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On September 10 2007 11:13 RowdierBob wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 10:51 akast wrote:On September 10 2007 10:37 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:On September 10 2007 10:35 akast wrote:
Well the let me rephrase my question.
Whats wrong in favouring strategy over mass clicking?
Am I wrong or is SC supposed to be about different and unique strategies?
Leave the micro in battles, not in base management. It takes out the option. In BW, mass clicking isn't just a necesary part of the game that you have to do in every situation, every game, it's an option to spend your limited time and handspeed. Should you continue to micro your four marines that are behind a zerg's mineral line and neglect keeping your barracks pumping for a few seconds, or are you lacking in base defense so you have to build out of raxes? Is your economy strong enough that you can let your goons melt and dent that tank line a little and rebuild, or is that a hanbang force that's game deciding that you HAVE to micro? MBS doesn't simply remove a tedious aspect of BW, it also removes the choice involved in where to spend your limited amount of clicks. Take a step back. SC2 will compensate that by providing more choices for strategy. In other words, would your marines behind mineral lines be the most effective strategy or is there another more effective strategy? The fact that you don't have to worry about base management will allow you a greater range of strategies that you have a choice to pick from. With no MBS and rally points, the amount of strategies at hand will be limited as you are concentrating on the tedious aspects of SC as well as the major aspects. What SC2 is doing is improving the quality of tools for the player. You are the strategist, commander, captain and you are in charge of the tools and resources at your disposal. If the tools are faulty, like the old SC UI, that means you will not be able to maximise the effectiveness of your strategies. So they are improving the tools to allow better and more effective strategies. So you've never played BW then akast?
Either that or you're not a very clever troll. BW has a strategic depth no other game has.
As for the OP, you're post is good, but I can't say I agree. Macro the way it is now in BW is incredibly important and vital to the game. If you dumb it down with MBS and auto-mine you're taking away a critical element that makes BW the brilliant game it is. BW is good because it's so hard. I'm all for the new units, abilities etc, but they need to keep the fundamentals of the macro, micro and speed of the game.
Strategy will come with the new units and abilities, but please keep BW non-noob friendly. We want a competitve game, not something to satiate the newbs. First of all, I have played broodwar for years, although granted I have not played at a professional level. Second, why on earth would a game not cater to new players? This does not make business sense in the least. Blizzard does want to cater to the pro community but it also wants to increase the fanbase of Starcraft. Why do you want to limit the fanbase? Are you that egotistical and up there on your high horse to not expand Starcraft's fanbase? I'm sorry but this is complete and utter crap. If you really think the macro in BW limits the strategic depth of the game, then you don't know what you're on about. I don't want to limit the fanbase, I'm just saying they would be making a huge mistake by dumbing down one of the critical aspects of the game that make BW the best RTS ever. If Blizzard don't make SC2 better than BW they will lose their fanbase. Fans don't want SC2 to reinvent the game, just reimagine it.
I never said Macro limited the strategic depth of the game...I said that the limited UI limited it.
And as I said before, the poor UI cannot be considered the most critical aspect of the game because it can be replicated so easily by other games. Any game producer can produce a game that requires 200+APM to play a game properly. But will this game be any good or successful? I doubt it.
Starcraft's most critical aspect is differentiated races and balance. Not poor UI.
And you did imply you wanted to limit the fanbase.
Strategy will come with the new units and abilities, but please keep BW non-noob friendly. We want a competitve game, not something to satiate the newbs.
Keep it non-newb friendly? Using that logic, how the hell will the fanbase be expanded if new players find it way to hard to even play the game? Sorry, not everyone starts out as pros.
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I'm wondering about the correlation between skill at SC and their stance on MBS. Does the fact that they're good at SC1 mean their opinions are automatically better on what they want for SC2? Why? Sure, they know SC1 better, and are thus more intricately linked with the game and what made it good. But, discounting other people's opinions because they are worse than them doesn't seem to make sense. The better players seem to like the competitive level the way it is and want the SC2 interface to be the same as SC1's for the sake of keeping things as close as they can, in hopes that everything remains the same.... This isn't a criticism of the anti-MBSers, but it seems like that those that are good at the game tend to be antiMBS, and I'm wondering why.
