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Note: This is focusing more on the design of Terran, not the state of balance of the race. This analysis will be focused on the compositions and builds that races currently use against each other.
MAIN PURPOSE OF THIS THREAD: I want Blizzard to rethink its approach and figure out ways to help other Terran playstyles become a viable option for the race. The simple band-aid approach, in my opinion, is not going to keep the game as exciting as the balance team argues it to be. In other words, they should NOT be afraid of making some radical changes as part of their balancing testing (it doesn't have to be implemented, if the radical change seems to be too game-changing).
After seeing a lot of games with Terran and hearing Flash's perspective, I think it is time to investigate why Terran is currently suffering from design problems.
Before I get into the Terran, let's look at other races:
Zerg (vs. Zerg):
We see several types of gameplay:
- Mutalisk wars (uncommon)
- Mutalisk transition into roach/hydra
- Roach/Hydra/Infestor
- (Late game units are pretty rare)
Zerg (vs. Protoss):
- Zerglings/Mutalisk for map control
- Roach/Hydralisk with Viper Support
- (Late game units are pretty rare)
Zerg (vs. Terran):
- Mutalisk/Zerg/Baneling
- Roach/Ling/Baneling rush (rare lately)
- Broodlord/Infestor/Ultralisk/Viper (getting rare lately)
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What about Protoss?
Protoss (vs. Protoss):
- a bunch of coin flipping builds (4-gate + DT rush)
- Stargate opening with Oracle
- Deathball (Colossus, Archon, Gateway units)
- Tempest
- Airtoss (very rare lately)
Protoss (vs. Zerg):
- Airtoss
- Gateway units (up to tier 3)
- Deathball (Colossus, Archon, Gateway units, High Templars, and maybe some air support)
Protoss (vs. Terran):
- Deathball (sometimes, with 5 or 1 colossus)
- If very late game, Warp Prism harass
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Now with the Terran,
Terran (vs. Terran):
- Hellbat/Helion opening into Mech
- Banshee opening
- Sky Terran (late game)
- Bio with Tank Support
Terran (vs. Zerg):
- MMMM
- Reaper/Hellion/Banshee (rare)
- Marauder/Hellion (rare)
- (Hellbats are relatively nonexistent, due to the nerf).
Terran (vs. Protoss):
- MMM with Ghost and Viking support
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Unlike other races, Terran suffers from using bio only against other races. Yes, Protoss has the deathball, but it can use other compositions against Zerg and Protoss. Zerg has some of the most dynamic openings against Zerg and Protoss. Although Zerg does have tier 3 units against Terran, lately Terrans have prevented Zerg from reaching that far with the constant MMMM push.
TvT (in my opinion) is the most interesting mirror matchup because, unlike other mirror matchups, each player has its own preference. However, when it comes to other races, bio is the way to go. Mech is easily countered by vipers, zealots, immortals, etc, and it is very difficult to get ghost with Mech. As for Sky Terran, again those units are easy to counter with mass corruptors, Void Rays, and Tempest.
Suggestion: Instead of just crying about Bio, why not focus on improving other Terran units (although I think the WM could use some work)? I know Blizzard is trying to give modest buffs to zerg, but I think it is severely ignoring how Terran is an extremely inflexible race, which does not make any sense because Terran by design should be a versatile race.
EDIT: Added some Terran all-ins.
EDIT # 2: After much argument with other people, I have decided to explain myself.
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FIRST
User was temp banned for this post.
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This topic has been beaten to death and the sad truth is nothing will change until LotV, if ever.
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That's weird... I actually think Terran is the best designed race, by far. To me Terran IS the most flexible race...
When I play TvP (mech), I am constantly changing my army composition. Playing with one style doesn't mean all the games are the same. In fact, I am still learning this style (master level, imho it says a lot, because people below my level could learn even more), and each game is unique.
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Your point? Every race has 2 builds they use vs terrans... Airtoss or deathball, Mech or Bio, MutaBane or Ultra Queen or whatever they use vs Terran
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On August 26 2013 06:15 algue wrote:
FIRST
User was temp banned for this post.
I'm surprised people are only getting temp bans for this when it's been going on long enough. I remember when it first started a long time ago and we got people to cut this shit out really fast. Not only that this guys been around since '11. That is just shameful. OP I find this relatively funny because technically you could say there are design flaws all across the board race to race. It is what it is and these comments won't fix it.
