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This post is just my personal opinion, and I’m not even a good player, so take everything with a grain of salt.
Seeing The Forest Beyond The Trees:
Nearly all recent discussions on Macro Boosters focus around a single issue: Mechanical Difficulty. Folks who want Starcraft 2 to be mechanically difficult argue that Macro Boosters need to stay, while folks who think the game is too hard argue that Macro Boosters need to be removed/tuned down. The community’s collective vision is blocked by a single tree and we have lost sight of the forest beyond.
Questioning the premise: Why must we bundle together Mechanical Difficulty and Macro Boosters in a single discussion? How do Macro Boosters affect the game other than mechanics? Can we not inject Mechanical Difficulty in other areas of the game even if Macro Boosters are removed?
In this post, I will not engage in the discussion on Mechanical Difficulty. I believe that while Macro Boosters may provide some benefit to the game in the form of mechanics, their negative affects on other areas of the game far outweigh their positive, and they should be removed at once. If players want more Mechanical Difficulty after the removal of Macro Boosters, we can find other ways to inject difficulty into the game.
Sin #1: Time Compression Lowers the Quality of the Game
Shout out to this article that elaborated quite a bit on time compression, and how it causes players to lose control of the game: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/legacy-of-the-void/482697-razzia-of-the-blizzsters
Often we hear people say: “Man, both players executed everything perfectly! What an epic game!” vs. “Well, both players made many disappointing mistakes this game, they must be having an off day.” The quality of an SC2 game is determined by how close to perfection the players perform. How does time factor into the quality of the game?
Imaging two chess Grandmasters playing a game with 3 hours on each player’s clock. Both Grandmasters can think 20 moves deep, and with plenty of time on the clock, every move they make is nearly perfect. The quality of the game is very high. Now let’s compress time. The same two chess Grandmasters play a ‘bullet chess’ game with only 1 minute on each player’s clock. With no time to think, both Grandmasters start to make some mistakes they would never make in a normal time setting. The game may still be entertaining to watch, but with so many mistakes, the quality of the game has been lowered from grandmaster level to amateur level.
The first negative impact of Macro Boosters is that they drastically speed up the economy. (I will talk about the uneven time compression between economy and other aspects of the game later, for now I will focus on the general speed boost) Since the economy determines the range of possible actions one can make, speeding up the economy speeds up the rest of the game, and time is compressed.
How fast is too fast? That’s a debatable question too large to cover in this post. However, one can easily imagine that, if we go to the extreme, such as setting the game speed to X10, no progamer will be fast enough to macro or micro properly, players will make ridiculous blunders, being unable to control the game. While this may provide some entertainment, the quality of game will be garbage.
I believe that a slower game CAN be more action packed than a faster one. Because a slower game gives players more time to think, to act, and to react. Simply put, with more time at the player’s disposal, the player has more control over the game. This will enable the players to make less mistakes, and raise the quality of the game. In contrast, by making the game faster, the player has less time to think, to act, and to react. Consequently the player with less time at his disposal will make more mistakes, and the quality of the game will be lowered.
Once again, I am not attempting to debate whether the current game is too fast or too slow, that topic deserves its own discussion. What I am saying is that there is an inverse relationship between game speed and the amount of control a player has over the game. Faster game -> less time for players-> less control for players -> more mistakes -> lower quality game.
This is Sin #1 of Macro Boosters. They drastically speed up the game and compress time, and thus take control away from players, causing more mistakes, and lower the quality of the game overall. Will the removal of the Macro Boosters make the game too slow? Just right? Still too fast? I don’t know the answer. What I do know is that by giving players more time and thus more control, they will make less mistakes, and the quality of Starcraft 2 will improve.
Sin #2: Time Compression Reduces the Skill Gap
I dare to make a prediction. If we set the game speed to X10, there will be no skill gap at all between Code A and Code S players. What good is skill when you have no time to demonstrate your skill?
A concern that is hotly debated right now is: How will the removal of Macro Boosters affect the macro skill gap? Some folks believe that the Mechanical Difficulty of the Macro Boosters is what separates the good from the bad. I hold the opposite opinion, I believe that Macro Boosters actually reduce the macro skill gap, and here is why:
The difficulty of macro lies in multitasking, not just in mechanical speed. If you ask the progamers to macro without an opponent in the game, there will be no difference in their mechanical execution. What differentiate a player with good macro from the rest is multitasking, to produce stuff while doing a million other things at the same time, such as engaging your opponent or defending against harassment.
How much time does a player have in SC 2 to demonstrate superior macro? It is the amount of time between the start of the game to when peak economy saturation is reached. The faster players can reach peak saturation, the less time they have to demonstrate their macro and multitasking skills. Simple comparison: if it only takes players 5 minutes to reach peak saturation, they only have to deal with a few harassments and may be one small attack before their full economy kicks in; but if it takes players 20 minutes to reach peak saturation, they will have to deal with a lot more harassments and likely many frontal attacks before their full economy kicks in. In which scenario do players have more opportunities to demonstrate superior macro and multitasking? The one with more time.
Sin #2 of Macro Boosters is that by speeding up the economy so much, peak saturation can be reached very fast for all players, this diminishes the value of having good macro and multitasking by reducing the amount of time a player has to demonstrate his skill level. By removing the Macro Boosters, peak saturation will take far longer to reach, giving players more time to harass and attack each other, more time to show off their superior macro and multitasking skill level, and thus increases the skill gap in game.
Sin #3: Time Compression Reduces Comeback Potential
Last topic on time compression. Players need time to make a comeback.
Macro Boosters reduce the amount of time it takes to go from one phase of the game to another. The time compression in economy largely causes SC 2 to be a very all-in game with little chances of making a comeback. How many workers can a player make in one minute of game time? If the number is low, the player who fell behind in worker count has time to catch up because his opponent won’t be able to explode in worker count. With the Macro Boosters, however, to fall behind in economy means your opponent will snowball you very quickly afterwards. One simply cannot catch up in worker count when his opponent is making 20 drones per inject, and therefore, the player who fell behind is forced to all-in.
If a Terran player begins his parade push vs Zerg and fails to do anything with the first wave, how much time does he have to make something happen before he is mined out of minerals? How much time does he have before Zerg is fully saturated on 4 bases? How much time does he have before Zerg gets ultras out? The longer theses timing windows, the more chances he has to make a comeback.