As someone pointed out earlier, if MBS is balanced correctly, the better players will still do things the hard way because it should be more efficient and better than doing it the easy way, just like queueing up units.
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Ok I'm going to bring my thing about skill differences since it makes more sense in this thread than the other.
On September 10 2007 10:41 mahnini wrote:
...
Secondly, it's a huge problem, this just makes it worse for the new players to get acquainted to the game. If a mid-level player can 5z with MBS 25% of the time and the new player can only 5z 10% of the time he's just going to get run over. A new player would get crushed even harder.
Here's the way I see it, and I'm seeing this through your way just for the hell of it.
1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10
There are many skill levels in SC but the gap between each is fairly low. The difference between 9 and 10 would be apparent but not too bad and the gap between 1 and 2 would be the same.
1-2-3-4-5
There are less skill levels in SC2 (with MBS) but the gap between each would be significantly larger. A player at skill level 1 would lose worse to a player at skill level 2 than in SC. While it does lower the gap between skill level 3 to 5.
So the improvement in SC is linear in terms of levels not time while the improvement in SC2 with MBS would be great at first but slowly become flat.
I don't know where this came from, random thoughts, carry on.
I've constructed a pictogram (fancy word I felt like using not knowing the exact definition because I'm too lazy to look it up):
Blue = SC
Red = SC2 with MBS
![[image loading]](http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/7896/graphthing2lj4.png)
As you can see once a player learns how to take advantage of MBS the newer player will actually be more at a disadvantage than he would in SC. SC2 would also reach it's "highest" level much higher due to much less to do other than micro. So in essence in SC2 the difference between lowest and highest is smaller than it would be in SC. But the difference between sequential levels would be higher until about midpoint.
Blue is y = root of x
Red is y = x^3
In terms of shape in case you can't tell due to my apparent parkinsons.
x = arbitrary time btw :D
Disclaimer: random thoughts
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I am sure that the campaigns will teach any new player how to take advantage of MBS. You have to assume that every player who has a brain will be able to take advantage of it. They might not hotkey the buildings properly, but MBS will still be available. I don't think this theory works out. The skill gap should be lowered among lesser players, and at the very top the SC2 line should reach a bit higher than SC.
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On September 10 2007 11:33 orangedude wrote:
I am sure that the campaigns will teach any new player how to take advantage of MBS. You have to assume that every player who has a brain will be able to take advantage of it. They might not hotkey the buildings properly, but MBS will still be available. I don't think this theory works out. The skill gap should be lowered among lesser players, and at the very top the SC2 line should reach a bit higher than SC.
Even if you know how to use hotkeys and MBS after the campaign, it doesn't mean you're used to using it in a fast-paced competitive environment to its full potential. Until you reach it's full potential, of which there is one, you're going to get raped by everybody who has reached that potential. That problem doesn't happen in BW because players are not only limited by their habits, but their speed too.
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On September 10 2007 11:33 orangedude wrote:
I am sure that the campaigns will teach any new player how to take advantage of MBS. You have to assume that every player who has a brain will be able to take advantage of it. They might not hotkey the buildings properly, but MBS will still be available. I don't think this theory works out. The skill gap should be lowered among lesser players, and at the very top the SC2 line should reach a bit higher than SC.
What a cop out.
You would assume campaigns would teach players how to macro too but apparently not.
The average player that starts with SC has about 40apm (It was for me and for others I've seen play), I don't want to start an apm debate but 40apm is not enough to be able to micro and take full advantage of MBS.
Edit: nothing warrants SC2 to have a higher peak than SC that makes no sense. Being top of the game is being top of the game, I'm just saying SC has many more in between skill levels due to the amount of things that you must learn to do. The gap is bigger among lesser players, think about it, it makes sense.
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On September 10 2007 11:00 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
More importantly, your example, "would your marines behind mineral lines be the most effective strategy or is there another more effective strategy" still isn't as mind intensive or as time intensive. I mean, arguably, it's already present in BW. Should you go for a storm drop in PvZ or focus on your main army? However, an amount of urgency/tension gets taken away from both options if you take away a lingering option in the back of your mind every 15-30 seconds, keeping your gateways producing perfectly.
