just proves what a joke the SC2 graphics and pathing is. Big blobs of stuff shooting at eachother. What you guys also have to remember is that you can't compare BW in 2002 with SC2 today. SC2 today is dominated mostly by players with a lot of experience. MVP and MC trained BW for years on most of their free time. Their overall RTS skills are much better than Boxer's was in 2002, and they probably have double the APM, if not more. The top SC2 players today are really good and there's really not much Flash will be able to add. Whatever Flash did, Nada had already done a few years prior. The only thing Flash brought to the table was strategies, his ability to read games and adept and his flawless macro. If Flash switches, you might be able to see some creative strategies, or brilliant comebacks, but that's it. You will not see him change the standards on micro. Nada could match Flash easily on micro in BW, and what have he done for SC2 micro?
This is Nada's marine micro in BW. That group of mnm did around 10 times more damage than they was worth.
In similar situations, I have personally lost around 30 mnm to half of that amount of lurkers. The BW engagements are intense and requires your immediate attention so that you're not caught off guard. SC2 will never be able to offer that, and on top of that, SC2 will always be plagued by the blobby graphics.
The ppl who are saying it's a natural progression to go from BW to SC2 clearly have no clue what you're talking about since you can't see that there's a huge difference between the games.
The reason why we are angry is because we feel that SC2 is a downgrade. Tell us why our players should switch to a game that is worse? Also tell us why we should watch said game instead? Everybody would have questioned KESPA's sanity if they had transitioned into WC3 a few years ago, so how come BW -> SC2 is taken for granted? Blizzard games are not like Tekken, where there are little to no difference between each new version of the game. If a transition to SC2 is to take place, wouldn't you first have to ask yourself if SC2 actually is a better game? This is a question that the ppl who switched to SC2 never asked themselves. They just hyped it up blindly and assumed that the game would follow the same path as BW.
What happened with BW in Korea was a miracle and it would require a really awesome game if we are to ever see such a great scene again. The fact that KESPA seems open to just disband this scene in favor of SC2, who's future is very uncertain, is quite saddening. BW won't last forever, but I highly doubt that the korean viewers will accept SC2. As ppl have said, the SC2 scene is niched towards gamers. What will happen when the next big RTS is released? I remember WC3 was huge a few years ago, atleast among gamers. Now the game is pretty much dead. But more importantly, the mainstream non gamers in Korea couldn't care less about SC2. BW have transcended to another level. In Korea it's mainstream, a sport. I remember reading a recent interview with the young Samsung KHAN progamer Reality, where he said that the high school he attended was very understanding of his BW career, and that they let him follow a more personalized scheduling plan in school, so that he could more easily focus on both gaming and school. That's how mainstream BW is in Korea. Even grown up parents watch BW with their kids, and teenage girls follow the scene and their players as if they were K-pop stars. I don't think most SC2 fans really understand how huge BW is in Korea, and how many different groups of ppl that SC2 would have to appeal to for a transition to work.
1225 (7 lurker gas cost) / 25 (baneling gas cost) = 49
I think its even more sad that if you could actually micro 11 marines and 1 medivac to kill 49 banelings, 20 zerglings, a Hatchery and an Evo Chamber, there would be mass screams of imba and Blizzard would never let it happen. T_T
Although at the same time other races had equal opportunities to gain huge advantages by exploiting weaknesses in small battles.
Of course to have situations like the above, Blizzard would need to remove auto-clumping. I think this is the biggest issue that needs to be resolved, players are too scared to engage each other because armies are almost 100% efficient at all stages of the game. If you removed clumping, players would be more inclined to be opportunistic and engage when the other player has moved out of position.
The second point I need to make about this is that de-clumping won't cause dragoon AI problems. Remember Warcraft III pathing? That used a very similar algorithm to Broodwar, its just that it wasn't a 13 year old game and pathfinding had gotten better since then.
I wanted to highlight this post from the end of the first page again. I never followed or played BW in a competitive way but when I watch BW games now it's clear to see why SC2 games have less small skirmishes. Armies are too condensed in SC2 so, in conjunction with less microable units (moving shot issue), engaging even a slightly larger force with a detachment from your army is never advisable. This leads to less interesting games because players just wait for their balls to grow to 200/200 before attacking.
You might say that there are drops in SC2 and other harassment options. The difference is that in SC2 your harass is really only effective when you're catching the other player entirely out of position or if your army is already stronger. It's too difficult to engage a section of the opponent's main army and come out ahead because the army is too condensed.
I liked that the quoted post mentioned the WC3 engine. Even though there were way less units on the field in WC3, the engine did a good job at making battles spread out in a way that made them epic. I think it would be interesting to see what SC2 would be like if the collision interactions between units was more like WC3. I remember in WC3 you could completely stop a unit from moving by surrounding it with 4 units in the cardinal directions. In SC2, I believe a unit would simply "squeeze" out of this kind of surround. It's very strange that units in SC2 have smaller collision boxes while they're moving, which ends up making them as close together as possible when they stop moving.
Not just WC3, BW had the same dynamic. SC2 collision boxes for the staple units (non-gimmick like thors) are so tiny that it's difficult to trap them. Some of the most interesting micro in both BW and WC3 involved trapping units so they weren't able to retreat.
A huge part of the problem is how condensed units can be. It made ranged units in huge balls too powerful, especially with Blizzard nerfing AOE units and abilities to compensate. The 1A 200/200 ball is really something they should try to solve in HOTS. It's too powerful compared to the alternatives. Moving collision detection and spacing back to BW/WC3 levels would be a good start.
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.
^ i was looking for the thread where that guy increased collision size in all units, but i couldn't find it. i remember thinking it was quite cool and liking it a lot.
I think it will happen eventually (playing like in brood war), but right now nobody has skill to play like that. And it's a lot easier to play the way you describe and it works right now. But it won't when everyone gets better. That's how i feel about it.
On November 24 2011 04:28 intrigue wrote: ^ i was looking for the thread where that guy increased collision size in all units, but i couldn't find it. i remember thinking it was quite cool and liking it a lot.
I remember that one. The armies actually looked like what you would expect. Mass marines in SC2 currently move like a bacteria colony instead of individual units.
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.
Just a thought, would decreasing the overall attack damage or increasing the overall unit health increase the length of battles? which would allow more time to micro and to reinforce?
In my opinion this happens because given the way the AI works, once AoE units enter the game it is extremely hard to lose a battle (any battle) and have enough left to survive a counter attack. Which means there is only a single large encounter which decides the game. There's no real skirmishes like there used to be, because the same AI issues mean that a small unit advantage quickly becomes decisive, which in turn means you can't make small groups of skirmishers work, since that would mean your main army gets crushed and then you lose.
Clumping imo, is what causes most of these problems.
On November 24 2011 05:13 Escape wrote: Just a thought, would decreasing the overall attack damage or increasing the overall unit health increase the length of battles? which would allow more time to micro and to reinforce?
It would, but there would be side effects on stuff like raiding, attacking bases, etc.
For example, if you just straight up decrease damage, raiding becomes universally less effective (except for the oracle, which would become more effective), as players would have more time to run their workers and/or send units to clean up raids.
Similarly, increasing HP would make worker raids worse (see above) but would make base raids more effective, as raiding units would die slower while the buildings' durability wouldn't have changed, unless you increase building health, too, but would change the balance of base trades, probably....
It's a bit of a mess. Also keep in mind that changing units in any way other than attack delay changes the number of hits to kill, such as +1 zealots or roaches vs zerglings.
Furthermore, I'm not 100% on this, but I think increasing unit durability in any fashion either of us mentioned would function as a direct buff to Zerglings against Marines except certain situations where the Marines are crammed into a corner, because less Zerglings would die in the approach and less overall time would be spent by Zerglings moving forward to replace a Zergling that died.
I think you would be more correct a couple months ago, but after IPL 3 and Providence I'm starting to think this game is become very aggressive late game. For example, IdrA vs Nestea was some of the scariest ZvZ we've all seen to this date. Also at IPL3: Origins, game 2 Kiwikaki vs Stephano was some of the most amazing games i've seen. The game is passive late game for sure compared to brood war, but overall this game is still young. Though I think we are all improving decently fast.
A lot of people have pointed at Ver's response as kind of the main answer to this question. However I think this is not correct. The reasons he gives why passive play can be prevalent from time to time are all valid but still I don't think this makes Starcraft 2 a game which has to be played passively. The rewards for aggression are still very high. In fact people realize more and more that it's not enough to just sit back and turtle because if you're unable to defend just one single drop you can fall behind pretty quickly. An aggressive game plan which uses the right timings without sacrificing defensive capabilities or economy will always succeed over passive play.
Okay to clear up a few things, I think I may have poorly worded the title to this thread. There are a lot of people making their arguments in here that I believe haven't read the initial post and are blindly arguing. They are talking as if I said the game entirely is passive. I'm talking about the late stages of the game.
As a Zerg, do you know how hard it is to harass a base with let's say 16 lings as opposed to 8 marines? Equal in supply and mineral cost but harassing with lings is so much very inefficient. The same goes for 4 zealots vs 16 lings. I know that I shouldn't be crying imbalance, but this just goes to show. In the PvZ match up, Protoss can death ball to no end and remain completely defended against small back stabs due to imbalance between army values. I'm talking about army at that very moment, so don't argue back with remaxing. Zerg can't harass a base with a small strike force because it will fail easily due to ease of defense for the Protoss. If you even think about trying to add more units to harass that base, your army is that much weaker and the Protoss will have no problem walking right up to your base and end the game right there.
As many people have pointed out in this thread so far. We need more position holding units and such. Glad to see the feedback on this thread though.
On November 24 2011 07:11 eSuBuildings wrote: Okay to clear up a few things, I think I may have poorly worded the title to this thread. There are a lot of people making their arguments in here that I believe haven't read the initial post and are blindly arguing. They are talking as if I said the game entirely is passive. I'm talking about the late stages of the game.
As a Zerg, do you know how hard it is to harass a base with let's say 16 lings as opposed to 8 marines? Equal in supply and mineral cost but harassing with lings is so much very inefficient. The same goes for 4 zealots vs 16 lings. I know that I shouldn't be crying imbalance, but this just goes to show. In the PvZ match up, Protoss can death ball to no end and remain completely defended against small back stabs due to imbalance between army values. I'm talking about army at that very moment, so don't argue back with remaxing. Zerg can't harass a base with a small strike force because it will fail easily due to ease of defense for the Protoss. If you even think about trying to add more units to harass that base, your army is that much weaker and the Protoss will have no problem walking right up to your base and end the game right there.
As many people have pointed out in this thread so far. We need more position holding units and such. Glad to see the feedback on this thread though.
That's why Zergs like Stephano have started using Spines to prevent the Protoss from just a moving into the Zerg base. Sure you can't shut down the whole map like this but it's very effective to shut down the main attack paths. Also Mutas have proven to be very effective against passive robo play all game long. I don't see a reason why aggression should stop in the late game. Just like at any other point in the game aggression can turn the tide in this phase of the game gaining either positional or economic advantages.
I'm not sure what anyone was supposed to get out of those two example videos. Of all the many games in all the many tournaments, can I ask why you picked the video you did for the sc2 example?
Here is a recent example I would have picked where hellions are used extensively throughout the game:
By the end of the game MVP had 70-some workers of Leenock's and still lost.
Many of the games from MLG Anaheim featured terran players from the SlayerS team using blue-flame hellions extensively to kill workers, harass and buffer their tanks.
On November 24 2011 06:10 Vasher_Pwnzer wrote: I think you would be more correct a couple months ago, but after IPL 3 and Providence I'm starting to think this game is become very aggressive late game. For example, IdrA vs Nestea was some of the scariest ZvZ we've all seen to this date. Also at IPL3: Origins, game 2 Kiwikaki vs Stephano was some of the most amazing games i've seen. The game is passive late game for sure compared to brood war, but overall this game is still young. Though I think we are all improving decently fast.
Overall, good post!
The game is becoming very aggressive overal. Because of time constraints I only watch big live tournaments like MLG and Dreamhack and I have to say that the level of play increases with each passing tournament. A year ago, the builds pros were doing were rather straightforward and easy to copy, and pro games were rather boring. Nowadays, however, I find the build orders to be really complicated with little room for error. It's not something a platinum-level player like me can pull off without seriously putting himself at risk. Hell, most platinum level players aren't even able to scout properly so the chance of getting all-in'd is rather high.
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.
To me it's because you can't hold positions with fewer units like you could in Brood War. Unfortunately with SC2 it's mainly just wait wait wait one huge attack and either the game is over or you just reload and do it again, also bigger maps help.
I think workers should spawn like zerglings. That would hugely solve the problem of maxes being so worker heavy. Something that really handicaps SCII is that you're basically limited to 3 bases fully saturated. This is a huge problem because it make the supreme late game horrible for the pace of the game. Blizzard has said that this was a big problem and many people say that the supply cap should be raised. However, blizzard doesn't want to do that because huge armies will mindfuck most people's computers. So why not just make workers spawn like lings? It would let you take more bases (hugely important for zerg specifically imo) and back up the idea of having 2 gas at each expo/more mineral patches that blizzard has so heavily enforced.
Of course it would need to be tweaked but I think something MUST done to address this problem. Otherwise the game will most likely fall into a horrible downward spiral of success because the game becomes boring and easier.
Do you mean having workers only cost half supply? It's a pretty good idea if you ask me. Could mess up the supply timing in early game though, maybe make it an late game upgrade.
If you mean they have to be build in pairs then it won't make much sense for non-zerg races.
Do you mean having workers only cost half supply? It's a pretty good idea if you ask me. Could mess up the supply timing in early game though, maybe make it an late game upgrade.
If you mean they have to be build in pairs then it won't make much sense for non-zerg races.
Personally I think that the most optimal change would definitely be something along the lines of less mineral patches buteach give off more money and maybe 2 guys on gas with 2 gas (or just 1 gas like in BW). And of course a mule nerf along with it to keep things even.
There's alot of problems and I'm just brainstorming in hopes of finding something good.
Normally this is where I would chime in, but then it hit me: it won't change much of anything.
I digress,
We can only use what's given to us. The community summits in the past did very little to resolve such issues. In some cases, there was miscommunication (Sen comes to mind) or Blizzard threw it under a bus. In the end, a lot of suggestions got shot down, or weren't even heard.
Do I think the design of the game is flawed? Of course I do, but I've learned to accept it for what it is. D.B. & Co. will continue to implement whatever they think is necessary. The ball is in their court. If they make any improvements. Peachy, if not. Well, then I guess its everyone's loss. I'm not going to cry about it. Like I said before, there isn't much we can do about it. It is what it is.
HotS and LotV are nothing more than an excuse to prolong the game's longevity when in retrospect, there might not have been enough substance to begin with. As sleepingdog put it, the game might get old fast if Blizzard doesn't tweak the core dynamics. As it stands right now, the game-play suffers from having too few dimensions. I'll leave it at that.
I think one of the problems is that early battles between both games seem so much different. BW early game battles seem to last a good 5-10 seconds longer because the T1-2 units are a bit more resilient, whereas in SC2 the battles with squishy units are done with right away.
At first thought it would seem like more buff units in the game allow for more defensive play, but if both sides have similarly buff units earlier in the game it allows for the aggressive player to use his micro and multitasking over a longer period of time to gain an edge. If early battles in SC2 are over in 3-5 seconds and it is an even trade then both players have only had to task their battle micro along with their macro for that long. On the other hand if the early units take 20-30 seconds of intense micro while they both have to macro at the same time, the person who is better with micro and multitasking can come out on top.
I really enjoyed Vers post on the matter and there are some inherent flaws in the game but I'm willing to give it some more time before I give up or lose interest.
BW turning out the way it did was nothing short of a miracle. They did not plan at all for the game to be played in the way it does.
So making a new game and expecting it to work as well is going to be hit or miss. We'd need another miracle, they'd need to take wild risks, which they're not going to do. The moment something looks to be imbalanced, they patch it within a month.
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.
This is a double edged sword and can be counter-intuitive. 1) Defender's advantage can translate to even more passive game. With even more defender's advantage more death ball building will inevitably follow. Only thing that would fix this is bigger maps.
2) Defender's advatage in BW comes not only from bigger maps and unit designs, but also from the things like pathfinding and unit movement with chokes being much more effective, which kinda defeats the purpose of fluid Sc2 unit movement and it will definitely wont change. A lot of technical things are different in BW.
3) Defender's advatage of course as mentioned came partly from unit designs. For example, Zerg lost cloaked attacking unit, which had choke holder as one of the roles, which is why a lot of metagame changed. Still ZvT remains, imo, the most BW resembling matchup, because of the same reason that zerg is encouraged to be on the offensive state rather than defensive.
Although there is a lot of truth in your post too, for example the army size. Which i think is too late to change.
However, we cant solely blame this on unit design, because a lot of factors made Sc2 different. The saying that if u dont like sc2 go play BW has a bit of truth. The technical design is also different in the sequel, and more factors, not only unit design, are present.
Sorry, but broodwar is pretty much dead everywhere but Korea. That speaks a great volume for a company to learn about when trying to adapt into today's society.
Alot of discussions here are completely baseless and just simply out of nostalgia. This "broodwar is more active" is meaningless when talking joyment for the players and viewers. There is enough dynamics in sc2 for constant aggressive play as shown in most highest sc2 tier games in mutas, dropships, hellions/lings etc.