Sin #3 of Macro Boosters is that by speeding up the economy, and thus reducing the amount of time it takes go from one phase of the game to another, players are deprived of the time they need to make comebacks happen.
Sin #4: Uneven Opportunity Costs Reduce Strategic Diversity
Previously I’ve noted that Macro Boosters speed up the economy without affect other game speed settings, such as unit movement, shooting speed, etc. This uneven time compression heavily skews the opportunity costs of different strategic options. Because the economy is the only aspect of the game that is directly sped up by Macro Boosters, the option to go economy is usually superior to all other options.
What is a non-all-in fast tech build that can go toe to toe with the standard economic build? It doesn’t exist. If you tech really fast instead of working on your economy, you have to do crippling amounts of damage to your opponent, or you simply lose from the economic damage you inflicted on yourself by not choosing the economic option.
What is a non-all-in fast army build that can go toe to toe with the standard economic build? It doesn’t exist. If you made fast army production buildings instead of working on your economy, you once again have to do crippling amounts of damage to your opponent, or you simply lose from the economic damage you inflicted on yourself by not choosing the economic option.
In the current game, if you are not going for the economic option, you are basically all-in. Because if you don’t go for the economic option, your Macro Boosters are wasted while your opponent will explode in economy. In other words, Macro Boosters help the economic option so much they make all other options all-in.
This is Sin #4 of the Macro Boosters. By skewing the balance of opportunity costs between economy vs tech vs army, the Macro Boosters make every non-economic build an all-in. This reduces the amount of strategic diversity in the game and is very harmful for RTS. In HOTS, you either all in, or you turtle to peak saturation while sending out a few harassing units. No other strategic options exist, because the economic option is way too good due to the Macro Boosters.
By removing Macro Boosters, the economic option will be more balanced compared to other options. Already in LOTV, Terrans are experiencing a mineral/gas “imbalance” in bio play. Without mules pumping so much extra minerals into the Terran economy, tech options such as going for Liberator harass has become more attractive. Players are no longer forced to make Orbitals as soon as they can afford it. The third CC can now be made into a PF for better defense. Etc… Once the game becomes balanced without Macro Boosters, I predict we will see an explosion in strategic diversity of tech builds and fast army builds that are not all-ins for all three races.
Sin #5: Uneven Opportunity Costs Makes the Game Less Action-Packed
This is heavily related to the previous point that the economic option is too good compared to other options due to Macro Boosters, but this point is significant enough that I will give it a different section.
The so called early to mid-game “action” we have in HOTS is either all-in or sending out a few overly cost-efficient harassment units. If neither player all-ins, we basically have a turtle fest until peak saturation is reached, and the only units that leave base are oracles and medivacs with mines. The strength of harassment units have a lot to do with this, but that is a different topic entirely. Here, I will discuss the negative impact of Macro Boosters on “action”.
By skewing the opportunity costs heavily in favor of the economic option, Macro Boosters discourage players from making faster armies if they do not wish to gamble on all-ins. When two players want to play it “safe”, they are forced to focus completely on economy while relying on a few harassment units to keep their opponent honest. This is because if players invest in early army production buildings and combat units, their opponents who go for the economic option will explode in economy and snowball them very quickly, essentially putting the army player in an all-in situation. The effect of this is we never see any fight for map control or positioning or pressure play in the early mid-game in “macro” games. The opportunity cost of doing anything other than going full economy is too high.
This is Sin #5 of Macro Boosters. By boosting the economic option so much, they discourage players from making early combat units unless they want to go all-in. Without combat units, players cannot fight for map control, or apply army pressure to their opponent, and what we have left is a turtle fest in the early mid-game.
Sin #6: Uneven Boost to Low Tech Unit Production Causes Death Ball Play
In RTS, there is an inherent unit balance rule: low tech units that are cheap and build fast need to have poor stats, whereas high tech units that are expensive and build slowly need to have good stats. The gap in efficiency between the low tech units and the high tech units cannot become too wide, or the game will always go into death ball play. Let me explain:
Take for example, blink stalker vs immortal/colossi. Blink stalkers are cheaper and build faster compared to the Robotic units, so by necessity, there needs to be an efficiency gap between blink stalkers and Robotic units. But how wide of an efficiency gap is appropriate? If blink stalkers are too strong, the sheer number and production speed of blink stalkers will overwhelm immortal/colossi, everyone will make blink stalkers and we will never see a death ball. In contrast, if the efficiency of immortal/colossi are too high, they will melt any number of blink stalkers, then everyone will make immortal/colossi and we will see death balls in every game.
You may be wondering: how do Macro Boosters factor into all this? Well, low tech units are almost exclusively limited by economy, while high tech units have additional limiting factors such as tech building construction, unit production, and research speed. Macro Boosters speed up the economy drastically but do not directly affect other game speeds such as tech building construction, unit production, and research. (Chrono boost effect is already factored into Protoss build/research timings that it is more of a catch up rather than a boost) This means that Macro Boosters have a much bigger impact on low tech unit production compared to high tech unit production. More economy directly translates into producing more low-tech units, but high tech units are still limited by all the other game speed factors. This creates a big gap in unit count between how many low tech units a player can make vs how many high tech units a player can make. The big gap in unit count in turn creates a big gap in unit efficiency to compensate for the numerical difference. The big gap in efficiency makes high tech units scale much better into the late game, and thus people like to make death balls.
Sin #6 of Macro Boosters is they have a much bigger impact on low tech unit production compared to high tech unit production, caused by the uneven boost to economy but not to other game speeds. This creates a chain of effects that widens the unit efficiency gap between low tech and high tech units, which makes high tech units scale much better into the late game, causing death ball play. Removing the macro boosters will slow down the economy, thus remove the direct production boost to low tech units. This will lessen the numerical gap between low tech and high tech units, which will then allow the efficiency gap between low tech and high tech units to become smaller. Low tech units will then be able to scale better into the late game, and we won’t have as much death ball play.
Sin #7: Zerg Death Ball
This one is going be a bit selfish, and even more of a personal opinion than the rest of my personal opinions. I just don’t like the idea of a Zerg death ball at all... Zerg is supposed to win with quantity instead of quality right? Then how come Zerg has to make death balls to compete in the late game, and that the Zerg death ball is arguably the most cost efficient of all three races? Makes no sense to me…
Well, actually it does. In the previous sin #6 I talked about the economic effect of Macro Boosters on low tech unit production. Here I want to highlight the production capacity effect that is specific to Zerg’s larva inject. I’ll just come out and say it, the amount of production capacity Zerg gets from larva inject is stupid, and is terrible for the Zerg race design. Adding on top of the economic effect from earlier, larva inject also directly boosts the amount of units Zerg can make, which further widens the numerical gap between low tech and high tech units. This in turn further widens the efficiency gap between low tech and high tech units to compensate for the numerical difference, causing Zerg death balls.
