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I agree that some of the spells and the splash has been toned down a bit. And while thinking about your argument of army composition vs micro. I really though about broodwar army composition and the fact is that in scbw everyone already has army composition figured out.
If you watch practically any TvP game you will see mainly Tanks and Vultures vs Dragoons and Zealots those are the main stay units that is your basic army composition. If the Protoss tried to go Zealots and DTs he would prolly lose cause of Mines and the insane amount of damage vultures do to small units. Or if the Terran tried to go Tanks and marines late game for instance they would get raped by storm.
Your average PvT hopefully a bit more dragoons in the background
There are so many more examples of how army composition would be more important than micro.
Dragoon heavy army vs Tank Vultures, A Zealot heavy army vs Lurker Hydra, Mass hydra vs MnM or any Protoss composition of units that does not include storm vs Mass Hydra 
Also I believe that there can be alot of more interesting micro in SC 2. In fact the reason that they made macroing a bit easier was to give new players the ability to micro more. When you first start out with SCBW when a battle is happening you can either micro or macro you can't do both.
In SC 2 its a bit easier to macro and also with so many abilities microing is a lot more effective in my book. Consider these abilities Blink, Forcefield, Roach fast regeneration, Roach moving burrow, Thors Cannons, Vikings Transitions, banshee cloak, Thats not even including the "main stay" spell casters Like the templar, mothership, infester, and the raven.
As you mention so of the spells are toned down now. So doesn't that mean that each spell has to be used to its full potential? Sure in Low Platinum League can you mass Templars up for psi storm. But at a pro level everything becomes harder. Feedback and Emp even Fungal Growth can be used as counters to Templar (you can't storm what you can't get too )
I really think SC 2 will have more intense micro battles. Just imagine the crowd when a small group of marines can focus down a collosi with no casualties XD
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Comparing 4 month old SC2 to 12 year old SC1 with an expansion ftw ^^
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I'm agreed at all aside the Lurker/corsair part because sc2 still lack 2 expansions
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As much as I love being in the beta, I can't help but feel that if Blizzard had kept SC2 in closed beta, with a large influence from the Korean Pro scene, we would have a much better game.
Instead we have players whining about void rays on the forums because they cant seem to win while six pooling and doing 2 gate proxys.
The community right now is filled with players treating the game like its already released, that its their right to play, and everything is balanced. Instead of thinking of a new strategy, a new trick, a new build order, they scream IMBALANCE every time they lose to something. This doesn't progress the game, but further limits the options a player can make, as Blizzard patches and fixes what the vocal demographic wants.
Great article.
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I think this article is extremely well written, but not very productive. Sort of a high-qual rehash of what's been posted in the forums before. Perhaps an article on what can / needs to be done?
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Agreed. I'm still taking PTO from work July 27th but I always play broodwar 
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Great article and a great read! thanks for the time that you had put into this! I really enjoyed your point of view, and i agree 100%!
Everyone who plays and enjoys sc2 should take note:
If you found fault with this article, i have only a few things to say to you...
arguments of sc2 vs BW are over. BW is nigh un-attainable in a game ever again. So will bw always be better than sc2? yes... But what you all need to start realizing is that when people have dissenting opinions about sc2, they are not trying to destroy the game! They are trying to make it better, so it can hopefully live up to the name of SCBW!
Secondly- to anyone that shares the logic of 'sc2 is still in beta' you need to to take a hard look at your arguments. They are not valid for a number of reasons. There are no hidden gems or hidden tricks to be found out... sc2 is figured out from a mechanical point of view. in the article, the OP is simply pointing out the fact that if this is all sc2 has to mechanically offer, it is going to be a poor excuse for BW.
Lastly- Newcomers to SC should really learn to listen. Listen to more experienced players, listen to more well thought out opinions. I am getting sick and tired of your one liner rebuttals. I am talking to you- 'sc2 is in beta' 'apm elitist' 'everything has not been figured out yet' 'sounds like another crybaby' posters. Listen up and respect the hard work and opinion of the forum veterans. these people will know more about sc and rts than you ever will. they understand both games very intimately- and when one of them creates a wonderful piece, it's simply rude to answer with a simple one liner.
