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Northern Ireland1200 Posts
OK this thread is really long, so I aint read the whole 23 pages, just the first page!
I just wanna say one thing regarding this MBS thing. I agree with the OP. I just wanna add. Some people think that because you can select lots of buildings at once, that this is the end if macro. Not at all. Put it this way. Say you have 7 factories, and you want 4 tanks, 2 vultures and one Goliath. You cant exactly pick all 7 factories and do this. You will have to select 4 factories for the tanks, 2 factories for the vultures and another factory for the Goliath. There is still macro...
Also in regards to unit selection. I don't know about you, but in war3 i find it harder when you can select more units. Especially when you have 1 hero, lots of normal guys and maybe other guys that have spells too. I would still hot key my spell casters on different numbers. Still lots of micro selecting units etc.
So MBS, is not bad. It is a good thing. Embrace it and love it.
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not at all chewits WC3 MBS is like say u have 7 factory's 4 with add on's 2 without.. u could have them all selected and hit T 4 times and V 2 times and Boom all fac's producing lol its a dumb system mbs will make SC2 a CC3 remake T.T dont screw up my dreams blizzard leave mbs and automine out of the game Keep Oldschool Like All the Good Gamers want screw these newbs.. there going to buy the game anyways rather it has it in there or not.. but.. u want to see the game last?? like scbw?? then u cant have mbs in it --a
gogo 10 years of SC2 Fighting!~
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On September 28 2007 15:37 koryano321 wrote:
to the people who said micro isn't important in sc.... WTF ARE YOU THINKING? in t v z late game, try losing all your science vessels due to a micro mistake in battle. say your marines are focus firing on zlings, lurks and mutas while 20 scourges fly in and destroy all ur vessels. THAN tell me that micro isnt important. or what bout losing your first reaver in p v t? BOTH micro and macro is an essential part of the game. dont try to just say that macro is the only important feature in sc...
Yes. Of course. I can also name at least 20 situations where micro is important. But most of the time you're doing macro, not micro. You're not using all available units. You're not using all available spells (Okay, maybe part of that is also the fault of the game because some of these units/spells maybe should be better).
And the longer the game lasts, the worse you're controlling your units, because it's more rewarding to just pump more of them instead of take good care (important note here: taking care != taking good care) of your existing ones. This is especially true in the matchups known as macro matchups: PvT and ZvP.
Obviously I'm almost only talking about late game, because the earlier it is in a game, the easier macro is, so you can also in turn micro quite well. In early and mid game there's almost no point in having MBS. But in late game, it will remove the burden that is constant clicking through your factories/gateways/hatcheries and instead allow you to focus on better control of your units.
Do you get it now?
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Stegosaur
Netherlands1231 Posts
Maybe people consider that fun Brutalisk?
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On September 28 2007 19:32 Brutalisk wrote:
Yes. Of course. I can also name at least 20 situations where micro is important. But most of the time you're doing macro, not micro. You're not using all available units. You're not using all available spells (Okay, maybe part of that is also the fault of the game because some of these units/spells maybe should be better).
And the longer the game lasts, the worse you're controlling your units, because it's more rewarding to just pump more of them instead of take good care (important note here: taking care != taking good care) of your existing ones. This is especially true in the matchups known as macro matchups: PvT and ZvP.
Obviously I'm almost only talking about late game, because the earlier it is in a game, the easier macro is, so you can also in turn micro quite well. In early and mid game there's almost no point in having MBS. But in late game, it will remove the burden that is constant clicking through your factories/gateways/hatcheries and instead allow you to focus on better control of your units.
Do you get it now?
The longer the game lasts in starcraft, the tougher it gets. THIS IS BRILLIANT. I think that if I was playing well, I would be able to survive early game with a progamer. Heck in the first minute of a game, there would be no differentiation of skill between a progamer and myself. However as the game gets goin further, it gets harder and harder to keep up. No longer am I playing with a single hatchery, im now forced to be running multiple expansions, controlling much larger armies and using complex spells. Suddenly the better player has the advantage, he is able to control all of this, in my case with the progamer, I stand zero chance of winning.