The most obvious example is the roach, with the drone explosion (more economy) and larva explosion (more production capacity) that larva inject provides, Zerg can max out on roaches very fast. This creates a huge numerical disparity between how many roaches Zerg can have in the early-mid game vs how many units other races can have. Terran and Protoss can only produce a small fraction of units in terms of numbers to deal with the roaches, which then by necessity means those fewer units must be many times more cost efficient compared to roaches, which then makes roaches scale horribly into the late game, to the point Zerg basically has to trade off all the roaches and switch completely into higher tech unit compositions in the late game, aka death balls.
Sin #7 of Macro Boosters, well, just larva inject, is that on top of the economic boost to low tech unit production, it also provides a production capacity boost to low tech unit production, further widening the efficiency gap between low and high tech units, which further causes Zerg to have to switch into a death ball composition. It is my sincere hope that larva inject be removed completely, not tuned down to two larva with auto-inject, so that both the economic and production capacity boost to Zerg low tech units are removed. This will lessen the numerical gap between Zerg’s low and high tech units, and thus lessen the efficiency gap as well. Which means Zerg low tech units can then scale better into the late game, and this whole Zerg death ball business can be eliminated.
Conclusion: Macro Boosters Do More Harm Than Good
The above are my seven reasons to argue for the removal of Macro Boosters. I think the question of Mechanical Difficulty should not be bundled with the removal of Macro Boosters. The community is too focused on the Mechanical Difficulty aspect of Macro Boosters. In my personal opinion, the harms that Macro Boosters do to the game far outweighs whatever benefits they provide in mechanics, and they should be removed at once. Thank you for reading.
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I agree with you 100%
I also made a point that if we lower the macro parts of the game we could introduce new ways for micro.
Like high ground benefits that we had in WoL beta, etc.
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Chess gms dont usually see the next 20 moves, otherwise great post, i really liked it.
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Well written and entertaining/informative post + Show Spoiler +can we still remove autoinject
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Right On!!
Right now most people against the macro changes are failing to see the forest beyond the trees. They are more concerned about how their race is made weaker or stronger rather than see the harmful effects of these. At this point game design is more important than balance!
Also injects in any form needs to go!!
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A reporter once asked: How many moves do you see ahead? (a despised question among chess masters)
The GM answered: one
... the best one. (ohhh... sick burn)
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A great voice of reason amongst many very upset people  . I agree with you completely, just like I agreed with theDwf's post a while back. The macro boosting mechanics are stupid. The time compression they cause only limits the ability of a player to show his abilities.
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Well written.
The combination of all of those sins is the reason why the most optimal way to play HOTS is to go full econ into full 3 base 66+ worker saturation while harassing lightly and build as few units as possible and tech as fast as possible and just go straight into late / end game deathball composition. NR15, one big ball vs big ball fight, GG.
The only time where that is not the case is when terran goes bio, then the terran is on the time clock and if they do not do enough damage to the zerg or protoss, once late game composition is achieved by protoss or zerg, bio terran just dies.
As mech became viable in HOTS after swarmhost nerf, terrans started doing the same NR15 into mech / death ball in TvZ.
I really hope these macro boosters are removed permanently including autoinject and larva mechanic rebalanced without it.
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Horrible post, everything is relative, not even a single point withstands scrutiny. And your deathball definition is wrong.
What you are saying is about balance, which can be tuned with or without the macro boosters. The problem of whether to have these boosters is always, whether the additional effort to use them creates strategy diversity and distinguishes players in a visible way. In other words, in a simplistic 2-class classification, if the boosters are (i) mandatory apm sinks that good players are forced to do but otherwise requires very little thought, then they should be removed; if they are (ii) interesting decisions that shape up builds or sharpen the timings or making comebacks possible, then they should stay.
I would say currently in HoTS they are too much (i), even though sometimes they do bring (ii).
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On August 26 2015 08:09 timchen1017 wrote:
Horrible post, everything is relative, not even a single point withstands scrutiny. And your deathball definition is wrong.
What you are saying is about balance, which can be tuned with or without the macro boosters. The problem of whether to have these boosters is always, whether the additional effort to use them creates strategy diversity and distinguishes players in a visible way. In other words, in a simplistic 2-class classification, if the boosters are (i) mandatory apm sinks that good players are forced to do but otherwise requires very little thought, then they should be removed; if they are (ii) interesting decisions that shape up builds or sharpen the timings or making comebacks possible, then they should stay.
I would say currently in HoTS they are too much (i), even though sometimes they do bring (ii).
The only 'macro' mechanic which fits your definition is chronoboost.
Mule is not a decision. Remove mule and suddenly terrans are not even making orbital commands anymore, or delaying them until they might need a scan. OC in HOTS is not a choice or an 'interesting decision'. It's what you have to do, so that you can drop mules.
Inject is not a decision. It's what you have to do to have more army. End of story.
Only chronoboost has decisions, but even then not much of one. In the early game protoss can only afford 1 tech path. In fact, you can pretty much guess how their chrono is going to be spent.
late game protoss has plenty of chrono and it's spent on anything which takes time. upgrades, colossus, storm, whatever. it's only spent on gateways when defending a big push or making a big push.
Can we please stop pretending mules or chrono or even injects are much of an APM sink? once every 30 seconds you goto your nat mineral line and spam down as many mules as you have energy for. Bam Bam Bam. Done. With even a little bit of practise this isn't a thing. Same with chrono. For injects people have hot key setups so it's basically just spam that and you're done.
It's NOT an APM sink. It's a multi-tasking sink. You need to keep track of when you last injected or chrono'd or mule dropped while doing something else (harassing, defending, whatever) and refresh it all. The extra actions required to manage this is actually pretty small. Any bronze level muppet could sit on 1 base without being pressured and hit perfect injects or mules or chrono, I don't care how 'slow' they play.
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This is a fairly good analysis, pointign towards the trade offs involved.