Explain to me how changing '5z6z7z8z9z0z' to '5z' or '5zzzzzz' (Luuh's revision) or 'gzgzgzgzgzgz' (my revision) takes away the option to hit those keys every 15-30 seconds. It's not like the computer is constantly producing whatever unit I tell it to out of all the production buildings I have; MBS affects the execution, not the decision behind it.
On September 10 2007 11:35 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
Even if you know how to use hotkeys and MBS after the campaign, it doesn't mean you're used to using it in a fast-paced competitive environment to its full potential. Until you reach it's full potential, of which there is one, you're going to get raped by everybody who has reached that potential. That problem doesn't happen in BW because players are not only limited by their habits, but their speed too.
Actually, the problem is worse in BW, since it's much harder to learn how to use the hotkeys (awkwardly-spaced, most people's non-dominant hand, lack of dexterity in the pinky and ring fingers) as fast as most competitive SC players (who are pretty much 99% of melee players nowadays). Therefore, there's a much longer period of rapage.
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MyLostTemple
United States2921 Posts
On September 10 2007 11:33 orangedude wrote:
I am sure that the campaigns will teach any new player how to take advantage of MBS. You have to assume that every player who has a brain will be able to take advantage of it. They might not hotkey the buildings properly, but MBS will still be available. I don't think this theory works out. The skill gap should be lowered among lesser players, and at the very top the SC2 line should reach a bit higher than SC.
How would sc2 reach a higher skill gap with all this skill based material out of the game? Your talking as if progamers can't even execute brilliant strategies becuase they're too busy spamming hotkeys. They can do both, that is the beauty of starcraft which separates this game from the piles of unsucessful esport failures we call 'other rts games.'
Are you turning down my 1:1 offer? If your knowledge of this game is so good that you can assert all this about the future of esports you should be willing to show your own skill in this game. You can pick the map.
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On September 10 2007 11:27 akast wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 11:13 RowdierBob wrote:On September 10 2007 10:51 akast wrote:On September 10 2007 10:37 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:On September 10 2007 10:35 akast wrote:
Well the let me rephrase my question.
Whats wrong in favouring strategy over mass clicking?
Am I wrong or is SC supposed to be about different and unique strategies?
Leave the micro in battles, not in base management. It takes out the option. In BW, mass clicking isn't just a necesary part of the game that you have to do in every situation, every game, it's an option to spend your limited time and handspeed. Should you continue to micro your four marines that are behind a zerg's mineral line and neglect keeping your barracks pumping for a few seconds, or are you lacking in base defense so you have to build out of raxes? Is your economy strong enough that you can let your goons melt and dent that tank line a little and rebuild, or is that a hanbang force that's game deciding that you HAVE to micro? MBS doesn't simply remove a tedious aspect of BW, it also removes the choice involved in where to spend your limited amount of clicks. Take a step back. SC2 will compensate that by providing more choices for strategy. In other words, would your marines behind mineral lines be the most effective strategy or is there another more effective strategy? The fact that you don't have to worry about base management will allow you a greater range of strategies that you have a choice to pick from. With no MBS and rally points, the amount of strategies at hand will be limited as you are concentrating on the tedious aspects of SC as well as the major aspects. What SC2 is doing is improving the quality of tools for the player. You are the strategist, commander, captain and you are in charge of the tools and resources at your disposal. If the tools are faulty, like the old SC UI, that means you will not be able to maximise the effectiveness of your strategies. So they are improving the tools to allow better and more effective strategies. So you've never played BW then akast?
Either that or you're not a very clever troll. BW has a strategic depth no other game has.
As for the OP, you're post is good, but I can't say I agree. Macro the way it is now in BW is incredibly important and vital to the game. If you dumb it down with MBS and auto-mine you're taking away a critical element that makes BW the brilliant game it is. BW is good because it's so hard. I'm all for the new units, abilities etc, but they need to keep the fundamentals of the macro, micro and speed of the game.