Here is a wake up call! Don't come into a gaming community involved with ONE GAME FOR THE PAST DECADE- and somehow kid yourself that you have an enlightened opinion.
/rant
edit: my sig was made for a thread like this
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I think it's absurd to say that SC2 will need another 10+ years to be figured out. When the community has reached a high meta-game in the prequel, you know what to look for in the next game. It's not like we all suddenly have amnesia and forgot every strategy from the previous game. Even though it's too early to know the direction of the meta-game, we can make an educated of how much the game engine/design will take us, it's beta afterall, we're supposed to test and see how this stuff works.
I played Melee competitively, and when Brawl came out and all the advanced techniques were removed, people were saying "oh! give it time! Melee has been out for like 7 years!" But all the experienced players can already see the glaring flaws in the game, and it turns out, the experienced players were right for the most part. Brawl just isn't as entertaining to watch and play compared to Melee (you may disagree, but sorry, most players will tell you otherwise in terms of depth). It's definitely not as obvious in SC2, but you can still see the potential depth of the game being lower than that of BW. Not saying that SC2 can't be fun because I think it's a lot of fun to play, but its longevity as a spectator e-sport is questionable.
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Good article steel full of statuo quo bias ( many bw pros want to stay things the same negleting the evidence that sc2 is in so many ways better - bit of Semmelweis reflex here - )
and rosy retrospective ones ( see older games as better as they used to be when actually they werent )
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Great article and while I respect SC vets, I also think you need to give Blizzard a chance and look at history. Yes, you guys are knowledgeable and intelligent, but Blizzard's employees are every bit as intelligent and arguably more. Name one PC game made by Blizzard that sucked.
Historically, every succeeding game (and arguably almost every expansion) made by Blizzard has outshone its predecessor. D2: LOD > D2 > D1, SC:BW > SC, WC3: TFT > WC3, etc. Everyone has their opinions, but you cannot deny history.
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lots of good points in the OP and the thread but for me, it boils down to slows and stuns. BW had one slow, ensnare, and two stuns (lockdown and maelstrom, I guess you can say 3 if you count stasis). SC2 has way more. Ultimately, I think that's the difference.
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On July 12 2010 11:51 prochobo wrote:
Great article and while I respect SC vets, I also think you need to give Blizzard a chance and look at history. Yes, you guys are knowledgeable and intelligent, but Blizzard's employees are every bit as intelligent and arguably more. Name one PC game made by Blizzard that sucked.
Historically, every succeeding game (and arguably almost every expansion) made by Blizzard has outshone its predecessor. D2: LOD > D2 > D1, SC:BW > SC, WC3: TFT > WC3, etc. Everyone has their opinions, but you cannot deny history.
I just want to remind anyone who was there of the shitstorm that centered on the War3 beta and launch. My recollection of it, while somewhat vague all these years later, is that many competitive players in the beta raised numerous objections to design decisions in the game, and Blizzard/the supporters argued that they simply couldn't know how things would work out after only a few months. My recollection is that the vast majority of the decisions that were complained about were huge issues to good competitive play, and were changed in time, eventually spawning the nearly complete overhaul of the game that was The Frozen Throne. My recollection is also that the competitive scene was stagnant between vanilla coming out and the xpac released, and even now my feeling (which may be off) is that War3 has always been overshadowed by DoTA and BW, and has failed to really live up to the competitive potential people had hoped for it.
In short, many people claimed that during War3's beta, it was simply too soon to predict how things would go, or to think expert players already understood the game. But I find it very telling that DoTA is the game which has spawned so many copycats and so many competitive leagues, not War3.