And the claim that sc2 is already reaching its peak, worn out and 1 dimensional is even more laughable. The meta has changed drastically over the year, and currently every race is heading toward a different drastic meta changes as well.
See the shift to mutas for zerg, more warp prism style for protoss and abusing upgrades /w zealots or HT usage in general.
Changes are even more noticeable for Terran due to how fast that race is being developed. Just 1 or 2 years from now, sc2 will played nothing like the one you see today
On November 24 2011 22:12 iky43210 wrote: Sorry, but there is a reason why broodwar is dead everywhere but Korea. That speaks a great volume for a company to learn about when trying to adapt into today's society
On November 24 2011 21:59 Sbrubbles wrote: Yet another pure nostalgia inspired thread ...
BW =/= SC2
dismissing the OP's concerns because he compared the game to BW is rather sad.
OP just wants the game to be better than BW by learning from it, not dismissing it as you are with your post.
What's the point of being concerned about something you can't change, if not for the purpose of whining?
These are the TL forums, not the Blizzard forums. If he wants to suggest something to the people who make SC2, he can go there. Also, note that not much CAN be changed, even with 2 expos, because the foundations have already been laid down.
OP may want the game to be better, but this thread serves no purpose if not nostalgia-inspired whining.
On November 24 2011 21:59 Sbrubbles wrote: Yet another pure nostalgia inspired thread ...
BW =/= SC2
Yet another thoughtless response disregarding an OP that mentions both BW and SC2
But he is completly right... It's been that way since the beginning of SC2. People whine around how Broodwar after 10+years of development in gameplay is "so much better". People whine around because a lot of units and mechanics are different from broodwar and after they played 10years of broodwar, don't like how they have to learn completly new ways of playing RTS for SC2. People whine around how bad it is that "broodwar B-Team"-players and foreigners do well in SC2, because "the good RTS players are all still playing BW". That's like expecting Michael Schumacher's charity football games to be better than then the matches the german football team are playing, because at certain points of time he was a more successful in sports than the team...
It's a freaking different game... It is a great game. There are points that can be improved, but simply going back to Broodwar won't improve SC2... It will simply kill SC2 and create SC:BW "now with better graphics". Also Broodwars has a ton of flaws as well... If you want to see a ton of action with every unit you produce, there are other RTS games that work with real "rock-paper-scissor"-principles, in which you're forced to use your stuff, else your 20infantry units will become useless the moment your opponent builds 1tank...
So in conclusion: I like my starcraft rather brainy than stressy. That's why I play it and watch it. Passive pressure ("getting ahead") is at least as exciting as unit control and battles for me.
On November 24 2011 21:59 Sbrubbles wrote: Yet another pure nostalgia inspired thread ...
BW =/= SC2
dismissing the OP's concerns because he compared the game to BW is rather sad.
OP just wants the game to be better than BW by learning from it, not dismissing it as you are with your post.
What's the point of being concerned about something you can't change, if not for the purpose of whining?
These are the TL forums, not the Blizzard forums. If he wants to suggest something to the people who make SC2, he can go there. Also, note that not much CAN be changed, even with 2 expos, because the foundations have already been laid down.
OP may want the game to be better, but this thread serves no purpose if not nostalgia-inspired whining.
Exactly. Blizzard made a game keeping many different types of people and skill levels in mind and the final product turns out to be pretty popular You can simply not please everyone when making a game, but for some reason the elitists making these topics think their opinion is more important than the majority. Making it better for some people could possibly make it worse for others, its not as simple as it seems.
On November 24 2011 21:59 Sbrubbles wrote: Yet another pure nostalgia inspired thread ...
BW =/= SC2
Yet another thoughtless response disregarding an OP that mentions both BW and SC2
But he is completly right... It's been that way since the beginning of SC2. People whine around how Broodwar after 10+years of development in gameplay is "so much better". People whine around because a lot of units and mechanics are different from broodwar and after they played 10years of broodwar, don't like how they have to learn completly new ways of playing RTS for SC2. People whine around how bad it is that "broodwar B-Team"-players and foreigners do well in SC2, because "the good RTS players are all still playing BW". That's like expecting Michael Schumacher's charity football games to be better than then the matches the german football team are playing, because at certain points of time he was a more successful in sports than the team...
It's a freaking different game... It is a great game. There are points that can be improved, but simply going back to Broodwar won't improve SC2... It will simply kill SC2 and create SC:BW "now with better graphics". Also Broodwars has a ton of flaws as well... If you want to see a ton of action with every unit you produce, there are other RTS games that work with real "rock-paper-scissor"-principles, in which you're forced to use your stuff, else your 20infantry units will become useless the moment your opponent builds 1tank...
So in conclusion: I like my starcraft rather brainy than stressy. That's why I play it and watch it. Passive pressure ("getting ahead") is at least as exciting as unit control and battles for me.
I kinda agree with this. There's just too much subjective opinion when BW fans talk about how SC2 should change that it's really hard to find what's actually a good improvement and what's just old BW love/bias showing.
I think it depends a lot on the players, not the game itself. Warpprisms and overlords allow for the same amount of harass in the late game as do medivacs. I can't believe that battles are lost b/c 8 supply of the P army was harassing an expo instead of joining the main army. I think as time goes on, players will discover more of these timings to abuse the immobility of deathballs even more.
Also: Threads like this should get closed b/c they add nothing but BW vs SC2 rant to the forums.
On November 23 2011 23:24 Micket wrote: Can someone show me a game where a TvP, PvZ, PvP or ZvZ didn't end in a single decisive engagement? Very rarely do we get even trades. Very rarely does the person winning the engagement decisively lose the game.
The best PvZ I can think of at the moment is Kiwikaki vs Stephano in the IPL3 tournament, game 2:
Several engagements, long game, the crowd loved that game too. + Show Spoiler +
On November 23 2011 23:24 Micket wrote: Can someone show me a game where a TvP, PvZ, PvP or ZvZ didn't end in a single decisive engagement? Very rarely do we get even trades. Very rarely does the person winning the engagement decisively lose the game.
you should check out any Hero's PvZ matchup. That guy truly knows how to play against zerg and peel them apart. He plays PvZ like a top tier TvZ playstyle. Multi-drop, harass and pressure
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
As someone who doesn't belong to the "people who have spent lot of time with both games" (based on the date you joined and by reading your posts), you aren't getting the point.
Let me redefine what I mean about "success" - not in terms of popularity but quality. In this definition, Justin Bieber won't be considered as a musical "success". Not that SC2 is as bad as him but it's a success (according to your definition), it's dumbed down.
SC2 is popular because of the money put in and the hoards of people who have never seen BW before and all the foreigners from wc3 and bw who follow the money pumped in by -- Blizzard themselves. In BW, it was the korean companies themselves who became sponsors - because a game became something more. One of the reasons BW wasn't very popular outside of Korea is because people care more about graphics. Trust me, I've trie getting a lot of people to watch or play BW and the first thing they comment about is the graphics, before the gameplay.
And when I say SC2 is inferior. I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but, if you actually read what I posted without getting all hurt, as someone who wants SC2 to be better, to be the replacement so that everyone can enjoy something at the level (or even higher) of BW because it reaches a wider audience and has good graphics, instantly appealing to the casual gamer. Thing is, watching the direction they are taking makes me disappointed.
Oh ya and I didn't just waltz into a random SC2 thread and called it inferior like a troll. Read the OP please.
Edit: And I (and most people I'd suppose), will be very happy to be proven wrong that SC2 is inferior when the day comes.
What quantifiable measurement, what number, what threshold must be met before you would admit SC2 is as good or better than BroodWar?
Number of audience members at tournaments? Number of tournaments? Number of countries holding tournaments? Number of years tournaments are held? Amount of prize money given out? Number of companies sponsoring pro players? Amount of money earned by pro players? Number of units of the game sold?
Or maybe you're more interested in numbers related directly to the game itself so perhaps: Average duration of pro games? Average number of units killed in pro games? Average number of engagements in pro games?
We can discuss numbers solidly and logically, but it's hard to discuss individuals' qualitative, gut-level requirements for satisfaction.
Workers take up too much supply. If I send two dropships out to harrass in a TvP that's almost 20% of my army supply. Why do we have to have 70 workers to get decent mining? At least terran can make 10 orbitals and get a true 200/200 army except for gas SCVs.
On November 24 2011 22:12 iky43210 wrote: And the claim that sc2 is already reaching its peak, worn out and 1 dimensional is even more laughable. The meta has changed drastically over the year, and currently every race is heading toward a different drastic meta changes as well.
See the shift to mutas for zerg, more warp prism style for protoss and abusing upgrades /w zealots or HT usage in general.
Changes are even more noticeable for Terran due to how fast that race is being developed. Just 1 or 2 years from now, sc2 will played nothing like the one you see today
What? The game is actively being patched.. of course it's fucking changing. None of you automatic jump-to-sc2 defence posters seem to actually read or think things though at all. Thank god PL starting again so there's something to watch which isn't resolving around 5 second engagements and everything dying.
On November 23 2011 23:24 Micket wrote: Can someone show me a game where a TvP, PvZ, PvP or ZvZ didn't end in a single decisive engagement? Very rarely do we get even trades. Very rarely does the person winning the engagement decisively lose the game.
This did, ultimately, end in a final engagement, and was very boring save a few moments that people only thought were exctigin because there was a mothership involved. Very overrated imo.
Sometimes I feel people get caught up in the moment of discussion when threads like these arise...
So many posts described how SC2 games are usually just people getting their 200/200 and being afraid of attacking each other and then ending in one big engagement...
I'm sorry, but are we playing the same game here? Zergling runbys, medivac drop, warp prism harass, burrowed infestors, ovie drops, constantly repeated pushes until opponent crumbles, Zealots in the miniral line while the main armies are fighting, dt harass, timing attacks with or without expanding, muta harass, ht harass, zergs flanking, mass recall tactics, hidden cannons, army spreading, hellion harass, banshee harass, blink stalkers, the zerg 300 food push, baneling drops,...and there are still more things you could do and I have seen being done !
I mean, are we even playing the same game here?
I understand that we get to 200/200 pretty fast in sc2, however, that also means that the army can be remade faster (espec zerg and somewhat toss), which often results in the other guy not being able to break the enemy and him getting back in for a new round during which the other guy has tried to get a small advantage from his lead (This is basically all my zvp's )
I honestly can't remember the last time I saw a game where none attacked or harass until we had 200/200 and then the game ended after one big fight...I'm not saying it hasn't happened, but I really can't remember any games...I can, however, recall many many games where this wasn't the case!
On November 23 2011 23:24 Micket wrote: Can someone show me a game where a TvP, PvZ, PvP or ZvZ didn't end in a single decisive engagement? Very rarely do we get even trades. Very rarely does the person winning the engagement decisively lose the game.
This did, ultimately, end in a final engagement, and was very boring save a few moments that people only thought were exctigin because there was a mothership involved. Very overrated imo.
You are the type of person I was talking about when I posted this:
On November 25 2011 08:35 ajabberwok wrote: What quantifiable measurement, what number, what threshold must be met before you would admit SC2 is as good or better than BroodWar?
Number of audience members at tournaments? Number of tournaments? Number of countries holding tournaments? Number of years tournaments are held? Amount of prize money given out? Number of companies sponsoring pro players? Amount of money earned by pro players? Number of units of the game sold?
Or maybe you're more interested in numbers related directly to the game itself so perhaps: Average duration of pro games? Average number of units killed in pro games? Average number of engagements in pro games?
We can discuss numbers solidly and logically, but it's hard to discuss individuals' qualitative, gut-level requirements for satisfaction.
Some of your suggestions just you trying to think of anything possible you can do "timing attacks with or without expanding" haha. Why do you have to take things to the extreme and suggest people are saying there's NOTHING else? Watch a BW game and compare and you'll see the difference. It's stupid people repeating the same thing over and over saying you don't see where the balls are. It's not just max'd army vs max'd army that's boring. It's all extremely short, position your units, cast spells, all within a few seconds. And yes this is the main part of the game
To be honest not much of that other stuff even interests me because it's just easy-micro versions of BW ideas, like the muta harass. If you are not familiar with both games why are you even posting? You don't understand what the comparison is yet you jump to the defence of the game anyway.
And yeah there's loads of silly overrated games. People like motherships or nukes regardless of if its a good game. Just gimmick games. Also people should stop saying metagame at all when it's not even 'naturally' changing.
On November 23 2011 13:21 Praetorial wrote: This is a BW vs SC2 thread. There is little need to compare the two or suggest that one is superior to the other.
little need for who? I write crappy games as a hobby. Reading decent arguments about this stuff can be useful.
Personally - even though i barley played bw - its interesting to see the differences and compare gameplay. It helps to understand how differences can effect the game.
When constructive it can be interesting -especially as sc2 is still evolving (dunno about bw).
I do have to say though i micro a crap ton less now than i used to 10 years ago. I didnt used to attack move and never put buildings on control groups so I could have twice as many control groups of units (c&c/ra).
On November 24 2011 21:59 Sbrubbles wrote: Yet another pure nostalgia inspired thread ...
BW =/= SC2
dismissing the OP's concerns because he compared the game to BW is rather sad.
OP just wants the game to be better than BW by learning from it, not dismissing it as you are with your post.
Is there any good stuff to learn from BW that can be implemented in SC2?
IMO, SC2 is a fixed version of BW. Better path-finding, and better UI. (except bnet)
BW is much harder than SC2 to play casually, but BW pro matches are much more action packed than SC2 and spectator wise that's something better isn't?
But that's something devs can't pull off given how making the learning curve steep drives sales away. :/
I don't see how BW was ever balanced in casual level.
INB4 CasualSux because it's the casuals that drives the sales numbers in the end.
I've been watching more and more BW again over SC2 because the difference is night and day in terms of actual game quality. So for me at least I've been less concerned with SC2 matches (1v1 at least) and more excited about BW. I do agree with OP that a lot of SC2 games are really slow. especially when someone does something at 6 minutes to win the game and the game goes on for 20 minutes where they finally decide to win the game / the other guy gg's. Those games are disgusting and games like naniwa v stephano are few and far between
On November 25 2011 10:13 infinity2k9 wrote: Some of your suggestions just you trying to think of anything possible you can do "timing attacks with or without expanding" haha. Why do you have to take things to the extreme and suggest people are saying there's NOTHING else? Watch a BW game and compare and you'll see the difference. It's stupid people repeating the same thing over and over saying you don't see where the balls are. It's not just max'd army vs max'd army that's boring. It's all extremely short, position your units, cast spells, all within a few seconds. And yes this is the main part of the game
To be honest not much of that other stuff even interests me because it's just easy-micro versions of BW ideas, like the muta harass. If you are not familiar with both games why are you even posting? You don't understand what the comparison is yet you jump to the defence of the game anyway.
And yeah there's loads of silly overrated games. People like motherships or nukes regardless of if its a good game. Just gimmick games. Also people should stop saying metagame at all when it's not even 'naturally' changing.
I would, but I have never been able to finish watching a brood war game cause I get so bored...
Stop being an elitist ass and go back to bw if you feel that way.
Also if you read my post I'm actually not even comparing bw to sc2. I don't care what bw did cause I didn't enjoy that game. I treat sc2 as it's own game with it's own standards that I'm judging and I like what I see.
On November 23 2011 23:24 Micket wrote: Can someone show me a game where a TvP, PvZ, PvP or ZvZ didn't end in a single decisive engagement? Very rarely do we get even trades. Very rarely does the person winning the engagement decisively lose the game.
This did, ultimately, end in a final engagement, and was very boring save a few moments that people only thought were exctigin because there was a mothership involved. Very overrated imo.
Wow. A game ended in a final engagement. There must be some erious magic at work. On the serious side, you should probably add that it was very boring FOR YOU, not for the majority of people who watched this. Really, do you think that was all faked excitement? Do you think I would have watched the game if it was as boring as you said? Hell no, I've got better things to do than that. I was watching it because I was just amazed at the ability of the players and the tension that I felt all game long. It was just so close until the last moment, and the game ended with a bang of genius. It's ok if you don't understand this, but please don't teach everybody what he/ she should or shouldn't feel excited about.
Do people who repeat "different game different game" like a broken record even understand what "different game" means? Street Fighter and Marvel vs Capcom are different games. One tournament will often feature both games because they're different. Most people like both, but for those who don't it's easy to pick out the one they do like. No one wants Justin Wong to stop playing one in favor of the other. When another different game like Melty Blood comes out the community can decide whether or not it's worth playing along with the other games.
This obviously isn't the same situation with SC2 because SC2 and BW are not different games like SF4 and MvC3. SC2 is very obviously meant to be the successor to BW and there are powerful forces pushing for SC2 to completely take over BW's position. When you look at it this way it's obvious why BW fans would be upset and desperately hoping for SC2 to become a comparable product.
As soon as these posts arrive by the second page it loses all point.
Let me say this bluntly first, before going into actual detail.
Harder =/= equal better, nor should the focus be on making things smaller.
and another point
harder = less popularity. (more about casuals then point 1)
Now to go into details
point 1.