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Terran is the most flexible race because bio is the most flexible composition and is rather easily supplemented with low numbers of other units if needed.
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think about this, real life army, we use tanks and marines in fights at war.... Terran is based around the human race so what could they do? Making the window mine and banshee was about as imaginative but realistic as it gets without going overboard
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I still play mech tvp and win agains mid gm protoss, also Strelok plays mech tvp on high gm level. The true is that most Terran players just follow the current meta in Korea...
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Topic has been beaten to death and this is some of the most thinly veiled balance whine I have seen in a while.
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Even Flash has said everything you have said, im pretty sure  . As a Terran player I agree, they should make more or somehow improve without making mech units imba (warhound and hellbat (pre nerf) ) Maybe for teh next expansion they need to remove the some units and add newer ones, like the reaper for example, its only really useful for that early scout or 2 with 4 hellions for early presssure, after 6 minutes its useless unless you mass them ..... maybe bring back the science vessel and remove the raven i reckon that would strenghten mech considerably. Or like hellions make some mech unit that can transform between two modes which have drastically different tactics involved.
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I've seen professional players win with mech against both zerg and protoss so it might not be the preferred strategy but it is viable at all levels except maybe the tip top.
Terran has similar core compositions in all matchups, its true, but has a thousand ways to get there and many late late game options, you can hardly complain.
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On August 26 2013 06:19 Ambre wrote:
That's weird... I actually think Terran is the best designed race, by far. To me Terran IS the most flexible race...
When I play TvP (mech), I am constantly changing my army composition. Playing with one style doesn't mean all the games are the same. In fact, I am still learning this style (master level, imho it says a lot, because people below my level could learn even more), and each game is unique.
Mech only works against Protoss and Zerg if your opponent has no clue how to deal with it. Yes there are a lot of Master League Protoss and Zerg, falling into that cathegory. If you have fun with it, fine do so . But for anyone who wants to perfect his gameplay, it´s a waste of time at the moment, because eventually you will hit a wall with it. When looking at it objectively, Terran has very limited options in both non-mirror matchups from the midgame onwards. That IS a terrible design weakness, because as mentioned in OP, every unit aside from those we use normally is hardcountered by a very simple to use unit of the other races.
I could live very well with a stim pack nerf (because let´s be honest, stimmed marine/marauder have too high DPS for their cost) if we are compensated with a more useful package of factory and starport units. And no, that does not include widow mines or medivacs, but all other units that come from those production facilities. Battlecruisers ? a joke, Banshees? haha good one, ravens? LOLOOL! Siege Tanks? well they are somewhat useful to open very safely against zerg, but that´s pretty much a borderline appearance. Hellions, yes they are good in the earlygame but fall off hard after it, so yeah, hellions are fine. Thor? a joke of a unit in non mirrors. Hellbats? David Kim told us, we have too try out timings to include them again in our army composition. Apparently David Kim knows some extraordinary terran builds noone else does and refuses to share them with the rest of the world. Until those miracle builds are presented to the mass, I´ll say: Hellbats suck in their current state.
So yeah, at the moment Terran has one matchup that slowly but surely drifts away from the terran side in TvP due to the hellbat nerf and one matchup that is dominated by the race through a combination of 2 very strong (perhaps too strong) things, that harmonize just very well with each other: widow mines and stimmed marines.
I can understand Zerg players, thinking we have no right to complain, because Terrans beat the shit out of them right now, but it´s very stupid if your fate in one matchup is bond to a unit like the widow mine. Because the destructive potential of the unit is nearly as high for the terran as it is for the opponent.
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Terran only goes bio != Terran is badly designed
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Unlike other races, Terran suffers from using bio only against other races.
Suffers? I wouldn't quite call it suffering.
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United States4883 Posts
On August 26 2013 06:26 ShootingQuasar wrote:Even Flash has said everything you have said, im pretty sure . As a Terran player I agree, they should make more or somehow improve without making mech units imba (warhound and hellbat (pre nerf) ) Maybe for teh next expansion they need to remove the some units and add newer ones, like the reaper for example, its only really useful for that early scout or 2 with 4 hellions for early presssure, after 6 minutes its useless unless you mass them ..... maybe bring back the science vessel and remove the raven i reckon that would strenghten mech considerably. Or like hellions make some mech unit that can transform between two modes which have drastically different tactics involved.
