A week ago to-day, Blizzard Entertainment allowed several fansites a look into the latest multiplayer build of StarCraft II. Your correspondents arrived armed with the forces of Science and Technology, with Twitter-equipped and photo-capable smartphones. Blizzard followed their three public Battle Reports with three on-site Battle Reports, as we watched the games in their outsized theatre. Subsequently, Karune and company hustled us into a Star2 gaming room. It was then that a Blizzard PR man ran in to insist that we cease reporting and retract our previous statements – the fatal NDA.
The ban is now lifted.
This initial newspost will cover your correspondents' thoughts on the races and game-infrastructure developments while addressing any questions you may have.
Karune tells us that Kerrigan’s broods constitute the weakest StarCraft II faction in in-house testing, and I believe him. Early-game terrors such as the Baneling do not transition well into mid-game; what Browder calls “board control” is lost due to the lurker’s move to T3. Four main points to note:
Overlords: Detection is still not automatically available. Thus, phoenix-DT is, for all intents and purposes, more powerful than the BroodWar equivalent. The fact that the Zerg player is required to not only invest precious gas into making his overlords see, but also protect these investments against airborne threat, makes for tough situations early in the matchup. Against one of the Blizzard devs, I razed two hatcheries, a dozen drones, a queen, and some other units with my initial two dark templar simply due to detection difficulties.
That being said, creep-drop is underused (nobody at the conference bothered to explore its potential). One duly notes the power of creep: zerg movement speed increase on the biomatter is evident and significant. A player such as by.hero or n.Die_Jaedong who has the 400+ apm available would be able to turn half the map purple – this may fix the race’s current control ailments.
Banelings: Upgraded to eighty damage. Able to explode while underground. Available in significant numbers relatively early. This is still one of the better units in the Zerg arsenal. A curiosity to note: Banelings lifted via the Phoenix’s graviton beam can now explode in the air. Your correspondent does not predict this happening in a pro-circuit game ever, but it’s an amusing oddity nevertheless.
Hydralisks: Move like crack once upgraded, and, at tier 1.5, they are in the correct placement. Zerg with no credible anti-air unit until T2 is just bizarre compared to the other two races. Hydralisks against mutalisks may actually be possible now, as the ground unit is mobile enough to defend and the air unit is not as mobile as it once was.
Mutalisks: The staple unit of Zerg masters from YellOw to Jaedong is, in the words of Browder, being “recreated” as faithfully as possible. After much pressure from the competitive scene, mutalisks have changed from clunky and useless to moderately good. Now they’re about as strong as pre-Shark muta. They perform a passable moving shot and even got a one-point damage increase. However, the lack of perfect stacking limits their viability, especially with the advent of 55-hp marines. Browder told me he would re-examine the mutalisks to see if they can stack more properly.
The race as a whole is considered the strongest in-house. Late game, a bionic army with appropriate support cannot be stopped. The Zerg, with the same toys they had before minus unlimited energy and with no scourge, keel over and die. Protoss puts up better resistance with high templar and colossi, but the new ghost EMP eliminate the caster threat and anti-air annihilates the war machines.
Lack of medics does not obviate early game mobility as the 125-hp marauder and his slowing grenades + the increased HP of the marines themselves allow for early aggression. Furthermore, as demonstrated by David Kim, addon compatibility between the Factory, Barracks, and Starport mean that your Starport can be cranking out Medivacs two at a time as soon as it goes up. Some notes:
Medivac: It heals faster than a medic. Terran units have, on the whole, more health. This leads to some dps problems as Zerg’s masses struggle to overcome Terrans holding chokepoints. Also, with no scourge, drops cannot be killed efficiently in transit; there’s no way Zerg can have corruptors and mutalisks patrolling to shoot them down. On paper, you might submit the Queen as a counter, but she too struggles to kill fast enough.
Bunker/Depot: 100% salvage. Early game harassment what.
Mass mobility: Terran does not have an equivalent to mass overlord/nydus worm/warp-in/phase prism shenanigans. This might be an issue but they said it wasn't in-house. We'll see once the beta hits.
Banshee: Imagine the wraith. Now, reverse its anti-air and anti-ground damage. Balance problems much? Karune agrees that countering air harass may be a problem, but if there are issues in the beta, they'll be duly addressed.
Many of the eSports team members publicly admit their Reach-fanship. This is clearly evident – Zealots are stronger, storm is better, and all in all Protoss is awesome.
Nullifier: Forcefield is quite good. It costs 50 energy only, and lasts for a respectable time. The unit itself costs 100 gas though, and gas is harder to get than it was in SC1. So it’s not particularly game-breaking. It might help to get one earlier on to block runbys though.
Dark Pylon: It’s now called the Obelisk, and is not a pylon (does not power, does not supply). It also does not cloak. Right now it powers up your workers (macro mechanic) and acts as a shield battery. I find this macro mechanic far better than the old broken-gas gimmick. Also, the choice between Obelisk or Pylon is a critical one that the devs themselves are unsure about – some swear by Obelisk-first whereas others cannot bear being supply stuck. It’s a good building, and I enjoy its inclusion.
Immortal: Due to balance reasons, this unit may be moved to the Robotics facility. This puts it higher up on the tech tree, but I really don’t see why this is necessary. It’s not a particularly critical unit due to the Siege Tank’s lessened importance anyway.
High Templar: Psionic storm is back, bigger and better than ever. It deals 120 damage (yes, more) over 4 intervals (yes, less) over a larger area (yes, larger) and has a sick animation best described as SC1 storm meets WC3 flamestrike. Most of my games revolved around massing enough high temps to storm everything to kingdom come. With smartcasting, now everyone can be like Reach! A great, fun, cathartic, but not imbalanced unit.
Warp Gates: They produce units faster on top of performing their instant-warp duties. Impressive indeed. Many of the Blizzard devs watching me play other devs criticized my late transition to warpgates, being unused to it. They're researched from the cybercore for 50/50, so I understand their strategic reasoning. I would like to note that I simply opted for an in-base horror proxy and did win with it.
Mothership: It moves very, very slowly. I fail to see its usefulness in most games, as the only way to get it to the battlefield is to make a proxy pylon and warp to it. Browder is OK with it being a marginalized unit though - he notes that SC1 had its own share of "fuck you" units in the scout and queen.
SC2
Replays: These show resource count, unit count, building count, infrastructure investments - all the statistics you could ever need. They also show FPview and can rewind. Yes, replays now rewind.
B.net 2.0: They couldn't talk about this. Nor could they talk about single-player. However, LAN is right out due to Bnet 2.0 features that they could not discuss.
Game mechanics: MBS is in. Unlimited unit selection is in. No surprises there, but they did confirm it for sure. They're also not coding in a way to disable the windows key, as it would disqualify them from the Games for Windows tag. Ally color changes are in, and they're working on implementing F2-F4.
Summary statistics: These now provide build-order information as well as some other relevant information. Think bwchart ported in-game.
ESPORTS: Blizzard's partnership with GOM is a move into e-Sports (a term tossed around at least twenty times during interview sessions; also half the employees I met were in "e-Sports"), which will... receive further coverage once they discuss B.net 2.0. I am proud to note that the e-Sports staff are proper men who are fans of Reach.
Other: As for those who are displeased with Blizzard's handling of the beta and public relations, I assure you that Karune's explanations in our interview were perfectly sufficient. The game is in a playable state, but the server infrastructure required to handle 30-40k users is not in place. Thus it is now a purely logistical issue, and he estimates beta within a relatively short timeframe.
I suggested July 17, citing Science. Karune waffled on a response. This is a clear affirmation of the Kennigit Intelligence Department's findings.
Other happenings
Congratulations to SC2GG for defeating us in sub-5 minute dual rush games on wide ramps. This illustrates the need to use intelligent building construction in the new SC, as zealot/probe won't cut it anymore. I'm sure they'll cover their win in detail, though it can basically be summarized as 2gate+9pool x2.
Also, congratulations to SC2GG for crashing a Blizzard arcade machine with a single button press.
I did indeed drop a fairly entertaining solo match against Karune. My other games against devs, despite being all wins, were not nearly as interesting. If there's interest I'll provide a battle report as best as I can remember.
As always, feel free to ask questions and now that NDA is lifted I'll do all I can to answer them. Apologies for the roughness of this post as I have been entertaining family visitors from Taiwan/working/otherwise busy.
Might want to mention about the lan thing, something that I am not sure other reports have covered is the way they phrased it. LAN is out because of some of the bnet features they can't discuss yet. Maybe it's just me but I'm holding out hope they aren't this stupid and have some kind of alternative.
EDIT: To clarify my above comment, the move to have SC2 multiplayer be played entirely on BNet was based on some of the planned technology to be incorporated into BNet, which they (Blizzard) can't release yet.
LR must have been pretty angry to not have won a SINGLE game against the SC2GG guys.
If you guys listen in to the podcast tomorrow, I'll explain the games in detail. But LR. You never blocked your ramp. In fact, I think the first set of matches we played both had small ramps. The 2nd set had one with the large ramps. But in ALL those games. You and SOG did the same builds. 1 base tech and SOG walled off to tech. You guys need to learn how to 2v2 like SC1. It played basically the same.
Also, I will admit. I broke the arcade game. Although, I really had no idea what it did at first until I pushed the button. tt.
LOL had to go and be sore losers, eh. One of the games may have been sub 5 minutes, but maybe not, and the other certainly wasn't sub 5 minutes. We won through aggression and teamwork, which last time I checked is a requirement in 2v2 in SC1 as well. Me and Psyonic took 1st and Diggity teamed up with Teargas (the only team to take game from us all day) from gamereplays to take 2nd.
On June 29 2009 16:35 blabber wrote: ya about the LAN thing, they could possibly do it like how Steam would do it, you'd have to connect to their server first then after that you can LAN
Duh, i think this one kind of obvious, and people seem to be panicking.
It's rather evident that blizz is planning big for bnet 2
On June 29 2009 16:37 MasterOfChaos wrote: Taking LAN out is so stupid -_- LANs are the best promotions ever and once they want to play on bnet they need their own key.
Well that's the idea. They want everyone to buy all 3 copies of Starcraft 2, and they want Korean Starleagues to be run through Battle.net2 so they have full control over it and will probably charge us money to watch or something.
Yep. Diggity and TearGas from GameReplays.org were the only ones to take games from us. 2-1 the first time we played and 2-1 in the finals. 2 games total. Also, the 2v2's started out as Bo3 double elim but some of the other sites were so god damn FUCKING terrible at the game. I am serious. One guy build 5 spawning pools and asked why he wasn't getting zerglings yet. Karune near the end of the tournament switched it to Bo1 because it was taking so long. Finals were Bo3 though.
Edit: I also like how the 2v2 tournament only gets 3 sentences while last year you guys devoted almost a whole page to it. Looooooooool.
On June 29 2009 16:37 MasterOfChaos wrote: Taking LAN out is so stupid -_- LANs are the best promotions ever and once they want to play on bnet they need their own key.
uggg... ill still play... but with bitterness... or well... after the whole OMG SC2!!!!! feeling for the first few years ^__^
On June 29 2009 16:37 MasterOfChaos wrote: Taking LAN out is so stupid -_- LANs are the best promotions ever and once they want to play on bnet they need their own key.
Fuck it. No LAN. Protoss tech tree is fucking linear... Stupid MotherShit. No new map features besides those we already seen. Stupid WC3 one-armying. THOR. Hunter Seeker Bullshit. Infested Terrans.
On June 29 2009 16:49 Psyonic_Reaver wrote: Yep. Diggity and TearGas from GameReplays.org were the only ones to take games from us. 2-1 the first time we played and 2-1 in the finals. 2 games total. Also, the 2v2's started out as Bo3 double elim but some of the other sites were so god damn FUCKING terrible at the game. I am serious. One guy build 5 spawning pools and asked why he wasn't getting zerglings yet. Karune near the end of the tournament switched it to Bo1 because it was taking so long. Finals were Bo3 though.
It's pathetic that Blizzard considered them a legitimate representative worthy of their press event. Who the fuck wouldn't at least try an hour of Starcraft beforehand if their job was to cover the sequel?
No LAN is very disconcerting but I'll withhold judgment until all the details on B.Net 2.0 are out. I have to say that from what I've seen from the gameplay video the unit/building models all look amazing and ready to go, but the gameplay seemed hectic to watch from an observer standpoint. How easy was it to get a grip of where you stood mid-battle with spine crawlers shooting across the screen, banelings blowing up, and psi storms looking absolutely badass?
They're also not coding in a way to disable the windows key, as it would disqualify them from the Games for Windows tag.
Since when did Blizzard care about games for Windows?
Please don't tell me this has something to do with Live.
Honestly, they could slap a big ass blue Blizzard banner on their box, and it would be better brand recognition and sell better than the Games for Windows banner.
There was an interesting bit about the beta in there, that all they're doing now is setting up the infrastructure for it. That's more news than we've heard before.
I think what you fail to understand is that I admit your teamwork etcaetera were superior and you won fairly; I am simply drawing attention to the undeniable fact that ramps are now wider than they once were, and that building blocks are perfect.
On June 29 2009 16:54 Last Romantic wrote: I think what you fail to understand is that I admit your teamwork etcaetera were superior and you won fairly; I am simply drawing attention to the undeniable fact that ramps are now wider than they once were, and that building blocks are perfect.