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I don't quite understand sin number 6. If I assume that hots is currently balanced, and that your point that macro mechanics increase economy which increase production of tier 1 units, shouldn't the high tier 3 units need to be excessively efficient verse the tier 1 units in order to keep balance?
Removing the current macro mechanics should be an inherent nerf to tier 1 units, which would then make the currently powerful tier 3 units even better vs the tier 1 units, leading to deathball play.
Are you implying that tier 3 units can be nerfed, (in a manner similar to the collosus) as a direct result of the tier 1 units being nerfed due to the economy not exploding because of lack of macro mechanics?
**on a side note, your post was amazing, and if I think logically about what is better for the game, I very well would agree with you. But my emotions, and feelings toward macro mechanics simply will not let me make a rational choice. I simply love cronoboost too much for its versatility, I love the miracles that mules bring about, and I love the larva injects which actually make zerg swarmy. These emotions compel me to fight against the removal of macro mechanics for no rational reason. That, and it seems that I have grown old and hate change**.
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On August 26 2015 10:08 AkashSky wrote:
I don't quite understand sin number 6. If I assume that hots is currently balanced, and that your point that macro mechanics increase economy which increase production of tier 1 units, shouldn't the high tier 3 units need to be excessively efficient verse the tier 1 units in order to keep balance?
Removing the current macro mechanics should be an inherent nerf to tier 1 units, which would then make the currently powerful tier 3 units even better vs the tier 1 units, leading to deathball play.
Are you implying that tier 3 units can be nerfed, (in a manner similar to the collosus) as a direct result of the tier 1 units being nerfed due to the economy not exploding because of lack of macro mechanics?
**on a side note, your post was amazing, and if I think logically about what is better for the game, I very well would agree with you. But my emotions, and feelings toward macro mechanics simply will not let me make a rational choice. I simply love cronoboost too much for its versatility, I love the miracles that mules bring about, and I love the larva injects which actually make zerg swarmy. These emotions compel me to fight against the removal of macro mechanics for no rational reason. That, and it seems that I have grown old and hate change**.
Tier 3 units aren't really that efficient in HotS though. Carriers, BCs, and Brood lords don't see that much gameplay outside of super late-game scenarios because Tier 1 units can mass up quickly enough to overwhelm small numbers (thanks to macro boosters). HotS isn't really balanced around using Tier 1 and 3 units equally, it's more balanced around Tier 1 units and the AoE units (Banelings, WMs, Colossi, HT, etc.). It's just not possible to use higher-tier units without amassing a critical number first and keeping them all together, i.e. deathball.
I'm no expert, but I think the argument is that without macro boosters, Tier 1 super-armies get nerfed, which will allow smaller numbers of upper tier units to be deployed more effectively.
I'm really on board with the rest of the post too.
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Yes, that's exactly his point. When mass marines (tier 1) are a viable strategy, higher tier units like the colossus have to be very cost-efficient to be worthwhile. When the macro mechanics allow Terrans to mass up marines very quickly, Protoss must race to its tier 3 damage dealers very quickly, leading to deathball play.
Removing the mechanics takes the air out of the balloon and makes it nigh impossible to exploit mineral intensive compositions like MMM. It also lays bare all the balance decisions blizzard had to make to counter those easily massed tier one units.
Naturally, if blizzard keeps the change, and I hope they will, then they can tone down the damage output from the tier 3 units if they want.
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Now in LOTV a single semi-succesfull harassment or early game timing attempt might just instantly end the game.
Not seeing how that's improving game quality, hightens the skill-gap, increases comeback potential, adds strategic diversity, creates more action, or more forgiving.
There are interesting sides to the macro change, but they are nowhere near a magic bullet. They cause more issues for now than they solve.
In fact, the games are going to be more brutal, decided by single actions, and there won't be much possibility to recover. That's even what David Kim said about the changes. Frankly, to me that stuff just sounds boring and frustrating.
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thanks for taking the time to put this together.
interesting read.
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blizzard balanced the game with the intent that Protoss would turtle while building that scary aoe deathball. Hence, MMM recks gateway units.
Interestingly, the colossus nerf discourages deathball play by making higher tech less attractive. And the mule removal takes away the impetus for rushing to aoe to some extent (because churning out MMM is a lot harder now). So they're attacking the problem from both directions. The root cause and the symptoms so to speak. It's smart.
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On August 26 2015 12:45 gh0st wrote:
blizzard balanced the game with the intent that Protoss would turtle while building that scary aoe deathball. Hence, MMM recks gateway units.
Interestingly, the colossus nerf discourages deathball play by making higher tech less attractive. And the mule removal takes away the impetus for rushing to aoe to some extent (because churning out MMM is a lot harder now). So they're attacking the problem from both directions. The root cause and the symptoms so to speak. It's smart.
What you've mentioned here pretty much describes the changes I've made to my play style for protoss.
In WoL and HotS... defend 3 bases, shaping up an army with a mix of colossi and HTs + gateway ball and hit that 200/200 clash, then warp in gateway units (with 10+ gates) with your forward pylon and kill the terran.
In LotV, I find myself with a more Middle-tier unit composition. with a lot more immortals and disruptors compared to a mostly gateway colossus army. Had a fun PvT game last night where I had 4 robo facilities producing immortals/distruptors in the mid game. Had to mix in tempests though once I scouted a mix of Liberator/Viking. My opponent did try to make Bio/Sky Terran work though but denying the 4th constantly starved him eventually.
Coming back to this though, the lack of Chrono and Muling in the match feel like good changes in terms of player vs player interactions. Playing as protoss I feel like I don't have to turtle until I have enough to just Spirit Bomb the opponent in one hit.
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On August 26 2015 07:57 mishimaBeef wrote:
A reporter once asked: How many moves do you see ahead? (a despised question among chess masters)
The GM answered: one
... the best one. (ohhh... sick burn)
Capablanca?
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On August 26 2015 13:53 CometNine wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2015 12:45 gh0st wrote:
blizzard balanced the game with the intent that Protoss would turtle while building that scary aoe deathball. Hence, MMM recks gateway units.