However with MBS and Automine, Smartcast, Unlimited selection. Suddenly I'm given all these new tools that automates parts of the game, parts that I would usually be unable to control. Suddenly, it becomes a hell of a lot easier to keep up. In early game it takes 3 buttons to make a drone and tell him to go mine. (select hatchery, select larva, morph drone). Fast forward to later game, it takes me 3 buttons to make all 5 of my expansions build drones and make them mine. The game has lost its scale. No longer does this game get harder to play the longer the game goes on. The only differnce is the amount of units your using and the different unit types.
Now broodwar hit the perfect combo, where a player could last a little while against a better player, but ultimately stood no chance. In earlier games without the additions that starcraft had, players would have fallen behind earlier, and with more additions, players wil be able to keep up for much longer. With these additions people should be able to keep up for the entire game, making micro the only real defining difference between players.
In starcraf games where players were of equal skill, they would usually go all the way to very late game. When two players had similar skill, but one was better, the game would be intense until late game when the difference in skill allowed the better player to win. In games where one player was much better than the other, the game was over before mid game. This is how starcraft should be. If you think back to your most memorable games, they'll be the ones where you went late game and you were still equal skill with your opponent.
The more you have, the harder it should be to control and the larger the scale of the game, the larger the advantage the better player should have.
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On September 28 2007 14:18 Brutalisk wrote:Show nested quote +On September 28 2007 12:37 IdrA wrote:
a good game needs a balance, hard enough to play to be competetive (everyone cant be godly on a weeks practice), but not so hard that its no fun to play. Yes. And this balance isn't given in SC1, because the better you get, the more important macro is. You will do some micro tasks, sure, depending on their importance (some micro tasks are so important that you can't just ignore them, for example running a group of M&M from lurkers or a psi storm), but nonetheless you'll be busy 75% of the time with macroing. And this is just wrong, even though there is skill needed for it. The skill itself is "wrong". It shouldn't be a deciding factor in the game who is the fastest keyboard jockey. I know that some of the pro-SBS people like that skill, would like to keep it and think that it makes the game richer. But the pro-MBS people think that the skill is too stupid to have in the game again. Also, remember that macro consists of other factors, which are more important than just the keyboard speed. For example, pick any non-Korean gamer with the same APM as iloveoov or Savior (to name two well-known macro monsters). Does he have the same unbelievable macro now? Nope. So we see that macro is much more than just clicking. It's deciding when to build what, when to expand, when to focus on worker or unit production as Z, and so on. And all that is still present if you include MBS. It's just the tedious factor that gets removed, and that in turn allows the player to do more micro tasks which previously were too unimportant to do. And units or abilities, which are just too hard to use in SC1 (e.g. ghosts, restoration, mind control, parasite) will maybe become more common. So there's the potential for more variety. In SC1, everyone (including pro gamers) is so busy with macro and controlling the usual few units in combination that many things are just too hard to do, so they aren't done. Ever. Things to consider: - Macro is more important than micro in SC1 ==> SC2 should fix the balance again by making micro more important or macro less important, or both. This is my most important point. It also gives creative players like Boxer and Nal_Ra better chances again. - Being fast with the keyboard is a skill, but one that is considered tedious by many players - Blizzard games have always been about being easy to learn but hard to master. If you make a game without MBS now, it won't be easy to learn, because all other games don't have SBS anymore. This is against Blizzard philosophy. Plus, it might prevent these newbies from becoming future gosus just because the UI ruined the fun for them, so they stop playing it. - Without MBS, It will be very hard for newbies who are used to the "better" interfaces of newer RTS games to get at least better than the "total noob" level. With MBS, this will help them and also make BattleNet more interesting for the better players. I bet many of you who are at least of average skill hate playing a random 1v1 and notice after 6 or 7 minutes that your opponent is so extremely bad that you'll just walk over him shortly. It was just a waste of time. And when you think that this was the worst player you've ever played against, then soon you will run into one who is even worse. And this goes on and on. If you make macro less time consuming by introducing MBS, players can concentrate more on micro. Previously unimportant actions will become important again if you want to have an edge over your opponent. So, in theory, there should