Making it harder doesn't make it more interesting. What makes games interesting is how players use the mechanics given to them. Players in BW make use of the constricted control groups as their form of army control and with a larger army possible it was fairly simple that you'd not get maxed as often. The max isn't a "goal" it's just part of the game. Now take this to SC2. With higher worker count and armies that die faster, you get quicker battles, but you actually get more bang for your buck. Throwaway drops are fairly common even as you get to the highest level. The end game goal is getting the strongest army you can and getting an advantage with that army. It's more passive yes, it's easier yes, but THAT DOESNT MAKE IT WORSE. SC2 allows for a higher focus then who micros that one control group of dragoons better, it allows for an even higher level of overall strategy then we see right now and that we couldn't see in BW. In BW the micro/macro mechanics restrict how good you are, and the legends are those that go beyond that level. In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
point 2
BW could never get to the level of SC2 in viewership and as an international esport. A large majority of viewers are players (or would be players if they didn't watch), THIS is the difference that will make sc2 a true success internationally. No longer do you have to be a good RTS player or really understand the game to even begin to see what's going on in the game. Fact, people like to watch what they can understand. People can watch sc2 who couldn't even begin to watch BW (i'm completely disregarding graphics btw, since they could always make BW 2.0 as many of you seem to want). This is more relating to esports as a success vs as a game, but it is still a very important point.
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
You should probably try to learn more about both games before you make comments which are way off. This is just a highlight of where you went wrong.
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
You should probably try to learn more about both games before you make comments which are way off. This is just a highlight of where you went wrong.
It isn't, you can't compare sc2 to chess as so many people in this topic do without recognizing the strategy aspect that is involved. A game of chess is pure strategy, to compare sc2 to chess moreso then bw then say it doesn't require more strategy is the sign of an ignorant fanboy.
so thanks, i'll disregard every post that ever mentions chess and yet seems to think strategy isn't bigger in sc2, including the OP.
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: As soon as these posts arrive by the second page it loses all point.
Let me say this bluntly first, before going into actual detail.
Harder =/= equal better, nor should the focus be on making things smaller.
and another point
harder = less popularity. (more about casuals then point 1)
Now to go into details
point 1.
Making it harder doesn't make it more interesting. What makes games interesting is how players use the mechanics given to them. Players in BW make use of the constricted control groups as their form of army control and with a larger army possible it was fairly simple that you'd not get maxed as often. The max isn't a "goal" it's just part of the game. Now take this to SC2. With higher worker count and armies that die faster, you get quicker battles, but you actually get more bang for your buck. Throwaway drops are fairly common even as you get to the highest level. The end game goal is getting the strongest army you can and getting an advantage with that army. It's more passive yes, it's easier yes, but THAT DOESNT MAKE IT WORSE. SC2 allows for a higher focus then who micros that one control group of dragoons better, it allows for an even higher level of overall strategy then we see right now and that we couldn't see in BW. In BW the micro/macro mechanics restrict how good you are, and the legends are those that go beyond that level. In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
point 2
BW could never get to the level of SC2 in viewership and as an international esport. A large majority of viewers are players (or would be players if they didn't watch), THIS is the difference that will make sc2 a true success internationally. No longer do you have to be a good RTS player or really understand the game to even begin to see what's going on in the game. Fact, people like to watch what they can understand. People can watch sc2 who couldn't even begin to watch BW (i'm completely disregarding graphics btw, since they could always make BW 2.0 as many of you seem to want). This is more relating to esports as a success vs as a game, but it is still a very important point.
BW is a simpler game than SC2. Just saying. The viewer base for BW is actually much more casual (in Korea), hardly anyone watches SC2 without having played it, there are tonnes of BW fangirls/guys/mums/dads who haven't played a single game of BW.
Also you should really follow BW or play it before you make such crazy claims. You still see crazy strategies being developed in BW and rookies beating top pros from time to time.
On May 08 2011 11:15 MountainDewJunkie wrote: Add this to the list of annoying TvZ builds:
Kitchen sink build: cheese into harass into m&m-wraith-valk-tank-vulture
The one-of-everything build (aka fast irradiate): That ridiculous 1 rax cc (or 14 cc) build that goes rax->fac->port->facility for fast irradiate to push back muta harass that typically moves towards standard SK or bio-mech. It's not very successful vs competent zergs, yet Flash and fantasy still occasionally experiment with it.
Sparks Terran: 3-rax all-in sunken break
The Asshole build: The inspiration for the Kitchen Sink's harassment element, I feel. You may have seen this build in the Ro8 of the Avalon MSL, Canata vs Jaedong, game one. It was basically something absurd like 8 rax (overlord sniping or bunker rush attempt), 8 fact with vulture run-by attempt, and 8/9 port for wraith to hunt overlord. When it works, it pretty much ends the game. I think there was a similar game Hwasin vs Hyvaa back in the day.
The Combo Breaker: You see it more often today, the 2 fact to 4 rax into goliath+m&m 2 base timing attack. As seen used by Flash and Iris recently.
iloveoov fake mech: Self explanatory. Watch Jaedong vs Ganzi to see its effectiveness.
THE fantasy build: I mean THE build. Killed GGplay but failed vs Jaedong. 1 rax 1 fac 1 vulture then cc into vulture drop w/ speed. Works great vs 3 hatch muta. Not so much vs 2 hatch muta. Hardly seen these days.
2 port wraith into bio: This build always makes a comeback.
2 factory: ForGG played around with this a couple of games last year.
There are others, but those are the ones on the top of my head.
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: As soon as these posts arrive by the second page it loses all point.
Let me say this bluntly first, before going into actual detail.
Harder =/= equal better, nor should the focus be on making things smaller.
and another point
harder = less popularity. (more about casuals then point 1)
Now to go into details
point 1.
Making it harder doesn't make it more interesting. What makes games interesting is how players use the mechanics given to them. Players in BW make use of the constricted control groups as their form of army control and with a larger army possible it was fairly simple that you'd not get maxed as often. The max isn't a "goal" it's just part of the game. Now take this to SC2. With higher worker count and armies that die faster, you get quicker battles, but you actually get more bang for your buck. Throwaway drops are fairly common even as you get to the highest level. The end game goal is getting the strongest army you can and getting an advantage with that army. It's more passive yes, it's easier yes, but THAT DOESNT MAKE IT WORSE. SC2 allows for a higher focus then who micros that one control group of dragoons better, it allows for an even higher level of overall strategy then we see right now and that we couldn't see in BW. In BW the micro/macro mechanics restrict how good you are, and the legends are those that go beyond that level. In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
point 2
BW could never get to the level of SC2 in viewership and as an international esport. A large majority of viewers are players (or would be players if they didn't watch), THIS is the difference that will make sc2 a true success internationally. No longer do you have to be a good RTS player or really understand the game to even begin to see what's going on in the game. Fact, people like to watch what they can understand. People can watch sc2 who couldn't even begin to watch BW (i'm completely disregarding graphics btw, since they could always make BW 2.0 as many of you seem to want). This is more relating to esports as a success vs as a game, but it is still a very important point.
BW is a simpler game than SC2. Just saying.
simpler in some ways, but much tougher to understand at higher levels and much tougher to even attempt to pick up and play. The average person could pick up sc2 and be able to understand what's happening rather quickly, or even after watching a few well commentated game could pick up some of the ideas. To get near that same level for viewing BW you'd need to spend extensive time and put a commitment into it. Which will never happen until esports reaches the point it doesn't need to persuade, because it's already there.
nice ninja edit, time to add on to mine :p
The difference between what happened with BW in korea is based in what was going on. As anyone that knows anything about BW knows, it became popular because of the timing it hit with the state of Korea as the main driving force. It was cheap entertainment and was VERY well advertised. Also, the casual got hooked on the players, not the game. The adverts was focused on the players. hell cnn compared it to a cult (love hyperbole).. Most of them ended up learning more as they viewed as a side effect. to be short, it wasn't the game that attracted the casual viewers, it was the unique portrayal of the game that only worked because of when and how they executed it
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
You should probably try to learn more about both games before you make comments which are way off. This is just a highlight of where you went wrong.
It isn't, you can't compare sc2 to chess as so many people in this topic do without recognizing the strategy aspect that is involved. A game of chess is pure strategy, to compare sc2 to chess moreso then bw then say it doesn't require more strategy is the sign of an ignorant fanboy.
so thanks, i'll disregard every post that ever mentions chess and yet seems to think strategy isn't bigger in sc2, including the OP.
I'm sorry, I was being unclear. I intended 'both games' to encompass BW and SC2, not SC2 and chess. It's true when you say that SC2 leans more towards the strategy side than the mechanics side. That still doesn't mean that the strategy in SC2 is deeper and more complex that the strategy in BW, which has had a decade longer to develop. I can't say if in 10 years SC2 will be more strategically complex than BW ever was, but right now that is not the case.
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: As soon as these posts arrive by the second page it loses all point.
Let me say this bluntly first, before going into actual detail.
Harder =/= equal better, nor should the focus be on making things smaller.
and another point
harder = less popularity. (more about casuals then point 1)
Now to go into details
point 1.
Making it harder doesn't make it more interesting. What makes games interesting is how players use the mechanics given to them. Players in BW make use of the constricted control groups as their form of army control and with a larger army possible it was fairly simple that you'd not get maxed as often. The max isn't a "goal" it's just part of the game. Now take this to SC2. With higher worker count and armies that die faster, you get quicker battles, but you actually get more bang for your buck. Throwaway drops are fairly common even as you get to the highest level. The end game goal is getting the strongest army you can and getting an advantage with that army. It's more passive yes, it's easier yes, but THAT DOESNT MAKE IT WORSE. SC2 allows for a higher focus then who micros that one control group of dragoons better, it allows for an even higher level of overall strategy then we see right now and that we couldn't see in BW. In BW the micro/macro mechanics restrict how good you are, and the legends are those that go beyond that level. In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
point 2
BW could never get to the level of SC2 in viewership and as an international esport. A large majority of viewers are players (or would be players if they didn't watch), THIS is the difference that will make sc2 a true success internationally. No longer do you have to be a good RTS player or really understand the game to even begin to see what's going on in the game. Fact, people like to watch what they can understand. People can watch sc2 who couldn't even begin to watch BW (i'm completely disregarding graphics btw, since they could always make BW 2.0 as many of you seem to want). This is more relating to esports as a success vs as a game, but it is still a very important point.
BW is a simpler game than SC2. Just saying.
simpler in some ways, but much tougher to understand at higher levels and much tougher to even attempt to pick up and play. The average person could pick up sc2 and be able to understand what's happening rather quickly, or even after watching a few well commentated game could pick up some of the ideas. To get near that same level for viewing BW you'd need to spend extensive time and put a commitment into it. Which will never happen until esports reaches the point it doesn't need to persuade, because it's already there.
Its actually quite the opposite when it comes to viewership which is what you are pointing out.
Just think about what is involved in macro in BW and SC2. Which one is easier to understand?
i'm done with this topic because now everone is confused by ninja edits. I'll come back in like 30 mins when it's not an issue :p
I'm sorry, I was being unclear. I intended 'both games' to encompass BW and SC2, not SC2 and chess. It's true when you say that SC2 leans more towards the strategy side than the mechanics side. That still doesn't mean that the strategy in SC2 is deeper and more complex that the strategy in BW, which has had a decade longer to develop. I can't say if in 10 years SC2 will be more strategically complex than BW ever was, but right now that is not the case.
I see a lot of higher strategy currently in sc2 then i see in most but the VERY highest level of BW, i dont know where you see the opposite.
Its actually quite the opposite when it comes to viewership which is what you are pointing out.
Just think about what is involved in macro in BW and SC2. Which one is easier to understand?
they are relatively similar actually. most casual viewers wouldn't even need to understand most of sc2 macro to understand what they would see from watching it. There is of course a slight difference in say, zerg macro, where it might be more complicated in sc2 then in BW. Things like chrono boost and mules/scans can always be summed up in simple sentences that mean no extra difficulty to understand. Like "missing chronos are bad, because they speed up production) and "mules and scans come from same energy source and as such must be used efficiently, because every scan means a lost mule", which later translates to in their minds "mules/scans good, but can't do both".
On November 25 2011 12:36 darklight54321 wrote: i'm done with this topic because now everone is confused by ninja edits. I'll come back in like 30 mins when it's not an issue :p
I'm sorry, I was being unclear. I intended 'both games' to encompass BW and SC2, not SC2 and chess. It's true when you say that SC2 leans more towards the strategy side than the mechanics side. That still doesn't mean that the strategy in SC2 is deeper and more complex that the strategy in BW, which has had a decade longer to develop. I can't say if in 10 years SC2 will be more strategically complex than BW ever was, but right now that is not the case.
I see a lot of higher strategy currently in sc2 then i see in most but the VERY highest level of BW, i dont know where you see the opposite.
Its actually quite the opposite when it comes to viewership which is what you are pointing out.
Just think about what is involved in macro in BW and SC2. Which one is easier to understand?
they are relatively similar actually. most casual viewers wouldn't even need to understand most of sc2 macro to understand what they would see from watching it. There is of course a slight difference in say, zerg macro, where it might be more complicated in sc2 then in BW. Things like chrono boost and mules/scans can always be summed up in simple sentences that mean no extra difficulty to understand. Like "missing chronos are bad, because they speed up production) and "mules and scans come from same energy source and as such must be used efficiently, because every scan means a lost mule", which later translates to in their minds "mules/scans good, but can't do both".
Problem is players have almost identical army sizes at most stages of the game. Look at Flash or Best create a massive armies in half the time of other players. That's macro people can really notice. Of course this is not the only way to be good, its just an attribute of Flash. Anyway that's macro that is simple and easy to understand, one where one player has a substantially bigger army than another person. In SC2 you are maxing out so quickly, so its more about remaxing the army, which is not as easy to see and only noticeable when you see a bunch of brief engagements and one player is still reinforcing.
With your argument about top players only creating strategies. There are tonnes of strategic players like sataNik[pG] who are really good (ICCUP A+ / WCG 2007), but no where near close to best in the world (obviously). Heaps of rookies in proleague trumping the top players by playing strategic as well.
the main issue with his post is the condemnation he seems to give the game. Also, it seems to contradict a point. he talks about how it focuses on ease of use and offense (EoU is true) but it seems like he goes to the opposite of what most people seem to say especially with the offense. It seems to me like the main isue i that it's not as action packed, wouldn't a game focused on offense be more action packed? He makes some valid points but it's very skewed on most of them.
On November 25 2011 12:36 darklight54321 wrote: i'm done with this topic because now everone is confused by ninja edits. I'll come back in like 30 mins when it's not an issue :p
I'm sorry, I was being unclear. I intended 'both games' to encompass BW and SC2, not SC2 and chess. It's true when you say that SC2 leans more towards the strategy side than the mechanics side. That still doesn't mean that the strategy in SC2 is deeper and more complex that the strategy in BW, which has had a decade longer to develop. I can't say if in 10 years SC2 will be more strategically complex than BW ever was, but right now that is not the case.
I see a lot of higher strategy currently in sc2 then i see in most but the VERY highest level of BW, i dont know where you see the opposite.
Its actually quite the opposite when it comes to viewership which is what you are pointing out.
Just think about what is involved in macro in BW and SC2. Which one is easier to understand?
they are relatively similar actually. most casual viewers wouldn't even need to understand most of sc2 macro to understand what they would see from watching it. There is of course a slight difference in say, zerg macro, where it might be more complicated in sc2 then in BW. Things like chrono boost and mules/scans can always be summed up in simple sentences that mean no extra difficulty to understand. Like "missing chronos are bad, because they speed up production) and "mules and scans come from same energy source and as such must be used efficiently, because every scan means a lost mule", which later translates to in their minds "mules/scans good, but can't do both".
Problem is players have almost identical army sizes at most stages of the game. Look at Flash or Best create a massive armies in half the time of other players. That's macro people can really notice. Of course this is not the only way to be good, its just an attribute of Flash. Anyway that's macro that is simple and easy to understand, one where one player has a substantially bigger army than another person. In SC2 you are maxing out so quickly, so its more about remaxing the army, which is not as easy to see and only noticeable when you see a bunch of brief engagements and one player is still reinforcing.
With your argument about top players only creating strategies. There are tonnes of strategic players like sataNik[pG] who are really good (ICCUP A+ / WCG 2007), but no where near close to best in the world (obviously). Heaps of rookies in proleague trumping the top players by playing strategic as well.
Not as noticable? i feel like macro is obviously notable. While yes, the flash magic is a clear exception, similar things happen in sc2 through different things. Your main issue with sc2 is more about the focus on macro as in workers and maximizing amount of workers to gain the best economy as safely as it can, vs whatever your opinion of BW macro should be like.
i believe i covered your second paragraph with the talk about how the mechanics is the underlaying line of BW though. You can't be at the very highest without the very highest mechanics. BW is simply mechanics > strategy until you reach pro level, and a that point it's still so heavily mechanics based that strategy is on the backburner. Its simple, when people are asked what one difference there is between sc2/BW its the mechanics. it's simpler in SC2 and easier.
the main issue with his post is the condemnation he seems to give the game. Also, it seems to contradict a point. he talks about how it focuses on ease of use and offense (EoU is true) but it seems like he goes to the opposite of what most people seem to say especially with the offense. It seems to me like the main isue i that it's not as action packed, wouldn't a game focused on offense be more action packed? He makes some valid points but it's very skewed on most of them.
That's the entire point of his post. Call it the offensive advantage paradox.