Lolz, no. The reaper and raven are well-balanced units.
On August 26 2013 06:30 Steel wrote:
I've seen professional players win with mech against both zerg and protoss so it might not be the preferred strategy but it is viable at all levels except maybe the tip top.
Terran has similar core compositions in all matchups, its true, but has a thousand ways to get there and many late late game options, you can hardly complain.
Really? Have you REALLY seen a professional mech game vs. zerg or protoss lately? Because the only one that comes to mind is the super shitty Lucifron vs. Goswer game that Lucifron lost. Mech is not viable except in TvT. Nothing is "viable" unless it can be done against tip top competition, it's only "possible". For instance, you could say that FilterSC's mass marine build is "possible" for people in diamond, but that doesn't make it viable.
On August 26 2013 06:23 Just_a_Moth wrote:
Terran is the most flexible race because bio is the most flexible composition and is rather easily supplemented with low numbers of other units if needed.
The biggest issue of terran is that bio is too flexible while everything else is kind of a hard counter unit. Terran also faces the issue of not being able to control space well, which is why lategame TvP is so protoss-favoured. You can say that a BC transition is very strong, and undoubtedly, ghost/BC in TvP is one of the strongest armies in the game, but the inability to control space well makes these sorts of air transitions very risky.
The biggest issue facing terrans moving forward is that there are no real lategame options and the midgame is becoming stale once again. With the hellbat nerf, terrans lost a valuable map control mechanism in the early game, and so they've had to resort to the old WoL-type builds that stay very passive until 10:00. Even hellbat/marauder, an exciting new composition, was mostly killed by the nerf.
I played terran for a little while until I got bored of it. I can understand why a lot of terran players have retired between 2010 and now. Terran is never going to change from MMM.
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You are mixing up rush builds with unit compositions with game speed. Terran can play very fast paced drop-centered games against zerg, doing more concentrated pushes from more bases (like bomber vs jaedong), rely more on tanks or more on widow mines. citing 4gate builds for PvP and only MMMM for TvZ is comparing apples and oranges.
I read your OP as "why is there only one way to play TvP and TvZ?" and the answer is: the question is wrong, there are a lot of ways to play these matchups. Even if your unit composition is similar each game, you can do so much different stuff with it!
And in the end: who cares if the games are good and entertaining and the game itself is not imbalanced?
On August 26 2013 06:38 TeeTS wrote:Mech only works against Protoss and Zerg if your opponent has no clue how to deal with it. Yes there are a lot of Master League Protoss and Zerg, falling into that cathegory. If you have fun with it, fine do so . But for anyone who wants to perfect his gameplay, it´s a waste of time at the moment, because eventually you will hit a wall with it. When looking at it objectively, Terran has very limited options in both non-mirror matchups from the midgame onwards. That IS a terrible design weakness, because as mentioned in OP, every unit aside from those we use normally is hardcountered by a very simple to use unit of the other races.
But who in here is high masters or at the brink of becoming it? I guess most people will never reach that level and so for playing ladder it's perfectly fine. It's harder because you have limited pro-plays to study but that doesn't mean it's not usable.
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Ok, this is ridiculous. Just because Terran players can't do mech doesn't mean it doesn't have the most diverse combination of builds and puzzle pieces to play with of any race, period...
This is silly. Terran has more diversity in the way it can put together its compositions than both Zerg and Protoss. Protoss follows with a very close second...If you want to whine about diversity, whine about Zerg.
In fact, I'm glad the other races shit on mech as it is. Before you even think about enabling the most diverse race in the game to have another strategic subset, why don't you whine for Blizzard to enable the race which has the least strategic options or build flexibility?
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On August 26 2013 06:39 GhostKorean wrote:
Terran only goes bio != Terran is badly designed
badly is very vague word. I'd say terran is limited in options and thus dull...
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I don't agree, Terran is one of the best designed, you can just look at the mirror matchup, it's the best.
It's because of counter units like the Immortal u cannot mech in TvP and meching vs Zerg has a big timer, due to swarmhost/broodlords, but it can be done.
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