EPTMacro Boosters:
We felt the new Inject was the closest to home and felt most like Starcraft, so we've decided internally to make similar changes to Chrono Boost. Also we felt that while Macro Boosters are important in the start of the game, so you have something to do, the strength of them was too powerful and had a too huge impact on how it sped up the game, here are the changes:
* Chrono Boost reverted to the HotS version, but only at 25% increase rate. It now can stack like what we've tested with Inject (You can now see how many stacks are currently on the building.)
(The following underlined section, Blizzard have found a similar better and more balanced solution.)
* Inject is changed to 2 Larvae (You can now see how many stacks are currently on the building.)
* Mule stays the same, but now occupies the Mineral Field for twice the duration, giving it 50% income, but furthermore nerfs it in the late game when you drop many Mules on the same Mineral Patch.
Core game changes:
We've been hearing your feedback about solving more core issues, rather than changing specific units and making exceptions. This is something that means a lot to us, but bear in mind changing something like this can have great impact on the game, so we really need feedback in this area, when the patch is live.
* Rich Mineral Fields can now be seen on the Minimap.
* Camera Locations are now saved on every map, between games.
* You now get notion on where your opponents spawned at the start of the game.
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* Low Ground Disadvantage: Ranged units that attack to higher ground, now have 1 less range.
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Give players more reason to conquer the map for favourable high ground positions. It allows races to contain without always having defensive structures/units with the army, allows for much more tactical maneuvering on the fly.
It will be much tougher to encroach fortified positions, since moving up ramps hampers your units firing range. Imagine moving up ramps with Roaches against Siege Tanks, now imagine the units were Marines, with range of Roaches. They'd do nothing, this change fights the death ball on two ends. 1) The Death Ball does not look as Death Bally, since lower range units rely much heavilier on concaves, getting surrounds. Roach vs Roach is not as Death Bally as other compositions. 2) Death Ball only really stop to matter when we get situations where a smaller and weaker army can defeat bigger, stronger armies. Once that can happen, it allows for splitting your armies in halves, which means more action, more pew pew, more fun.
It will be much tougher to encroach fortified positions, since moving up ramps hampers your units firing range. Imagine moving up ramps with Roaches against Siege Tanks, now imagine the units were Marines, with range of Roaches. They'd do nothing, this change fights the death ball on two ends. 1) The Death Ball does not look as Death Bally, since lower range units rely much heavilier on concaves, getting surrounds. Roach vs Roach is not as Death Bally as other compositions. 2) Death Ball only really stop to matter when we get situations where a smaller and weaker army can defeat bigger, stronger armies. Once that can happen, it allows for splitting your armies in halves, which means more action, more pew pew, more fun.
Medium Armor introduced:
General rule of thumb is that units that have +vs the armor types: armored and light have + half that damage to the Medium Armor type.
Baneling, Queen, Ravager, Ghost, Adept, Disruptor, Oracle, Liberator, Hellbat is now considered Medium Armor.
[As an example this means that Ghosts now deal slightly less damage to Adepts, while Marauders deal slightly more.]
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Medium Armor would be perfect for Adepts, first it was Light and now in an attempt to nerf it, it's Armoured. With so many more units in the game, since WoL, there's an increased need to differentiate unit roles, a new armour type allows for just that. Furthermore it gives us fewer instances where our units do ALL or NOTHING damage to the units we fight. The units with no armour type were floating in nowhere land and countered units in weird ways. Queens were surprisingly good vs Stalkers, Immortals, Void Rays. Ghosts soak infinity Banelings. The rest was changed from one type to another, in order to buff or nerf the unit, one more armour type just gives us more options.
* Protoss Shields: All Protoss units and structures shields now take 50% more damage from Splash Damage.
We've had trouble balancing splash vs all 3 races and have made changes like +vs Shields on Widow Mines and Disruptors in the past. We hope that a change such as this will make it more scary to walk around with your entire army as a Protoss player.
+vs Shields are in our first iteration are cut from the game (this has no effect on EMP, EMP removes Shields rather than damages it.)
* Energy Upgrades has been changed, instead of granting 25 more energy upon Spawn, it increases the regeneration of the unit slightly.
High Templar, Oracle, Ghost now have energy upgrades.
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Energy Upgrades have been in a weird spot, for some units it was totally useless, for others it was absolutely crucial. The upgrade never really made sense for the casters that don't have spells that cost 75 energy. Our standard core units, we can invest in, to get more profit, this is not the case with Spell casters, it's pretty cool, whenever you can invest in something and gain a slight edge from that unit. The new Energy Upgrade does that.