By removing defenders advantage, - Players will be afraid to engage, because if their army dies they cannot defend at all - Players will be afraid to split up their army, because their army needs to be 100% efficient to engage -- 1st Corollary, a marine drop can be remaxed very quickly so this does not count, where are talking about having chunks of armies around the map
On November 25 2011 12:36 darklight54321 wrote: i'm done with this topic because now everone is confused by ninja edits. I'll come back in like 30 mins when it's not an issue :p
I'm sorry, I was being unclear. I intended 'both games' to encompass BW and SC2, not SC2 and chess. It's true when you say that SC2 leans more towards the strategy side than the mechanics side. That still doesn't mean that the strategy in SC2 is deeper and more complex that the strategy in BW, which has had a decade longer to develop. I can't say if in 10 years SC2 will be more strategically complex than BW ever was, but right now that is not the case.
I see a lot of higher strategy currently in sc2 then i see in most but the VERY highest level of BW, i dont know where you see the opposite.
Its actually quite the opposite when it comes to viewership which is what you are pointing out.
Just think about what is involved in macro in BW and SC2. Which one is easier to understand?
they are relatively similar actually. most casual viewers wouldn't even need to understand most of sc2 macro to understand what they would see from watching it. There is of course a slight difference in say, zerg macro, where it might be more complicated in sc2 then in BW. Things like chrono boost and mules/scans can always be summed up in simple sentences that mean no extra difficulty to understand. Like "missing chronos are bad, because they speed up production) and "mules and scans come from same energy source and as such must be used efficiently, because every scan means a lost mule", which later translates to in their minds "mules/scans good, but can't do both".
Problem is players have almost identical army sizes at most stages of the game. Look at Flash or Best create a massive armies in half the time of other players. That's macro people can really notice. Of course this is not the only way to be good, its just an attribute of Flash. Anyway that's macro that is simple and easy to understand, one where one player has a substantially bigger army than another person. In SC2 you are maxing out so quickly, so its more about remaxing the army, which is not as easy to see and only noticeable when you see a bunch of brief engagements and one player is still reinforcing.
With your argument about top players only creating strategies. There are tonnes of strategic players like sataNik[pG] who are really good (ICCUP A+ / WCG 2007), but no where near close to best in the world (obviously). Heaps of rookies in proleague trumping the top players by playing strategic as well.
Not as noticable? i feel like macro is obviously notable. While yes, the flash magic is a clear exception, similar things happen in sc2 through different things. Your main issue with sc2 is more about the focus on macro as in workers and maximizing amount of workers to gain the best economy as safely as it can, vs whatever your opinion of BW macro should be like.
i believe i covered your second paragraph with the talk about how the mechanics is the underlaying line of BW though. You can't be at the very highest without the very highest mechanics. BW is simply mechanics > strategy until you reach pro level, and a that point it's still so heavily mechanics based that strategy is on the backburner. Its simple, when people are asked what one difference there is between sc2/BW its the mechanics. it's simpler in SC2 and easier.
You are getting confused with emphasis and deepness. SC2 emphasises strategy over mechanics, doesn't mean that the strategy part is better than BW.
There are plenty of strategic players at the top level in BW.
Stork and Savior have less apm than the average SC2 player. about ~200-230apm. Savior was nicknamed Ma Bonjwa. Stork is one of the four pillars of current broodwar. You can be the best at BW if you are good at strategy, tactics, or mechanics, it doesn't matter. Even Flash will develop 3 brand new strategies in every Bo5 final.
MVP has arguably the best mechanics of any SC2 player, also being the best player to come from BW (besides ForGG). What does that say about SC2, and the notion of strategy > mechanics?
Really you need to stop posting, learn about BW first, and then make a response that isn't extremely ignorant to say the least.
darklight you should really stop pretending to understand BW when trying to make your point because it's obvious you haven't watched a single game of BW in your life, let alone understand what the highest level of strategy is, and no way do you understand BW well enough to make a comparison with SC2.
There's nothing wrong with defending SC2, but just stop pretending to understand BW at anything more than a cursory level, it just makes your posts look silly.
On November 25 2011 12:56 darklight54321 wrote: BW is simply mechanics > strategy until you reach pro level, and a that point it's still so heavily mechanics based that strategy is on the backburner.
With sc2 I just can't appreciate the microness of the game. It feels like it's purposely taken out notch down the skill level a lot. Remember when boxer killed a lurked with a micro marine. Or boxers dropship tank micro? Or even his plan to get mass medics so he can blind all the observers so they could not detect cloaked wraiths? They were brilliant. With sc2 I have not seen something as awesome as that. Sure there might be a nuke or a mothership in the game, but I just don't get why people orgasm over those nukes and mothership so much. It seems with sc2 blizzard is trying to actively force a style of game in sc2. Imagine if blizzard never patch the mineral bug update and a Korean actually used that as a skill to get 7% extra minerals for the whole. Now it's hard to pull off whole game but I know. A Korean would practice it constantly to give them an edge. It would be exciting to see because real hard work should be rewarded, not being lucky like in most match ups
I never said i really did understand it at a high high level, but it seems stupid to me that i keep getting told "this is why BW is better" and then when something new comes up that goes against this idea, theres no issue about the previous thing ending up being wrong. Most of what i'm saying was actaully taken from the BW side of previous topics i used to lurk in.
it honestly seems to me like the BW vs SC2 argument is much like r/bias.
On November 25 2011 13:00 Carnivorous Sheep wrote: darklight you should really stop pretending to understand BW when trying to make your point because it's obvious you haven't watched a single game of BW in your life, let alone understand what the highest level of strategy is, and no way do you understand BW well enough to make a comparison with SC2.
There's nothing wrong with defending SC2, but just stop pretending to understand BW at anything more than a cursory level, it just makes your posts look silly.
On November 25 2011 12:56 darklight54321 wrote: BW is simply mechanics > strategy until you reach pro level, and a that point it's still so heavily mechanics based that strategy is on the backburner.
Another example of where you went wrong ;d
The same argument goes both ways. And what he said holds alot of truth, "strategy" in bw is worth much less than having stellar mechanics
On November 25 2011 13:00 Carnivorous Sheep wrote: darklight you should really stop pretending to understand BW when trying to make your point because it's obvious you haven't watched a single game of BW in your life, let alone understand what the highest level of strategy is, and no way do you understand BW well enough to make a comparison with SC2.
There's nothing wrong with defending SC2, but just stop pretending to understand BW at anything more than a cursory level, it just makes your posts look silly.
On November 25 2011 12:56 darklight54321 wrote: BW is simply mechanics > strategy until you reach pro level, and a that point it's still so heavily mechanics based that strategy is on the backburner.
Another example of where you went wrong ;d
The same argument goes both ways.
No cheep is right; mechanics > strategy until high levels in SC2 as well. So, you can't really say that unless you are going to cite something else.
On November 25 2011 13:00 Carnivorous Sheep wrote: darklight you should really stop pretending to understand BW when trying to make your point because it's obvious you haven't watched a single game of BW in your life, let alone understand what the highest level of strategy is, and no way do you understand BW well enough to make a comparison with SC2.
There's nothing wrong with defending SC2, but just stop pretending to understand BW at anything more than a cursory level, it just makes your posts look silly.
On November 25 2011 12:56 darklight54321 wrote: BW is simply mechanics > strategy until you reach pro level, and a that point it's still so heavily mechanics based that strategy is on the backburner.
Another example of where you went wrong ;d
Don't waste your time. I tried to reason why his arguments were flawed with him through pm, but he doesn't get it nor does he want to.
darklight, nobody here is telling you that SC2 sucks and BW is better. They both have their merits. Please stop because you are giving the SC2 community a bad rap.
I remember watching mlg on youtube while the stream link was on the frontpage on youtube and there were a lot of people not that familiar with sc2. I think it was mvp vs naniwa and there wasnt a single interaction between the players before like 15 minute mark when they were both maxed. People in the chat kept saying OMG THIS GAME IS BORING and stuff like that and it sort of broke my heart. Yea youtube is notorious for its trolls but I think they had a point, never would you see that kind of lame game in BW where just sitting back and building up like that meant you lose the game.
I rly hope blizz wakes up in HotS, I rly am starting to think that they dont fully understand their own product and dont know what they need to do to make this game as epic as BW.
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: As soon as these posts arrive by the second page it loses all point.
Let me say this bluntly first, before going into actual detail.
Harder =/= equal better, nor should the focus be on making things smaller.
and another point
harder = less popularity. (more about casuals then point 1)
Now to go into details
point 1.
Making it harder doesn't make it more interesting. What makes games interesting is how players use the mechanics given to them. Players in BW make use of the constricted control groups as their form of army control and with a larger army possible it was fairly simple that you'd not get maxed as often. The max isn't a "goal" it's just part of the game. Now take this to SC2. With higher worker count and armies that die faster, you get quicker battles, but you actually get more bang for your buck. Throwaway drops are fairly common even as you get to the highest level. The end game goal is getting the strongest army you can and getting an advantage with that army. It's more passive yes, it's easier yes, but THAT DOESNT MAKE IT WORSE. SC2 allows for a higher focus then who micros that one control group of dragoons better, it allows for an even higher level of overall strategy then we see right now and that we couldn't see in BW. In BW the micro/macro mechanics restrict how good you are, and the legends are those that go beyond that level. In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
point 2
BW could never get to the level of SC2 in viewership and as an international esport. A large majority of viewers are players (or would be players if they didn't watch), THIS is the difference that will make sc2 a true success internationally. No longer do you have to be a good RTS player or really understand the game to even begin to see what's going on in the game. Fact, people like to watch what they can understand. People can watch sc2 who couldn't even begin to watch BW (i'm completely disregarding graphics btw, since they could always make BW 2.0 as many of you seem to want). This is more relating to esports as a success vs as a game, but it is still a very important point.
BW is a simpler game than SC2. Just saying. The viewer base for BW is actually much more casual (in Korea), hardly anyone watches SC2 without having played it, there are tonnes of BW fangirls/guys/mums/dads who haven't played a single game of BW.
Also you should really follow BW or play it before you make such crazy claims. You still see crazy strategies being developed in BW and rookies beating top pros from time to time.
On May 08 2011 11:15 MountainDewJunkie wrote: Add this to the list of annoying TvZ builds:
Kitchen sink build: cheese into harass into m&m-wraith-valk-tank-vulture
The one-of-everything build (aka fast irradiate): That ridiculous 1 rax cc (or 14 cc) build that goes rax->fac->port->facility for fast irradiate to push back muta harass that typically moves towards standard SK or bio-mech. It's not very successful vs competent zergs, yet Flash and fantasy still occasionally experiment with it.
Sparks Terran: 3-rax all-in sunken break
The Asshole build: The inspiration for the Kitchen Sink's harassment element, I feel. You may have seen this build in the Ro8 of the Avalon MSL, Canata vs Jaedong, game one. It was basically something absurd like 8 rax (overlord sniping or bunker rush attempt), 8 fact with vulture run-by attempt, and 8/9 port for wraith to hunt overlord. When it works, it pretty much ends the game. I think there was a similar game Hwasin vs Hyvaa back in the day.
The Combo Breaker: You see it more often today, the 2 fact to 4 rax into goliath+m&m 2 base timing attack. As seen used by Flash and Iris recently.
iloveoov fake mech: Self explanatory. Watch Jaedong vs Ganzi to see its effectiveness.
THE fantasy build: I mean THE build. Killed GGplay but failed vs Jaedong. 1 rax 1 fac 1 vulture then cc into vulture drop w/ speed. Works great vs 3 hatch muta. Not so much vs 2 hatch muta. Hardly seen these days.
2 port wraith into bio: This build always makes a comeback.
2 factory: ForGG played around with this a couple of games last year.
There are others, but those are the ones on the top of my head.
BW is a simpler game you say but yet often BW fans talk about smart casting, tank targeting, how to micro Muts, that vid with Dragoons shooting at spider mines and other UI/pathing-related micro. All those things just look like stuff attacking stuff to me, as i didn't know all the intricacies until someone pointed them out. I don't know how that can be considered simple and fun to the casual viewer? BW became huge because it came out at a perfect time in the perfect setting. (pc bangs, korea etc)
On November 25 2011 12:36 darklight54321 wrote: i'm done with this topic because now everone is confused by ninja edits. I'll come back in like 30 mins when it's not an issue :p
I'm sorry, I was being unclear. I intended 'both games' to encompass BW and SC2, not SC2 and chess. It's true when you say that SC2 leans more towards the strategy side than the mechanics side. That still doesn't mean that the strategy in SC2 is deeper and more complex that the strategy in BW, which has had a decade longer to develop. I can't say if in 10 years SC2 will be more strategically complex than BW ever was, but right now that is not the case.
I see a lot of higher strategy currently in sc2 then i see in most but the VERY highest level of BW, i dont know where you see the opposite.
Its actually quite the opposite when it comes to viewership which is what you are pointing out.
Just think about what is involved in macro in BW and SC2. Which one is easier to understand?
they are relatively similar actually. most casual viewers wouldn't even need to understand most of sc2 macro to understand what they would see from watching it. There is of course a slight difference in say, zerg macro, where it might be more complicated in sc2 then in BW. Things like chrono boost and mules/scans can always be summed up in simple sentences that mean no extra difficulty to understand. Like "missing chronos are bad, because they speed up production) and "mules and scans come from same energy source and as such must be used efficiently, because every scan means a lost mule", which later translates to in their minds "mules/scans good, but can't do both".
Problem is players have almost identical army sizes at most stages of the game. Look at Flash or Best create a massive armies in half the time of other players. That's macro people can really notice. Of course this is not the only way to be good, its just an attribute of Flash. Anyway that's macro that is simple and easy to understand, one where one player has a substantially bigger army than another person. In SC2 you are maxing out so quickly, so its more about remaxing the army, which is not as easy to see and only noticeable when you see a bunch of brief engagements and one player is still reinforcing...
Problem seem to be that you don't watch enough SC2 then. I don't know how many times Tastosis has been suprised by how much ahead players like Bomber get just by superior macro compared to other good terrans, there's often not just 200 vs 200 armies, you exaggerate. Also TvZ's and TvT's are back and forth and who's better at reinforcing is quite easy to see and appreciate imo.
Saying things like this don't help your cause as it's subjective bs veiled as BW > SC2. I just hope the protoss matchups improve from the ball syndrome they have now.
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: As soon as these posts arrive by the second page it loses all point.
Let me say this bluntly first, before going into actual detail.
Harder =/= equal better, nor should the focus be on making things smaller.
and another point
harder = less popularity. (more about casuals then point 1)
Now to go into details
point 1.
Making it harder doesn't make it more interesting. What makes games interesting is how players use the mechanics given to them. Players in BW make use of the constricted control groups as their form of army control and with a larger army possible it was fairly simple that you'd not get maxed as often. The max isn't a "goal" it's just part of the game. Now take this to SC2. With higher worker count and armies that die faster, you get quicker battles, but you actually get more bang for your buck. Throwaway drops are fairly common even as you get to the highest level. The end game goal is getting the strongest army you can and getting an advantage with that army. It's more passive yes, it's easier yes, but THAT DOESNT MAKE IT WORSE. SC2 allows for a higher focus then who micros that one control group of dragoons better, it allows for an even higher level of overall strategy then we see right now and that we couldn't see in BW. In BW the micro/macro mechanics restrict how good you are, and the legends are those that go beyond that level. In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
point 2
BW could never get to the level of SC2 in viewership and as an international esport. A large majority of viewers are players (or would be players if they didn't watch), THIS is the difference that will make sc2 a true success internationally. No longer do you have to be a good RTS player or really understand the game to even begin to see what's going on in the game. Fact, people like to watch what they can understand. People can watch sc2 who couldn't even begin to watch BW (i'm completely disregarding graphics btw, since they could always make BW 2.0 as many of you seem to want). This is more relating to esports as a success vs as a game, but it is still a very important point.
BW is a simpler game than SC2. Just saying. The viewer base for BW is actually much more casual (in Korea), hardly anyone watches SC2 without having played it, there are tonnes of BW fangirls/guys/mums/dads who haven't played a single game of BW.
Also you should really follow BW or play it before you make such crazy claims. You still see crazy strategies being developed in BW and rookies beating top pros from time to time.
On May 08 2011 11:15 MountainDewJunkie wrote: Add this to the list of annoying TvZ builds:
Kitchen sink build: cheese into harass into m&m-wraith-valk-tank-vulture
The one-of-everything build (aka fast irradiate): That ridiculous 1 rax cc (or 14 cc) build that goes rax->fac->port->facility for fast irradiate to push back muta harass that typically moves towards standard SK or bio-mech. It's not very successful vs competent zergs, yet Flash and fantasy still occasionally experiment with it.
Sparks Terran: 3-rax all-in sunken break
The Asshole build: The inspiration for the Kitchen Sink's harassment element, I feel. You may have seen this build in the Ro8 of the Avalon MSL, Canata vs Jaedong, game one. It was basically something absurd like 8 rax (overlord sniping or bunker rush attempt), 8 fact with vulture run-by attempt, and 8/9 port for wraith to hunt overlord. When it works, it pretty much ends the game. I think there was a similar game Hwasin vs Hyvaa back in the day.
The Combo Breaker: You see it more often today, the 2 fact to 4 rax into goliath+m&m 2 base timing attack. As seen used by Flash and Iris recently.
iloveoov fake mech: Self explanatory. Watch Jaedong vs Ganzi to see its effectiveness.
THE fantasy build: I mean THE build. Killed GGplay but failed vs Jaedong. 1 rax 1 fac 1 vulture then cc into vulture drop w/ speed. Works great vs 3 hatch muta. Not so much vs 2 hatch muta. Hardly seen these days.