I thought there was a unit that a staff member wanted to rave out...? No LAN makes me very sad D: hopefully if it isn't initially, they'll patch in later, like they did with the LAN UDP for BW
On June 29 2009 16:45 Nevuk wrote: Out of curiosity, what does smart cast mean? Like, how is it any different from sc1 psi storms casting?
Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that smart casting is similar to MBS, when you have 3 high templar selected and cast storm only one will cast it, if you cast storm again the second will cast it, and if you cast storm a third time the third will cast it.
On June 29 2009 16:45 Nevuk wrote: Out of curiosity, what does smart cast mean? Like, how is it any different from sc1 psi storms casting?
Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that smart casting is similar to MBS, when you have 3 high templar selected and cast storm only one will cast it, if you cast storm again the second will cast it, and if you cast storm a third time the third will cast it.
Which is easier to micro and makes a stronger Psionic storm seem ridiculous.
LR is still my handsome hero though despite his KTF fanboyism <3
I still don't understand why they'd take out LAN though T_T I'm not a PC genius so correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't it suck when the game lags and you're playing the person sitting next to you on a pc-bang? T_T
Oh right Hellions... they work, they're practical - honestly it's a firebat weapon on a vulture body - but I honestly feel they're not an adequate replacement for the original vulture.
Thanks for the report guys,really appreciate it.Thou its a fuken disappointment Edit:I mean obviously I wanted beta announcement.Hell it was about time already!!!
On June 29 2009 17:04 Last Romantic wrote: Oh right Hellions... they work, they're practical - honestly it's a firebat weapon on a vulture body - but I honestly feel they're not an adequate replacement for the original vulture.
Indeed the entertainment of the vulture will be missed, but it's not certain that such a cheap (and powerful) unit would belong. They would probably be pretty f'in incredible at penetrating bases with the new pathing and just mining up everywhere.
On June 29 2009 16:54 omfghi2u2 wrote: Are units distinguishable? I remember watching videos and noticing how when zerglings move, it looks like utter shit and you cant tell shit apart.
Also, how were the ultras?
Oh right; about this: In screenshots and in youtube-quality, the game looks either confusing or messy.
Up close and personal, however, it's very good. Things die quickly if a bit violently, battles are fast but still viewer-friendly, and all that.
One worries that it might be like WC3, but the death animations are better and the battle speed is faster. Also, the lack of mass spell buff icons makes a world of difference, as does the comparatively reduced # of spells available to each race.
Also, was this really worth NDAing for a week? Either there's 'something more' or... I don't know, blizzard was expecting everyone to be able to do a more in-depth writeup.
In all honesty, I'm not sure what was worth NDA-ing for a week. There was no set announcement date, no gamebreaking balance changes, etc.
Blizzard's a mystery, even to Blizzard employees. Props to Karune for defending TL's twittering; he, unlike PR-man, understands the instant speed of web 2.0.
No LAN has to be very scary for the Korean starleagues. What are they going to do if b.net goes down (bugs, hacked, DDoS, etc.) during an event? What's going to happen if Blizzard releases a patch that completely screws up the game, and they can't fix it for a few days?
On June 29 2009 16:45 Nevuk wrote: Out of curiosity, what does smart cast mean? Like, how is it any different from sc1 psi storms casting?
Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that smart casting is similar to MBS, when you have 3 high templar selected and cast storm only one will cast it, if you cast storm again the second will cast it, and if you cast storm a third time the third will cast it.
Which is easier to micro and makes a stronger Psionic storm seem ridiculous.
the thing is, theyve made psi storm soo much weaker than SC's (with proper balance bc right now players can mass temps and have amazing casts with smartcast and kill everything in sight).
I thought a while back Blizzard said it would be impossible to rewind replays unless they did a complete overhaul on the engine and coding. Gom/Esports must've pushed them really fucking hard on this one. But that leads me to wonder about the LAN thing. Esports would never let LAN disappear, there must be some crazy LAN 2.0 thing now.
On June 29 2009 16:45 Nevuk wrote: Out of curiosity, what does smart cast mean? Like, how is it any different from sc1 psi storms casting?
Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that smart casting is similar to MBS, when you have 3 high templar selected and cast storm only one will cast it, if you cast storm again the second will cast it, and if you cast storm a third time the third will cast it.
Which is easier to micro and makes a stronger Psionic storm seem ridiculous.
the thing is, theyve made psi storm soo much weaker than SC's.
Did you read the article? Storm does more damage in less time over a larger area.
On June 29 2009 17:18 CharlieMurphy wrote: What the fuck?
I thought a while back Blizzard said it would be impossible to rewind replays unless they did a complete overhaul on the engine and coding. Gom/Esports must've pushed them really fucking hard on this one. But that leads me to wonder about the LAN thing. Esports would never let LAN disappear, there must be some crazy LAN 2.0 thing now.
btw, nice write up LastRomantic
Remember that it's not really rewind... it's like a "checkpoint" system.
Ahah rotfl, no LAN. That's ridicolous - no more lan partys at home ppl! XD
Anyways, it's still confirmed that Zergs are the weakest race now in SC2 - they don't do enough dps, don't have an air-air counter (scourge) despite of mutas who, well, don't do enough damage to stop something in time. Zergs are going to see hard time with that protoss teletransport air thingy.
That's pretty bad - no groundbreaking nda announcement But still eagering for the game to come
On June 29 2009 17:04 Last Romantic wrote: Oh right Hellions... they work, they're practical - honestly it's a firebat weapon on a vulture body - but I honestly feel they're not an adequate replacement for the original vulture.
SC2 is visually way too busy, in every video I've seen. I realize I'm judging from video, but just compare to SC1 video and the huge difference in screen readability is apparent.
Here's the direct quote from the interview they're sourcing:
We got quite different answers about local area networking (LAN), where both Dustin or Sigaty said they were still discussing it, however, Pardo knew immediately: "we don't have any plans to support LAN," he said and clarified "we will not support it." The only multiplayer available will be on Battle.net.
Sounds to me like the people calling to bring back scourges are not without merit. Also I would still really like to see the Mothership being dropped to the single player campaign and replaced with the Arbiter. A "Dark Arbiter" as proposed by someone in another thread would be the best idea imo as you could add/rework/enhance/change its abilities appropriately.
I like a lot of the things Im seeing in the tech trees and though theres surely going to be a ton of balancing issues the game looks fun as hell to play already.
hate to say i told you so about LAN..but i told you so about the LAN. LR were you guys not allowed to take in-game screenshots/photos? were they at ? gotta say the game is looking "fun" but also seriously flawed.
-starport is prereq for DTs, templar, and Robo support bay? the core used to be the key to any and all tech in BW. that led to so many cool styles and BOs. Now, Toss users have to core, and starport to get HTs? makes no sense. -banelings are the demolition dwarfs from wc3. im not interested in mass suicide ground units. skurgee were amazing because you only made a few of them and really have to micro well to make them effective. massing a bunch of green demolition dwarfs to blow up shit while burrowed.. that is not zerg style. -mutalisks sound like mere caricatures of their former selves and no scouge? an anti-air unit that turns enemy air units into "airborne turrets"? come one man, wtf. sounds like they are making all units with the idea that in battle these units will always be massed and a-moved into each other. -mothership is so fail. why do we need useless units in sc2 browder? -Terran seems so imba and Zerg so weak. -still no inclusion of f2-f4 keys? -its really easy to sit here without having played the game with its sleek new graphics and complain.. but honestly. i can't help but think that except for the starcraft intellectual property involved this game is looking for like warcraft meets C&C
don't know why everyone's going so crazy about the no-lan thing.
when you host a battle.net custom game and someone from your lan joins, you both still have lan ping. where's the problem? afraid that you're going to a lan that doesn't have an inet connection so you can log in? EVERY big lan i went to in the last year had broad ban internet connection for everyone (but im in germany so no idea how it is 4 u). big deal.
the only thing that troubles me there is the fact that i won't be able to download a cracked starcraft 2 beta client and play it with my buddy if i don't get a key for the beta, i won't be able to play it until it comes out the end of the year. now THAT is a big deal.
Thanks for the new info. Was hoping for some bigger news (*cough*Beta*cough*), but I am content with what we got given the circumstances. The current version is looking really nice IMO, can't wait to play it!
On June 29 2009 18:14 heishe wrote: don't know why everyone's going so crazy about the no-lan thing.
when you host a battle.net custom game and someone from your lan joins, you both still have lan ping. where's the problem? afraid that you're going to a lan that doesn't have an inet connection so you can log in? EVERY big lan i went to in the last year had broad ban internet connection for everyone (but im in germany so no idea how it is 4 u). big deal.
the only thing that troubles me there is the fact that i won't be able to download a cracked starcraft 2 beta client and play it with my buddy if i don't get a key for the beta, i won't be able to play it until it comes out the end of the year. now THAT is a big deal.
No. E.g. when you're using the same router, the lag's just unplayable. I and my brother usually can't even join the same game. T______T
Not to mention the fact that LAN parties would now have to share a single bandwidth. Or the fact that StarLeague and such would have to connect to BNet 2.0, which causes dozens of previously mentioned problems...
Nice to see the Hydralisk back on hatchery tech. Zerg still looking pretty weak though in comparison to the other races. Terran looking stronger. Protoss looking awesome
One thing I didn't understand was in the Protoss tech tree. Is it necessary to get a Fleet Beacon in order to get Templar/Colossus tech? Also, are Stalkers as good of an anti-air unit as the Dragoon was in SC1?
On June 29 2009 18:14 heishe wrote: don't know why everyone's going so crazy about the no-lan thing.
when you host a battle.net custom game and someone from your lan joins, you both still have lan ping. where's the problem? afraid that you're going to a lan that doesn't have an inet connection so you can log in? EVERY big lan i went to in the last year had broad ban internet connection for everyone (but im in germany so no idea how it is 4 u). big deal.
the only thing that troubles me there is the fact that i won't be able to download a cracked starcraft 2 beta client and play it with my buddy if i don't get a key for the beta, i won't be able to play it until it comes out the end of the year. now THAT is a big deal.
No. E.g. when you're using the same router, the lag's just unplayable. I and my brother usually can't even join the same game. T______T
Not to mention the fact that LAN parties would now have to share a single bandwidth. Or the fact that StarLeague and such would have to connect to BNet 2.0, which causes dozens of previously mentioned problems...
Jaedong + lag = 800apm :O
On a more serious note, I've never tried playing against people on B.net using the same router... I hope this doesn't turn into such a huge problem in SC2
this is the first Blizzard title without LAN support. This is significant and sets a precedent for all games to come. No more LAN parties, no more freedom playing their games. You are not freely buying software anymore. You are paying to become part of their grid.
THIS was NDA'd? Massively disappointed, but oh well, you take what you can get. Lack of lan is scaring the shit out of me, but if it's a simple as steam (i.e: connect to bnet, THEN you can play lan) it won't be a problem. But them saying it's just not there doesn't inspire confidence.
Replays with rewind and fpview is AWESOME, love it. Hopefully blizzard can get it right in regards to esports and viewing pro-games, very excited for the future of this game. I'm sure all (or most) major kinks can be worked out during beta, so I'm not really getting hung up on balance atm, though blizzard seems really against reintroducing some units that could easily solve the problems they're facing (scourge), which is worrying.
And O_O that arcade machine looks awesome, wonder what game(s) it has on it... And do I spy a rock band drum kit? Looks like blizzard knows how to have fun XD. And wtf, LR chokes yet again, massive fail. You disappoint TL...
The room you guys were playing in looks like a team house, blizzard to sponsor their own progaming team? It's more likely than you think!
Please do recount your battle(s) with karune, the more information the better :D
Replays: These show resource count, unit count, building count, infrastructure investments - all the statistics you could ever need. They also show FPview and can rewind. Yes, replays now rewind.
On June 29 2009 16:45 Nevuk wrote: Out of curiosity, what does smart cast mean? Like, how is it any different from sc1 psi storms casting?
Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that smart casting is similar to MBS, when you have 3 high templar selected and cast storm only one will cast it, if you cast storm again the second will cast it, and if you cast storm a third time the third will cast it.
Which is easier to micro and makes a stronger Psionic storm seem ridiculous.
the thing is, theyve made psi storm soo much weaker than SC's.
Did you read the article? Storm does more damage in less time over a larger area.
On June 29 2009 18:14 heishe wrote: don't know why everyone's going so crazy about the no-lan thing.
when you host a battle.net custom game and someone from your lan joins, you both still have lan ping. where's the problem? afraid that you're going to a lan that doesn't have an inet connection so you can log in? EVERY big lan i went to in the last year had broad ban internet connection for everyone (but im in germany so no idea how it is 4 u). big deal.
the only thing that troubles me there is the fact that i won't be able to download a cracked starcraft 2 beta client and play it with my buddy if i don't get a key for the beta, i won't be able to play it until it comes out the end of the year. now THAT is a big deal.
No. E.g. when you're using the same router, the lag's just unplayable. I and my brother usually can't even join the same game. T______T
Not to mention the fact that LAN parties would now have to share a single bandwidth. Or the fact that StarLeague and such would have to connect to BNet 2.0, which causes dozens of previously mentioned problems...
Imagine the OSL finals game 5 and one of the players drops?
Replays: These show resource count, unit count, building count, infrastructure investments - all the statistics you could ever need. They also show FPview and can rewind. Yes, replays now rewind.
FPview sounds too good.
Is it real FP view, though, or just slightly improved gimmick they had in WC3 (no mouse movement, no selection shown, etc.)?