Interestingly, the colossus nerf discourages deathball play by making higher tech less attractive. And the mule removal takes away the impetus for rushing to aoe to some extent (because churning out MMM is a lot harder now). So they're attacking the problem from both directions. The root cause and the symptoms so to speak. It's smart. What you've mentioned here pretty much describes the changes I've made to my play style for protoss. In WoL and HotS... defend 3 bases, shaping up an army with a mix of colossi and HTs + gateway ball and hit that 200/200 clash, then warp in gateway units (with 10+ gates) with your forward pylon and kill the terran. In LotV, I find myself with a more Middle-tier unit composition. with a lot more immortals and disruptors compared to a mostly gateway colossus army. Had a fun PvT game last night where I had 4 robo facilities producing immortals/distruptors in the mid game. Had to mix in tempests though once I scouted a mix of Liberator/Viking. My opponent did try to make Bio/Sky Terran work though but denying the 4th constantly starved him eventually. Coming back to this though, the lack of Chrono and Muling in the match feel like good changes in terms of player vs player interactions. Playing as protoss I feel like I don't have to turtle until I have enough to just Spirit Bomb the opponent in one hit.
Chargelots are AMAZING now. I went for chargelot archon with a sprinkling of adepts and stalkers vs a terran to great effect. Mines and a PF on the 3rd pretty much stopped my advance from just killing him outright though.
It was great feeling like gateway units have some real teeth to them now and that terran might actually want to get something other than pure MMM.
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Russian Federation80 Posts
On August 26 2015 07:57 mishimaBeef wrote:
A reporter once asked: How many moves do you see ahead? (a despised question among chess masters)
The GM answered: one
... the best one. (ohhh... sick burn)
This historical quote is more like a joke to be fair, although it's one of my favourites  The person it belongs to is Jose Raul Capablanca, 3rd chess world champion. The point is that computing far ahead in non-forced situations on board is mere waste of time, and in these cases any strong player will evaluate the position based on its markers. And for these cases it is true, of course, but there are situations where a strong player would prefer to calculate moves (mostly forced or semi-forced combinations).
I think the poster above, who said that GMs do not normally calculate 20 moves ahead is correct. But still they do it (cut the number off, sometimes it's less than 20, sometimes even more) a few times a game, and not having the time to do it would definitely affect the quality of play.
PS: I don't think you've been arguing with the point in general, I just wanted to add my 2 cents on the game I love
On topic: this topic is very well written, I enjoyed reading it. At glance all concerns seem legit or at least worth consideration.
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On August 26 2015 14:28 Kharnage wrote:
Chargelots are AMAZING now. I went for chargelot archon with a sprinkling of adepts and stalkers vs a terran to great effect. Mines and a PF on the 3rd pretty much stopped my advance from just killing him outright though.
It was great feeling like gateway units have some real teeth to them now and that terran might actually want to get something other than pure MMM.
You only see this from one side. Terrans are not forced to play something that is not pure MMM (it was already the case against chargelots/archons and once colossi or HTs were on the field). They're litterally forced into not playing MMM.
Honestly, the bio needs some love right now. The only buff they got is some movement speed on the ghost, a useless snipe, and a medivac buff.
I'm okay with that, but what do you expect, really ? You give the Protosses a very strong chargelot buff, a very powerful and cheap unit with a ton of HP, and you nerf the marauder, expecting the bio player to multitask and harass only. Terrans can't avoid the fight forever, and Protosses just got a warp buff too.
Then you buff the hardest thing to deal with as a bio player : the Warp Prism.
Playing bio right now makes no sense, you'd better turtle a little more and crush the opponent with liberators or cyclones.
It's much worse than what you may think, once the timings are worked on, it won't be "my gateball can compete with MMM, yay !", but "Oh, you're playing bio, I remember when it used to work against any unit at all".
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Mostly agree with OP ,especially the last point about zerg
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Interesting article, but I don't agree with this point at all:
Time Compression Reduces the Skill Gap
In a faster game, small differences in APM result in much greater differences in capability. If you take it to extremes (e.g. to such a speed that a game only takes on average 0.1 minutes), a player with 200APM gets to perform 20 actions in the entire game, a player with 300APM gets to perform 30 actions. That is a huge difference in skill level - I would expect the 300APM player to always win, regardless of strategy. Taking it to the other extreme, (0.01% the current speed), APM becomes completely irrelevant as everyone has enough time to complete all of their actions perfectly - the game becomes solely strategy.
To me a decrease in speed means a high focus on strategy over mechanics - and a smaller skill gap.
The reason SC1 had a wider skill gap at the top was it had much much higher mechanical requirements - which more than compensated for the slower game progression. In essence it was "faster" overall because more actions needed completing in less time - SC2 has far fewer actions (i.e. no manual worker rallying), but is slightly faster in its game speed to compensate.
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i like the post makes sense but if we are talking top level many people on these forums over the years have said the strategy of the game doesnt come in till you are top masters / gm mmr, otherwise ur just massing units and sending them across the map copying some build idea you saw in some pro game earlier today.
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*sidles back into the room and pretends like he never left*
I agree with some of the OP, but not all.
Overbearing opportunity costs limiting strategies, for instance. Protoss? No way. Protoss has used - and won with - chronoboost in every imaginable way, from macro to warpgate to upgrade timings to tech. Zerg? What is building queens and injecting stopping you doing, exactly? Same with Terran.
Strategic diversity has mostly been a tug of war between the individual races, in my view. If one race has a lot of strategic diversity in a matchup, then it is almost inevitable that the other race will have very little, because it is natural for only a very few strategies to be safe against a wide range of threats. In early WoL Zerg had a terrible time against both Protoss and Terran in that respect, struggling to even find one stable strategy that had a fighting chance against everything. And as was proved later, that inequality of strategic diversity was a double edged sword (Winfestor Broodlord, anyone?).
Time compression lowering the quality of the game? First, while macro mechanics might compress windows of time, they don't speed the game up. They mostly create greater quantity. And narrow windows do present opportunities for individual brilliance.
I don't buy your chess analogy. Would the quality of a game of starcraft be higher if it were played at 0.1x speed? 0.01x? No, so clearly we are looking for a sweet spot, not pursuing an extreme.
While a slower game might allow more control, it reduces the significance of the controlling you do. Look at roach vs roach: long fights, fast units, plenty of opportunity to micro - and does anything other than tech/upgrades/numbers ever matter? Not so much. Compare to ling/bling/muta vs marine/medivac/mine: low health, high damage, fights over super quickly - but they are the most vital and exciting and positional interactions in SC2.
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Thank you all for the responses I avoided discussing balance because the game isn't finished, all I looked at are the effects of Macro Boosters on the game across all three races, except #7 which is Zerg only, but not about balance.