2 port wraith into bio: This build always makes a comeback.
2 factory: ForGG played around with this a couple of games last year.
There are others, but those are the ones on the top of my head.
BW is a simpler game you say but yet often BW fans talk about smart casting, tank targeting, how to micro Muts, that vid with Dragoons shooting at spider mines and other UI/pathing-related micro. All those things just look like stuff attacking stuff to me, as i didn't know all the intricacies until someone pointed them out. I don't know how that can be considered simple and fun to the casual viewer? BW became huge because it came out at a perfect time in the perfect setting. (pc bangs, korea etc)
On November 25 2011 12:36 darklight54321 wrote: i'm done with this topic because now everone is confused by ninja edits. I'll come back in like 30 mins when it's not an issue :p
I'm sorry, I was being unclear. I intended 'both games' to encompass BW and SC2, not SC2 and chess. It's true when you say that SC2 leans more towards the strategy side than the mechanics side. That still doesn't mean that the strategy in SC2 is deeper and more complex that the strategy in BW, which has had a decade longer to develop. I can't say if in 10 years SC2 will be more strategically complex than BW ever was, but right now that is not the case.
I see a lot of higher strategy currently in sc2 then i see in most but the VERY highest level of BW, i dont know where you see the opposite.
Its actually quite the opposite when it comes to viewership which is what you are pointing out.
Just think about what is involved in macro in BW and SC2. Which one is easier to understand?
they are relatively similar actually. most casual viewers wouldn't even need to understand most of sc2 macro to understand what they would see from watching it. There is of course a slight difference in say, zerg macro, where it might be more complicated in sc2 then in BW. Things like chrono boost and mules/scans can always be summed up in simple sentences that mean no extra difficulty to understand. Like "missing chronos are bad, because they speed up production) and "mules and scans come from same energy source and as such must be used efficiently, because every scan means a lost mule", which later translates to in their minds "mules/scans good, but can't do both".
Problem is players have almost identical army sizes at most stages of the game. Look at Flash or Best create a massive armies in half the time of other players. That's macro people can really notice. Of course this is not the only way to be good, its just an attribute of Flash. Anyway that's macro that is simple and easy to understand, one where one player has a substantially bigger army than another person. In SC2 you are maxing out so quickly, so its more about remaxing the army, which is not as easy to see and only noticeable when you see a bunch of brief engagements and one player is still reinforcing...
Problem seem to be that you don't watch enough SC2 then. I don't know how many times Tastosis has been suprised by how much ahead players like Bomber get just by superior macro compared to other good terrans, there's often not just 200 vs 200 armies, you exaggerate. Also TvZ's and TvT's are back and forth and who's better at reinforcing is quite easy to see and appreciate imo.
Saying things like this don't help your cause as it's subjective bs veiled as BW > SC2. I just hope the protoss matchups improve from the ball syndrome they have now.
Broodwar viewers don't need to know all the intricacies to find it fun. When I started watching pro BW I knew nothing about pathing tricks, micro of any sort, or even basic builds. The fact is that BW is popular with casual viewers in Korea more than a decade after its release. There are more factors to this than just the gameplay and SC2 needs more time to prove itself.
His other point is that the ease of macro in SC2 makes being a 'macro specialist' less obvious and less of an advantage than it was in BW. I'm sure that he agrees that there can be differences in the time to max, albeit smaller ones than we saw in BW.
I feel that huge armies are too easy to move (unlimited units per control groups). BW games were more dynamic because moving a 200 supply army was nearly impossible.
On November 25 2011 17:30 Patate wrote: I feel that huge armies are too easy to move (unlimited units per control groups). BW games were more dynamic because moving a 200 supply army was nearly impossible.
I'm glad you think BW is dynamic, though armies in BW are definitely possible to move around the map. At the pro level, keeping your army moving is essential to victory. You should watch games on Destination for examples of this, since Desti is such a great map when it comes to positioning. You'll notice both players have to cover all the bridges in a split map situation, which entails a lot of army movement. This will occur even if neither player is intending to engage.
Just for the record, I think you should all know that control groups go up to 255.
Not that anyone would even get an army of 255 units, but just saying.
Oh and if you're watching Dreamhack right now on Day9's stream, you can see just what I mean when the game has become deathball vs deathball and nothing is interesting.
Active play and constant harassment is something that comes about through necessity. The Starcraft 2 metagame is just barely reaching the point where players are learning how to survive against every sort of 200/200 deathball-like attack. Once games get to the point where two players with max armies engage each other and the outcome is so close that it's basically like flipping a coin in the first place, that's when it will start to get more important to gain edges by other means.
I think the thing that will drive more active play style development is when players are more certain of how to build a max army that is optimally cost-efficient against what their enemies are doing. If you notice in Brood War, unit compositions are very well mapped out all the way into the late game in every matchup, and for almost every set of openings. Because of that, players won't be able to gain an edge without being very aggressive about finding holes in their opponents play to exploit constantly throughout the game.
I also feel like people need to gain more "starsense" in SC2 about where to look for holes in defense. One thing that I'm starting to notice lately in big SC2 macro games is that both players usually have a ton of holes in their defense, but are so pre-occupied with managing their main armies that they don't notice or attempt to take advantage of these. When it's a little bit less scary to engage in important battles, people are gonna be striking at these weak points a lot more often.
On November 26 2011 07:56 eSuBuildings wrote: Just for the record, I think you should all know that control groups go up to 255.
Not that anyone would even get an army of 255 units, but just saying.
Oh and if you're watching Dreamhack right now on Day9's stream, you can see just what I mean when the game has become deathball vs deathball and nothing is interesting.
I think everyone here agrees that the Tod v Happy game 1 was a complete random almost never seen in pro play game that should never have lasted that long and it was indecision on both players parts that lead to the situation.
On November 26 2011 09:19 alexanderzero wrote: Active play and constant harassment is something that comes about through necessity. The Starcraft 2 metagame is just barely reaching the point where players are learning how to survive against every sort of 200/200 deathball-like attack. Once games get to the point where two players with max armies engage each other and the outcome is so close that it's basically like flipping a coin in the first place, that's when it will start to get more important to gain edges by other means.
I think the thing that will drive more active play style development is when players are more certain of how to build a max army that is optimally cost-efficient against what their enemies are doing. If you notice in Brood War, unit compositions are very well mapped out all the way into the late game in every matchup, and for almost every set of openings. Because of that, players won't be able to gain an edge without being very aggressive about finding holes in their opponents play to exploit constantly throughout the game.
I also feel like people need to gain more "starsense" in SC2 about where to look for holes in defense. One thing that I'm starting to notice lately in big SC2 macro games is that both players usually have a ton of holes in their defense, but are so pre-occupied with managing their main armies that they don't notice or attempt to take advantage of these. When it's a little bit less scary to engage in important battles, people are gonna be striking at these weak points a lot more often.
This sounds like a very good explanation based on my (admittedly limited) experience watching BW. Just comparing SC2 now to SC2 a year ago we see a big difference with regards to drops, counters and exploitation of certain openings and certain army movements. By no means is it very advanced or very detailed knowledge but it is improving. I think seeing some improvement is what gives me hope whereas if there had been no change and no improvement then I would be worried.
Lets take the protoss example. A year ago, heck even 6 months ago it was posited that protoss as a race has very inefficient small engagement units and having any of your army supply away from the main army would mean a loss guaranteed. We see now that at the very least DT harass with Zealots dropped while the main army is defending or moving for a different attack path is at least possible vs Zerg and even in some cases against Terran.
We see a small move towards shifting supply out of the death ball as it were and this can only improve with time. (I hope anyway)
If OP is right the passivity may be caused by the fact that armies die "so fast" in sc2. Because, as opposed to bw, armies are easier to control (mass selection) and lack of units with with set-up time (Z &P) and board control units. When battles end so fast positioning and unit control is every thing so that causes caution among players of when to engage. I think that blizzard will manage to fix this in Hots with better mech units in TvP
this game is so new compared to BW it's not even funny. And this game isn't even like BW except for the basic mechanics, so to think that people will be as innovative in BW with only a year of sc2 experience is rediculous! let's wait a couple years before we go on and make these kinds of threads.
2 months ago we didn't even see protoss harassment and everyone was convinced that blizzard needed to add a harassment unit for protoss, now we see warp prism harass being extremely effective and it's used by a lot of players now. We used to never see hellions or mech in TvT but that obviously all changed as well, and now TvT is changing out of mech and is becoming an incredibly diverse match up, so is PvP.
As I said, I can't see how we can compare BW, a game where people have had 10 years to perfect themselves to SC2 where everyone is still figuring shit out and we still have expansions to go through like SC1 -> BW.
also building placements and static defence may be too strong in sc2. especially things like cannon behind gateway and forge in FFE, PF + 3 turrets, siege tank behind buildings, spine crawlers being able to move quite quickly.
On November 26 2011 10:24 ThePlayer33 wrote: also building placements and static defence may be too strong in sc2. especially things like cannon behind gateway and forge in FFE, PF + 3 turrets, siege tank behind buildings, spine crawlers being able to move quite quickly.
Was easier to hold key positions with few units in BW.
On November 26 2011 10:24 ThePlayer33 wrote: also building placements and static defence may be too strong in sc2. especially things like cannon behind gateway and forge in FFE, PF + 3 turrets, siege tank behind buildings, spine crawlers being able to move quite quickly.
Actually I feel the other way around. Apart from Terran defense (which also requires a huge investment and possibly a couple of tanks to be effective), the other two races defensive capabilities are fairly limited in SC2 when compared to SC1. Zerg base defense was much better with Sunken colonies and Lurkers in BW. Toss relied on having strong T1 units plus cannons and reavers to hold in BW. In SC2, both races lost their major defensive advantages and gained very little in return. Forcefields are good, but by themselves are useless and gateway units were nerfed in order to compensate for warp ins. You need a whole lot of other stuff along with the sentries to get a solid defensive line. Same with spine crawlers. You need to have quiet a few of them along with other units in order to get a good defensive position.
Disclaimer: This is not a balance whine, just in case someone interprets this as a Terran OP post. Its not. I feel the game is fairly balanced, and any buffs to the other two races in this stage would tilt the game in their favor.
On November 26 2011 10:22 emc wrote: this game is so new compared to BW it's not even funny. And this game isn't even like BW except for the basic mechanics, so to think that people will be as innovative in BW with only a year of sc2 experience is rediculous! let's wait a couple years before we go on and make these kinds of threads.
2 months ago we didn't even see protoss harassment and everyone was convinced that blizzard needed to add a harassment unit for protoss, now we see warp prism harass being extremely effective and it's used by a lot of players now. We used to never see hellions or mech in TvT but that obviously all changed as well, and now TvT is changing out of mech and is becoming an incredibly diverse match up, so is PvP.
As I said, I can't see how we can compare BW, a game where people have had 10 years to perfect themselves to SC2 where everyone is still figuring shit out and we still have expansions to go through like SC1 -> BW.
Everytime I see the "SC2 is so new, BW had 10 years to develop not fair to compare!!" argument, I can't help palm my forehead. SC2 and BW are extremely similar games, with very few (key) differences, but the basic strategic frame from BW is there in SC2, along with many of the strategies/tactics employed in BW.
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: EsuBuildings xd I posted this like 3 months ago on Gamefaqs. Its basically because everyone is lazy and rather max out before doing any type of harassment. The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa8xMv5fhQo
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
Oh gawd, this video reminds me how terrifying archons were in BW. I want those archons back...
On November 23 2011 14:11 bennyaus wrote: I watched the last proleague finals, and I saw like 3 zergs do a 3 hatch hydra all-in against Protoss. Then I remembered how people complained about how there was too many all-ins in SC2, or that the macro games suck.
Get a grip. Just because you can post one youtube example of a sick BW game (which is a game that was pro for 8-9 years by that stage) does not exclude the fact that many of them were quite similar to SC2 games. There are plenty of passive games, plenty of all-ins. Both games are interesting in their own ways. I can also find vods of sick late-game SC2 games, like an earlier poster mentioned. Thorzain vs MC in TSL was quite memorable, and HuK vs Moon at Dreamhack group stage as well. This is excluding the fact that TvZ/ZvT in SC2 is almost awesome in every match provided it gets past the 10min mark.
the problem is: sc2: 1 sick late game engagement = gg bw: can produce prolonged sick engagements throughout the game
that's undeniable
Actually, I'll deny that whole heartedly.
Please refer to the recent Dreamhack Winter 2011 games, specifically Sheth vs ToD.
On November 26 2011 10:24 ThePlayer33 wrote: also building placements and static defence may be too strong in sc2. especially things like cannon behind gateway and forge in FFE, PF + 3 turrets, siege tank behind buildings, spine crawlers being able to move quite quickly.
Defense is too weak. Players are too scared to move out because they can lose their base in seconds.
Speaking of passive games... anybody see Tod vs Happy earlier at Dreamhack? Seriously, look it up, it's hilarious- Day9 had me almost falling out of my seat laughing.
i don't see much of any problem. you're given more freedom to do what you want within reasonable time.. it is your choice if you want to be some 400apm sc2 beast, or some player who plays at whatever pace lets him mmm micro like anyone else. the faster, more talented player will find the gap, the chink, the timing.... this is how it was always generally like since the game evolved--past slayers_boxer's prime
On November 23 2011 14:11 bennyaus wrote: I watched the last proleague finals, and I saw like 3 zergs do a 3 hatch hydra all-in against Protoss. Then I remembered how people complained about how there was too many all-ins in SC2, or that the macro games suck.
Get a grip. Just because you can post one youtube example of a sick BW game (which is a game that was pro for 8-9 years by that stage) does not exclude the fact that many of them were quite similar to SC2 games. There are plenty of passive games, plenty of all-ins. Both games are interesting in their own ways. I can also find vods of sick late-game SC2 games, like an earlier poster mentioned. Thorzain vs MC in TSL was quite memorable, and HuK vs Moon at Dreamhack group stage as well. This is excluding the fact that TvZ/ZvT in SC2 is almost awesome in every match provided it gets past the 10min mark.
the problem is: sc2: 1 sick late game engagement = gg bw: can produce prolonged sick engagements throughout the game
that's undeniable
Actually, I'll deny that whole heartedly.
Please refer to the recent Dreamhack Winter 2011 games, specifically Sheth vs ToD.
Insane army trades in late game. Drops by ToD constantly and overall and very exciting back and forth game.
You guys are looking at BW through nostalgia tinted glasses. SC2 is an amazing, exciting game and will continue to be just that.
Throwing away the first group of brood lords cost him the game because of the constant harass it was hard making brood lords and enough ground forces to make an attack. Once ToD got more then 4 bases it was over at that point he had 3 mining bases while Sheth was constantly dealing with all the harass and doing a trade for an army and losing all his main tech was another way to lose the game. The game was over for a long time but Sheth didn't want to leave and just continued to play to see if he could make anything out of it which was impossible because the income of the Protoss was greater then the income of the Zerg which is never a good sign for them.
On November 23 2011 14:11 bennyaus wrote: I watched the last proleague finals, and I saw like 3 zergs do a 3 hatch hydra all-in against Protoss. Then I remembered how people complained about how there was too many all-ins in SC2, or that the macro games suck.
Get a grip. Just because you can post one youtube example of a sick BW game (which is a game that was pro for 8-9 years by that stage) does not exclude the fact that many of them were quite similar to SC2 games. There are plenty of passive games, plenty of all-ins. Both games are interesting in their own ways. I can also find vods of sick late-game SC2 games, like an earlier poster mentioned. Thorzain vs MC in TSL was quite memorable, and HuK vs Moon at Dreamhack group stage as well. This is excluding the fact that TvZ/ZvT in SC2 is almost awesome in every match provided it gets past the 10min mark.
the problem is: sc2: 1 sick late game engagement = gg bw: can produce prolonged sick engagements throughout the game
that's undeniable
Actually, I'll deny that whole heartedly.
Please refer to the recent Dreamhack Winter 2011 games, specifically Sheth vs ToD.
Insane army trades in late game. Drops by ToD constantly and overall and very exciting back and forth game.
You guys are looking at BW through nostalgia tinted glasses. SC2 is an amazing, exciting game and will continue to be just that.
How many times has these argument been brought up by the people on the other side ? We bw fans looks at thing with nostalgia glasses , How is it that we are looking at our games with glasses when every time we watch a game , we get panic, worried , because our team may lose this round because of mistakes made by the individual players ? . Bw has really well developed teams and the game is just as fresh as it is , when I compared it to the game played back than in 1998 and 2011 . So much changes has been made to the game , no one in their right mind in boxer era would have expo and take multi expansion as fast as it did in the current style of playing broodwar .
Game is still changing and we are seeing multiple strategies that have come up across the time , such as the queen to snipe off tanks with spawn broodling , Terran without tanks in their mech armament they are good as dead , Protoss +1 timing attack meant to destroy zergs who are greedy and wants to drone and skim on the defense . That's what baffle me with the thought of these argument keep bringing up again and again .It's getting really stale , if I am looking at a nostalgia game that still relies on boxers era 1 base build to satisfy my desire to watch broodwar than I can agree with the looking at things with nostalgia glasses .However bw current metamorphosis of new tactics and the ability to play aggressive thanks to the familiarity of macro mechanics system . It's really unpredictable what can happen on screen .