On June 29 2009 18:14 heishe wrote: don't know why everyone's going so crazy about the no-lan thing.
when you host a battle.net custom game and someone from your lan joins, you both still have lan ping. where's the problem? afraid that you're going to a lan that doesn't have an inet connection so you can log in? EVERY big lan i went to in the last year had broad ban internet connection for everyone (but im in germany so no idea how it is 4 u). big deal.
the only thing that troubles me there is the fact that i won't be able to download a cracked starcraft 2 beta client and play it with my buddy if i don't get a key for the beta, i won't be able to play it until it comes out the end of the year. now THAT is a big deal.
No. E.g. when you're using the same router, the lag's just unplayable. I and my brother usually can't even join the same game. T______T
Not to mention the fact that LAN parties would now have to share a single bandwidth. Or the fact that StarLeague and such would have to connect to BNet 2.0, which causes dozens of previously mentioned problems...
Imagine the OSL finals game 5 and one of the players drops?
This gives even more room for Bisu to "innovate." T___T
On June 29 2009 17:35 Last Romantic wrote: Zatic says early game Z is strong; I believe him. Didn't test it enough to confirm myself, but his reasoning is sound.
Karune agrees too, but I'm not sure Blizzard is aware exactly HOW strong. More details from Zatic if you bug him.
I don't think it a good style of balancing if you make each of the races strong in certain timeframes. If Zerg only is strong earlygame, obviously all zergs will play according to that. So no zerg will ever get into lategame, but rush as hard as possible.
Mothership: It moves very, very slowly. I fail to see its usefulness in most games, as the only way to get it to the battlefield is to make a proxy pylon and warp to it. Browder is OK with it being a marginalized unit though - he notes that SC1 had its own share of "fuck you" units in the scout and queen.
I doubt this attitude will allow Blizzard to create a game as great as SCBW. You are essentially overloading the game with crap. Additionally to the units that will be useless in certain circumstances. And there will be such units.
If I have an infestor with mind control bug and I mind control a raven with everything researched, can I plant down those sentry things? Will they still be under my control after the mind control deminishes? How long do the sentries last? On a timer like broodlings or until they die?
Mothership: It moves very, very slowly. I fail to see its usefulness in most games, as the only way to get it to the battlefield is to make a proxy pylon and warp to it. Browder is OK with it being a marginalized unit though - he notes that SC1 had its own share of "fuck you" units in the scout and queen.
What's the point in making ' "fuck you" units '. If i want to humilate my opponent i build 8 hatches in his nat or sg...
Not to jump on the bandwagon, but the thing with no LAN support. Have you guys never been to those small funny LANs where you get like 10-20 guys together and just play the entire weekend. the net is down half the time, you practially inject caffein into your body and so on. You can't take out LAN from multiplayer games since you rely too much on a stable broadband connection (we've even had lans where we didn't have a connection at all, I loved it)
Also, did they mention what parts they were/weren't prepaired to change based on the beta-feedback?
I'm confident enough in Blizzard's networking abilities that Battle.Net 2.0 will have enough neat little capabilities and be optimized enough that I'll forget that there's no LAN.
But there are some things that feels insecure.. like unlimited unit section doesn't feel Starcraftish at all. If they want us to focus on micro why not make 12 unit limit so we would actually have to make 1a2a3a4a5a instead of 1a. Also the disable of LAN is really bad, what if "you don't have access to internet for let's say all your 6 computers because of the router and u still wanna game some sc2 with friends at home?" - anyway someone will just crack the b.net2.0 engine and make a LAN function anyway. (hackerz are ze pr0)
And as alot have mentioned... Zerg does not only look bad, they also look and sound boring compared to Terran and Protoss. Altough I like the disadvantage and will be the new Emperor of Zerg, making THEM the best race for sc2!
On June 29 2009 17:18 CharlieMurphy wrote: What the fuck?
I thought a while back Blizzard said it would be impossible to rewind replays unless they did a complete overhaul on the engine and coding. Gom/Esports must've pushed them really fucking hard on this one. But that leads me to wonder about the LAN thing. Esports would never let LAN disappear, there must be some crazy LAN 2.0 thing now.
btw, nice write up LastRomantic
Remember that it's not really rewind... it's like a "checkpoint" system.
Blizzard has been dead set on not having Zerg rely on scourge. They could pull this off if they made Corruptors better in their anti-air role.
I wasn't interested in seeing old Zerg spells coming back; because I want them to feel fresh in this sequel, but I think Zerg would gain a lot if Corruptors could Ensnare.
Zerg best DPS comes from melee range. Hampering unit speed allows zerg to sustain that melee dps for a longer period.
Ensnare also helps with detection so instead of investing gas in overseers zerg could invest gas in corruptors who would actually put up a good fight against protoss air instead of being a punching bag.
Lastly ensnare can ensure dropships don't get away at all from corruptors that are attacking them.
The other way to fix this is to make brood lords Lair tier and morphable into Corruptors at Hive tier.
If the stats I'm seeing elsewhere are true then lurkers and Broodlords are competing as siege units because both out range cannons, crawlers and bunkers. Why have two siege units available in the same tier (Hive)? Why have 3 anti-air units essentially in the same tier (Lair)?
It can work out because the way these overlapping units fight are very different but it seems like another good way of fixing zerg dps problems in the middle game. To speculate on why Zerg look weak after the early game, I think in general Zerg is very strong with Hive tech but no one can realize this potential because Lair tech is flawed to the point of crippling zerg's ability to have the economy to fund Hive tech as strongly as they should.
I'm still scared about lack of lan support, but then again maybe they have some crazy b.net thingy that makes LAN obsolete (thats at least what they make it sound like)
On June 29 2009 16:49 Psyonic_Reaver wrote: Yep. Diggity and TearGas from GameReplays.org were the only ones to take games from us. 2-1 the first time we played and 2-1 in the finals. 2 games total. Also, the 2v2's started out as Bo3 double elim but some of the other sites were so god damn FUCKING terrible at the game. I am serious. One guy build 5 spawning pools and asked why he wasn't getting zerglings yet. Karune near the end of the tournament switched it to Bo1 because it was taking so long. Finals were Bo3 though.
It's pathetic that Blizzard considered them a legitimate representative worthy of their press event. Who the fuck wouldn't at least try an hour of Starcraft beforehand if their job was to cover the sequel?
by the sound of it.. it was ALOT of people...
actually alot of people that have never touched an rts game in their life it sounds like.
On June 29 2009 17:18 CharlieMurphy wrote: What the fuck?
I thought a while back Blizzard said it would be impossible to rewind replays unless they did a complete overhaul on the engine and coding. Gom/Esports must've pushed them really fucking hard on this one. But that leads me to wonder about the LAN thing. Esports would never let LAN disappear, there must be some crazy LAN 2.0 thing now.
btw, nice write up LastRomantic
Remember that it's not really rewind... it's like a "checkpoint" system.
Man where did you get this info? LR said rewind, not checkpoint. You are confusing ppl
On June 29 2009 21:07 mutantmagnet wrote: Blizzard has been dead set on not having Zerg rely on scourge. They could pull this off if they made Corruptors better in their anti-air role.
I wasn't interested in seeing old Zerg spells coming back; because I want them to feel fresh in this sequel, but I think Zerg would gain a lot if Corruptors could Ensnare.
Zerg best DPS comes from melee range. Hampering unit speed allows zerg to sustain that melee dps for a longer period.
Ensnare also helps with detection so instead of investing gas in overseers zerg could invest gas in corruptors who would actually put up a good fight against protoss air instead of being a punching bag.
Lastly ensnare can ensure dropships don't get away at all from corruptors that are attacking them.
The other way to fix this is to make brood lords Lair tier and morphable into Corruptors at Hive tier.
If the stats I'm seeing elsewhere are true then lurkers and Broodlords are competing as siege units because both out range cannons, crawlers and bunkers. Why have two siege units available in the same tier (Hive)? Why have 3 anti-air units essentially in the same tier (Lair)?
It can work out because the way these overlapping units fight are very different but it seems like another good way of fixing zerg dps problems in the middle game. To speculate on why Zerg look weak after the early game, I think in general Zerg is very strong with Hive tech but no one can realize this potential because Lair tech is flawed to the point of crippling zerg's ability to have the economy to fund Hive tech as strongly as they should.
LR didn't mention it in his newspost, but from asking him, the Corrupter is apparently really, really, really strong vs air units now.
On June 29 2009 17:18 CharlieMurphy wrote: What the fuck?
I thought a while back Blizzard said it would be impossible to rewind replays unless they did a complete overhaul on the engine and coding. Gom/Esports must've pushed them really fucking hard on this one. But that leads me to wonder about the LAN thing. Esports would never let LAN disappear, there must be some crazy LAN 2.0 thing now.
btw, nice write up LastRomantic
Remember that it's not really rewind... it's like a "checkpoint" system.
Man where did you get this info? LR said rewind, not checkpoint. You are confusing ppl
Also from talking to LR - it's a checkpoint system, they are just saving thousands of checkpoints during the replay so you can pretty much scroll backwards smoothly (then the checkpoints are deleted once rep is done).
also wtfs up with lurks being 3rd teir? i mean i don't think anyone is going to use them since they are that high up.
Maybe they could make ramps out of creep and the banelings could roll up them to get airborne and blow up air units
Serious note though in the g4 interview, they talk about how since the units clump so much in sc2, that the siege tank and lurker were really overpowered because they did so much damage to those clumps.
That annoys me more than anything. Why not fix the engine so every unit doesn't clump together and clip into eachother than dissuade us from using splash units as much as possible?
On June 29 2009 17:18 CharlieMurphy wrote: What the fuck?
I thought a while back Blizzard said it would be impossible to rewind replays unless they did a complete overhaul on the engine and coding. Gom/Esports must've pushed them really fucking hard on this one. But that leads me to wonder about the LAN thing. Esports would never let LAN disappear, there must be some crazy LAN 2.0 thing now.
btw, nice write up LastRomantic
Remember that it's not really rewind... it's like a "checkpoint" system.
Man where did you get this info? LR said rewind, not checkpoint. You are confusing ppl
So many people bitching about LAN being to "laggy" on SC1 when the real problem is not lag itself but the lack of NAT support, which I'm 100% sure they will include in SC2 since routers/hubs/switches and shared internet connections are much more popular now than back in 1998.
I'm... seriously upset about this. They're taking away LAN. Zergs might have bad anti-air. And I miss the defiler. Also, as stated before, what's the point of making a useless unit? Sure, queens weren't used often, but they were still neat to have around. They still could be useful. =/ Are nullifiers actually balanced? 50 energy for force field along with being, what, tier 1 and having good damage? I find it hard to believe, lol.
Well at first i must say im sad for how useless NDA was. That guy of PR was really wrong. I was really expecting Beta, it would be worthy of a NDA Anyway, great writeup. I really enjoyed the read. 1 critic: why dont you screenshot the Unit screen also? The tech tree screen is awesome though
Zerg -It seems the devs must spend more time on them. The fact they admit the swarm problems must come together with an action to correct it, at least a little bit, before Beta. -The overseer problem could be solved by a very cheap cost i think. And it must be avaliable as soon as Obs is for toss by example. -The early game appear to be very similar to SC1, except with the addition of banelings. The mid game is more like an issue, but wouldn't the infestors make it stronger? Hydra-ling is really so weak that the infestor does not help? -How about the zerg late game. Ultras-Lurkers-Broodlords were not used? Lurkers with additional range appear to be strong. -If the real problem of the Zerg is really only the dps, it could be easier to solve.
Terran -Marine/Marauder/Medivac being strong vs everything is a bad decision. Marauders appear to need a small hp debuf. -Siege tanks need a damage boost. If they put the Immortal for toss there is no need to lessen the damage of siege. It is a double debuff: less damage and a hard counter. -How about vikings? Wouldnt they be the air-air counter you said Banshee not have? -Ive noticed the tech tree doesnt mention the Addons needed, wich is not user-friendly.
Protoss -Being the race with most development time its no surprise they apper to be so solid. However the tech tree screen is not well made. Looks like you only need a Stargate to advance to last tier, wich is not true. -You said gas is harder to get than in SC1, why if we have 2 gas on base now ? Because the costs of a new assim and more 3 probes? -Obelisk-Pylon strategic choice is awesome. -The immortal on robotics facility would not make it easier to get? This way if i build a Robotics i can build observer/immortal/warp prism. The way it is now is better, as players need to choose immortals or detection/transport first. -High templar really amazed me. But the increased/quicker/wider psy damage is really not imba? -How warp gates upgrade work? You need only to pay 50/50 cost on CyCore and all your gates become Warp Gates or you need to pay something more on each gate? -Browder is reaaaaally wrong about Mothership. The Arbiter is the norm now vs Terran, very usefull. They should not build a unit to be useless. The community/progamers will determine wich unit will be useless after some years of play.
edit: the blank is on question i would like to know the answers
I foresee ZERG getting crushed regularly by dt rushes and nukes due to lack of free detection.
Mutas will be made every game against protoss because ground units will be useless in this matchup(lurkers tier 3???) due to the new blocking spell i.e. of course until they nerf it.
On June 29 2009 17:18 CharlieMurphy wrote: What the fuck?
I thought a while back Blizzard said it would be impossible to rewind replays unless they did a complete overhaul on the engine and coding. Gom/Esports must've pushed them really fucking hard on this one. But that leads me to wonder about the LAN thing. Esports would never let LAN disappear, there must be some crazy LAN 2.0 thing now.
btw, nice write up LastRomantic
Remember that it's not really rewind... it's like a "checkpoint" system.