still be enough to do for you. If everyone is macroing less, then everyone will be microing more. I don't understand why this would require less skill. I guess most of you just immediately think of WC3, but it's bad to compare these two games. WC3 is all about having small groups of units around one hero, and the units don't die fast. So the game is much slower and easier to overview than Starcraft. And this leads to progamers being "bored". But I don't see how SC2 could possibly become like that. I think it's just vastly exaggerated to say that MBS will make the game boring because there will be "nothing left to do". Of course all SC1 hardcore gamers will think that SC2 is easier when they are first confronted with MBS, but this will just be temporarily because they will soon learn that they have to start concentrating more on the OTHER things, because if they don't, they will start losing soon once everyone knows the basics of SC2. You'll need to adapt and change your game style. It's a new game after all, not SC1 with new graphics and units. Blizzard has progamers testing the game, and they know that SC2 must be a competitive game. It would be silly to think that it will become a noob game, and it's just as silly to think that SBS is a requirement for having a competitive RTS game. If you seriously think that, then just read iamke55's post for ideas on how to make the game even more competitive. WOW!(Long post again... meh.)
the entire problem with the 'remove macro and everything else becomes more important' argument is.. look at the top progamers. they ALREADY do everything else almost perfect. there are hundreds, probably thousands of semi pros who have near perfect macro, just as good as any of the top pros. but you're never gonna hear their name, because to be a top progamer takes way, way more than macro. however there are also many semi pros who play just as cheesy and creative and aggressive as ra, but you're never gonna hear of them either, because that alone isnt enough either.
that is why the skill ceiling in bw is so high, at the highest level you have to be able to do everything on a near-perfect level to be competetive, and thats a major reason the korean bw scene developed. whos gonna pay to watch people play a game that anyone can be really good at?
removing macro will make bw easier, its not possible to argue that, every person who played sc2 at blizzcon commented on how easy production was. make it easier and you're gonna end up with just another rts that gets some hype when it comes out, people will play it professionally for a little bit, then everyone will move on. it wont end up as a 10 year old game with a massive pro scene.
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On September 28 2007 23:45 IdrA wrote:Show nested quote +On September 28 2007 14:18 Brutalisk wrote:On September 28 2007 12:37 IdrA wrote:
a good game needs a balance, hard enough to play to be competetive (everyone cant be godly on a weeks practice), but not so hard that its no fun to play. Yes. And this balance isn't given in SC1, because the better you get, the more important macro is. You will do some micro tasks, sure, depending on their importance (some micro tasks are so important that you can't just ignore them, for example running a group of M&M from lurkers or a psi storm), but nonetheless you'll be busy 75% of the time with macroing. And this is just wrong, even though there is skill needed for it. The skill itself is "wrong". It shouldn't be a deciding factor in the game who is the fastest keyboard jockey. I know that some of the pro-SBS people like that skill, would like to keep it and think that it makes the game richer. But the pro-MBS people think that the skill is too stupid to have in the game again. Also, remember that macro consists of other factors, which are more important than just the keyboard speed. For example, pick any non-Korean gamer with the same APM as iloveoov or Savior (to name two well-known macro monsters). Does he have the same unbelievable macro now? Nope. So we see that macro is much more than just clicking. It's deciding when to build what, when to expand, when to focus on worker or unit production as Z, and so on. And all that is still present if you include MBS. It's just the tedious factor that gets removed, and that in turn allows the player to do more micro tasks which previously were too unimportant to do. And units or abilities, which are just too hard to use in SC1 (e.g. ghosts, restoration, mind control, parasite) will maybe become more common. So there's the potential for more variety. In SC1, everyone (including pro gamers) is so busy with macro and controlling the usual few units in combination that many things are just too hard to do, so they aren't done. Ever. Things to consider: - Macro is more important than micro in SC1 ==> SC2 should fix the balance again by making micro more important or macro less important, or both. This is my most important point. It also gives creative players like Boxer and Nal_Ra better chances again. - Being fast with the keyboard is a skill, but one that is considered tedious by many players - Blizzard games have always been about being easy to learn but hard to master. If you make a game without MBS now, it won't be easy to learn, because all other games don't have SBS anymore. This is against Blizzard philosophy. Plus, it might prevent these newbies from