Strategy will come with the new units and abilities, but please keep BW non-noob friendly. We want a competitve game, not something to satiate the newbs. First of all, I have played broodwar for years, although granted I have not played at a professional level. Second, why on earth would a game not cater to new players? This does not make business sense in the least. Blizzard does want to cater to the pro community but it also wants to increase the fanbase of Starcraft. Why do you want to limit the fanbase? Are you that egotistical and up there on your high horse to not expand Starcraft's fanbase? I'm sorry but this is complete and utter crap. If you really think the macro in BW limits the strategic depth of the game, then you don't know what you're on about. I don't want to limit the fanbase, I'm just saying they would be making a huge mistake by dumbing down one of the critical aspects of the game that make BW the best RTS ever. If Blizzard don't make SC2 better than BW they will lose their fanbase. Fans don't want SC2 to reinvent the game, just reimagine it. I never said Macro limited the strategic depth of the game...I said that the limited UI limited it. And as I said before, the poor UI cannot be considered the most critical aspect of the game because it can be replicated so easily by other games. Any game producer can produce a game that requires 200+APM to play a game properly. But will this game be any good or successful? I doubt it. Starcraft's most critical aspect is differentiated races and balance. Not poor UI. And you did imply you wanted to limit the fanbase. Show nested quote +Strategy will come with the new units and abilities, but please keep BW non-noob friendly. We want a competitve game, not something to satiate the newbs. Keep it non-newb friendly? Using that logic, how the hell will the fanbase be expanded if new players find it way to hard to even play the game? Sorry, not everyone starts out as pros.
I don't want to limit the fanbase. I never said that, I never want that. I just want a game that is hard and not catering to people who expect to be a pro after one week.
SC2 should be something that develops over years like BW did and features like MBS will limit this. If the game is too easy people will abandon it once they realise it has limited gameplay and a lack of depth. If Blizzard are really serious, they need to make SC2 as hard as BW is to generate the competition that will be needed to keep it successful for a long time.
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On September 10 2007 11:37 1esu wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 11:00 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
More importantly, your example, "would your marines behind mineral lines be the most effective strategy or is there another more effective strategy" still isn't as mind intensive or as time intensive. I mean, arguably, it's already present in BW. Should you go for a storm drop in PvZ or focus on your main army? However, an amount of urgency/tension gets taken away from both options if you take away a lingering option in the back of your mind every 15-30 seconds, keeping your gateways producing perfectly. Explain to me how changing '5z6z7z8z9z0z' to '5z' or '5zzzzzz' (Luuh's revision) or 'gzgzgzgzgzgz' (my revision) takes away the option to hit those keys every 15-30 seconds. It's not like the computer is constantly producing whatever unit I tell it to out of all the production buildings I have; MBS affects the execution, not the decision behind it.
Your point is valid up to six gates or so, where you don't have to go back in order to macro perfectly. But once you hit that critical mass where hotkeying all your production buildings isnt effective, in BW, you ahve to go back (physically to looking at your base and clicking gateways) and take time to macro if you want to. With MBS, you can macro perfectly in-battle all game long. There, explained.
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On September 10 2007 11:36 mahnini wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 11:33 orangedude wrote:
I am sure that the campaigns will teach any new player how to take advantage of MBS. You have to assume that every player who has a brain will be able to take advantage of it. They might not hotkey the buildings properly, but MBS will still be available. I don't think this theory works out. The skill gap should be lowered among lesser players, and at the very top the SC2 line should reach a bit higher than SC. What a cop out. You would assume campaigns would teach players how to macro too but apparently not. The average player that starts with SC has about 40apm (It was for me and for others I've seen play), I don't want to start an apm debate but 40apm is not enough to be able to micro and take full advantage of MBS.
That's not a cop out at all. MBS will be a feature of the UI that SC2 is built around. That's like saying it's difficult to learn how to select more than one unit at a time, so noobs will order units to attack one by one. Blizzard will make damn sure that they'll teach the player how to use it. Macro on the other hand is too broad to be taught. You learn it by experience.
How is 40 apm not enough to take advantage of MBS? I don't see your logic at all. That's like saying there's a minimum apm requirement to select your group of zealots at once.
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a few quick points
- game intensity / "tasks to juggle" can be increased by increasing game speed -- blizzcon speed wasn't max
- agree with the points that there should be macro mistakes (be it idle scvs or forgetting pylons or whatever) and micro mistakes even by the best pros because the game demands too much.
- agree that blizzard has already addressed noobification concerns somewhat with warp gates and tech addons, etc.