On August 26 2015 10:08 AkashSky wrote:
Are you implying that tier 3 units can be nerfed, (in a manner similar to the collosus) as a direct result of the tier 1 units being nerfed due to the economy not exploding because of lack of macro mechanics?
**on a side note, your post was amazing, and if I think logically about what is better for the game, I very well would agree with you. But my emotions, and feelings toward macro mechanics simply will not let me make a rational choice. I simply love cronoboost too much for its versatility, I love the miracles that mules bring about, and I love the larva injects which actually make zerg swarmy. These emotions compel me to fight against the removal of macro mechanics for no rational reason. That, and it seems that I have grown old and hate change**.
Yes, I think either low tech units can be buffed following the reduction in economy, or high tech units can be nerfed. Balance isn't my focus. My point is that if the numerical gap isn't so big between low tech and high tech units, then the efficiency gap doesn't need to be so big either. A smaller efficiency gap will allow low tier units to scale better in the late game, and we have less death ball plays.
On August 26 2015 21:00 Haighstrom wrote:Interesting article, but I don't agree with this point at all: In a faster game, small differences in APM result in much greater differences in capability. If you take it to extremes (e.g. to such a speed that a game only takes on average 0.1 minutes), a player with 200APM gets to perform 20 actions in the entire game, a player with 300APM gets to perform 30 actions. That is a huge difference in skill level - I would expect the 300APM player to always win, regardless of strategy. Taking it to the other extreme, (0.01% the current speed), APM becomes completely irrelevant as everyone has enough time to complete all of their actions perfectly - the game becomes solely strategy. To me a decrease in speed means a high focus on strategy over mechanics - and a smaller skill gap. The reason SC1 had a wider skill gap at the top was it had much much higher mechanical requirements - which more than compensated for the slower game progression. In essence it was "faster" overall because more actions needed completing in less time - SC2 has far fewer actions (i.e. no manual worker rallying), but is slightly faster in its game speed to compensate.
I agree with your analysis on APM. However, my post wasn't focused on player speed differences, it looked at the effects of Macro Boosters on the game for all players. If you imagine both players having the same APM, then the amount of actions they can perform during each phase of the game is determined by time, or how long that phase lasts.
I believe the difficulty of macro lies in multitasking. Any pro can have perfect injects if he has no opponent in the game. It is the ability to produce stuff while dealing with a million other things that define who has good macro, not just pure mechanical speed. The removal of Macro Boosters will slow down the economy, but won't affect other game speeds like unit movement, so the effect is that each phase of the game lasts longer, but players and units still retain their normal speed. This gives both players more time and opportunity to demonstrate their skills, thus increasing the skill gap.
On August 26 2015 22:20 Umpteen wrote:
I agree with some of the OP, but not all.
Overbearing opportunity costs limiting strategies, for instance. Protoss? No way. Protoss has used - and won with - chronoboost in every imaginable way, from macro to warpgate to upgrade timings to tech. Zerg? What is building queens and injecting stopping you doing, exactly? Same with Terran.
Strategic diversity has mostly been a tug of war between the individual races, in my view. If one race has a lot of strategic diversity in a matchup, then it is almost inevitable that the other race will have very little, because it is natural for only a very few strategies to be safe against a wide range of threats. In early WoL Zerg had a terrible time against both Protoss and Terran in that respect, struggling to even find one stable strategy that had a fighting chance against everything. And as was proved later, that inequality of strategic diversity was a double edged sword (Winfestor Broodlord, anyone?).
Time compression lowering the quality of the game? First, while macro mechanics might compress windows of time, they don't speed the game up. They mostly create greater quantity. And narrow windows do present opportunities for individual brilliance.
I don't buy your chess analogy. Would the quality of a game of starcraft be higher if it were played at 0.1x speed? 0.01x? No, so clearly we are looking for a sweet spot, not pursuing an extreme.
You made some good points, strategic diversity varies by race, and also the game cannot be slowed down infinitely.
My point on opportunity cost wasn't race specific, it was comparing between the economic option vs tech vs army options, and that Macro Boosters make the economic option superior to the others, thus all builds that are not all-ins tend to focus on economy. Without Macro Boosters inflating the economic option, we can potentially see more tech or fast army builds that aren't necessarily all ins. That is the strategic diversity I was focused on.
Completely agree that we need to find a sweet spot on game speed. I do believe that more time will give players more control, which means less mistakes and higher quality games. Obviously we cannot slow down the game so much that it is not fun anymore.
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Double Post 
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Questioning the premise: Why must we bundle together Mechanical Difficulty and Macro Boosters in a single discussion? How do Macro Boosters affect the game other than mechanics? Can we not inject Mechanical Difficulty in other areas of the game even if Macro Boosters are removed?
I think I can answer these.
1. Mechanical difficulty and boosters are tied together because the macro elements within Starcraft 2 are too easy without them. This is a result of the engine improvements moving from Brood War to SC2. If there is a way to achieve mechanical difficulty without macro boosters, I have yet to see anyone mention it.
2. I think there are plenty of pieces that answer this question and I think that's what your article is mostly discussing.
3. If there is a way, I have yet to see it. Blizzard's idea is to add a bunch of spells and shit to make the micro more difficult. If there is a good way to make the macro more difficult while also keeping it somewhat friendly for newer players, I'm all for it. The only solution I have come up with is a retooling of the engine which is just too impractical.
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Sin #1 : yeah right because 2 hours long games are always so much fun in SC2. Did someone say swarm host?
Sin #2 : yeah right because in SC2 the ability to do a lot of things in a restricted amount of time isn't the definition of skill. Did someone said Real Time Strategy?
Sin #3 : yeah right, because when I poorly defend an allin as terran but have 3 CCs, mules don't help me make a comeback at all. Did someone said fuck logic?
Sin #4 : only kindda makes sense for mule, the rest is heavy theorycrafting.
Sin #5 : YEAH, right. Less action packed. Let's just see how many passive terran players won a TvP lately. None. The lack of action is mainly due to band aid units such as the MSC, and mech play immobility.
Sin #6 : complete theorycrafting.
Sin #7 : "zergs go mass roaches => deathball". Yeah because in any RTS ever, if you gain an advantage early/mid game with "timed" units (less effective in the late game), your main option to finish the game is to build a tech heavy army deathball style and stomp the enemy. The fact that you can produce a high amount of low tier units and then have to transition into something more lategame is the macro mechanics fault. Of course.