becoming future gosus just because the UI ruined the fun for them, so they stop playing it. - Without MBS, It will be very hard for newbies who are used to the "better" interfaces of newer RTS games to get at least better than the "total noob" level. With MBS, this will help them and also make BattleNet more interesting for the better players. I bet many of you who are at least of average skill hate playing a random 1v1 and notice after 6 or 7 minutes that your opponent is so extremely bad that you'll just walk over him shortly. It was just a waste of time. And when you think that this was the worst player you've ever played against, then soon you will run into one who is even worse. And this goes on and on. If you make macro less time consuming by introducing MBS, players can concentrate more on micro. Previously unimportant actions will become important again if you want to have an edge over your opponent. So, in theory, there should still be enough to do for you. If everyone is macroing less, then everyone will be microing more. I don't understand why this would require less skill. I guess most of you just immediately think of WC3, but it's bad to compare these two games. WC3 is all about having small groups of units around one hero, and the units don't die fast. So the game is much slower and easier to overview than Starcraft. And this leads to progamers being "bored". But I don't see how SC2 could possibly become like that. I think it's just vastly exaggerated to say that MBS will make the game boring because there will be "nothing left to do". Of course all SC1 hardcore gamers will think that SC2 is easier when they are first confronted with MBS, but this will just be temporarily because they will soon learn that they have to start concentrating more on the OTHER things, because if they don't, they will start losing soon once everyone knows the basics of SC2. You'll need to adapt and change your game style. It's a new game after all, not SC1 with new graphics and units. Blizzard has progamers testing the game, and they know that SC2 must be a competitive game. It would be silly to think that it will become a noob game, and it's just as silly to think that SBS is a requirement for having a competitive RTS game. If you seriously think that, then just read iamke55's post for ideas on how to make the game even more competitive. WOW!(Long post again... meh.) the entire problem with the 'remove macro and everything else becomes more important' argument is.. look at the top progamers. they ALREADY do everything else almost perfect. there are hundreds, probably thousands of semi pros who have near perfect macro, just as good as any of the top pros. but you're never gonna hear their name, because to be a top progamer takes way, way more than macro. however there are also many semi pros who play just as cheesy and creative and aggressive as ra, but you're never gonna hear of them either, because that alone isnt enough either. that is why the skill ceiling in bw is so high, at the highest level you have to be able to do everything on a near-perfect level to be competetive, and thats a major reason the korean bw scene developed. whos gonna pay to watch people play a game that anyone can be really good at? removing macro will make bw easier, its not possible to argue that, every person who played sc2 at blizzcon commented on how easy production was. make it easier and you're gonna end up with just another rts that gets some hype when it comes out, people will play it professionally for a little bit, then everyone will move on. it wont end up as a 10 year old game with a massive pro scene.
I think I've said it at least ten times allready but not even the best macro progamers are anywhere close to having perfect macro. It's not humanly possible to have close to perfect macro in SC. It won't be humanly possible to have perfect macro in SC2 either even though everyone will certainly have better macro. Perfect macro is building what you want and getting it to the point that you want it the instant you can.
As long as progamers have to go back and use several production buildings at one time and send whole groups of units as reinforcements they don't have perfect macro. After a few minutes of gametime I haven't seen any gamer instantly build and send reinforcements no matter how good they are.
I imagine oov could come pretty close to it with MBS tho.
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well, it would be a good thing if it was near impossible to having perfect macro, because that means there would always be room for growth and improvement, even among the best players.
but your definition of macro is flawed, perfect macro is having as many units as possible. what kinds of units and when/where you have them is part of strategy and timing.
in terms of having as many units as possible, yes stork, oov, bisu, maybe savior and some others, are all close. they rarely ever accumulate more resources than necessary, they all time expos and production buildings very well, especially oov and savior.
and i dont know what you mean by "I haven't seen any gamer instantly build and send reinforcements no matter how good they are", almost all pros make production rounds as soon as the previous one finishes and send units as soon as theyre built. given their speed that is only difficult to do in late game when theres a massive amount of stuff going on.