Man where did you get this info? LR said rewind, not checkpoint. You are confusing ppl
Also from talking to LR - it's a checkpoint system, they are just saving thousands of checkpoints during the replay so you can pretty much scroll backwards smoothly (then the checkpoints are deleted once rep is done).
But there is a small loading after each checkpoint or it is instantly?
when you guys keep saying there is no "LAN" youre just saying that Bnet will have no LAN latency simulator for people who are not on a LAN... correct?
youre not saying literrealy that the game includes no LAN ability?? (meaning you can play it on a local area network.) Saying there is "no LAN"... "no lan sucks" is pretty deceptive. i can play this game on a LAN yes?
On June 29 2009 22:41 cUrsOr wrote: when you guys keep saying there is no "LAN" youre just saying that Bnet will have no LAN latency simulator for people who are not on a LAN... correct?
youre not saying literrealy that the game includes no LAN ability?? (meaning you can play it on a local area network.) Saying there is "no LAN"... "no lan sucks" is pretty deceptive. i can play this game on a LAN yes?
so literally there is no LAN. i am amazed. its stupid.
it must have something to do with proffit and being able to check that people arent playing on coppies that werent purcahased in the 200$ Trilogy format.
Yeah, they are trying to cut down on piracy by hurting everybody. I'd love to hear Blizzard explanation seeing as SC and SC:BW have sold millions of copies even with LAN support. All this is, is just another stake in the heart of SC2. Personally, if Blizzard is stupid enough to take something as critical as LAN support out; I'll be happy to see SC2 fail.
the explanation is this... why make a shit ton of money when you can make more? why sell it as 1 when you can sell it as 3? imagine how much money they will make? its the proffit motive. typically, its pretty corrupting and destroys things. lol we will see.
Not having LAN is the single dumbest idea they have ever had. There's absolutely NO reason not to have LAN games possible. It allows you to play with your friends if you're somewhere where you don't have high speed access (or no internet at all). It also eliminates the lag you'll find on B.net. Am I the only one who finds this completely ridiculous?
They can still make plenty of money if they have LAN. Just require that you need 2 different CD keys, or require that you need a CD to be in in order to play the game. There are ways they can make it work, this is just pure bullshit.
oh btw ya, i know that i personally have bought about 5 coppies of SC and BroodWar. because i go though phases in gaming and have lost the CD a number of times. also a couple times it got damaged. and im not into any sort of cloning or "sharing" because i personally dont like it. im sure many many people have similar stories. but like i said, why make money when you can make more. their hope is they can do it without ruining the game. of course.
Sorry but only realy new think could be said in one santance - you now what u can do in replays - now you can do it as obs... ok there were few new things but in my opinion nothing worth doing NDA (conspiracy - are they hiding something > )
About LAN, if they realy took it out then after a month (bha few days) it comes out there will be appropriate softwere to play game on LAN...
On June 29 2009 22:56 Stratos_speAr wrote: Not having LAN is the single dumbest idea they have ever had. There's absolutely NO reason not to have LAN games possible. It allows you to play with your friends if you're somewhere where you don't have high speed access (or no internet at all). It also eliminates the lag you'll find on B.net. Am I the only one who finds this completely ridiculous?
They can still make plenty of money if they have LAN. Just require that you need 2 different CD keys, or require that you need a CD to be in in order to play the game. There are ways they can make it work, this is just pure bullshit.
your not the only one. someone started an online petition some where...
sc2 = fail all this wait for so many problems it took them 6 years to come up with a cool 3d engine but a failed game? i think im gonna keep playing BW as its a much better game now i understand why beta isn't out yet, im so dissapointed with blizzard
linear tech trees is really a disappointement. i HATE HATE to be one of the nay sayers, but especially with the protoss. your advancd buildings had 3 branches. so scouting a Adun compared to a Robtoics or Stargate lead to other things. now, none of the buildings are dependant on any of the others? except the photon cannon. are you kidding?
Sigh. I'm looking less and less forward to the release with every "update" tbh....
But until then I hope they will put Zerg on equal status with the other races, I have a bad feeling . And about the LAN-feature not being implemented, if they don't patch it in I'm sure someone with a lot of time on his hands will make it happen, it's just too much fun to not be implemented at all.
I understand that they want to centralise network play to give them the kind of control that they have in WOW, but it feels like there will some trumped up reason why the need the features of battlenet even in LAN (achievements or some such rubbish). Clearly cracks will come out to allow non battlenet play and the sad things are that this leaves pirates with a more flexible product than purchasers.
After waiting with bated breath for this game for over a year, several issues worry me to the point that I'm no longer a certain pre-release purchase, in fact I will wait on word of mouth after release. Perhaps if there hadn't been such a long time for me to consider the negatives I'd pile in, but after all we are not the critical purchasers, they want a big boad hit of people more casually (if at all) associated with the game (imho)
I really hate to flame an unfinnished game but up untill now with every new insight into game it destroys my entusiasm to really play/wait for sc2. I mean till now all the info we got were like 80% bad for the community in general...so crushed rite now -__-
The amount of whine in this thread is amazing. Games have been known to change completely during beta, so moving a building around on the tech tree or boosting a unit's stats is going to happen A LOT of times. Knowing blizzard, they aren't afraid to even start from scratch, like the 1.10 D2 patch, that introduced synergies and made a lot more classes viable.
On June 29 2009 23:30 IceCube wrote: I really hate to flame an unfinnished game but up untill now with every new insight into game it destroys my entusiasm to really play/wait for sc2. I mean till now all the info we got were like 80% bad for the community in general...so crushed rite now -__-
Dont worry with that. 90% of the critics are unjustified.
After destroying the Nexus of the expansion, Cooper pressed forward with Immortals and Dark Templar in addition to his Zealots and Stalkers. Kim sent forth a Colossus in defense, but Cooper's forces stormed up the ramp into his base and overwhelmed the Colossus. Kim declared "GG" and the first match was over.
haha no lan, plus no f1 or windows key disabling due to Games for Windows? Why the fuck do they care about Games for Windows if it makes their games shittier?
Games for Windows is important for marketing. If you see a shelf full of games for windows games, won't you be kind of suspicious about the one that doesn't have that branding?
Why does everyone care so much about LAN play? Do people really play over LANs that frequently?
On June 30 2009 00:03 Mumblee wrote: Why does everyone care so much about LAN play? Do people really play over LANs that frequently?
Yeah, but the question is, how often do people play on LAN, all with legitimate copies of the game, without internet access. Those are the only people being hurt by the lack of LAN feature.
If they have internet access, they can play on B.net and it's just as good as LAN.
If they pirate, or install one legit copy of the game on a bunch of computers, then they're irrelevant.
Why does everyone care so much about LAN play? Do people really play over LANs that frequently?
A very significant share of the potential players do. There are dozens of valid reasons. I can't understand your apathy.
People care about LAN's because LANs are nearly 100% reliable. Have you ever had your LAN connection crash? I sure haven't. But I have experienced hundreds upon hundreds of wireless internet crashes. Nothing ruins an evening like an epic game that crashes midway due to a problem in your connection.
It's also discriminatory towards poor people and people living in underdeveloped areas to not include a LAN since not everyone has access or fucking even afford a fast enough connection. Do you have ANY idea how scarce fast internet connections are in some places? This doesn't even have to be in countries with less IT infra than yours or mine. As I've read SC2 is quite the brandwidth-hogger, and thus scores of young students already tight on money wishing to engage in skirmish-play are going to be forced to spend needlessly on upgrading their internet connections or be denied the pleasure of the game. And why? Because someone purposefully decided not to code in a lan-feature.
Finally, I'd like you to consider what do you, as a paying player of the game, gain by the removal of LAN? Nothing, and indeed the vast majority of players will end up losing. The exclusion of LAN possibly adds needless lag to use your internet connection instead of a direct link between computers. It also equally superfulously restricts the places a laptop-owner can play the game as you'll have to be connected to the internet. All in all, some will lose less and some more, but not one player will benefit from this.
Really disappointed about the weakness of Zerg. This is something that I felt was also the case in the Blizzcon 2008 build.
I for one would like to see a Blizzard beta strategy where they make tons of changes very quickly, then reverse them if necessary. In the past they have been extremely reticent to undo any changes, even if something was clearly nerfed/buffed too much. I suppose this is considerably more work on their part, particularly in terms of bug testing.
On June 30 2009 01:01 Ingenol wrote: Really disappointed about the weakness of Zerg. This is something that I felt was also the case in the Blizzcon 2008 build.
I for one would like to see a Blizzard beta strategy where they make tons of changes very quickly, then reverse them if necessary. In the past they have been extremely reticent to undo any changes, even if something was clearly nerfed/buffed too much. I suppose this is considerably more work on their part, particularly in terms of bug testing.
dont worry alot about the balencing atm. it will get enhanced (not perfect but a vast improvement) during beta (cant wait!!)
On June 30 2009 00:55 wtfhi2u wrote: Really Kennigit, with all due respect, how does Bnet 2.0 (connecting to a service on the internets) save / replace a LAN option? Please? I really don't see how the two are related, or how one can replace the other.
Because they'll obviously make it possible to still have the equivalent of LAN games, except requiring you to log in to b.net first?
Anyone who actually thinks Blizzard isn't going to make it possible to play with someone on network latency is woefully ignorant.
And the whole issue with it causing people to drop from games is completely false. The only times that happens on battle.net is in ladder games that are hosted on battle.net. Active custom games continue playing even when battle.net crashes, since they're not hosted by b.net. I'm sure b.net 2's LAN "replacement" will be the same way.
Honestly I think Rob Pardo just didn't choose his words very well.
I think Blizz used the 1 week NDA because they wanted all the sites to be able to come up with a single article including all the game details. Maybe they thought that PR would be disrupted if all community was tweeting the new reveals and the hype will dye before the in depth articles are completed.
Also, "there is no LAN because of some new Bnet features" could mean there is a (scarce) possibility the game could act as a game server (a pseudo Bnet server) that would allow a more organized ladder system in a LAN environment. Anyway this is what I hope for, because LAN or no LAN, there will always be alternate Bnet servers (PGTour or ICCUP style) and piracy will still thrive.
the whole reason BW took off in korea and china (the first two countries to really support BW with a unified communities) was because of LAN connectivity which allowed net cafes to have the game on site. you can go to one of these cafes, load the game, and play with friends or connect to battlnet or garena, hamchi, etc.
but NOW with Activlizzard in control
You can't play SC2 without buying the game, getting a CD, and signing up for BATTLE.NET. This is all about the benjamins gentlemen. NO LAN MEANS YOU HAVE TO BUY TO PLAY. PERIOD. no buy, no cd key, no battlenet account, no sc2 4 u
dude... you dont get it. i applaud your efforts.. but seeriously. they know exactly what they are doing. they do not want SC2 to be played anywhere except battle.net. not on garena, not on iccup, not on hamachi, not in the privacy of your home offline with pals on LAN... nowhere but under the watchful eye of the Activlizzard. this is all by design. its not like the model of the DT that is open to fan input... no LAN is by design and frankly quite repulsive.
Just a quick question, has there been any hints on sc2's system requirements? I will most likely be buying a new machine for this and want to keep specs in mind.
On June 30 2009 01:16 rally_point wrote: TL - thanks for the information as always.
Just a quick question, has there been any hints on sc2's system requirements? I will most likely be buying a new machine for this and want to keep specs in mind.
All that's really been said right now is that it will be optimized for dual core and that you will need at least a Pixel Shader 2.0 compliant video card.
On a more serious note I agree that not haveing LAN-play included is a bad thing, it doesn't make much sense to go in reverse in terms of "technology". Also when a big and respected developer like Blizzard ditches LAN-features other developers might think it's OK for them to do so too and now not haveing LAN in your games is the standard instead of always haveing it like it was up until now.
It's not my petition. The link was in the closed thread about "no lan in SC2".
It will not make a difference. But what else should we do?
there is nothing to be done.. that is why they can do it. because even though they are bending you over and entering your ass without grease... you are gonna take it. because its sc2... its SC2. "hell its about time...to rape all the fans, take their money three times, and cut out any potential ESPORTS competition". they learned from iccup and garena (which was ripped off from a chinese server called VS). how do you cut out the competition? cut out LAN. simple.
Re: the corruptor, it's a very good air-to-air combat unit. That being said, it's still definitely more in the devourer role - good against other combat units, but nobody will conceivably use them to prevent drops and such.
One more thing about LAN if Bnet will close you will never be able to play SC2 in mp, but SC will work forever, seems unlikely now but you can't be sure, plus other companies do similar things with they online activation, and Blizz will just give them more creditability you can play all those great old games from companies that were on top in the past, but did anyway bankrupt. Also there is simply a possibility that Bnet 2 will not be the best possible server, adn somebody else could for example make better antihack program.
The point is that they introduce artificial inconvenience, and customers should not just accept it or else things will steadily get worse. Let be serious about piracy problem Blizzard is likely to sell SC2 greatly with LAN or without it, so what is the problem other then they greed? I had buy almost every blizzard game like a rabid fanboy, but it can change becouse of moves like that. (only didn't buy those that I was not interested in at all)
This just looks like brood war minus some units, plus some new units, plus a face lift. 10 years later, and Blizzard is going to release a sequel that is marginally different from its predecessor. I hope this turns out well.
dude... you dont get it. i applaud your efforts.. but seeriously. they know exactly what they are doing. they do not want SC2 to be played anywhere except battle.net. not on garena, not on iccup, not on hamachi, not in the privacy of your home offline with pals on LAN... nowhere but under the watchful eye of the Activlizzard. this is all by design. its not like the model of the DT that is open to fan input... no LAN is by design and frankly quite repulsive.
are you trying to insinuate that the activision/blizzard merger has absolutely anything to do with this decision?