This post is an insult to logic. I'm sad to see some people have so little understanding the the game that they agree with this post.
The only reason to blame macro mechanics that's not complete bullshit ("it's not enjoyable for the viewers so let's remove it" : yeah because the game is made to be watched, not to be played?), is that inject and chronoboost are mindless APM sinks. Terran macro mechanics lead to strategic choices : if I mule, I won't have a scan, if I scan, I loose money for 90 secs, and if I fucked up, I'm forced to supply drop and loose a mule/scan.
Chrono and inject are kinda mindless and HAVE to be done for the P/Z to win. The right way to change that would be to give P/Z a CHOICE. If queens could instantly spawn 2 larvae for 25 energy on a hatch, but giving the hatch a 40 sec cooldown where it cant be injected or targeted by this ability, it'd give zergs a choice : do I want half the larvae now to defend a push or do a strong timing, or do I want optimal production capacity?
Give people a choice in the macro mechanics blizzard, so that macro stays an important and decisive part of the game.
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On August 26 2015 19:30 Yiome wrote:Mostly agree with OP ,especially the last point about zerg
Yeah now Zerg moslty waits for a deathball cuz less larva means no more fast remax.
Maybe this will mean buffed units at least.
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I want to take the time to write a response to each of your points:
1&2. Time compression lowers the quality of the game/Time Compression lowers the skill gap
These are the main points that made me want to write this response, particularly with the examples that you used. You gave the example of two chess grandmasters having a 3 hour time limit versus a 1 minute time limit and stated that the 3 hour limit would lead to a more thought out game. However, in doing so, you focused entirely on quality and not on the rest of the picture.
This point carries on into your second point, and they can both are highly related. Therefore, I will cover both points at once.
The first problem with your post is that you talk about quality of the game, but do not define it in a definite manner. You state that the quality of the game is related to how close to perfection the players preform. The question that needs to be asked is "Is this a positive thing?" which in turn raises the question "What about it is positive?" Your paragraph begins with how a quality game is "epic" -due to this I believe that quality refers to entertainment value, which is what I will be covering.
Right now, you equate quality with both the skill level of the players (Higher skill = Higher Quality) and the entertainment value to the game to the viewer (Higher Quality = More fun to watch). However, both of these comparisons are flawed.
To start, let us talk about skill. You state that having a longer time to react gives a player more chance to show their skill. This a half true. A player can show off their macro skill better with a longer game, but it minimizes their other skills which benefit in a faster game. The large aspects of the game that benefit from a fast early game are decision making and micro. This raises the question, which aspect of the game is more important? Is trading more opportunities for macro skill worth the lessening of micro and decision making?
Let us answer that question by talking about your first point. What are some of the most entertaining games that you can remember? In addition, what makes a game entertaining? When you think of exciting SC2, what do you think of? Most people think of close, back-and-forth games or comebacks. Furthermore, some of the most entertaining SC2 I can remember were scrappy matches which came down to micro. Macro games tend to be boring.
The point is that entertain value does not mainly come from macro. Entertainment comes from micro - watching units fight with one another. In that sense, it is better for the game to have an accelerated time frame, so that these compositions are reached sooner. Macro mechanics are one way to speed up the game.
Blizzard also agrees that micro is more entertaining then macro, which is why they put the accelerated start in LotV.
That said, do macro mechanics benefit macro oriented players? The answer is yes. Perfect injects are better than someone who misses some injects. MULEs influence Terran greatly. One of the defining factors of a top Protoss is that they use chronoboost constantly though out the game. Macro mechanics are a way for macro players to set themselves apart.
Furthermore, while macro mechanics may lessen the visibility of macro, they do not take anything away from it. A viewer might not see the amazing macro going on behind the scenes, but a person knows that it is there. While it might not be the focus, it still exists.
To conclude this first point, I want to directly state what I had already said. Macro is a one of many aspects of SC2, in addition to being a skill players have. However, Macro is less entertaining than other aspects of SC2. This is why Macro mechanics exist to cut to the action, so to speak. Macro mechanics lead to more entertaining games. Additionally, Macro mechanics offer a way for players to demonstrate there macro, which would be lost if not for these mechanics. Finally, macro is one of many skills needed to play SC2. While macro mechanics may "lower the skill gap" of direct macro, they offer opportunities for other skills to shine in macro's stead.
3. Time Compression Lowers Comeback Potential
This is another statement that I disagree with very much. The main disagreement I have with it, however, is how you worded it. It should say that Macro mechanics lowers comeback potential. This is because you are discussing macro mechanics. The reason that I make this distinction is that I will not argue with the fact that time compression lowers comeback potential. It is harder to come back in a faster paced game. There is a difference between simple time compression and macro mechanics, which is what I wish to discuss.
Let us start by looking at a ZvZ. Both players are sending lings at one another, fairly evenly matched, until one player loses a queen. The other zerg acquires a large advantage due to his opponents crippled production. This is a situation where a comeback is difficult. The one player is ahead far more then he would be without macro mechanics. The issue I take with this is that the problem is not macro mechanics.
Why did one player lose the queen in the first place? Was it because they had less lings, as they built too many drones? Perhaps they miscontrolled their units. Whatever the case, the loss of the queen was not due to macro mechanics, but rather due to another mistake. The player would then push the blame to macro mechanics.
That is unique to a zerg situation, but this point is really only valid for zerg. If a Terran loses an orbital or a protoss loses their nexus early game, the game is probably decided even without macro mechanics. Without macro mechanics, the other player would still have an advantage.
The addition of macro mechanics do not increase that advantage what so ever.
Finally, as a counterexample, almost every massive comeback I can think of involved MULEs. Even if it did not, macro mechanics are something that a losing player can rely on to attempt to take a better position. There is a chance that the winning player will slip on his macro. Without, there is no extra ability to come back.
4&5 Opportunity Cost
Both of these points discuss opportunity cost. Both of these points need to consider the bigger picture and realize that the fault is not macro mechanics, but rather overall balance.
These points have a much larger scope than simply macro mechanics, and I agree that this is a huge problem with SC2 currently.
Protoss is completely innocent of these charges. No one ever built a nexus solely for chronoboost.
To be extremely short, Economy play is extremely powerful, but it would still be powerful without macro mechanics. I do not believe that macro mechanics are the cause, but rather a side effect of a powerful economy. Furthermore, I believe that the answer to this problem is not with removing macro mechanics, but buffing early game units.