- agree with the point that requiring frequent multitasking back to macro to spend $ or build supply/buildings/workers will keep the game almost as challenging (even without the other additions or increased speed), even if the actual clicking/spending process is faster
- agree that the average player (aka super-noob) must be able to enjoy the game, and a non-artificially limited interface is important for this.
bravo OP and a few others for the discussion here.
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Are you serious rofl. Relying on CAMPAIGNS? You have really lost all credibility there.
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Although Aphelion hasn't stated it quite so kindly, he's right. The ability to beat the campaign has never, and will never correlate with your multiplayer skill.
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On September 10 2007 11:41 orangedude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 11:36 mahnini wrote:On September 10 2007 11:33 orangedude wrote:
I am sure that the campaigns will teach any new player how to take advantage of MBS. You have to assume that every player who has a brain will be able to take advantage of it. They might not hotkey the buildings properly, but MBS will still be available. I don't think this theory works out. The skill gap should be lowered among lesser players, and at the very top the SC2 line should reach a bit higher than SC. What a cop out. You would assume campaigns would teach players how to macro too but apparently not. The average player that starts with SC has about 40apm (It was for me and for others I've seen play), I don't want to start an apm debate but 40apm is not enough to be able to micro and take full advantage of MBS. That's not a cop out at all. MBS will be a feature of the UI that SC2 is built around. That's like saying it's difficult to learn how to select more than one unit at a time, so noobs will order units to attack one by one. Blizzard will make damn sure that they'll teach the player how to use it. Macro on the other hand is too broad to be taught. You learn it by experience. How is 40 apm not enough to take advantage of MBS? I don't see your logic at all. That's like saying there's a minimum apm requirement to select your group of zealots at once.
No, I'm saying that new players won't have the ability to multitask well enough to take full advantage of MBS. He won't know how to macro as well as the other guy who will be cranking out units much faster than he would be able to in SC. Also, it has the potential to turn new player games into a macro fest since the time invested in macroing has much higher output than time spent microing.
Not to mention it's easier and unit combos really won't matter too much at that level as long as you can overpower his macro. I'm talking D- to D level here.
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On September 10 2007 11:38 RowdierBob wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 11:27 akast wrote:On September 10 2007 11:13 RowdierBob wrote:On September 10 2007 10:51 akast wrote:On September 10 2007 10:37 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:On September 10 2007 10:35 akast wrote:
Well the let me rephrase my question.
Whats wrong in favouring strategy over mass clicking?
Am I wrong or is SC supposed to be about different and unique strategies?
Leave the micro in battles, not in base management. It takes out the option. In BW, mass clicking isn't just a necesary part of the game that you have to do in every situation, every game, it's an option to spend your limited time and handspeed. Should you continue to micro your four marines that are behind a zerg's mineral line and neglect keeping your barracks pumping for a few seconds, or are you lacking in base defense so you have to build out of raxes? Is your economy strong enough that you can let your goons melt and dent that tank line a little and rebuild, or is that a hanbang force that's game deciding that you HAVE to micro? MBS doesn't simply remove a tedious aspect of BW, it also removes the choice involved in where to spend your limited amount of clicks. Take a step back. SC2 will compensate that by providing more choices for strategy. In other words, would your marines behind mineral lines be the most effective strategy or is there another more effective strategy? The fact that you don't have to worry about base management will allow you a greater range of strategies that you have a choice to pick from. With no MBS and rally points, the amount of strategies at hand will be limited as you are concentrating on the tedious aspects of SC as well as the major aspects. What SC2 is doing is improving the quality of tools for the player. You are the strategist, commander, captain and you are in charge of the tools and resources at your disposal. If the tools are faulty, like the old SC UI, that means you will not be able to maximise the effectiveness of your strategies. So they are improving the tools to allow better and more effective strategies. So you've never played BW then akast?
Either that or you're not a very clever troll. BW has a strategic depth no other game has.
As for the OP, you're post is good, but I can't say I agree. Macro the way it is now in BW is incredibly important and vital to the game. If you dumb it down with MBS and auto-mine you're taking away a critical element that makes BW the brilliant game it is. BW is good because it's so hard. I'm all for the new units, abilities etc, but they need to keep the fundamentals of the macro, micro and speed of the game.