Micro,Macro,multi prong drop harassment all over the map, mini battles happening at every continent of the map , every time when I see these happening on screen , I feel like I am watching broodwar again for the first time and me having the hind sight of what's happening in game because the pro players not only have to juggle between selecting every individual building to macro , he has to multi task back and forth from his base and micro to get what you are seeing on screen come alive . That to me is more than enough to stick to this game forever .
I agree about the resource collection rate. I don't know why they nerfed it down to 5. if anything they should've just bumped it to 10 if they really wanted a solid number. It really cuts into the food especially now that we need SIX workers per geyser than 3. Great points and I agree
I only really find tvt too passive! That game of Flash vs Fantasy was no more exciting in my view than most match-ups that are not tvt, I think you are just getting confused as the Korean commentators talk so fast and with so much energy! I mean they are just looking at their build orders and still talking in 4x speed
If you watched hero's game vs sheth that was just played on dreamhack, you will know that the only reason sc2 seems too passive atm is because sc2 is still a young game. Pros are still figuring out the game.
Hero and sheth displayed ridiculous skill and there were engagements going all over the map the entire game.
Give it time imo. Especially for the BW pros to switch over.
I always thought that it's the watchtowers that make the macro games passive. Slower resource collection doesn't necessarily translate to more passive games; since action should still be able to occur at any point of time in the game. Watchtowers however, makes it such that army movement is easily scouted by one side, which means that while powering up early on, corners can be cut to the maximum due to the easy access of information, and in late game, moving an army away from the watchtower means giving up an already strong position.
Boxer vs Rain was actually a unique situation because it was clear it's a situation nobody has seen before and neither player knew how to continue on from that point except to try mine more. TvT air play became a lot more refined and easier to watch in the GSL a month after that game.
It should also be noted that the maps also create different activity in macro games. Daybreak seems to keep producing great macro games with the multiple quick paths/chokes. On the other hand, maps like Antiga Shipyard simply requires you to clash in the exact centre.
Once slow, no multitask, deathballing Protosses start losing their games, the faster SC2 will develop and move away from passive play. Unfortunately, defensive, turtly, deathball Protoss still wins most of the time and is easy to do. Furthermore, when it starts losing, Protoss starts whining, create sad zealot fanclubs, Blizzard buffs Toss and they go back to deathballing.
I feel the other matchups are pretty dynamic, unless Terran goes mech. But I feel Terran mech is far harder than bio or P deathball and so does not happen enough to really add to the total passivity of the game.
OP has the wrong topic! It should be I dislike the tossball.
OP likes ZvT and TvT but doesn't mention ZvZ or PvP because those match-ups are very aggressive. It leaves out pvz and pvt match-ups which makes me think that OP ha either a negative attitude towards the players or the game design. Both those cases doesn't make for fruitful discussions as he didn't specify why that is but just a problem he has observed. C- piece.
i think to be a bit of a red herring the argument of player skill and innovation missing from sc2 being bw level in macro games.
Look at the foreign BW scene. Players make a lot of errors, theres tons of sloppiness and strategic mistakes, bad tactics. And yet, the games are incredibly entertaining to watch. I gotta agree that theres still a bit of that x-factor, those magic sparkles that Browder and co will have to figure out in the sc2 gameplay, including establishing defenders advantage in order for splitting up armies to have a smaller penalty, so as to have the grand feel of BW lategame.
I agree, I personally prefer shorter heavy aggressions over longer macro games because they can become boring, long, and slow. Hopefully as people learn more and more about the match ups and the game, this will not be the case.
On November 26 2011 14:40 Natespank wrote: Speaking of passive games... anybody see Tod vs Happy earlier at Dreamhack? Seriously, look it up, it's hilarious- Day9 had me almost falling out of my seat laughing.
I don't think it's been uploaded onto his blip channel yet.
well the overall game became more passive because you don't need to do things that you needed or they became easier to do but still the game is pretty active because both games require multitasking if your multitasking is lacking of course the game will look more passive
On November 23 2011 12:48 eSuBuildings wrote: Starcraft 2 is more like chess where late late game situations tend to become a matter of waiting and unit control rather than tactics.
Well chess endgames don't have much tactics too it is all about waiting and execution.
On November 27 2011 00:27 archonOOid wrote: OP has the wrong topic! It should be I dislike the tossball.
OP likes ZvT and TvT but doesn't mention ZvZ or PvP because those match-ups are very aggressive. It leaves out pvz and pvt match-ups which makes me think that OP ha either a negative attitude towards the players or the game design. Both those cases doesn't make for fruitful discussions as he didn't specify why that is but just a problem he has observed. C- piece.
PvZ is becoming great match up because players start to figure out with what they can get away in midgame (zergs aggressively expanding and forcing some response from toss who choose massive tech and harass).
PvT will become fun as well once protoss will understand that they need faster third for that extra gas otherwise they'll continue struggling to fight 2 vs 2 base against bio-terrans while slowly expanding. Such kind of play favours terran a lot.
On November 27 2011 00:20 Micket wrote: Once slow, no multitask, deathballing Protosses start losing their games, the faster SC2 will develop and move away from passive play. Unfortunately, defensive, turtly, deathball Protoss still wins most of the time and is easy to do. Furthermore, when it starts losing, Protoss starts whining, create sad zealot fanclubs, Blizzard buffs Toss and they go back to deathballing.
I feel the other matchups are pretty dynamic, unless Terran goes mech. But I feel Terran mech is far harder than bio or P deathball and so does not happen enough to really add to the total passivity of the game.
I'm starting to think sc2 developer really likes the deathball style... like day9 said emp is like mosquito bite radius now. MaNa already showed pre nerf of emp, toss is incredibly powerful with splitting templar and such which differentiated him as one of the better toss...I can't help but feel mosquito bite emp radius just sending the wrong message of promoting the same old deathballs.
Another thing is bio vs deathball... happy vs tod lol. Thankfully I believe HOTS will kind of fix this assuming tvp will hopefully turn into mech vs deathball.... so it will become more interesting by default as the quicker deathball maneuvers around the slower mech train.
On November 27 2011 00:27 archonOOid wrote: OP has the wrong topic! It should be I dislike the tossball.
OP likes ZvT and TvT but doesn't mention ZvZ or PvP because those match-ups are very aggressive. It leaves out pvz and pvt match-ups which makes me think that OP ha either a negative attitude towards the players or the game design. Both those cases doesn't make for fruitful discussions as he didn't specify why that is but just a problem he has observed. C- piece.
PvZ is becoming great match up because players start to figure out with what they can get away in midgame (zergs aggressively expanding and forcing some response from toss who choose massive tech and harass).
PvT will become fun as well once protoss will understand that they need faster third for that extra gas otherwise they'll continue struggling to fight 2 vs 2 base against bio-terrans while slowly expanding. Such kind of play favours terran a lot.
PvT will become really boring once people realize that sitting on 3-4 bases with a deathball and accumulating money + gateways is the best way to play. Mana and Hasuobs have been doing this for the last 8-10 months, and they rarely lose PvT.
But no, we're still gonna have idiots doing 2base allins and then complaining about balance once it stops working.
Its NOT going in the right direction, even with higher supply and more board control units it will still be very rewarding keeping your army in a ball because of how units clump up so nicely and the huge dps they dish out.
They should do the war3 pathfinding and ATLEAST make units take up more space.. There is so little room to micro in this game its sad, pulling injured units is useless already in midgame because ball dps is already too high so the only micro in this game is arranging your army a little bit before a battle.. wooow.
and stop saying "another bw thread" maybe people keep making them because sc2 is missing something that could very easily be added into the game and make it way more epic??
What Starcraft 2 needs is more positional play in some matchups (TvP, ZvP, PvP). I think the issue is how poorly Protoss is designed, warpgates fucked up Protoss balancing, as they had to make them weaker, and Toss had to rely on a boring 1-a unit such as Colossus. The biggest problem with Sc2 is Protoss, it needs to be designed better, warpgates need to be removed, and core gateway units need a better design+a unit that you can use to zone out enemy is needed. (or that would pay off with good micro)
yea what i love about broodwar is that every race had absolute defence. tanks, turrets, mines for terran. Lurkers, defilers, scourage, sunkens, spore for zerg. cannons, templar, reaver for protoss. no way your gonna break that defence attacking it head on or any damage for that matter. . this make for some action pack games where they send small plattoons to try to put pressure on any weak point of the defence. no way you can just fight head on in broodwar unless your protoss( loll) but even good protoss players need zealot/templar drops. to break these defences.
On November 25 2011 11:52 darklight54321 wrote: As soon as these posts arrive by the second page it loses all point.
Let me say this bluntly first, before going into actual detail.
Harder =/= equal better, nor should the focus be on making things smaller.
and another point
harder = less popularity. (more about casuals then point 1)
Now to go into details
point 1.
Making it harder doesn't make it more interesting. What makes games interesting is how players use the mechanics given to them. Players in BW make use of the constricted control groups as their form of army control and with a larger army possible it was fairly simple that you'd not get maxed as often. The max isn't a "goal" it's just part of the game. Now take this to SC2. With higher worker count and armies that die faster, you get quicker battles, but you actually get more bang for your buck. Throwaway drops are fairly common even as you get to the highest level. The end game goal is getting the strongest army you can and getting an advantage with that army. It's more passive yes, it's easier yes, but THAT DOESNT MAKE IT WORSE. SC2 allows for a higher focus then who micros that one control group of dragoons better, it allows for an even higher level of overall strategy then we see right now and that we couldn't see in BW. In BW the micro/macro mechanics restrict how good you are, and the legends are those that go beyond that level. In SC2 the average pro must understand more strategy then the average BW pro, simply because the sc2 pros can't depend on micro/macro as much. Thats where the similarity of chess comes in, it's seems you dont like the fact that higher level strategy is used. I'm all for more action packed games, but not at the expense of what i see as the crowning achievement of SC2, the easier mechanics but higher focus on strategy.
point 2
BW could never get to the level of SC2 in viewership and as an international esport. A large majority of viewers are players (or would be players if they didn't watch), THIS is the difference that will make sc2 a true success internationally. No longer do you have to be a good RTS player or really understand the game to even begin to see what's going on in the game. Fact, people like to watch what they can understand. People can watch sc2 who couldn't even begin to watch BW (i'm completely disregarding graphics btw, since they could always make BW 2.0 as many of you seem to want). This is more relating to esports as a success vs as a game, but it is still a very important point.
Ok, this post so inherently wrong. Like, really wrong.
Point 1. Less mechanics does not equal more strategy. The macro of the BW pro's is so memorized, they don't even have to think about it. Even though it is harder than the SC2 macro, after years of grinding you automatically do this. Does a basketball pro need to think about dribbling? No. There is no higher focus on strategy. Or is the space in the brain shared for strategy and mechanics? So if the mechanics neurons are less active, do the strategy neurons have free way to send signal because they are not blocked anymore? Hey, BW pros can think and macro at the same time, yes, maybe be surprising for you who is oh so literate in StarCraft.
Point 2 Watch any BW Proleague/Starleague game. See the QTpies.
And I spotted a small paradox between 1 and 2: if less action = more strategy, then you need to understand the game before you can enjoy it, hence you need some basic knowledge about SC2, which contradicts Point 2, because according to that point,
No longer do you have to be a good RTS player or really understand the game to even begin to see what's going on in the game. Fact, people like to watch what they can understand.
But casuals who don't play SC2 don't understand strategy, hence the fallacy. Less action reduces the watchability of a SC2. Like in Chess, where you have like 100% strategy and no tits & 'splosions, a casual won't have a clue about what is going on.
In BW, QTs watch it because of the action and the players.
On November 27 2011 01:39 spajn wrote: Its NOT going in the right direction, even with higher supply and more board control units it will still be very rewarding keeping your army in a ball because of how units clump up so nicely and the huge dps they dish out.
They should do the war3 pathfinding and ATLEAST make units take up more space.. There is so little room to micro in this game its sad, pulling injured units is useless already in midgame because ball dps is already too high so the only micro in this game is arranging your army a little bit before a battle.. wooow.
and stop saying "another bw thread" maybe people keep making them because sc2 is missing something that could very easily be added into the game and make it way more epic??
then don't play this game if you think "it's sad" Go back to your perfect little broodwar world and play broodwar... NOONE is telling you that you must not play broodwar, just because it has a successor!
And maybe these threads keep coming up, because people just like to whine around about nostalgic things. But everytime they start broodwar, they realize that they WANT the comfortness of big control groups. They WANT good pathing. They WANT to move a ball around. They WANT to play Starcraft2 as it is!
This is just another "I want to play broodwar, but everyone prefers WoL and that sucks, so please change mak WoL=BW so that they have to play broodwar with me"
On November 27 2011 01:39 spajn wrote: Its NOT going in the right direction, even with higher supply and more board control units it will still be very rewarding keeping your army in a ball because of how units clump up so nicely and the huge dps they dish out.
They should do the war3 pathfinding and ATLEAST make units take up more space.. There is so little room to micro in this game its sad, pulling injured units is useless already in midgame because ball dps is already too high so the only micro in this game is arranging your army a little bit before a battle.. wooow.
and stop saying "another bw thread" maybe people keep making them because sc2 is missing something that could very easily be added into the game and make it way more epic??
then don't play this game if you think "it's sad" Go back to your perfect little broodwar world and play broodwar... NOONE is telling you that you must not play broodwar, just because it has a successor!
And maybe these threads keep coming up, because people just like to whine around about nostalgic things. But everytime they start broodwar, they realize that they WANT the comfortness of big control groups. They WANT good pathing. They WANT to move a ball around. They WANT to play Starcraft2 as it is!
This is just another "I want to play broodwar, but everyone prefers WoL and that sucks, so please change mak WoL=BW so that they have to play broodwar with me"
The relationship of BWlers to SC2 is similar to the relationship of CJ fans to Savior. They have been disappointed, yet they can't let it go.
The fact that Nightend just won a game vs Puma doing nothing but making a death ball all game is pretty stupid. Sc2 is gonna evolve very slowly if Protoss still win by doing nothing but making a bunch of units. Nightend couldn't even deal with one medivac at his 4th.
If Protoss makes a death ball, the game will be passive. Until P stop winning with such easy to pull off strategy, then the game will continue to be passive.
On November 27 2011 01:39 spajn wrote: Its NOT going in the right direction, even with higher supply and more board control units it will still be very rewarding keeping your army in a ball because of how units clump up so nicely and the huge dps they dish out.
They should do the war3 pathfinding and ATLEAST make units take up more space.. There is so little room to micro in this game its sad, pulling injured units is useless already in midgame because ball dps is already too high so the only micro in this game is arranging your army a little bit before a battle.. wooow.
and stop saying "another bw thread" maybe people keep making them because sc2 is missing something that could very easily be added into the game and make it way more epic??
then don't play this game if you think "it's sad" Go back to your perfect little broodwar world and play broodwar... NOONE is telling you that you must not play broodwar, just because it has a successor!
And maybe these threads keep coming up, because people just like to whine around about nostalgic things. But everytime they start broodwar, they realize that they WANT the comfortness of big control groups. They WANT good pathing. They WANT to move a ball around. They WANT to play Starcraft2 as it is!
This is just another "I want to play broodwar, but everyone prefers WoL and that sucks, so please change mak WoL=BW so that they have to play broodwar with me"
Well it's not much fun when nobody plays any more. The release of SC2 in all its newness all but killed the small foreign bw community... Starcraft is hard and takes a lot of work, and people want to be compensated for their time. So they all everyone switched. Can't really blame them.
It's pretty silly to say "just go play brood war". Yeah I do still play it but I'd rather play the game that replaced BW in the RTS community and have it actually be as good as BW. The fact is it should be better, how many years did it take to develop this game while having an already epic predecessor to use as an example?
Well, basically most matchups with Protoss becomes a turtling game if it transitions into something late since you need to have a ball to do damage, there's really no reward for spreading your army across the map.
On November 27 2011 00:27 archonOOid wrote: OP has the wrong topic! It should be I dislike the tossball.
OP likes ZvT and TvT but doesn't mention ZvZ or PvP because those match-ups are very aggressive. It leaves out pvz and pvt match-ups which makes me think that OP ha either a negative attitude towards the players or the game design. Both those cases doesn't make for fruitful discussions as he didn't specify why that is but just a problem he has observed. C- piece.
PvZ is becoming great match up because players start to figure out with what they can get away in midgame (zergs aggressively expanding and forcing some response from toss who choose massive tech and harass).
PvT will become fun as well once protoss will understand that they need faster third for that extra gas otherwise they'll continue struggling to fight 2 vs 2 base against bio-terrans while slowly expanding. Such kind of play favours terran a lot.
PvT will become really boring once people realize that sitting on 3-4 bases with a deathball and accumulating money + gateways is the best way to play. Mana and Hasuobs have been doing this for the last 8-10 months, and they rarely lose PvT.
But no, we're still gonna have idiots doing 2base allins and then complaining about balance once it stops working.
it won't man, because terrans will have to force the issue and start playing aggressively. No terran wants toss on fast three bases uncontested, believe me...
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
As someone who doesn't belong to the "people who have spent lot of time with both games" (based on the date you joined and by reading your posts), you aren't getting the point.
Let me redefine what I mean about "success" - not in terms of popularity but quality. In this definition, Justin Bieber won't be considered as a musical "success". Not that SC2 is as bad as him but it's a success (according to your definition), it's dumbed down.