Also, did you guys get to talk with David Kim at all? He said he was ranked #1 on their in-house ladder. I'm really curious about any details you could give about that (i.e. how many employees on it, if they play with all blizzard employees worldwide online, who's #2, etc).
On June 30 2009 01:20 omninmo wrote: how do you cut out the competition? cut out LAN. simple.
Sounds like a good way to make sure the community around the game never really takes off that much. Which is why it's idiotic.
exactly man. its really mindblowing. no wonder the game is being delayed so much.. they are just trying to figure out how to make battl.net support 10 million players. seriously, all your guys in canada, austria, etc... have you guys ever seen a PC cafe with 500 cpus packed to the brim 24 hours a day with guys/girls playing WoW, wc3, and starcraft? that is what its like in china and korea. its as if ASLmessenger, or someone else with no knowledge of the community, is in charge of sc2 network issues.
this is a perfect example of what happens when game studios get big. assholes in suits throw ridiculous sums of money at them and say, "you guys just keep making games, we will handle all that annoying PR, marketing, and image stuff". then some suit with absolutely no idea about how the community functions decides that the new game will only be played on battle.net. someone is getting a raise for this "brilliant" idea.
dude... you dont get it. i applaud your efforts.. but seeriously. they know exactly what they are doing. they do not want SC2 to be played anywhere except battle.net. not on garena, not on iccup, not on hamachi, not in the privacy of your home offline with pals on LAN... nowhere but under the watchful eye of the Activlizzard. this is all by design. its not like the model of the DT that is open to fan input... no LAN is by design and frankly quite repulsive.
are you trying to insinuate that the activision/blizzard merger has absolutely anything to do with this decision?
im not insinuating. this is a known industry fact. remember when SC vanilla came out. probably not. anyway, they had a "spawn" option on the CD which allowed your friends to install a multiplayer-only version of the game sans CDKEY so that if you bought it you and some friends (who werent willing to buy a game they never played before) could play each other over LAN connections. that was how blizzard did business. they were gamers for gamers. blizzard is dead. activlizzard uses the blizzard name, which it owns along with all of blizzard's intellectual property, but does not operate at even half the class-level as the latter on its worst day.
dude... you dont get it. i applaud your efforts.. but seeriously. they know exactly what they are doing. they do not want SC2 to be played anywhere except battle.net. not on garena, not on iccup, not on hamachi, not in the privacy of your home offline with pals on LAN... nowhere but under the watchful eye of the Activlizzard. this is all by design. its not like the model of the DT that is open to fan input... no LAN is by design and frankly quite repulsive.
are you trying to insinuate that the activision/blizzard merger has absolutely anything to do with this decision?
im not insinuating. this is a known industry fact. remember when SC vanilla came out. probably not. anyway, they had a "spawn" option on the CD which allowed your friends to install a multiplayer-only version of the game sans CDKEY so that if you bought it you and some friends (who werent willing to buy a game they never played before) could play each other over LAN connections. that was how blizzard did business. they were gamers for gamers. blizzard is dead. activlizzard uses the blizzard name, which it owns along with all of blizzard's intellectual property, but does not do business anything like the latter ever did.
so you're really saying that, had blizzard not merged with activision, they would have chosen to include traditional LAN support
I've bought almost every single blizzard game until now but I may not even buy SC2 anymore, little things like no LAN pisses me off about this new centralized direction blizzard is going. I'll gladly side with crackers and wait for pirate servers if so be it, at least they're pro-freedom.
Last Romantic: Are the tech trees in the original post accurate? If so, did anyone ask if they are open to changes? Requiring Stargate instead of Robotics Facility for Robotics Support Bay and requiring Stargate for Templar Archives seems so . . . weird Well, not necessarily weird, but illogical. Though I guess you need a Facility to build a Colossus anyway.
dude... you dont get it. i applaud your efforts.. but seeriously. they know exactly what they are doing. they do not want SC2 to be played anywhere except battle.net. not on garena, not on iccup, not on hamachi, not in the privacy of your home offline with pals on LAN... nowhere but under the watchful eye of the Activlizzard. this is all by design. its not like the model of the DT that is open to fan input... no LAN is by design and frankly quite repulsive.
are you trying to insinuate that the activision/blizzard merger has absolutely anything to do with this decision?
im not insinuating. this is a known industry fact. remember when SC vanilla came out. probably not. anyway, they had a "spawn" option on the CD which allowed your friends to install a multiplayer-only version of the game sans CDKEY so that if you bought it you and some friends (who werent willing to buy a game they never played before) could play each other over LAN connections. that was how blizzard did business. they were gamers for gamers. blizzard is dead. activlizzard uses the blizzard name, which it owns along with all of blizzard's intellectual property, but does not do business anything like the latter ever did.
That logic is ridiculous. It wouldn't have been reasonable to stick to the old distribution methods of Starcraft, regardless of whether Actizzard or old school Blizzard happened to be behind the wheel. By applying your 'logic' and 'industry facts', Warcraft 3 (being a Blizzard game, whine about it all you want) then would've, or should've, allowed spawns.
The 'fact' is, companies have been moving towards putting games online (see Steam), as its a relatively effective (as well as largely unintrusive-- hell, DRM shitstorms) way to prevent piracy. Considering how much more accessible the internet is nowadays, this should hardly be a problem, anyways.
This thread is all LAN complaints, yes we know theres not LAN and no LAN sucks but i think we have all heard it -.-.
With Protoss, like in SC you should be able to go Core > whatever you like, having to go Core > Port > Whatever you like is gay. I also don't like how DT's and High temp's are on different techs =[
On June 30 2009 01:52 Yenzilla wrote: The 'fact' is, companies have been moving towards putting games online (see Steam), as its a relatively effective (as well as largely unintrusive-- hell, DRM shitstorms) way to prevent piracy. Considering how much more accessible the internet is nowadays, this should hardly be a problem, anyways.
If my internet goes down, I can still play Left 4 Dead with my roommates on our LAN despite being a steam game. But not starcraft 2?
Yes in SC we had spawn version that allowed you legally to play on bn as long as you did enter to the game created by normal installment copy with the same cd-key. So practically almost fully working mp bn service for free for up to 8 players per copy. Now 10 years later there is even no LAN. They actually included diferent installation version to allow playing on bn by many people, and now it is evil piracy. How can anybody claim that this is not much of a difference in how they approach customer, and what they offer?
dude... you dont get it. i applaud your efforts.. but seeriously. they know exactly what they are doing. they do not want SC2 to be played anywhere except battle.net. not on garena, not on iccup, not on hamachi, not in the privacy of your home offline with pals on LAN... nowhere but under the watchful eye of the Activlizzard. this is all by design. its not like the model of the DT that is open to fan input... no LAN is by design and frankly quite repulsive.
are you trying to insinuate that the activision/blizzard merger has absolutely anything to do with this decision?
im not insinuating. this is a known industry fact. remember when SC vanilla came out. probably not. anyway, they had a "spawn" option on the CD which allowed your friends to install a multiplayer-only version of the game sans CDKEY so that if you bought it you and some friends (who werent willing to buy a game they never played before) could play each other over LAN connections. that was how blizzard did business. they were gamers for gamers. blizzard is dead. activlizzard uses the blizzard name, which it owns along with all of blizzard's intellectual property, but does not do business anything like the latter ever did.
That logic is ridiculous. It wouldn't have been reasonable to stick to the old distribution methods of Starcraft, regardless of whether Actizzard or old school Blizzard happened to be behind the wheel. By applying your 'logic' and 'industry facts', Warcraft 3 (being a Blizzard game, whine about it all you want) then would've, or should've, allowed spawns.
The 'fact' is, companies have been moving towards putting games online (see Steam), as its a relatively effective (as well as largely unintrusive-- hell, DRM shitstorms) way to prevent piracy. Considering how much more accessible the internet is nowadays, this should hardly be a problem, anyways.
i wasn't drawing conclusions in my OP i was simply listing facts. i was not implying that sc2 ought to have spawns, hell it ought to not even be sold in stores. it should be downloadable from the blizzard site after paying the fee. what you do with it afterwards is your own business. the new model is akin to going to the gym, buying a basketball and sneakers and being told that you can only play with the ball and shoes on their court.
On June 30 2009 01:55 wtfhi2u wrote: "relatively effective"? Are you kidding?
I'm playing a cracked fallout3 right now just because I don't want anything to do with games for windows live. I also played L4D for a while on pirated servers, no problem, worked like a charm. How is any of this crap relatively effective?
The ONLY thing this move is going to hurt as far as SC2 is concerned, is the community. No ICCUPS, Garenas and no small scale LANs.
It's relatively effective, because its much harder to pirate relative to other anti-piracy measures. Where with most CD protections, you have cracks, and most CD keys, you have keygens, you're forced to play, as you say, on pirated servers. While, obviously, not everyone would mind, pirated servers do not give you the full experience of, say, Battle.net.
Obviously, piracy will happen regardless, but requiring internet connections is still a fairly effective way to limit it (moreso than anything else I can think of)
On June 30 2009 01:53 wtfhi2u wrote: Thing is it's a battle they cannot win. End users want freedom to use the software they buy however they wish. If the developers don't provide it, the pirates will. The more artificial restrictions you put into place (such as needing an internet connection to play offline), the bigger the demand for piracy. Again, Bioshock.
We can be sure that Blizzard understands that their game will be pirated and that people will succeed at creating third-party servers for it. We can also be sure that Blizzard understands their legal capacity to sue such servers in order to force them to cease & desist, as they have done in the past and as courts have decided is correct. We can be almost sure that the EULA will tighten the reins on all non-Battle.net play, as well. If you don't like these things, you are free to either not play multiplayer/purchase the game or you are free to act illegally and risk whatever consequences there might be. That's the line Blizzard has drawn.
Tangentially, the axiom that more artificial restrictions = more piracy does not necessarily apply to Blizzard, or at least it doesn't seem to apply to the same degree that it applies to other companies. Battle.net is like a huge magnet for legal copies of the game because it provides an ease of use and size of player pool unlike any other multiplayer venue. This assumption is borne out by the fact that Battle.net 1.x, in all its iterations (D2, BW, WC3), still has large numbers of players connected with legal CD keys on a daily basis after 7-11 years.
On June 30 2009 01:53 Last Romantic wrote: Pretty sure that tree is wrong.
IMO twilight council -> Dark Shrine/Templar Archives;
On June 30 2009 02:01 Yenzilla wrote: While, obviously, not everyone would mind, pirated servers do not give you the full experience of, say, Battle.net.
And NEITHER WOULD LAN. Jesus F. Christ it's that hard to grasp or what?
Nice strawman, still, not related to the point that requiring the Internet helps limit piracy.
MBS and unlimited unit selection wont make the game purely 1a. Someone that spreads their army out and makes multiple groups and hits your giant blob from multiple angles will still beat you.
Being able to select an unlimited number of units, though, will help with getting your newly macrod units out of your base, or all those overlords floating over your rally point out of the way instead of double clicking one and sending them away then trying to pick out the other individually before being able to start grouping your real army under them.
I know Terran wont stick with Marine and Marauder once the Koreans get a hold of the game and start raping the shit out of the bioball. It'll should be similar to how it is now, except Terran will have to add Ghosts to either snipe or emp the Protoss army so storm doesn't rape face.
I, for one, would like to see banelings completely removed and lurks moved back down :|. Z and P are my homeboy races and if PvZ, the funnest matchup in the game, isn't as fun as it is now, ill be one very very sad panda.
On June 30 2009 02:06 theqat wrote: Battle.net is like a huge magnet for legal copies of the game because it provides an ease of use and size of player pool unlike any other multiplayer venue.
And so this is going to change with SC2 how? Even with a LAN option, those people interested in getting the full Bnet experience will pay for the game. Those who aren't will get a pirated version anyway. Big difference.
This trend of selling a game you can only play on a designated playground is getting really old really quick.
I'm not sure if you understood, so I'll rewrite it this way: Battle.net makes Blizzard's games worth purchasing legally and playing legally for a greater percentage of people than other companies' online services do for those companies' games.
I was principally agreeing with you that adding more restrictions causes more piracy, but my argument is that that equation doesn't affect Blizzard as much because Battle.net is so good. My supporting evidence is that Battle.net is still a thriving community with tons of legal players for D2, BW, and WC3 even after between 7-11 years since the release of each of those games.
Edit: Also, if you can only play a game on a designated playground and the playground is shitty, yeah, that sucks. But if Blizzard makes a great playground with Bnet 2 (which we have every reason to believe they will) they won't have a big problem to deal with.
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: And the only real, "sound" rationale for all this, is to keep control over all esports events (I'm sure Blizzard themselves can manage it better than the current scene RIGHT?). GJ Blizzard, and if you have to screw the end user for it, it's all worth it amirite? Fucking scrooges, x3.
They don't want to "manage" the esports scene. They just want a share of the money.
This arcticle made me deeply concerned about SC2's future. It's basically 100% bad news.
- No lan is ok as long as they tell us what "new BNET features" are replacing LAN. They said nothing about it. Why? Makes me feel that they actually have nothing, or are still struggling to come up with a good enough excuse to remove LAN play.