Strategy will come with the new units and abilities, but please keep BW non-noob friendly. We want a competitve game, not something to satiate the newbs. First of all, I have played broodwar for years, although granted I have not played at a professional level. Second, why on earth would a game not cater to new players? This does not make business sense in the least. Blizzard does want to cater to the pro community but it also wants to increase the fanbase of Starcraft. Why do you want to limit the fanbase? Are you that egotistical and up there on your high horse to not expand Starcraft's fanbase? I'm sorry but this is complete and utter crap. If you really think the macro in BW limits the strategic depth of the game, then you don't know what you're on about. I don't want to limit the fanbase, I'm just saying they would be making a huge mistake by dumbing down one of the critical aspects of the game that make BW the best RTS ever. If Blizzard don't make SC2 better than BW they will lose their fanbase. Fans don't want SC2 to reinvent the game, just reimagine it. I never said Macro limited the strategic depth of the game...I said that the limited UI limited it. And as I said before, the poor UI cannot be considered the most critical aspect of the game because it can be replicated so easily by other games. Any game producer can produce a game that requires 200+APM to play a game properly. But will this game be any good or successful? I doubt it. Starcraft's most critical aspect is differentiated races and balance. Not poor UI. And you did imply you wanted to limit the fanbase. Strategy will come with the new units and abilities, but please keep BW non-noob friendly. We want a competitve game, not something to satiate the newbs. Keep it non-newb friendly? Using that logic, how the hell will the fanbase be expanded if new players find it way to hard to even play the game? Sorry, not everyone starts out as pros. I don't want to limit the fanbase. I never said that, I never want that. I just want a game that is hard and not catering to people who expect to be a pro after one week.
Not having MBS implemented in SC will immediately limit the fanbase. Read earlier posts in this thread, many points were made there.
On September 10 2007 11:38 RowdierBob wrote:
SC2 should be something that develops over years like BW did and features like MBS will limit this. If the game is too easy people will abandon it once they realise it has limited gameplay and a lack of depth. If Blizzard are really serious, they need to make SC2 as hard as BW is to generate the competition that will be needed to keep it successful for a long time.
Then focus on making it hard without implementing a feature that will turn off a major portion of the potential fanbase. Something like making warpgates very viable.
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On September 10 2007 11:41 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 11:37 1esu wrote:On September 10 2007 11:00 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
More importantly, your example, "would your marines behind mineral lines be the most effective strategy or is there another more effective strategy" still isn't as mind intensive or as time intensive. I mean, arguably, it's already present in BW. Should you go for a storm drop in PvZ or focus on your main army? However, an amount of urgency/tension gets taken away from both options if you take away a lingering option in the back of your mind every 15-30 seconds, keeping your gateways producing perfectly. Explain to me how changing '5z6z7z8z9z0z' to '5z' or '5zzzzzz' (Luuh's revision) or 'gzgzgzgzgzgz' (my revision) takes away the option to hit those keys every 15-30 seconds. It's not like the computer is constantly producing whatever unit I tell it to out of all the production buildings I have; MBS affects the execution, not the decision behind it. Your point is valid up to six gates or so, where you don't have to go back in order to macro perfectly. But once you hit that critical mass where hotkeying all your production buildings isnt effective, in BW, you ahve to go back (physically to looking at your base and clicking gateways) and take time to macro if you want to. With MBS, you can macro perfectly in-battle all game long. There, explained.
Mate...Blizzard wants the average SC2 game to last 15-20 minutes. If someone can pull off 12+ gateways in that time, I'd like to see it. It would probably be a very small minority. It would be an unrealistic scenario.