Which is to say, I think it's very fair to say that SC:BW > War3, which came after it; and granted, they aren't exactly the same style of game, but in terms of hardcore depth and raw game charisma, (tho not in terms of UI or encounter sophistication) Vanilla WoW > BC > Wrath.
I dunno, I may be off base on these comparisons. Maybe I'm out of touch, and people really think War3 was a huge competitive success, and Wrath is a giant leap forward over Vanilla WoW. There are certainly a lot of innovations in all those examples that have improved convenience and accessibility, and been embraced by other games. /shrug?
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I agree with the above poster, but with BW. A lot of people don't take regards to the fact that BW took 10 years to balance, and it was an expansion. SC w/o BW was not very popular in Korea, and wasn't very competitive until BW came out. I believe we can't truly judge this game until both expansions are here, and Blizz have been balancing it for at least a couple years AFTER the final expansion. Although the OP fits perfectly to the beta right now, we all know the game will be totally different in a few years.
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On July 12 2010 07:11 Crippen wrote:
There are a lot of people who just don't like not being far and away the best anymore, and feel like because they were B+ players on SCBW they should automatically be the best at SC2. Now, intelligence and a general understanding of how the game works is much more important and will get you further than hours and hours of practice to perfect timings and 300 APM, which is the way it should be. Unfortunately, hours and hours of practice is all that some players had to fall back on.
I've fallen into a bit of a tangent, but some people were only good at SCBW because they thought "this is the exact second when I need to build Mutalisks, because that's what my build order dictates." In Starcraft 2, on-the-fly build orders and "Well, he seems to be doing X, I'll try Y" seem much more valid. Maybe everyone will stop complaining when the Koreans start playing the game and giving them all the answers again.
this isn't even a tangent; this is literally out of no where. how does ragging on old bw players have anything to do with game dynamics? there are many intricacies in bw that you can only understand when you've reached a certain level and i don't think many people who flat out disagree with the article have reached that point.
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anyone saying that sc2 needs 10 years to be a decent game and that sc2 is totally unrelated to bw is well, not thinking their arguments through. sc2 is not a completely different game, it's closer to being a second expansion for starcraft than it is to being an entirely different game. There isn't 4 months of experience to build on, there is 12 years. Can you name any other thing where they throw away all their previous experience when they design and evaluate the next model? Do university students have to discover every theory and personally research every idea themselves? no, they learn from the experience and research done by others in the past. Is every new car designed from scratch with no regard to previous designs? Are houses built with trial and error or do architects and builders draw on past experience?
Obviously in all these cases previous experience is not disregarded... I see no reason why starcraft 2 should be unique in this regard.
edit : I would like to know if anyone actually has examples of glaring issues in betas that "just worked themselves out" over time... I've seen arguments to the contrary, but noting supporting this idea.
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The most well writ argument for what is truly missing from SC2. Thanks for such a well thought out composition, and I sincerely hope the folks at Blizzard take the time to read this.
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The best part of Starcraft II is that we are guaranteed two expansions. This game is going to be a flawless work of art when it is finally done.
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You have many valid points that blizzard would do well to take note of. However, I think its a bit early to dismiss sc2 as an inferior game. It's not even out yet, you shouldn't be comparing it to a game thats been out for 10+ years and has been exhaustively analyzed, and with an expansion pack. Sc2 is still in it's infancy (or rather, it's the equivalent of a fetus at the moment), it seems a bit short sighted to be calling it inferior before it's even had a chance to grow.
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Very good OP and I quite agree with it.
And to all those saying "it's a beta, and bw took 10+ years to balance", you are suggesting we sit around and wait until it's the same fro sc2? "Cause we have nothing to worry, everything will turn fine"
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very interesting read, it shouldn't be read by TL users, but by Blizzard
btw i think it would be not bad if bw gets look of SC2 with some extra units & skills.
I am really considering that would be one of solutions to balance the game.
Why so many changes when something works well?
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EPT![[image loading]](http://img641.imageshack.us/i/34433489.jpg)