- Some of the balance statements scared the shit out of me. The whole Mothership entry + Show Spoiler +
Mothership: It moves very, very slowly. I fail to see its usefulness in most games, as the only way to get it to the battlefield is to make a proxy pylon and warp to it. Browder is OK with it being a marginalized unit though - he notes that SC1 had its own share of "fuck you" units in the scout and queen.
is absolutely unbelievable. Some of the units and abilities are now reportedly useless. The Hellion is still in the game. This is all very, very bad.
- I was totally expecting the excuse for having a NDA to be a very silly one, but seriously, the whole problem was simply "our servers not ready"? This pissed me off. Why have a NDA for this? And again: Why they have to keep absolute secret about BNET and single player yet they want us to buy their game?
Absolutely disappointed and underwhelmed by Blizzard's handling of the Beta delays and PR. They shouldn't be acting as the big-shot company with no interest all in being transparent with their fans about what's going on.
Some of you guys are so selective in your reading:
However, LAN is right out due to Bnet 2.0 features that they could not discuss.
I'm not saying that LAN is "in", but a lot of you probably should wait until you have full info before you spout your sensationalist conclusions!
My question is ... How does the FPView work exactly? Does it show the mouse pointer moving around? Or select + drag boxes? Is it 100% identical to watching the person's screen as they played it live?
edit:
Also, if you watch the new HQ vod, Hellions looks kinda cool (vs. the Banelings in particular); at the very least, they are still quick and move like Vultures. They just need a graphical overhaul and possibly some user activated ability.
And the Broodlords kicked the shit out of Void Rays in that video really quickly, so I think those will be good at least for Zerg anti-air.
If you have any information about this, could you explain how they can rewind replays? How does the code behind this works and stuff?
It was always said that it is impossible to rewind replays, so now im interested how they found a solution.
It is indeed impossible to have a true rewind. Replays are basically a recreation of every in-game action, not a movie. Ergo, resurrections et al. cannot be done.
To solve this, Blizzard implemented a checkpoint system that takes in-game snapshots of the situation periodically. These can be jumped to forward and back via buttons and/or replay bar.
@ FPView, it's not true fpview in that you do not see the mouse move. It follows screen and shows actions [drags, clicks, etcaetera] but the cursor itself is stationary.
@ B.net features I am afraid that they'll institute a pay programme for extra features. I feel this suspicion is valid, but hope that it is not.
-Hydra-ling is really so weak that the infestor does not help? -Ultras-Lurkers-Broodlords were not used? -How about vikings? Wouldnt they be the T air-air counter you said Banshee not have? -You said gas is harder to get than in SC1, why if we have 2 gas on base now ? Because the costs of a new assim and more 3 probes? -How warp gates upgrade work? You need only to pay 50/50 cost on CyCore and all your gates become Warp Gates or you need to pay something more on each gate?
the no LAN issue hurts players like me who these days primarily plays SC1 on LAN with people in locations with bad/no internet access. The university here filters out any gaming traffic so we're forced into LAN when we play on campus which is a large majority of the time and most of them won't be willing to go somewhere off campus because they don't have transportation. some of the other places we play have ass-terrible internet (56k at one guy's apartment) and the other guy uses bad-reception stolen wireless from his neighbors... :/ this is really bad news for me and I thought blizzard was actually concerned about having a good relationship with their userbase.
looks like my transition from starcraft to fighting games is cemented with this move
On June 30 2009 02:27 theqat wrote: They just want a share of the money.
Awesome reason to remove options like LAN when your war chests are full of WOW subscriptions.
Also, unthankful much? You have a scene that keeps your game alive for 11yrs, turns it into a would be national sport, and all you have to say is HEY WHERES MY CUT, LETS REMOVE FEATURES SO YOU HAVE TO START PAYING TO ORGANIZE TOURNAMENTS LOLOL.
Nobody here thinks SC's popularity and its user-friendliness are in the least bit related? Basically Blizzard is ok with SC2's success being less fantastic if that can make them more money. How exciting for the players.
When the game has been out for a year or more and everything is fine, I'm going to think of your melodramatic, overwrought concern and laugh heartily.
Hydraling is quite poor against Marine/marauder; it is OK against Protoss. Roaches are to be preferred against ground, though.
Yes, but only in already won/lost games. It's hard to judge their viability in competitive games. [Basically almost all the games I played were effectively 'over' in under 10 minutes, so hive-tech units had no actual impact on the result]
Vikings are indeed good against air. My point about the Banshee is that they rock everything on the ground.
It's harder because you get 5 a trip. So one base does get you 10 a trip but you have to build two assims and have six workers harvesting, which takes some infrastructure buildup and is only marginally more than the 8 a trip you got in the original. Minerals are also 5 a trip but it seems faster since you can mine them all right off the bat.
Warp gate ability is 50/50 at cycore. Then you can individually upgrade each gateway [it shuts down the building for like 10 seconds but it's free].
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: Pirates are going to have a pirated version anyway, with pirated servers, as it always happens. And for every server you "legally" take down, two will pop up in countries where you have no legal ground.
You make it sound as though it's a clear-cut choice between PIRATES and NOPIRATES. There are several points in between, many of which would be more ideal for a developer. For example, I have a number of friends who, as far as I know, do not buy PC games, ever. However, while they are entirely capable at pirating when it involves simple procedures (copy/paste a crack/cdkey), they do not have the slightest clue about how to find and get a private server to work.
Of course, the most tenacious of pirates will still pirate (as is the rule, by now), but these measures will limit the number of 'casual' (there's probably a better word for it that my brain is running blanks for) piraters.
Not to beat a dead horse about LAN, but what Nony said echoes through my own thoughts in that if you wanna LAN its not like everyone doesn't have internet to go on bnet anyway. While granted SC's bnet is shit compared to wc3, it still does the job sufficiently, and b.net2.0 sounds like it'll be even better.
Secondly as far as tournaments go, WoW does not have an offline mode, it has tournament servers that blizzard hosts so for events like MLG they're done all online. Even for smaller LANs everyone I've ever gone to except one I think had internet because yeah its a pretty big deal. So with that being said if it has LAN, great, cool. If it doesn't it really is a very minor point that really just the people who don't wanna buy the game are fussing over. It won't affect anything, but piracy really. Blizzard's the one company I won't do that with =x
As long as b.net 2.0 is great with good features and layout with a virtual lan set up or w.e blizz has cooking a low lat set up i'll be happy with no lan.
[14:36] Chill[Esports]> the letters L A N arent in ESPORTS [14:36] Kennigit> LOL [14:36] Chill[Esports]> so i think were good to go [14:36] pachi> uhoh [14:36] Kennigit> hahahaah
I look over this tech tree and I really wonder to myself what on earth Zerg could possibly do for air-air.
With mutalisks being worse than in Sc2 I just don't see it... not to mention that they have to be pretty bad late game given the lack of extra tools zerg have.
On June 30 2009 03:45 ronaldmcdonald wrote: Wow, so-called community representatives supporting removal of user friendly features in the name of what? Fighting piracy? (lol) Helping Blizzard get its money from the esports scene?
Get yourselves checked.
Nobody is in favor of removing LAN, if that is what you are saying
On June 30 2009 03:45 ronaldmcdonald wrote: Wow, so-called community representatives supporting removal of user friendly features in the name of what? Fighting piracy? (lol) Helping Blizzard get its money from the esports scene?
Get yourselves checked.
All you're going on is one sentence. We don't know anything really about Bnet 2.0 yet, so wait until they announce that and THEN complain. Your complaints don't mean much right now.
On June 30 2009 03:45 Jayme wrote: I look over this tech tree and I really wonder to myself what on earth Zerg could possibly do for air-air.
With mutalisks being worse than in Sc2 I just don't see it... not to mention that they have to be pretty bad late game given the lack of extra tools zerg have.
Good early game is good though. A good start.
LR just said a page or two ago that Corruptors are great air-air.
Edit: Sorry, it was more like three pages ago. Thread move fast now
On June 30 2009 03:49 ronaldmcdonald wrote: Supporting Blizzard's decision or "shhh wait for bnet 2.0" = in favor of removing LAN as far as I'm concerned.
They wouldn't say no LAN if multiplayer wasn't going to require an internet connection.
I don't see how this helps the community at all, regardless of your stance on piracy.
On June 30 2009 03:49 ronaldmcdonald wrote: Supporting Blizzard's decision or "shhh wait for bnet 2.0" = in favor of removing LAN as far as I'm concerned.
They wouldn't say no LAN if multiplayer wasn't going to require an internet connection.
I don't see how this helps the community at all, regardless of your stance on piracy.
Why did you re-register to continue trolling?
Oh noes I am unhappy with the removal of a standard RTS feature so Blizzard can control/monitor the esports scene and "fight piracy" (rofl) so I must be trolling.
Again, this decision doesn't help the community at all, regardless of your stance on piracy.
The fact that mods obviously don't want too much critiscism makes me question their level of care for the community. I would hope they are "gamers" before teenage Blizzard fanboys, tbh.
None of that is relevant. What is relevant is that no one can speak in a fully-informed way about the decision to omit LAN until we find out what is in bnet2. It's not that the mods don't want criticism--it's that your gimmick amounts to shouting others down because others are basically advocating patience and thus have no recourse in the face of your apparent fury.
You can be furious, but you don't need to take it out on other posters here.
Edit: Naturally, I don't want to put words in the moderators' mouths. I'm just making an educated guess.
Ohh Blizzard, you never cease to amaze me, you did it with splitting starcraft into 3 seperate games and now you are doing it with "no LAN"; free marketing is awesome =)
On June 30 2009 04:09 Kletus wrote: Ohh Blizzard, you never cease to amaze me, you did it with splitting starcraft into 3 seperate games and now you are doing it with "no LAN"; free marketing is awesome =)
Shine on you crazy diamonds.
splitting the game was awesome.. whats wrong with that
On June 30 2009 03:49 ronaldmcdonald wrote: Supporting Blizzard's decision or "shhh wait for bnet 2.0" = in favor of removing LAN as far as I'm concerned.
They wouldn't say no LAN if multiplayer wasn't going to require an internet connection.
I don't see how this helps the community at all, regardless of your stance on piracy.
Why did you re-register to continue trolling?
Oh noes I am unhappy with the removal of a standard RTS feature so Blizzard can control/monitor the esports scene and "fight piracy" (rofl) so I must be trolling.
Again, this decision doesn't help the community at all, regardless of your stance on piracy.
The fact that mods obviously don't want too much critiscism makes me question their level of care for the community. I would hope they are "gamers" before teenage Blizzard fanboys, tbh.
I disagree with the decision to remove LAN, but am waiting for further information on Bnet 2.0 before launching into ill-informed tirades.
Now if Bnet 2.0 has some sort of pay-to-play-LAN or other ridiculous limitations then yes, I will deliver scathing philippics against ATVI moneymongering.
On June 30 2009 03:49 ronaldmcdonald wrote: Supporting Blizzard's decision or "shhh wait for bnet 2.0" = in favor of removing LAN as far as I'm concerned.
They wouldn't say no LAN if multiplayer wasn't going to require an internet connection.
I don't see how this helps the community at all, regardless of your stance on piracy.
Why did you re-register to continue trolling?
Oh noes I am unhappy with the removal of a standard RTS feature so Blizzard can control/monitor the esports scene and "fight piracy" (rofl) so I must be trolling.
Again, this decision doesn't help the community at all, regardless of your stance on piracy.
The fact that mods obviously don't want too much critiscism makes me question their level of care for the community. I would hope they are "gamers" before teenage Blizzard fanboys, tbh.
I disagree with the decision to remove LAN, but am waiting for further information on Bnet 2.0 before launching into ill-informed tirades.
Now if Bnet 2.0 has some sort of pay-to-play-LAN or other ridiculous limitations then yes, I will deliver scathing philippics against ATVI moneymongering.
If b.net 2.0 has lan latency (ie. as if your playing on hamachi), which I'm expecting it does, it shouldn't really be a problem, and it is a good step against anti-piracy
You need the internet to use it.. but just about everywhere you go you can connect online
I didn't read all the pages, but, am I the only one to think that the spine crawler is the most awful building ever? I mean, his "tongue" is so thin in comparison to BW and it doesn't even attack by passing through the ground which make the attack look really ugly and imagine 5 of these attacking a Terran rush.
On June 30 2009 04:39 Psilver wrote: I didn't read all the pages, but, am I the only one to think that the spine crawler is the most awful building ever? I mean, his "tongue" is so thin in comparison to BW and it doesn't even attack by passing through the ground which make the attack look really ugly and imagine 5 of these attacking a Terran rush.
I actually like it a lot But you know what they say: There's no accounting for taste.
I kinda agree with the majority of the people about LAN, yea the LAN in it's original state will probably not be a part of SC2. However they did remove it because of features from BatteNet 2.0 so Bnet will probably have some super duper features LAN like features instead so it doesn't really matter. Don't complain until Blizzard has revealed BattleNet 2.0
Why not make the game mechanics an option? For example, if you want to play SC2 as SC2 is right now, good for you. But, what about the people that don't want MBS or unlimited unit selection or smart cast, but want a game more similar to BW? Just make an option to choose how you want to play right? I do not understand game programming much at all so I do not even know if this is possible, but it would be a nice addition as the current build of SC2 looks too "user friendly".
I am not sure if I explained the idea enough... but I will try to answer any questions you might have for what I mean.