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On September 28 2007 22:55 Fen wrote:
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That's all true, but completely misses the point.
With MBS, what you wrote will still be true. It's normal that the game gets harder and harder as time goes on because you have to take care of more and more things at the same time.
However, in SC1 things tend to get really messy in late game, for any gamer... while some progamers have close to perfect macro nowadays, they are constantly doing sacrifices in the micro department in order to have their macro machinery running at all times. And that is the point. You can never micro and macro perfectly. You can at best do one of the two things perfectly, and even that is pretty much impossible (perfect means no flaw at all, not even idle workers).
So if you simplify macro in late game, players will be able to control their units better instead of wasting many of them in order to build new ones. I'm not talking about huge micro mistakes, because these rarely happen in the progaming world, no, it's all the small things that add up.
In early and mid game, players rarely have problems with macroing and microing at the same time. MBS will not really change this, unless you're only building one unit type.
But in late game, macroing becomes more important, because you're getting a big steady stream of income that must be used, and you have a ton of buildings (often in different places) to click through and produce new units from. MBS should help there by making it less time intensive, so that macro can be almost as easy again as it was in the early and mid game. No one is complaining that macro is too easy at these stages, right?
With your free APM you will be able to control your units better. Why should these free APM be unused?
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I think a lot of people here confuse progamers with Korean progamers. SC1 will never become a sport outside South Korea, because nobody outside South Korea can get anywhere near their level of play. Now if SCII were to enable the best of us, primitive people, to macro like Korean pros - maybe, just maybe it would take off as a sport.
But that, of course, is my inherently flawed, pro-MBS opinion.
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Yeah, that's a problem with bad players... computer games are always improving in some way, contrary to a real sport like soccer or tennis which stays the same "for all eternity".
Casual players always want some kind of improvement in computer games. They wouldn't understand a decision like making the UI worse in order to make it more competitive. They always want it as easy as possible, and if other games are easier, then every new game must be easier as well.
If we lose these casual players (there are many of them), SC2 also won't make e-sport big outside of Korea, although it has the potential. The hardcore crowd like here in this thread is just too insignificant (and will stop playing at some point anyway, so there's only the "new school" gamers left who only know easy UIs).
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its not like theres some genetic barrier preventing non koreans from playing as well as koreans. its a cultural difference. sc1 happened to catch just right in korean culture so that it became the massive mainstream media giant it is today, that much attention and money going into it allows/encourages lots and lots of players to play 24/7 with the hope of becoming the best. given that environment any country could produce korean-equivalent talent and ability.
if you honestly want there to be a non-korean progaming scene that can rival what korea has for bw, you should want sc2 to be as close to sc as possible and for blizzard/other sponsors to hype the shit out of it when it comes out.
starcraft has shown it can maintain a high profile, mainstream progaming scene. other games have shown that.. they cant. if sc2 comes out as a game that is as good as starcraft in terms of gameplay and entertainment, but gets the publicity and sponsorship that all the other new shitty rts' get, it will be huge.
but if what you want is a newb friendly game that people only play until the next 'big game' comes out, then go ahead and dumb it down to match the rest of the games.
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On September 29 2007 06:03 Brutalisk wrote:If we lose these casual players (there are many of them), SC2 also won't make e-sport big outside of Korea, although it has the potential. The hardcore crowd like here in this thread is just too insignificant (and will stop playing at some point anyway, so there's only the "new school" gamers left who only know easy UIs).
If we cater to those casual players, it won't be a e-sport, period. In fact, I for one would quickly revert to Broodwar after the intial months.