6. Macro mechanics = Deathball
Macro mechanics do help build many low cost units. However, deathballs would still exist without macro boosters. It is wrong to state that macro mechanics lead directly to a preference of lower cost units. Rather, this is as a result of a build. A teching player needs to defend his base while he is teching. An attacking player wants to attack quickly. The teching player is looking for cost effective units, and probably wants them to be light on gas. The attacking player is looking for effective units to straight out kill his opponent, and they can't be too high tech. This leads to a situation where both players mass t1 untis.
This leads to deathball play. All macro mechanics do is increase the size of the deathball. The important thing is that it would still occur without macro mechanics.
In addition, chronoboost also does not really apply here.
7. Inject is OP
I have to get going, but this is a game design problem as well as a balance problem. Would nerfing inject help out much? That remains to be seen. However, I fail to see why this is a bad thing. If it were not for inject, the zerg would just have to build more hatcheries, at half the cost of a queen. Inject is a way for players macro to matter. I do believe inject is beneficial to the game.
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I think I am gonna call workers now Macro Boosters. As thats what they do, speed up macro.
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@Monochromatic, thank you for your detailed response, I can see you put a lot of time into it, really appreciate it.
On Time Compression:
I like your point that micro is more entertaining to watch. However, what makes a perfect game is a highly personal question. For me it is about the amount of mistakes the players make. Mistakes can happen in macro, micro, multitasking, or anything else, and the less mistakes a game has the higher it's quality in my eyes. A "perfect" game to me is one where neither player makes any mistakes. Obviously, this definition is not for everyone, so neither of us is wrong.
I disagree with you that a longer game diminishes micro. I think a longer game does not mean a slower game, players still operate at the same APM, and units still move just as fast, the difference is that with a lower economy, the amount of time it takes to go from one phase of the game to another increases. Longer phases actual give players more time and opportunities to do everything, including more micro opportunities. It's like having more smaller fights before peak saturation, rather than reaching peak saturation quickly and have fewer maxed out 200/200 fights.
Also, I think you are bundling Mechanical Difficulty with Macro Boosters, which I specifically tried to separate from this discussion. When you say "macro mechanics" differentiates good macro players, I believe you mean Mechanical Difficulty. I agree that Mechanical Difficulty can be good for the game, but my starting point was that we shouldn't bundle these two together. We should remove Macro Boosters for their other harmful effects, and perhaps find other ways to put Mechanical Difficulty back into the game.
On Comeback Potential:
My view is that Macro Boosters speed up the economy, and the faster economy speeds up how fast you go from one phase of the game to another. Such as how long it takes to reach peak saturation, how long to set up all your production buildings, etc. The less time you have, the less opportunities you have to make a comeback.
For example, let's say Terran skips a third CC in favor of two additional barracks, if his first attack fails he is basically lost in the standard game. This is because the Macro Booster of his Zerg opponent can make him 20-30 drones ahead very quickly after holding the initial push. Without Macro Boosters, Zerg (all races) cannot explode in economy so fast, and the Terran who failed his initial attack has more time to catch up and make a comeback.
On Opportunity Cost:
I disagree here again. Macro Boosters are the cause of the super powerful economy, without them the growth of economy will be much slower, but other game speeds still remain the same. This will make the economic option less attractive relative to other options. Economy play can still be strong and perhaps the dominant meta, but without Macro Boosters inflating the economy so fast, other strategies like fast tech or fast army can perhaps compete with fast economy without going all-in.
Protoss is definitely affected by this. If you go two base immortal sentry vs Zerg, forgoing the third Nexus, you forfeit your Macro Booster while your opponent is using his. If the two base attacks fails Protoss has virtually no way of catching up in economy again, making the strategy all-in. Compare this to Protoss making the third nexus, and making full use of his Macro Boosters, he can then go toe to toe with the Zerg economy.
On Deathball and Zerg Inject:
Low tech units are only constrained by economy, which is sped up by Macro Boosters, whereas high tech units also have constraints like tech buildings, longer unit production time, and research, which are not sped up by Macro Boosters. (choroboost aside). This is why I think Macro Boosters direct impact low tech units but has less of a ripple affect on high tech units. Obviously more economy also means more high tech units, but the other constraints not affected by Macro Boosters lessen the impact they have on high tech units.
I'm not saying Macro Boosters give preference to low tech units, I'm saying they cause a larger numerical disparity between low tech and high tech units. Take LOTV Terran bio right now, with less economy the amount of bio you can produce is a lot fewer, but the impact on making ravens isn't that different, since ravens are mostly about gas and tech building and long unit production time, and less about just economy.
The smaller the numerical gap between low tech and high tech units, the less their efficiency gap has to be. If one colossus needs to face off 10 stalkers, it must have incredibly high stats to compete, but if one colossus only has to face off 3 stalkers, it no longer needs the insane stats anymore. That is my point, should the efficiency gap between stalker and colossus decrease, people will make more stalker based armies, and less mass colossus death balls.
Same concept for inject, by providing production capacity on top of the economic boost, it further increases the numerical gap between low tech and high tech units. Roaches can be masses as long as you have economy and larva, which are directly boosted by inject, but ultras require Hive, Cavern, Armor upgrade, and has a long production time, these constraints are not directly boosted by inject. Therefore larva inject boost low tech units more than high tech units. By removing inject, the numerical gap between roaches and ultras will decreases, which means either roaches can be stronger or ultras can be weaker to match the numerical change. A smaller efficiency gap between roaches and ultras will make roaches scale better into the late game.
I hope these make sense to you, and thank you again for the thoughtful response!
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The OP is such a well written compelling argument. I felt like I was reading the distillation of only the best and most rational thoughts that were previously not spoken to the public of the entire Blizzard team and half of the gaming community over the recent changes. It is a truly great piece of writing.
I think most points are so well made you can't really argue with them logically. I mean sure, there are always small exceptions, but from a big picture perspective it all makes quite a bit of sense.
In conclusion, my own reasons for liking removal of inject/mule/chrono is solidified even more. The game is going to be healthier, more diverse, and just better when the dust settles. The big thing I am waiting for is the same treatment Zerg got for Protoss and Terran. Because right now, the new emphasis is lopsided in the Zerg direction. Some sort of equalization still must be in the works.
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I disagreed with macro changes until I read your opinions. I think most of them are true. Bravo!
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I agree with the OP. macro boosters should be removed. It was a bad game design from the start
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EPT