On June 30 2009 04:39 Psilver wrote: I didn't read all the pages, but, am I the only one to think that the spine crawler is the most awful building ever? I mean, his "tongue" is so thin in comparison to BW and it doesn't even attack by passing through the ground which make the attack look really ugly and imagine 5 of these attacking a Terran rush.
I actually like it a lot But you know what they say: There's no accounting for taste.
Me too. It also actually make sense in all situation unlike BW version, where the tongue could magically apear on different space platform over a huge space gap...
On June 30 2009 04:39 Psilver wrote: I didn't read all the pages, but, am I the only one to think that the spine crawler is the most awful building ever? I mean, his "tongue" is so thin in comparison to BW and it doesn't even attack by passing through the ground which make the attack look really ugly and imagine 5 of these attacking a Terran rush.
I actually like it a lot But you know what they say: There's no accounting for taste.
Me too. It also actually make sense in all situation unlike BW version, where the tongue could magically apear on different space platform over a huge space gap...
I hadn't even thought of it that way, but that's a perfect justification for it
On June 30 2009 04:39 Psilver wrote: I didn't read all the pages, but, am I the only one to think that the spine crawler is the most awful building ever? I mean, his "tongue" is so thin in comparison to BW and it doesn't even attack by passing through the ground which make the attack look really ugly and imagine 5 of these attacking a Terran rush.
I actually like it a lot But you know what they say: There's no accounting for taste.
Me too. It also actually make sense in all situation unlike BW version, where the tongue could magically apear on different space platform over a huge space gap...
my favorite is when i burrowed a group of zerglings on a transparent floor of glass with nothing but empty space below
On June 30 2009 04:46 Captain Peabody wrote: Wow...all the trolls are coming out of the woodwork.
And getting nuked.
Good writeup, though.
nukes are fun
did anyone use nukes at all?
Nukes cost no supply and build very quickly for a very low cost. I expect them to be used somewhat effectively. You still have time to dodge a nuke but to me it seems like they come just a tad faster then in SC1. Happy Nuking!
I feel incredibly underwhelmed. If Bnet 2.0 is not absolutely SPECTACULAR when they finally reveal it's features, I'm gonna - well I'm gonna... I'm gonna write an angry post on tl. Fuck it.
On June 30 2009 05:47 the hamburglar wrote: I have 2 kids which are well provided for
Now I can see how fgt azn moderators who aren't old enough to drink alcohol or have grown pubic hair yet are going to be proud to bend over and take it
if you think you can get rid of me with your ridiculous IP bans, good luck. I have a feeling you will get tired before I do.
Sounds like you are setting a great example for your kids.
On June 30 2009 05:47 the hamburglar wrote: Let me make this clear: I have 2 kids which are well provided for and will have no problem buying a legit SC2 box to play on Bnet. This isn't the problem.
While it doesn't completely surprise me most of the mods here have to hush hush the QQ about no LAN, tell me: how in the hell is bnet 2.0 going to allow LAN play without logging into a centralized server, thus requiring an internet connection?
I'm not sure how I have to spell it out, but this does not help any gaming community.
Basically, if your internet goes down, or you just don't have a connection where you're situated, or ICS isn't enabled to let you log on bnet, or there's any kind of network problem on your LAN: tough shit, you can't play SC2.
Now I can see how fgt azn moderators who aren't old enough to drink alcohol or have grown pubic hair yet are going to be proud to bend over and take it (not targeting anyone particularly) but myself being 20 years old OVER 10 (what 9000?) YEARS AGO and actually enjoying the happy times when developers didn't literally shit on their fanbase, I have a problem with it. Is it that big a deal?
God forbid some gamers out there still have some sort of spine (insert spine crawler joke)
Lastly, being admin for a political forum that welcomes everything from neonazis to communists (it's quite entertaining), if you think you can get rid of me with your ridiculous IP bans, good luck. I have a feeling you will get tired before I do.
You are 20 years old and have 2 kids? Must suck being them.
On June 30 2009 05:47 the hamburglar wrote: Let me make this clear: I have 2 kids which are well provided for and will have no problem buying a legit SC2 box to play on Bnet. This isn't the problem.
While it doesn't completely surprise me most of the mods here have to hush hush the QQ about no LAN, tell me: how in the hell is bnet 2.0 going to allow LAN play without logging into a centralized server, thus requiring an internet connection?
I'm not sure how I have to spell it out, but this does not help any gaming community.
Basically, if your internet goes down, or you just don't have a connection where you're situated, or ICS isn't enabled to let you log on bnet, or there's any kind of network problem on your LAN: tough shit, you can't play SC2.
Now I can see how fgt azn moderators who aren't old enough to drink alcohol or have grown pubic hair yet are going to be proud to bend over and take it (not targeting anyone particularly) but myself being 20 years old OVER 10 (what 9000?) YEARS AGO and actually enjoying the happy times when developers didn't literally shit on their fanbase, I have a problem with it. Is it that big a deal?
God forbid some gamers out there still have some sort of spine (insert spine crawler joke)
Lastly, being admin for a political forum that welcomes everything from neonazis to communists (it's quite entertaining), if you think you can get rid of me with your ridiculous IP bans, good luck. I have a feeling you will get tired before I do.
You are 20 years old and have 2 kids? Must suck being them.
I think he means he's 30 ("[I was 20 10 years ago]"), but if he's 30 and still writes like that he's got worse problems than being 20 and having two kids.
smart casting is when you have several units of the same type selected and cast selected spell, all off them wont cast it at the same time, only the first one in the stack will cast it, so you dont have to select all units individual units one of the other and cast it
im also pretty positive that the new bnet somehow will just auth you with the server and then you can go through the LAN options, since its super NDA there gotta be a massive bunch options yet to be revealed
No the internet tough guys is someone who feels the need to "brag" about being a moderator at some random forum and how he can avoid IP bans.
I think your a little paranoid and should just cool your jets. You aren't getting banned for what your saying, your getting banned because your spamming the tread saying the same thing over and over.
We get the point, you want LAN. But constantly posting over and over (to a bunch of people who have no control over the matter) is not only annoying but also pointless waste of your time.
On June 30 2009 06:17 the hamburglar wrote: Hahaha. No. I'm "spamming" because some dumbfucks who also happen to be moderators here and supposedly community advocates, are acting as if "Bnet 2.0 features" not yet revealed will compensate for the lack of LAN option. Sorry, connecting to a centralized server requiring you to go online does not compensate for a lack of LAN option.
If the mods here had the common sense to even acknowledge that, I may or may not give as much of a shit, but no, we're fed some stupid shit about how Bnet 2.0 will make it all better when anyone that has the slightest bit of networking knowledge realizes it's not the case.
I'm not bragging either, just stating that banning me is a waste of time.
See this is what I'm talking about. There isn't some conspiracy here where the TL staff are trying to make you drink the Bnet 2.0 Kool-aid. They aren't "feeding" you anything, they are just posting their opinions.
Yeah but instead of just saying that banning you is a waste of time, you felt the need to mention all the "great" things you are on the internet.
Anyways I'm done talking with you and further derailing this thread, since you seem to be a very unreasonable person.
On June 30 2009 03:03 Alizee- wrote:So with that being said if it has LAN, great, cool. If it doesn't it really is a very minor point that really just the people who don't wanna buy the game are fussing over. It won't affect anything, but piracy really. Blizzard's the one company I won't do that with =x
So basically if i wana play SC with my friend over LAN at my place i have to get SC2, all the expansions (which i will) and another copy of everything and be connected... no thanks, here where i live buying 6 games is way too much for a student to handle - may it even be an epic game like SC...
not including LAN at all (i still hope it wont happen) is cheap and low coming from Blizz
It's not my petition. The link was in the closed thread about "no lan in SC2".
It will not make a difference. But what else should we do?
there is nothing to be done.. that is why they can do it. because even though they are bending you over and entering your ass without grease... you are gonna take it. because its sc2... its SC2. "hell its about time...to rape all the fans, take their money three times, and cut out any potential ESPORTS competition". they learned from iccup and garena (which was ripped off from a chinese server called VS). how do you cut out the competition? cut out LAN. simple.
Your hyperbole is ridiculous and so out or proportion to what's going on.
No LAN is fine, I hope they have some system in place that replaces it. Real invasive DRM exists on games like Spore. Be glad you're not getting that and be grateful, not a dumb teenage twat with too much time on his hands spreading the "revolutionary word about righteous piracy" on internet forums.
On June 30 2009 03:03 Alizee- wrote:So with that being said if it has LAN, great, cool. If it doesn't it really is a very minor point that really just the people who don't wanna buy the game are fussing over. It won't affect anything, but piracy really. Blizzard's the one company I won't do that with =x
So basically if i wana play SC with my friend over LAN at my place i have to get SC2, all the expansions (which i will) and another copy of everything and be connected... no thanks, here where i live buying 6 games is way too much for a student to handle - may it even be an epic game like SC...
not including LAN at all (i still hope it wont happen) is cheap and low coming from Blizz
What amazes me is that some of you people readily admit that the reason you want LAN is to pirate the game, and then you get upset at Blizzard for removing it because now you'll have to buy copies of the game? Could you be any stupider?
On June 30 2009 01:12 omninmo wrote:
NO LAN MEANS YOU HAVE TO BUY TO PLAY. PERIOD. no buy, no cd key, no battlenet account, no sc2 4 u
LOL
exactly what I mean here. The horror of actually paying instead of pirating. Truly, Blizzard is the evil empire itself, they hate FREEDOM!
On June 30 2009 03:03 Alizee- wrote:So with that being said if it has LAN, great, cool. If it doesn't it really is a very minor point that really just the people who don't wanna buy the game are fussing over. It won't affect anything, but piracy really. Blizzard's the one company I won't do that with =x
So basically if i wana play SC with my friend over LAN at my place i have to get SC2, all the expansions (which i will) and another copy of everything and be connected... no thanks, here where i live buying 6 games is way too much for a student to handle - may it even be an epic game like SC...
not including LAN at all (i still hope it wont happen) is cheap and low coming from Blizz
Why doesn't your friend buy his own game? Where I'm from we don't buy 3 games for cheap ass friends.
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: And the only real, "sound" rationale for all this, is to keep control over all esports events (I'm sure Blizzard themselves can manage it better than the current scene RIGHT?). GJ Blizzard, and if you have to screw the end user for it, it's all worth it amirite? Fucking scrooges, x3.
They don't want to "manage" the esports scene. They just want a share of the money.
LOL if thats true (and it proabably is) Blizz is one sad sad company... i love them for the epic games they make, but a company that makes millions every month from WoW is capable of making SC2 and all of its expansions completely free without financial losses
On June 29 2009 16:16 Last Romantic wrote: They're also not coding in a way to disable the windows key, as it would disqualify them from the Games for Windows tag.
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: And the only real, "sound" rationale for all this, is to keep control over all esports events (I'm sure Blizzard themselves can manage it better than the current scene RIGHT?). GJ Blizzard, and if you have to screw the end user for it, it's all worth it amirite? Fucking scrooges, x3.
They don't want to "manage" the esports scene. They just want a share of the money.
LOL if thats true (and it proabably is) Blizz is one sad sad company... i love them for the epic games they make, but a company that makes millions every month from WoW is capable of making SC2 and all of its expansions completely free without financial losses
Blizzard isn't a charity to make you happy.
If it was EA, they would have milked the Korean scene ages ago for every penny. If anything, Blizzard has been a lot better than the other large gaming companies.
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: And the only real, "sound" rationale for all this, is to keep control over all esports events (I'm sure Blizzard themselves can manage it better than the current scene RIGHT?). GJ Blizzard, and if you have to screw the end user for it, it's all worth it amirite? Fucking scrooges, x3.
They don't want to "manage" the esports scene. They just want a share of the money.
LOL if thats true (and it proabably is) Blizz is one sad sad company... i love them for the epic games they make, but a company that makes millions every month from WoW is capable of making SC2 and all of its expansions completely free without financial losses
Key word bolded. Last I checked "companies" were in the business of making money. Also yes you do lose money giving away free games, because they cost money to make.
On June 29 2009 16:16 Last Romantic wrote: They're also not coding in a way to disable the windows key, as it would disqualify them from the Games for Windows tag.
this is laughably stupid
Agreed. But I can't decide if it's stupid because Blizzard feels the need to have the Games for Windows tag, or it's stupid because disabling the windows key disqualifies you from the Games for Windows tag.
On June 30 2009 06:41 Klogon wrote: The latter is much, much more stupid. The former is a business decision while the other is the root of the problem.
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: And the only real, "sound" rationale for all this, is to keep control over all esports events (I'm sure Blizzard themselves can manage it better than the current scene RIGHT?). GJ Blizzard, and if you have to screw the end user for it, it's all worth it amirite? Fucking scrooges, x3.
They don't want to "manage" the esports scene. They just want a share of the money.
LOL if thats true (and it proabably is) Blizz is one sad sad company... i love them for the epic games they make, but a company that makes millions every month from WoW is capable of making SC2 and all of its expansions completely free without financial losses
Blizzard isn't a charity to make you happy.
If it was EA, they would have milked the Korean scene ages ago for every penny. If anything, Blizzard has been a lot better than the other large gaming companies.
Other large gaming companies dont have a monthly income similar to one of a small country... capitalism is a bitch :D
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: And the only real, "sound" rationale for all this, is to keep control over all esports events (I'm sure Blizzard themselves can manage it better than the current scene RIGHT?). GJ Blizzard, and if you have to screw the end user for it, it's all worth it amirite? Fucking scrooges, x3.