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On September 29 2007 06:11 IdrA wrote:
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its not like theres some genetic barrier preventing non koreans from playing as well as koreans. its a cultural difference. sc1 happened to catch just right in korean culture so that it became the massive mainstream media giant it is today, that much attention and money going into it allows/encourages lots and lots of players to play 24/7 with the hope of becoming the best. given that environment any country could produce korean-equivalent talent and ability.
if you honestly want there to be a non-korean progaming scene that can rival what korea has for bw, you should want sc2 to be as close to sc as possible and for blizzard/other sponsors to hype the shit out of it when it comes out.
starcraft has shown it can maintain a high profile, mainstream progaming scene. other games have shown that.. they cant. if sc2 comes out as a game that is as good as starcraft in terms of gameplay and entertainment, but gets the publicity and sponsorship that all the other new shitty rts' get, it will be huge.
but if what you want is a newb friendly game that people only play until the next 'big game' comes out, then go ahead and dumb it down to match the rest of the games.
Duude... are you saying the world should adapt to StarCraft?
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what?
theres nothing special about koreans. way more people play, meaning those with natural talent are more likely to get into progaming, and they play a shitload more, which has obvious effects.
stick 30 non koreans into progaming and give them all the resources upcoming korean gamers have and at least a few of them will become high-calibre pros, probably a few starleaguers.
its not a matter of adapting, theres just no motivation outside korea because no sponsors will touch a 10 year old game.
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On September 29 2007 06:19 Chodorkovskiy wrote:Show nested quote +On September 29 2007 06:11 IdrA wrote:
....
its not like theres some genetic barrier preventing non koreans from playing as well as koreans. its a cultural difference. sc1 happened to catch just right in korean culture so that it became the massive mainstream media giant it is today, that much attention and money going into it allows/encourages lots and lots of players to play 24/7 with the hope of becoming the best. given that environment any country could produce korean-equivalent talent and ability.
if you honestly want there to be a non-korean progaming scene that can rival what korea has for bw, you should want sc2 to be as close to sc as possible and for blizzard/other sponsors to hype the shit out of it when it comes out.
starcraft has shown it can maintain a high profile, mainstream progaming scene. other games have shown that.. they cant. if sc2 comes out as a game that is as good as starcraft in terms of gameplay and entertainment, but gets the publicity and sponsorship that all the other new shitty rts' get, it will be huge.
but if what you want is a newb friendly game that people only play until the next 'big game' comes out, then go ahead and dumb it down to match the rest of the games.
Duude... are you saying the world should adapt to StarCraft?
SC is the best game ever made. It has no reason to adapt to the short-lived whims of teenage kids wanting to play with pew-pew lasers or the shitty precedent set by old games. This is fucking Starcraft II, goddamnit. Make it worthy of its name.
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I trust Blizzard to make a game competative on all levels without stilting themselves with a 10 year old UI. You're right, this is Starcraft II and it's going to be much more than kids playing with pew pew lasers, and it's going to be that even with MBS.
I think Blizzard would be doing a huge disservice to the gaming community by relying on the crutch of outdated UI to produce a competative game.
I look forward to fast, furious games with MBS because it's coming. You'll see in hindsight that it won't be so bad
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Yep Idra definately does win.
Why do people argue that perfect macro is unattainable and therefore must be changed? It baffles me. If you can do everything you want to do, the game becomes pointless. The fact that it is impossible to achieve what you want is what you want in a game (lol thats an amusing sentence).
Casual gamers care about graphics and explosions. They wont care either way. Competative gamers care about making the game tough to play and rewarding when you take the time to learn it well. The map editor that comes with broodwar will spawn some very interesting maps, most likely we will see BGH2 and Fastest Map 2. We will also see some innovative new UMS games that people will play for a long time (like dota). As far as the main game goes, as soon as the coolness of the graphics wear off, a casual gamer is going to move on. Most likely they'll move on to UMS games or Moneymap games. The competative gamer is going to stick with it. While for the first few months the ladder will be dominated by casual gamers and comepetative gamers alike, this will change and it will soon become domitated by competative gamers. It is then very important for the game to have the competative value that it's predecessor had. Without it, SC2 will turn into one of those games that are only played for the fun user made maps because the ladder offers a poor competative experience.
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EPT