SC2 is popular because of the money put in and the hoards of people who have never seen BW before and all the foreigners from wc3 and bw who follow the money pumped in by -- Blizzard themselves. In BW, it was the korean companies themselves who became sponsors - because a game became something more. One of the reasons BW wasn't very popular outside of Korea is because people care more about graphics. Trust me, I've trie getting a lot of people to watch or play BW and the first thing they comment about is the graphics, before the gameplay.
And when I say SC2 is inferior. I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but, if you actually read what I posted without getting all hurt, as someone who wants SC2 to be better, to be the replacement so that everyone can enjoy something at the level (or even higher) of BW because it reaches a wider audience and has good graphics, instantly appealing to the casual gamer. Thing is, watching the direction they are taking makes me disappointed.
Oh ya and I didn't just waltz into a random SC2 thread and called it inferior like a troll. Read the OP please.
Edit: And I (and most people I'd suppose), will be very happy to be proven wrong that SC2 is inferior when the day comes.
What quantifiable measurement, what number, what threshold must be met before you would admit SC2 is as good or better than BroodWar?
Number of audience members at tournaments? Number of tournaments? Number of countries holding tournaments? Number of years tournaments are held? Amount of prize money given out? Number of companies sponsoring pro players? Amount of money earned by pro players? Number of units of the game sold?
Or maybe you're more interested in numbers related directly to the game itself so perhaps: Average duration of pro games? Average number of units killed in pro games? Average number of engagements in pro games?
We can discuss numbers solidly and logically, but it's hard to discuss individuals' qualitative, gut-level requirements for satisfaction.
How can you quantify music? Take Justin Bieber vs your favourite band, let's say Led Zep just because a lot of people like them but you can interchange it with any band/singer you like. Of course assuming you think Justin Bieber is inferior to Led Zep, otherwise feel free to swap anyone with anyone else, especially effective for someone inferior + famous vs superior + not famous.
Using the above example I'm sure we all can agree that 1 is inferior than the other. Then try reposing all your questions again.
Number of audience members at concerts? Number of concerts? Number of countries holding concerts? Number of years concerts are held? Amount of prize money given out? (N/A) Maybe Amount paid for concerts? Number of companies sponsoring? Amount of money earned? Number of units of the albums sold?
Or maybe you're more interested in numbers related directly to the song itself so perhaps: Average duration of songs? Average number of notes or words in songs? Average number of hooks in songs?
This is a game, some say an art. The moment you can quantify it the way you seem to want it I think it ceases being one. I don't and don't know how to get philosophical about it but in short I think we can agree it doesn't feel right to do it. So no, I can't prove it using your methods.
Think about other ("real and legit") sports. How can you quantify them? Take my earlier slamball vs basketball comparison. Or maybe even this NBA vs WNBA one (let's put gender differences aside). I pasted the first plays of the year highlights I found
If you watch those 2 plays of the year videos, you'll know something feels wrong, the women are inferior. But how can you quantify that? Their dunks aren't flashy? How can you quantify flashiness?
Hang time? Movement of arms? Strength and force used to slam it in?
On November 27 2011 01:39 spajn wrote: Its NOT going in the right direction, even with higher supply and more board control units it will still be very rewarding keeping your army in a ball because of how units clump up so nicely and the huge dps they dish out.
They should do the war3 pathfinding and ATLEAST make units take up more space.. There is so little room to micro in this game its sad, pulling injured units is useless already in midgame because ball dps is already too high so the only micro in this game is arranging your army a little bit before a battle.. wooow.
and stop saying "another bw thread" maybe people keep making them because sc2 is missing something that could very easily be added into the game and make it way more epic??
then don't play this game if you think "it's sad" Go back to your perfect little broodwar world and play broodwar... NOONE is telling you that you must not play broodwar, just because it has a successor!
And maybe these threads keep coming up, because people just like to whine around about nostalgic things. But everytime they start broodwar, they realize that they WANT the comfortness of big control groups. They WANT good pathing. They WANT to move a ball around. They WANT to play Starcraft2 as it is!
This is just another "I want to play broodwar, but everyone prefers WoL and that sucks, so please change mak WoL=BW so that they have to play broodwar with me"
Actually, we can't go back to BW, since Blizzard made sure to kill of BW completely. The only argument you come up with is that we can choose to go back, but the scene is dead, and WoL is the cause. Did you miss that even proleague will start with WoL? TSL switched over, Dreamhack aswell, so where do I go if I want to watch well designed RTS?
Therefore, people wanted WoL to be well designed, just because there are nothing to to back to.
On November 27 2011 02:16 Bleak wrote: What Starcraft 2 needs is more positional play in some matchups (TvP, ZvP, PvP). I think the issue is how poorly Protoss is designed, warpgates fucked up Protoss balancing, as they had to make them weaker, and Toss had to rely on a boring 1-a unit such as Colossus. The biggest problem with Sc2 is Protoss, it needs to be designed better, warpgates need to be removed, and core gateway units need a better design+a unit that you can use to zone out enemy is needed. (or that would pay off with good micro)
I think that your suggestions tie in with developing sweet-ass maps that are larger yet don't give zerg an inherent advantage (which they do). Warpgates definitely need to be tweaked still as it makes no sense that they left normal gateways in the game as well.. (should just give gateways lower unit CD). My personal opinion is that the lead designers of SC2 (browder,kim) realize they might have released SC2 maybe a month or two too early to address just how much warpgates dictate the protoss metagame right now. It's impossible to tweak it anymore without drastically changing how the race plays as a whole.
TL;DR - They aren't changing a thing until HotS comes out and they have an excuse to fuck with the metagame.
Ugh, this turned into another ridiculous "Why BW is superior to SC2," post.
To everyone who fails to see how drastically play has changed over the course of the year, and would prefer to just believe that SC2 simply can't ever be as challenging as BW, I'd like to point something.
BW is to WC2 what SC2 is to BW, and yet when I first discovered TL 4-5 years ago I don't remember threads full of bitching about how BW was an inferior streamlined game. Even further back, before I found TL, I don't remember ever once hearing somebody dismiss SC1 just because it's an easier game with a more user friendly interface (unit groups of 12, better worker pathing, buildings can be unit grouped, auto-casting, etc.).
People let the game develop. A year and a half in they marveled at how far it had come instead of comparing the capabilities of players to WC2 players (even though, speaking relative to what we see today, the play was still shitty). Do you know why? Because while WC2 is objectively harder than BW which is harder than SC2, no human being will ever reach any of the skill ceilings for these games. Nobody ever hit the WC2 skill ceiling, nobody is going to hit the BW ceiling, and nobody will hit it for SC2 either.
Also, if you genuinely believe that the play isn't advancing quickly, maybe consider some other factors like the less-than-blossoming Korean scene and the insane number of mediocre semi-pros. While you're doing that, though, go back and watch some games from GSL Open 1 or the 2010 IEM finals at Gamescom, then January, then skip ahead to TSL 3, then GSL October or Orlando or something else recent.
tl;dr Chill. Bookmark this thread and look back on it 1-2 years from now and laugh.
Edit: As for the OP itself, I like the discussion about the current level passivity, but the apples/oranges BW vs SC2 stuff is always just going to espouse conflict as opposed to discussion.
On November 24 2011 02:33 JieXian wrote: And when I say SC2 is inferior. I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but, if you actually read what I posted without getting all hurt, as someone who wants SC2 to be better, to be the replacement so that everyone can enjoy something at the level (or even higher) of BW
"And when I say your wife is ugly, I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but as someone who wants her to look better".
Do you not understand that telling us that our game is inferior because it's not more like your game is insulting in and of itself?
SC2 has been out for over a year. It has a huge following and a vibrant pro scene. It is not meant to be Brood War HD, it's its own game, and you are not going to convince anyone at all by telling them the game they are passionate about is actually a boring failure.
Things will change in HotS, and some of those changes do seem to address some of the concerns people in this thread have, i.e. better space control and more incentives to move food out of main armies.
Your wife analogy hold very true if your wife as an object/game (like SC2), where you can manipulate her and her features any way you want. Where God constantly oversees her development and polishes her, and you can complain/suggest to God used to listen and change and improve her. But God doesn't listen to you or the "professional beauty experts", instead he has his own ideas, he seems to like small boobs so he gives every wife small boobs. He has a fetish for feet and likes to bite them so he gives them destructive feet which can grow back after you bite it off.
My point was to show you the views of the BW players love the game, what goes on in their mind when they say they find SC2 boring. What they actually want when they complain about SC2 --- to be able to enjoy playing it just like they did with BW. Not because they feel special for having played an old game.
There was not a single reason I gave concerning SC2 > BW or BW >SC2
On November 27 2011 02:16 Bleak wrote: What Starcraft 2 needs is more positional play in some matchups (TvP, ZvP, PvP). I think the issue is how poorly Protoss is designed, warpgates fucked up Protoss balancing, as they had to make them weaker, and Toss had to rely on a boring 1-a unit such as Colossus. The biggest problem with Sc2 is Protoss, it needs to be designed better, warpgates need to be removed, and core gateway units need a better design+a unit that you can use to zone out enemy is needed. (or that would pay off with good micro)
I think that your suggestions tie in with developing sweet-ass maps that are larger yet don't give zerg an inherent advantage (which they do). Warpgates definitely need to be tweaked still as it makes no sense that they left normal gateways in the game as well.. (should just give gateways lower unit CD). My personal opinion is that the lead designers of SC2 (browder,kim) realize they might have released SC2 maybe a month or two too early to address just how much warpgates dictate the protoss metagame right now. It's impossible to tweak it anymore without drastically changing how the race plays as a whole.
TL;DR - They aren't changing a thing until HotS comes out and they have an excuse to fuck with the metagame.
Tweaking them to make them weaker and perhaps supply efficient would make things very interesting, but the first step to a better game is the removal of the colossus.
Starcraft 2 is evolving. Warp prism harass, blue flame hellion drops, mutalisks in all match-ups, overlords dropping. In a few years Starcraft 2 will be extremely fast paced.
On November 23 2011 13:05 SkimGuy wrote: EsuBuildings xd I posted this like 3 months ago on Gamefaqs. Its basically because everyone is lazy and rather max out before doing any type of harassment. The game I used to demonstrate the amount of action that is possible in BW is game 1 of n.Die_soO vs JangBi in the OSL semis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa8xMv5fhQo
I bet you're unable to find that much action in any SC2 game xd
awesome game. archon/reaver/templar is such bullshit
It's not about MBS or macro mechanics or whatever. It's just dumb that they introduce injects, chrono etc, they require almost no decision making and pretty much serves the same purpose as an apm dump just like sc1 macro. If they said they want to make sc2 more exciting by allowing people to spend more apm on their army, they should just do it the damn proper way.
The main problem is unit collision. Units clumping just doesn't work well with ranged units. One type of units will always have an advantage over another once they hit a critical mass (e.g. marines), and that's why mirror match-ups do not have this problem besides pvp (colo and lack of defenders' advantage). Blizzard try to solve this deathball syndrome by forcing race to rely on aoe units. So what happens in half the games is the one with a lead just kill/maintain their lead once they hit a certain critical mass before aoe is out. There's little leeway for comebacks, you can't cut your backbone army for fragile aoe units.
Now imagine if armies are not clumped up. Units at the back can't attack well. You are forced to split up your army to utilize 100% of your army. Units don't die as fast and you can micro individual units now. Timing attacks will become less effective. Sentries can finally serve as their intended role - changing terrain instead of splitting armies. Aoe units can be changed back to high dps with them not damaging as many units. Static defences can be weakened with stronger units responsible for zonal defence. However, this will not cause turtlish playstyle because one's defence is still limited by his apm.
Exciting sc games are defined by tactics, and sc2 lacks that. Most games are predictable once at the mid game. If the one with a lead loses, it's usually because of mistakes (well you can hear that from casters almost every game -_-) . And you know the game is not exciting when one talks about mistakes more than praising players for pulling off brilliant maneuvers. If i could change the game, i would change unit collision, and limit air units to 12 units selection to prevent OP air unit clump. Tweak the raw stats of units and we are good to go even with current WoL unit design.
Sure, the Boxer vs Rain game will have it's moments in the early to mid game that will have crowds jeering out of their seats, but in the late game it becomes (like I pointed out in my OP) nothing but a waiting game whereas Flash and Fantasy's late game has so much movement going on inside it.
You're picking and choosing. The exact same thing happens in BW (people just flying back and forth with mass air) in TvT super lategame. There's no difference. Namely the BC wars.
The game is so passive because of defender's advantage (or lack of) and because of deathballs. Its easy, if you lose a battle, the enemy's deathball will just roll in your base and kill all. You cannot retreat, because of Marrauders, Blink stalkers and you cannot defend your base with fewer units (Well maybe against Zerg you can)
In BW if you look at a fight, because of the fact that an army was a couple of screens long and ramps were hard to break, a small number of units could defend a big invasion. So what happened was, the players were trying to peal apart the other player by denying expos and out maneuvering him.
In SC2, you just a-move your marrauders after you killed a big chunk of the enemy army and it's gg. Nothing the oponent can do.
On November 27 2011 07:02 okrane wrote: The game is so passive because of defender's advantage (or lack of) and because of deathballs. Its easy, if you lose a battle, the enemy's deathball will just roll in your base and kill all. You cannot retreat, because of Marrauders, Blink stalkers and you cannot defend your base with fewer units (Well maybe against Zerg you can)
In BW if you look at a fight, because of the fact that an army was a couple of screens long and ramps were hard to break, a small number of units could defend a big invasion. So what happened was, the players were trying to peal apart the other player by denying expos and out maneuvering him.
In SC2, you just a-move your marrauders after you killed a big chunk of the enemy army and it's gg. Nothing the oponent can do.
If you lose 60 supply of your army in an engagement BW and your opponent loses... 10... you're going to lose. Sure, he can't a-move right into your base, but you're going to lose unless he messes up big time. You can stall with lurker/defiler, or well place tanks/vessels, but eventually you will lose.
On November 27 2011 00:27 archonOOid wrote: OP has the wrong topic! It should be I dislike the tossball.
OP likes ZvT and TvT but doesn't mention ZvZ or PvP because those match-ups are very aggressive. It leaves out pvz and pvt match-ups which makes me think that OP ha either a negative attitude towards the players or the game design. Both those cases doesn't make for fruitful discussions as he didn't specify why that is but just a problem he has observed. C- piece.
PvZ is becoming great match up because players start to figure out with what they can get away in midgame (zergs aggressively expanding and forcing some response from toss who choose massive tech and harass).
PvT will become fun as well once protoss will understand that they need faster third for that extra gas otherwise they'll continue struggling to fight 2 vs 2 base against bio-terrans while slowly expanding. Such kind of play favours terran a lot.
PvT will become really boring once people realize that sitting on 3-4 bases with a deathball and accumulating money + gateways is the best way to play. Mana and Hasuobs have been doing this for the last 8-10 months, and they rarely lose PvT.
But no, we're still gonna have idiots doing 2base allins and then complaining about balance once it stops working.
I doubt it, protoss has been sitting in base and deathball since start of beta. it isn't working.
Mainly because you're just not going to beat zerg in terms of econ, you let him free to drones up and he'll destroy you before you even know whats up. Future of PvZ will be very similar to TvZ that you need to constantly harass and timing attacks
For those of you that haven't watched Hero vs Sheth, I suggest you check it once vods are out
On November 27 2011 07:02 okrane wrote: The game is so passive because of defender's advantage (or lack of) and because of deathballs. Its easy, if you lose a battle, the enemy's deathball will just roll in your base and kill all. You cannot retreat, because of Marrauders, Blink stalkers and you cannot defend your base with fewer units (Well maybe against Zerg you can)
In BW if you look at a fight, because of the fact that an army was a couple of screens long and ramps were hard to break, a small number of units could defend a big invasion. So what happened was, the players were trying to peal apart the other player by denying expos and out maneuvering him.
In SC2, you just a-move your marrauders after you killed a big chunk of the enemy army and it's gg. Nothing the oponent can do.
If you lose 60 supply of your army in an engagement BW and your opponent loses... 10... you're going to lose. Sure, he can't a-move right into your base, but you're going to lose unless he messes up big time. You can stall with lurker/defiler, or well place tanks/vessels, but eventually you will lose.
Besides, SC2 IS STILL SUCH A YOUNG GAME.
agreed mistakes make you pay, that's the nature of competitive games. This does not make my statement untrue.
On November 27 2011 07:02 okrane wrote: The game is so passive because of defender's advantage (or lack of) and because of deathballs. Its easy, if you lose a battle, the enemy's deathball will just roll in your base and kill all. You cannot retreat, because of Marrauders, Blink stalkers and you cannot defend your base with fewer units (Well maybe against Zerg you can)
In BW if you look at a fight, because of the fact that an army was a couple of screens long and ramps were hard to break, a small number of units could defend a big invasion. So what happened was, the players were trying to peal apart the other player by denying expos and out maneuvering him.
In SC2, you just a-move your marrauders after you killed a big chunk of the enemy army and it's gg. Nothing the oponent can do.
If you lose 60 supply of your army in an engagement BW and your opponent loses... 10... you're going to lose. Sure, he can't a-move right into your base, but you're going to lose unless he messes up big time. You can stall with lurker/defiler, or well place tanks/vessels, but eventually you will lose.
Besides, SC2 IS STILL SUCH A YOUNG GAME.
agreed mistakes make you pay, that's the nature of competitive games. This does not make my statement untrue.