They don't want to "manage" the esports scene. They just want a share of the money.
LOL if thats true (and it proabably is) Blizz is one sad sad company... i love them for the epic games they make, but a company that makes millions every month from WoW is capable of making SC2 and all of its expansions completely free without financial losses
Blizzard isn't a charity to make you happy.
If it was EA, they would have milked the Korean scene ages ago for every penny. If anything, Blizzard has been a lot better than the other large gaming companies.
Other large gaming companies dont have a monthly income of a smaller country... capitalism is a bitch :D
Do you honestly think that Blizzard could afford to make SC2 for free based on WoW's income? You should probably take an economics class if you think so. (Look up the term "overhead" in relation to business )
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: And the only real, "sound" rationale for all this, is to keep control over all esports events (I'm sure Blizzard themselves can manage it better than the current scene RIGHT?). GJ Blizzard, and if you have to screw the end user for it, it's all worth it amirite? Fucking scrooges, x3.
They don't want to "manage" the esports scene. They just want a share of the money.
LOL if thats true (and it proabably is) Blizz is one sad sad company... i love them for the epic games they make, but a company that makes millions every month from WoW is capable of making SC2 and all of its expansions completely free without financial losses
Blizzard isn't a charity to make you happy.
If it was EA, they would have milked the Korean scene ages ago for every penny. If anything, Blizzard has been a lot better than the other large gaming companies.
Other large gaming companies dont have a monthly income similar to one of a small country... capitalism is a bitch :D
You're right, and since Exxon Mobil makes even more money than Blizzard they should give me free gas for the next year. And Apple should give me free iPhone service, its only fair.
On June 30 2009 02:19 wtfhi2u wrote: And the only real, "sound" rationale for all this, is to keep control over all esports events (I'm sure Blizzard themselves can manage it better than the current scene RIGHT?). GJ Blizzard, and if you have to screw the end user for it, it's all worth it amirite? Fucking scrooges, x3.
They don't want to "manage" the esports scene. They just want a share of the money.
LOL if thats true (and it proabably is) Blizz is one sad sad company... i love them for the epic games they make, but a company that makes millions every month from WoW is capable of making SC2 and all of its expansions completely free without financial losses
Blizzard isn't a charity to make you happy.
If it was EA, they would have milked the Korean scene ages ago for every penny. If anything, Blizzard has been a lot better than the other large gaming companies.
Other large gaming companies dont have a monthly income similar to one of a small country... capitalism is a bitch :D
You're right, and since Exxon Mobil makes even more money than Blizzard they should give me free gas for the next year. And Apple should give me free iPhone service, its only fair.
Leme put it this way, i dont know if they do, but if exxon mobile would be selling gas to some racing team - would it be reasonable to expect from them to want their share of money? Thats what im talking about... not about SC2 being for free... original poster said Blizz wants their share of money from esports, its not the same thing but i hope you understand what i mean
I've heard absolutely nothing about the viking; and that makes me sad, because I've already promised my friends that in the first game we play, I'm going to go for a viking "drop" on their mineral line.
I haven't read all of the thread, so my fault if this has already been addressed, but does anyone ever build these things?
On June 30 2009 09:16 tree.hugger wrote: I've heard absolutely nothing about the viking; and that makes me sad, because I've already promised my friends that in the first game we play, I'm going to go for a viking "drop" on their mineral line.
I haven't read all of the thread, so my fault if this has already been addressed, but does anyone ever build these things?
It is quite solid anti-air, though in a strict air-to-air role the corruptor is a better unit.
Its strengths lie in its mobility and transformer aspect. They're a good counter [in air form] against Colossi, though against Zerg they're less viable.
If its not to much could we get your honest opinion about the macro mechanics?
How often did you use them? Did it feel like using manual mining and single building selection? Were there any neat tricks you found? Was any race at a disadvantage? How can they be improved? How do you think casual players will react to them and how do you think pros will?
Also does OC still have call-down supplies? I havnt heard it mentioned in any of the recent stuff. And can the queen heal now? And is the banshee portrait female?
Question: Zatic mentioned auto-surround at Cologne; is there any sort of automated combat AI for melee units in the current build or can you micro everything manually?
Oh man, and here I thought I was going to buy SC2. No LAN play? Hrm, 99.99% of the SC:BW I play is over LAN, the other 0.01% is just to download maps. And single player isn't my thing. People keep saying, "now I'm going to pirate this because there's no LAN", which is just a sorry excuse to try and justify their piracy. Why would I pirate something I don't want in the first place?
Anyway, I won't be buying SC2 until there's LAN play, and when they finally change their minds and include it, then and only then will I buy it.
On June 30 2009 11:02 qaswedfr25 wrote: Question: Zatic mentioned auto-surround at Cologne; is there any sort of automated combat AI for melee units in the current build or can you micro everything manually?
You can micro everything but the automatic battle AI for melee units is so damn good that you usually don't have to.
On June 30 2009 06:27 FieryBalrog wrote:What amazes me is that some of you people readily admit that the reason you want LAN is to pirate the game, and then you get upset at Blizzard for removing it because now you'll have to buy copies of the game? Could you be any stupider?
You know that in SC you had option for spawn installation, and that did mean that you could play on bn with one cd-key, not even only on the LAN. Wanting standards from 1998 makes you a pirate? Maybe get your facts straight about what SC offer with LAN, and spawn installation version to legally play on bn with one copy. 10 years later, and it is evil piracy now.
Just think about how inconvenience it is, now I have couple PC in home, so if somebody comes to my place we can play SC, but now I would have to buy SC2 couple times just for that reason? Or what every time when somebody did come to place I will install his copy just to play, and ten remove it? Fuck this shit.
On June 30 2009 04:39 Psilver wrote: I didn't read all the pages, but, am I the only one to think that the spine crawler is the most awful building ever? I mean, his "tongue" is so thin in comparison to BW and it doesn't even attack by passing through the ground which make the attack look really ugly and imagine 5 of these attacking a Terran rush.
Oh god this was painful to watch.
It makes sense the spine crawlers would attack like that because if sunkens could do so much damage while pushing through several layers of sediment then just bypassing that would improve their attack speed and their attack power.
Since Spine crawlers move I'm hoping Blizzard sees the potential in giving them two ground attacks. The first was like the original pushing through dirt attack but it counts as a cliffing attack so units won't fire back or engage unless another unit is in range to spot. The new attack animation allows for the crawler to increase dps significantly while sacrificing its ability to attack in a stealthy manner.
If they don't do this I hope Blizzard realizes they were on drugs to implement this new animation and should discard it immediately.
On June 30 2009 10:14 Archerofaiur wrote: If its not to much could we get your honest opinion about the macro mechanics?
How often did you use them? Did it feel like using manual mining and single building selection? Were there any neat tricks you found? Was any race at a disadvantage? How can they be improved? How do you think casual players will react to them and how do you think pros will?
Also does OC still have call-down supplies? I havnt heard it mentioned in any of the recent stuff. And can the queen heal now? And is the banshee portrait female?
Zerg: As you can see in Zatic's piece, queen management takes both apm and some thinking.
Terran: The varied addons mean that it's quite a lot like SC1, simply because MBS isn't as 'good' as it is with the other races. Mule still seems gimmicky though.
Protoss: I really like the dark pylon. Warp-in is cute, too.
No idea about calldown, don't think so, and i don't remember.
I was clicking through the Protoss units to see their 'irritation' soundbytes and they're still funny.
Ok, well from what I've read, Blizzard seems to be steadily making the game more and more balanced. The three races macro additions (esp zerg) sound like they are actually working quite well, which is defniatly a good thing. I have to agree, that I'm not that disturbed by the mothership just being a big fuck off slow piece of shit. It could would work well to break stalemates (which is what you would expect from something so late game), so I would presume it would be OP, and slow as fuck which would draw fire and therefore move forces away from both armies (thus potentially creating holes in defence for both).
The LAN argument is just stupid. Steam works just fine for CS:Source over lan, you don't play through Steam servers, you just verify and stay connected through the steam client. Further; it is perfectly reasonable if (with reference to the guy above me) you want to have multiple copies, you buy multiple games. People do it with WoW all the time, if your respective Jew friends are too cheap to buy the game for themselves, then get other friends (seriously, when you compare it with going to the movies togeather, it equates to about '4 nites entertainment'... or half a days wages.. seriously stop being so cheap)
Stop with this imbalance yells everywhere just because of psi storm being more powered or swarm getting larger or whatever. GUYS THIS IS NOT STARCRAFT 1. It pisses me off how much all those ppl just whine when they just haven't tried the game at all yet. THIS IS STARCRAFT 2 NOT 1 GET YOUR FACTS STRAIGHT. What for instance psi storm got more damage BUT lurks got more hp ? Exactly. Zerg whined because templars could kills lurks in 1 storm. How the fuk can you know if they'll be overpowered given that we won't have lurks unless you get to T3 ? Big fukin deal. All the game has changed. It's not sc1 anymore. Gah i'm leavin.
Medivac: It heals faster than a medic. Terran units have, on the whole, more health. This leads to some dps problems as Zerg’s masses struggle to overcome Terrans holding chokepoints. Also, with no scourge, drops cannot be killed efficiently in transit; there’s no way Zerg can have corruptors and mutalisks patrolling to shoot them down. On paper, you might submit the Queen as a counter, but she too struggles to kill fast enough.
Mass mobility: Terran does not have an equivalent to mass overlord/nydus worm/warp-in/phase prism shenanigans. This might be an issue but they said it wasn't in-house. We'll see once the beta hits.
Banshee: Imagine the wraith. Now, reverse its anti-air and anti-ground damage. Balance problems much? Karune agrees that countering air harass may be a problem, but if there are issues in the beta, they'll be duly addressed.
That problems I adressed at WWI are still there and quite fundamental for gameplay. Missing scourges matter so much lol. It's crazy how important that unit is for Z. Harass/Drops are so hard to stop. Hope they find a way to deal with this.
Thank You for great article and answers my questions are:
1) To call down mules Comsat is needed, so if CC has been changed into Planetary Fortress there is now way it can call them down? How many mules can you call down? Do they arrive near CC or anywhere you wish?
2) In BR#3 I've seen multiple Queens. Is number of Queens limited in any way? Can all of them be evolved?
3) Do Overlors transport units in this build? If yes is it 8 max? How many units (Marines) Medivacs can carry?
4) Is Corruptor a morphed Muta or Larva? Do you remember its cost? Is it slower than Medivac and Raven?
5) Is Ghost's Snipe in? Are Ghosts made in Barracks ;P (I'm confused by tech trees), same goes for Reapers?
6) Can you tell how well Siege Tanks deal with Roaches and Stalkers (putting Immortals aside)? Are they stronger than in BW still?
I can't think of more questions now ;P, Thank You for answers
I was just looking at some of the unit costs, and then I remembered that you only get 5 minerals per trip ... Reports from past events indicate resource gathering feels roughly the same, however. But would you say that 200 minerals in SC feels about the same as 200 minerals in SC2? Anything to note about it?
Did you ever have a difficult time keeping your money down?
Did the yellow minerals actually feel like a significant boost in your income?
Did you find yourself hotkeying multiple unit groups, or did you keep them separated by the type of unit? (Air, ranged, ground etc.)
Did all the maps include the typical cliff surrounded mains, ramp into natural, etc.? Any with small wall choke points on ground level instead? How many maps were available to play?
Final question: did you feel the built-in latency that zatic mentions in his other thread from the mid-May build? Was it significant?
I feel sorry for you having to answer all these questions, but I can assure you many of us do appreciate it!
edit: couple more for you:
How was the team interface? Standard share units, resources like in War3? What were the 2v2 maps like - were there any "shared" bases or shared ramps or whatever? Would you say they're more like a 1v1 map with 4 players, or did it seem to be designed for 2v2?
I'm pretty sure this has been asked/answered before, but was there "friendly fire" from splash etc.? Banelings or Lurker spines killing your teammates units?
1) Correct. It costs energy so it's effectively limited to one at a time. Anywhere on the battlefield. 2) They cost two supply and money, but other than that no limit. 3) Yes, 8 slots. 4) Larvae -> Corruptor, muta. Corruptor -> broodlord. 5) Yes, yes, no (Merc haven thing whatever) 6) Weaker than BW but they can fight roaches and stalkers alright.
Regarding casters, the abilities on them are still changing - like they recently gave the Infestor plague but are probably going to take it off again; therefore I think it'd be rather speculatory for me to say anything.
I did say that ghost EMP is good, and that queen larvae are good; dunno what else to say on the matter -_-
Thank You for answers once again but I just want to be sure: by Siege Tank being weaker do you mean it has weaker stats (cost, HP, dmg) than BW one (I meant stats in my 2nd question about it ) or do you mean it's weaker because units it used to counter in BW changed?
I know it did 50 + 50 vs armored targets? By less you mean 50 without bonus I hope TT?
edit: talking about LAN: what about private servers like ICCUP? Does it even depend on Blizz's choice if private servers will be possible to be established?
EPT![[image loading]](https://tl.net/staff/LastRomantic/july09press/IMG_0045.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/FrozenArbiter/zerg_tech_tree_cropped_June_.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/FrozenArbiter/terran_tech_tree_cropped_Jun.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/FrozenArbiter/protoss_tech_tree_cropped_Ju.jpg)
![[image loading]](https://tl.net/staff/LastRomantic/july09press/IMG_0052.jpg)
![[image loading]](https://tl.net/staff/LastRomantic/july09press/IMG_0051.jpg)