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On September 10 2007 11:41 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 11:37 1esu wrote:On September 10 2007 11:00 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
More importantly, your example, "would your marines behind mineral lines be the most effective strategy or is there another more effective strategy" still isn't as mind intensive or as time intensive. I mean, arguably, it's already present in BW. Should you go for a storm drop in PvZ or focus on your main army? However, an amount of urgency/tension gets taken away from both options if you take away a lingering option in the back of your mind every 15-30 seconds, keeping your gateways producing perfectly. Explain to me how changing '5z6z7z8z9z0z' to '5z' or '5zzzzzz' (Luuh's revision) or 'gzgzgzgzgzgz' (my revision) takes away the option to hit those keys every 15-30 seconds. It's not like the computer is constantly producing whatever unit I tell it to out of all the production buildings I have; MBS affects the execution, not the decision behind it. Your point is valid up to six gates or so, where you don't have to go back in order to macro perfectly. But once you hit that critical mass where hotkeying all your production buildings isnt effective, in BW, you ahve to go back (physically to looking at your base and clicking gateways) and take time to macro if you want to. With MBS, you can macro perfectly in-battle all game long. There, explained.
I think there's still an element of difficulty in the latter two, as you 1) have to remember how many gates/larvae/facts/etc. you have at your base, or you'll start queuing in one or more of them, and 2) have to make sure you can spam the key(s) as quick as you could select the buildings, without accidentally pressing too often. Regardless, I could easily add Aphelion's ctrl-click idea to any of the above options to select all the buildings of one type on the screen (but they remain unhotkeyable, like larvae), for use in the 7+ building phase, and then the interface is still streamlined with no effect on the decision.
Good point btw, I'll admit I was worried when you started your contribution by flaming everyone.
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On September 10 2007 11:28 mahnini wrote:Ok I'm going to bring my thing about skill differences since it makes more sense in this thread than the other. Show nested quote +On September 10 2007 10:41 mahnini wrote:
...
Secondly, it's a huge problem, this just makes it worse for the new players to get acquainted to the game. If a mid-level player can 5z with MBS 25% of the time and the new player can only 5z 10% of the time he's just going to get run over. A new player would get crushed even harder.
Here's the way I see it, and I'm seeing this through your way just for the hell of it.
1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10
There are many skill levels in SC but the gap between each is fairly low. The difference between 9 and 10 would be apparent but not too bad and the gap between 1 and 2 would be the same.
1-2-3-4-5
There are less skill levels in SC2 (with MBS) but the gap between each would be significantly larger. A player at skill level 1 would lose worse to a player at skill level 2 than in SC. While it does lower the gap between skill level 3 to 5.
So the improvement in SC is linear in terms of levels not time while the improvement in SC2 with MBS would be great at first but slowly become flat.
I don't know where this came from, random thoughts, carry on. I've constructed a pictogram (fancy word I felt like using not knowing the exact definition because I'm too lazy to look it up): Blue = SC Red = SC2 with MBS As you can see once a player learns how to take advantage of MBS the newer player will actually be more at a disadvantage than he would in SC. SC2 would also reach it's "highest" level much higher due to much less to do other than micro. So in essence in SC2 the difference between lowest and highest is smaller than it would be in SC. But the difference between sequential levels would be higher until about midpoint. Blue is y = root of x Red is y = x^3 In terms of shape in case you can't tell due to my apparent parkinsons. x = arbitrary time btw :D Disclaimer: random thoughts
good stuff, Mahnini, I was thinking of posting a graph too. although I don't see how that's y = x^3.
my graph would be more like:
![[image loading]](http://www.computing.dcu.ie/~humphrys/Notes/Neural/Bitmaps/sigmoid.gif)
with player skill along the x axis, and rewards/results in the game along the y-axis.
the flat part at the left is the learning curve, the flat part at the right is the asymptote.
the best part is when you're in the middle part of the curve, because you're being challenged, and when you improve a bit you can immediately see the results.
generally, a game should strive to keep the learning curve small (on the left side), and ensure that nobody (or only a very very few) will be in the asymptote at the right.
to me, wc3 is definitely a case where it was too easy to get to the right side of that curve -- "almost perfection". at that point, it's kind of boring, and random noise like creep-jacking luck plays too much of a factor.
edit: i forgot to add the bit on topic. if you added MBS/AM to original SC then it might push too many people up to near perfection, but this is a new game. blizzard can easily add other things to do, increase the speed, have units whose effectiveness varies wildly with skill (like HTs, mutas and marines), etc. to make the game require more skill and be more rewarding.
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I think the best solution is making it available in regular games if people want it, but disabling it for ladder games.
That way the newbs can have their MBS fastest map mega macro battles and the rest of us can have a game with real competition.
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EPT