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Tech Tree changes:
Protoss:
* Adepts now require Twiilight Council.
* Added 2 structures: The Phase Generator (requires Robotics Facility) and the Tribunal of Delphi (requires Star Gate.)
* Warp Prism Speed upgrade is now put on the Phase Generator, the Phase Generator allows the production of Disruptors for the Robotics Facility.
*The Tribunal of Delphi allows you to build Oracles and Tempests from your Star Gate.
Terran:
* Added 2 structures: The Cyborg Den (requires Factory) and the Liberation Statue (requires Star Port.)
* Production of Hellbats and Thors requirements changed to the Cyborg Den.
* Production of Liberators now require the Liberation Statue.
* Liberator requires Tech Lab.
Zerg:
* Added 2 new structures: The Ravager Warren (morphed from Roach Warren) and the Bile Nest (requires Hive.) Allows the production of Vipers.
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The addition of tech allows us to slow down the game in more areas and enrich it. We've seen more expanding strategies spawned from having less minerals, this sort of creates the same dynamic. The average player now has less tech, so if you invest in teching, it allows your units to do so much more than the opponent. Which can allow for more dynamic gameplay where one guy expands like crazy, the other techs like crazy, or whether he upgrades +1/+1 and so on.
Furthermore it gives players more information, whenever the player scouts something in his opponents base. How can players adapt, if we don't allow them to.
Furthermore it gives players more information, whenever the player scouts something in his opponents base. How can players adapt, if we don't allow them to.
Unit Changes:
Protoss:
* Warp Prism: Now have 16 seconds Warp In like normal Pylons, once the Warp Prism have stayed in Phase Mode for 3 Seconds the Power generated from the Prism is changed to Warp Gate power and units have 2 seconds Warp In.
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Warp Prism allins are simply too strong right now. Late game it also might be too devastating, but instead of neutering Prism play, a change such as this, makes it so that you don't just barge into the enemies base and Warps in Adepts on top of his army. Something I've actually done, it's pretty stupid. But if the player is searching for an invisible spot in the base and manages to find it, he can set up the Prism and start wreaking havoc in the enemies base, in the same way a Nydus Worm would.
* Late game 200/200 upgrade added for the Zealot (upgraded on the Templars Archive.) Zealots gain an auto-casted ability, where it explodes upon death, dealing damage to ALL units nearby (Friendly Fire.) Different from the Baneling in the way that the Zealot cannot activate the ability, it only happens when the Zealot dies from damage (can be deactivated.)
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This is really just added coolness to the Zealot, they should go out with a BANG. In the spirit of Predators from the Predator movies, they sacrifice themselves for the greater good. But I don't want to just introduce the Banelot, which is why it should have different qualities.
* Adept Shield Upgrade is removed and replaced by an upgrade that allows the Adepts shots to pierce the target allowing it to deal a thin line of splash damage behind the target.
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People have talked about how Adepts should not be tanky, and scale better into the late game. A semi splash allows that, it's not worse vs Bio Clumps, which is something Protoss struggle against, without late game splash opportunities. I think it fits pretty well with the disc theme.
* Flux Vanes upgrade added to the Fleet Beacon (Void Ray speed upgrade.)
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Void Rays lack utility, more than just being anti Corruptor. The coolest way you can utilize them now are together with the Mothership Core and go on base killing spree. This is a heavy buff to that strategy, if you INVEST into it.
* Psionic Storm duration increased to 4.5 from 4 seconds, dealing one more pulse of 10 damage, just enough to kill a Widow Mine.
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This is really just to protect ourselves from future metagames, where Mines blow everything Protoss up, now that the Colossus is somewhat out of the picture. + Storm is cool!
* Stasis Trap now has a duration of 5 min from unlimited.
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This isn't seen much, but I've abused it. Going mass Oracles and locking down the game, this is the Protoss version of Swarm Host or Raven play, stop it now already! Also, I've given them a damn energy regen upgrade.
* Mothership Core: Fixed a bug where the Mothership Core waits to float to it's destination, before issuing it's Recall order.
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More than any imbalance currently in the beta, this is what makes me cry the most.
* The Disruptor can now be picked up by Warp Prism/Phoenix while it's projectile is out, but the projectile fizzles.
* Disruptors can now damage each other.
* Disruptor's projectile can now also be controlled by holding in the hotkey of Purification Nova from the Disruptor.