...
okay?
So we agree that losing half your army for almost nothing in both games means you lose, yeah? It doesn't matter how fast you lose, you still lose.
On November 27 2011 07:02 okrane wrote: The game is so passive because of defender's advantage (or lack of) and because of deathballs. Its easy, if you lose a battle, the enemy's deathball will just roll in your base and kill all. You cannot retreat, because of Marrauders, Blink stalkers and you cannot defend your base with fewer units (Well maybe against Zerg you can)
In BW if you look at a fight, because of the fact that an army was a couple of screens long and ramps were hard to break, a small number of units could defend a big invasion. So what happened was, the players were trying to peal apart the other player by denying expos and out maneuvering him.
In SC2, you just a-move your marrauders after you killed a big chunk of the enemy army and it's gg. Nothing the oponent can do.
If you lose 60 supply of your army in an engagement BW and your opponent loses... 10... you're going to lose. Sure, he can't a-move right into your base, but you're going to lose unless he messes up big time. You can stall with lurker/defiler, or well place tanks/vessels, but eventually you will lose.
Besides, SC2 IS STILL SUCH A YOUNG GAME.
agreed mistakes make you pay, that's the nature of competitive games. This does not make my statement untrue.
...
okay?
So we agree that losing half your army for almost nothing in both games means you lose, yeah? It doesn't matter how fast you lose, you still lose.
because of the fact that half of your army is three fucking screen wide, losing half of it is a big feat. In SC2 you can lose half of your army to even three forcefields.
On November 27 2011 07:23 BandonBanshee wrote: can we stop using "SC2 IS A YOUNG GAME" as an excuse for glaring problems with it?
....
Can you compare BW after 1.5/2 years to BW now?
Honestly...
How is that even a remotely comparable scenario? There were no esports back then. Nothing was figured out. No set build orders, etc.
SC2 has progressed more in 1.5 years than BW has progressed over its first 7 or so years. Because there wer already tournaments at release, extensive balance testing, progamers in prohouses playing 12+ hours a day, etc.
Utterly laughable to compare it to BW where there were no progamers, no intricate knowledge of RTS in general, etc. SC2 has been "figured out" faster than any RTS in history most likely.
the metagame is quite slow at the moment on ladder, but im measly gold haha! Watching DH finals with Hero and Puma.. not to spoil it but some of the flanks and general back and forth really shows you it is probably the lower levels where its slow. up high its pretty intense!
On November 26 2011 10:22 emc wrote: this game is so new compared to BW it's not even funny. And this game isn't even like BW except for the basic mechanics, so to think that people will be as innovative in BW with only a year of sc2 experience is rediculous! let's wait a couple years before we go on and make these kinds of threads.
2 months ago we didn't even see protoss harassment and everyone was convinced that blizzard needed to add a harassment unit for protoss, now we see warp prism harass being extremely effective and it's used by a lot of players now. We used to never see hellions or mech in TvT but that obviously all changed as well, and now TvT is changing out of mech and is becoming an incredibly diverse match up, so is PvP.
As I said, I can't see how we can compare BW, a game where people have had 10 years to perfect themselves to SC2 where everyone is still figuring shit out and we still have expansions to go through like SC1 -> BW.
Everytime I see the "SC2 is so new, BW had 10 years to develop not fair to compare!!" argument, I can't help palm my forehead. SC2 and BW are extremely similar games, with very few (key) differences, but the basic strategic frame from BW is there in SC2, along with many of the strategies/tactics employed in BW.
I can't agree with that, even the best SC1 players aren't succeeding in this game. Why hasn't July, Nada, Boxer won a SC2 title yet? If the games are so similar then shouldn't they be winning? No, because the game IS different, even if you use the "they are older" argument, look at Nestea as an example of an old guy who is still winning because he is treating SC2 as a different game from BW.
Yea some of the same tactics are there, but a lot of things are different, even economy management is slightly different with chronoboost, larva inject and mules. Macro is easier which allows for more micro in a game where the ai is too good and one small mistep can ruin everything. New units changes everything and these new units are still being figured out. Like I said before, ghosts, warp prisms and battlecruisers were once never used, now they are (still waiting on the carrier and the nydus worm hasn't been getting much attention either). Granted after a year it seems like things in sc2 are figured out, but people thought that BW wouldn't change until great players changed it all.
I'm not saying SC2 is better, I'm not saying BW is a bad game. I'm just sick of these arguments because people keep comparing an old game to a new game, where almost everything is different. Just think about the two games and don't compare strategies or tactics, compare all the things that blizzard has added and taken away instead.
On November 26 2011 10:22 emc wrote: this game is so new compared to BW it's not even funny. And this game isn't even like BW except for the basic mechanics, so to think that people will be as innovative in BW with only a year of sc2 experience is rediculous! let's wait a couple years before we go on and make these kinds of threads.
2 months ago we didn't even see protoss harassment and everyone was convinced that blizzard needed to add a harassment unit for protoss, now we see warp prism harass being extremely effective and it's used by a lot of players now. We used to never see hellions or mech in TvT but that obviously all changed as well, and now TvT is changing out of mech and is becoming an incredibly diverse match up, so is PvP.
As I said, I can't see how we can compare BW, a game where people have had 10 years to perfect themselves to SC2 where everyone is still figuring shit out and we still have expansions to go through like SC1 -> BW.
Everytime I see the "SC2 is so new, BW had 10 years to develop not fair to compare!!" argument, I can't help palm my forehead. SC2 and BW are extremely similar games, with very few (key) differences, but the basic strategic frame from BW is there in SC2, along with many of the strategies/tactics employed in BW.
I can't agree with that, even the best SC1 players aren't succeeding in this game. Why hasn't July, Nada, Boxer won a SC2 title yet? If the games are so similar then shouldn't they be winning? No, because the game IS different, even if you use the "they are older" argument, look at Nestea as an example of an old guy who is still winning because he is treating SC2 as a different game from BW.
Yea some of the same tactics are there, but a lot of things are different, even economy management is slightly different with chronoboost, larva inject and mules. Macro is easier which allows for more micro in a game where the ai is too good and one small mistep can ruin everything. New units changes everything and these new units are still being figured out. Like I said before, ghosts, warp prisms and battlecruisers were once never used, now they are (still waiting on the carrier and the nydus worm hasn't been getting much attention either). Granted after a year it seems like things in sc2 are figured out, but people thought that BW wouldn't change until great players changed it all.
I'm not saying SC2 is better, I'm not saying BW is a bad game. I'm just sick of these arguments because people keep comparing an old game to a new game, where almost everything is different. Just think about the two games and don't compare strategies or tactics, compare all the things that blizzard has added and taken away instead.
What are you talking about? You clearly never watched BW.
July, Boxer, and Nada were not A-teamers when they switched. Players such as MVP were without a doubt better than Boxer/Nada/July. No one, with the exception of possibly Nada (who still wasn't A-team) was considered "good" towards the end.
I still remember a Bo5 between July and Flash, where July successfully all-ined Flash 3 games in a row, and Flash still went 3-0, despite being successfully allined and taking massive damage. That's how big the skill gap was, you can do MAJOR dmg with those attacks and still not close ANY of them.
You can not call any of them "the best players from Brood War." Boxer hadn't been on the A team since what, 2005?
On November 23 2011 18:50 JieXian wrote: TLDR : The people who have spent a lot of time with both games know when one feels inferior. It's not that they want it to be that way. I'm sure everyone wants sc2 to be a success, I'd have embraced BW dying and sc2 taking over. But not when SC2 turns out to be like this.
SC2 is a resounding success.
Please stop posting "SC2 is inferior" on the SC2 forums. It's really, really annoying and counterproductive.
As someone who doesn't belong to the "people who have spent lot of time with both games" (based on the date you joined and by reading your posts), you aren't getting the point.
Let me redefine what I mean about "success" - not in terms of popularity but quality. In this definition, Justin Bieber won't be considered as a musical "success". Not that SC2 is as bad as him but it's a success (according to your definition), it's dumbed down.
SC2 is popular because of the money put in and the hoards of people who have never seen BW before and all the foreigners from wc3 and bw who follow the money pumped in by -- Blizzard themselves. In BW, it was the korean companies themselves who became sponsors - because a game became something more. One of the reasons BW wasn't very popular outside of Korea is because people care more about graphics. Trust me, I've trie getting a lot of people to watch or play BW and the first thing they comment about is the graphics, before the gameplay.
And when I say SC2 is inferior. I mean it but not in an elitist or dismissive way, but, if you actually read what I posted without getting all hurt, as someone who wants SC2 to be better, to be the replacement so that everyone can enjoy something at the level (or even higher) of BW because it reaches a wider audience and has good graphics, instantly appealing to the casual gamer. Thing is, watching the direction they are taking makes me disappointed.
Oh ya and I didn't just waltz into a random SC2 thread and called it inferior like a troll. Read the OP please.
Edit: And I (and most people I'd suppose), will be very happy to be proven wrong that SC2 is inferior when the day comes.
What quantifiable measurement, what number, what threshold must be met before you would admit SC2 is as good or better than BroodWar?
Number of audience members at tournaments? Number of tournaments? Number of countries holding tournaments? Number of years tournaments are held? Amount of prize money given out? Number of companies sponsoring pro players? Amount of money earned by pro players? Number of units of the game sold?
Or maybe you're more interested in numbers related directly to the game itself so perhaps: Average duration of pro games? Average number of units killed in pro games? Average number of engagements in pro games?
We can discuss numbers solidly and logically, but it's hard to discuss individuals' qualitative, gut-level requirements for satisfaction.
How can you quantify music? Take Justin Bieber vs your favourite band, let's say Led Zep just because a lot of people like them but you can interchange it with any band/singer you like. Of course assuming you think Justin Bieber is inferior to Led Zep, otherwise feel free to swap anyone with anyone else, especially effective for someone inferior + famous vs superior + not famous.
Using the above example I'm sure we all can agree that 1 is inferior than the other. Then try reposing all your questions again.
Number of audience members at concerts? Number of concerts? Number of countries holding concerts? Number of years concerts are held? Amount of prize money given out? (N/A) Maybe Amount paid for concerts? Number of companies sponsoring? Amount of money earned? Number of units of the albums sold?
Or maybe you're more interested in numbers related directly to the song itself so perhaps: Average duration of songs? Average number of notes or words in songs? Average number of hooks in songs?
This is a game, some say an art. The moment you can quantify it the way you seem to want it I think it ceases being one. I don't and don't know how to get philosophical about it but in short I think we can agree it doesn't feel right to do it. So no, I can't prove it using your methods.
Think about other ("real and legit") sports. How can you quantify them? Take my earlier slamball vs basketball comparison. Or maybe even this NBA vs WNBA one (let's put gender differences aside). I pasted the first plays of the year highlights I found
If you watch those 2 plays of the year videos, you'll know something feels wrong, the women are inferior. But how can you quantify that? Their dunks aren't flashy? How can you quantify flashiness?
Hang time? Movement of arms? Strength and force used to slam it in?
I should have been more clear on the point I was trying to make. There are people in this thread (and other BW vs SC2 threads) who are essentially saying "I don't like SC2, it's boring, it's a terrible game."
But when you count up the amount of people currently paying to watch pro sc2 games, the amount of sponsorship money going to players, and the amount of tournaments worldwide (MLG, Dreamhack, IEM, IPL...), it shows that many people find the game entertaining and enjoy watching it.
I don't like Baseball, but I don't go to Baseball forums to tell people why I think it's a boring game. Or, using your example of Justin Bieber vs Led Zepplin - would you go to Bieber forums to try and convince them he sucks and they should listen to something else? If they have a good time listening to him, then who cares?
Puma vs Hero, you call that passive? Lets rename the thread. If your a noob sc2 is passive, if your pro, you micro and macro....AT THE SAME TIME....removes glasses...Mother of god!
On November 27 2011 07:23 BandonBanshee wrote: can we stop using "SC2 IS A YOUNG GAME" as an excuse for glaring problems with it?
....
Can you compare BW after 1.5/2 years to BW now?
Honestly...
How is that even a remotely comparable scenario? There were no esports back then. Nothing was figured out. No set build orders, etc.
SC2 has progressed more in 1.5 years than BW has progressed over its first 7 or so years. Because there wer already tournaments at release, extensive balance testing, progamers in prohouses playing 12+ hours a day, etc.
Utterly laughable to compare it to BW where there were no progamers, no intricate knowledge of RTS in general, etc. SC2 has been "figured out" faster than any RTS in history most likely.
How in the name of hell can you possibly know that after just two years and with MORE fucking expansions coming?
Its just that the difference in skill level between BW pros and SC2 is still very great. Maybe not mechanically, but knowledge wise? Hell yes.
BW has been played for over 10 years at a top tier level. SC2? about a 1/10 of BW's lifetime.
Watch the strategies that players used in 2006, 2007, 2008. Looks similar to SC2 doesn't it? What about now in 2011? Looks way more intense eh? Maybe that's because 3+ years later, the players, you know, get better. Or do I misunderstand why progamers practice?
Nice try to flame a game that you don't understand, and probably aren't that good at. But please, next time, save it for yourself.
To say that BW macro games aren't passive is naive and proves that you don't know what you are talking about. Some are passive, some aren't it depends on the maps, the players, and the scouting that each has. If a player thinks they have an opening (just like in SC2) they will take it, if they aren't sure and money/fame/honor is on the line, they won't risk it. Its called being smart, and careful, which is how you win in ANY sport that you look at. Overly aggressive players/teams/whatever work for short periods of time in any game (Wildcat offense anyone?) but eventually become better understood, and fall out of fashion in favor of safe, smart, reactionary play.
Also - your argument about pathing is silly. BW was a game that had to cut corners in order to run efficiently. Think about the common computer running BW in 2000, even 2005. They are less than 1/10th the power of the average computer running SC2 now. This means that the game's designers don't have to use a terrible pathing algorithm in order to ensure the game actually is playable. Again, clumping actually makes professional level micro WAY harder, because of the increased efficiency of AoE, top tier players need to split their units way better than they had to in BW, since the units were already somewhat split.
TLDR - Just because player's don't do it now, doesn't mean that it won't be useful in the future. You aren't a psychic, stop trying to say what will happen in the future. All you can do is look at the data we have with BW, WC3, and other RTS and then compare them to the lifespan of SC2. There are passive matches in all of these games, not just SC2.
all discussions can be solved with the "wait and see" solution. That doesnt mean shit. How do we know if....? Well how do you know the next expansions are not just gonna suck balls and the new and improved shitty shredders and tempests are gonna ensure even more passive play.
shut the fuck up and let people discuss. god forbids if someone has an intelligent discussion and tries to point out some flaw that needs fixing.
On November 27 2011 07:23 BandonBanshee wrote: can we stop using "SC2 IS A YOUNG GAME" as an excuse for glaring problems with it?
....
Can you compare BW after 1.5/2 years to BW now?
Honestly...
How is that even a remotely comparable scenario? There were no esports back then. Nothing was figured out. No set build orders, etc.
SC2 has progressed more in 1.5 years than BW has progressed over its first 7 or so years. Because there wer already tournaments at release, extensive balance testing, progamers in prohouses playing 12+ hours a day, etc.
Utterly laughable to compare it to BW where there were no progamers, no intricate knowledge of RTS in general, etc. SC2 has been "figured out" faster than any RTS in history most likely.
How in the name of hell can you possibly know that after just two years and with MORE fucking expansions coming?
God people are so ignorant sometimes.
His point is not ignorant at all. There was no infrastructure of skill, build orders, media, etc. in BW like there is in SC2 (till much later). His point stands.
On November 27 2011 07:23 BandonBanshee wrote: can we stop using "SC2 IS A YOUNG GAME" as an excuse for glaring problems with it?
....
Can you compare BW after 1.5/2 years to BW now?
Honestly...
How is that even a remotely comparable scenario? There were no esports back then. Nothing was figured out. No set build orders, etc.
SC2 has progressed more in 1.5 years than BW has progressed over its first 7 or so years. Because there wer already tournaments at release, extensive balance testing, progamers in prohouses playing 12+ hours a day, etc.
Utterly laughable to compare it to BW where there were no progamers, no intricate knowledge of RTS in general, etc. SC2 has been "figured out" faster than any RTS in history most likely.
How in the name of hell can you possibly know that after just two years and with MORE fucking expansions coming?
God people are so ignorant sometimes.
His point is not ignorant at all. There was no infrastructure of skill, build orders, media, etc. in BW like there is in SC2 (till much later). His point stands.
I still don't see how people are predicting the future after just two years. Look at the DH finals that just ended seconds ago. Insane game play. That's all I'm going to say here, you guys can sit here and make BW comparisons and SC2 is lame jokes all you want, we're loving it.
EPT
. A "massive" zerg army is like 120 food.
When you can just look at the game design and see how it's not possible. The reason TvZ is so developed is that it has Tanks, its a lot like TvP in BW. Where T is always jostling for position and point capture, while P is trying to look for opportunities to exploit Terran weaknesses. Similar applies to TvT, this is why Zerg and Protoss need strong immobile slow-shot siege units (Reaver, Lurker), it creates much better battle dynamics.
and 16:10 and higher resolutions, which means we see *much* more stuff in SC2. Put SC2 into 4:3 aspect mode, gimp down the resolution, and then suddenly armies "look" more like BW. But nobody is going to do that with SC2 if they have the option for a better spectating experience.