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Good playes can now save Disruptors, if you've made a foul play. Correct bad play, with good play! Disruptors deal friendly fire, because we don't want mass Disruptor, if you're about to hit your own, you can pick them up now 
* Tempest ability upgrade researched at the Tribunal.
The Tempest channels a Vortex right in front of it sucking in all AIR units in a small radius, finally living up to it's name.
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This is maybe one I shouldn't have made, if I want this post to be taken seriously. Though it makes sense with the Tempest theme, it was made as a counter to mass air, this is a semi counter to mass air units.
Terran:
* The Liberator don't grant vision of the area, when using AtG AoE.
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Prevents abusive play, hiding behind cliffs, also keep in mind I gave units on low ground -1 range.
The Ghost:
* Cost Changed to 150/150 from 200/100.
* EMP Radius increased to 2 from 1.5, Shield damage nerfed to 50 damage from 100. (Changed to be more anti-caster role.)
* Snipe damage increased to 180 from 170, just enough to kill an Adept.
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Adepts are currently super broken in the beta, they're now Medium, comes from Twilight Council and can be 1 shotted by Snipe. Hopefully this is enough, or maybe people will start picking up the Adepts in Warp Prism's everytime a Snipe ensues <.<
* Medivac Speed Boost is now a research upgraded at the Liberation Statue. Boost now have an energy cost of 12 energy.
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Killer of positional play, bringer of doom drops. I don't like it, but it can stay in the game, with these conditions. MMA+Maru+GumiHo are maybe good enough to make the upgrade worthwhile, maybe other Terrans won't research it? Different playstyles? What is this!
* Siege Tanks picked up in Medivacs while in Siege Mode, enter non-Sieged Mode state inside the Medivac and is dropped as non-Sieged.
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Many want Siege Tanks to be positional, others want pew, pew, bang, bang. You can still drop them like crazy, but they're worse in that regard. However, they're buffed in that you can save more of them, since you can carry 2 Siege Tanks in a Medivacs, from Sieged position.
* Vehicle and Ship Plating cost changed to 150/150, 225/225, 300/300 from 100/100, 175/175, 250/250.
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Makes it more fair, this is the cost for Ground Carapace.
Zerg:
* Spine Crawler and Spore Crawler now both have 9 duration root time.
(Spine Crawler from 12, Spore Crawler from 6.)
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Less numbers to remember, consistency.
* The Ultralisk Frenzy is removed.
* Ultralisk armour increased to 2 from 1. Chitinous Plating now gives +3 armor instead of +4.
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Ultralisks are a bit weak upon spawn, Carapace makes them insanely powerful. I like that they're strong, but you should be able to counter it with spells. Neural on Ultralisks, the dream.
* The Viper Parasitic Bomb's damage do not stack anymore.
* The Viper no longer has Abduct.
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Viper has too much utility currently, it makes sense, it has 4 abilities. Parasitic Bomb counter too many units, because you can just stack it like crazy and in those scenarious it's impossible to split your army.
The Corruptor:
* The Corruptor no longer has Caustic Spray.
* The Corruptor no longer has +vs Massive.
* The Corruptor now has the Abduct ability.
* Abduct range nerfed to 5 from range 9, it has a 25 second cooldown and don't require energy.
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Corruptor is boring, EVEN with Corruptor piss. Finally they can utilize the tentacles they have for something. It loses + Massive, since having Abduct is in itself a counter to massive units. There will be amazing moments where you've killed all air units, have nothing but Corruptors yet and hilariousness ensues. You start Abducting stuff like crazy and that is weird enough to be cool. Hey, you can even Abduct Ultralisks now.
* Fungal Growth duration increased to 5 from 4, full damage remains 30.
* Infested Terran Egg armor increased to 4 from 2.
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This makes Fungal Growth a little more Fungal Growth and a little less Psionic Storm. Infested Terran's are now stronger if your aim is to block certain units such as Ultralisks, they will spawn more often, it's a weak spell currently.
* Mutalisk Regeneration is now researched on the Bile Nest.
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I think this goes nice together with delayed Oracle, delayed Medivac Boost.
* New Upgrade added to the Bile Nest that increases the health regeneration of all Zerg Structures.
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Protoss have +shield upgrade for buildings, Terrans have +2 armour for buildings, Zerg should have something too.
![[image loading]](http://images.wikia.com/cnc/images/5/58/Hand_of_Nod.jpg)
