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Excellent! I'll try this + Show Spoiler +as soon as I get Heart of the Swarm
I like the idea (at least) of PFs only being able to use the strong defensive ability only so often, but perhaps give them a toned down version for other times? The cooldown ability could simply augment the existing (in this future?) basic weapon to deal splash damage and perhaps a larger amount of damage. Maybe the normal one could one-shot zerglings and the augmented one, like in WoL and HotS, could one-shot groups in an area, that simple sort of improvement.
Do the new Guardians still have around ~1.61 movement, 12 (it seems you changed it to 10) range and spawn broodlings on target death or do they function even more like plain Brood War guardians now? (I personally like the former concept the most)
How do you feel about income? I know you say you just changed the rate of income, but talking about proportions, even when expanding quite quickly, I feel like I have too much gas and not enough minerals as a zerg.
Also, I just noticed that in the WoL version at least, the Infested Creep ability doesn't show up on Overlords once researched, but it would be nice if it did. 
Maybe it's fine again in HotS with speeds restored to normal rates, but I feel like Infestors, with a Fungal Growth that doesn't deal damage (which I like) probably should move just a bit faster again? That's just how it feels to me. Not even necessarily 2.5 but over the normal 2.25, I thought. Just my feeling based on using them with ling(or speed hydra)+lurker. It's fine for them to be nowhere near as fast but it feels hard to make use of their fungal or plague.
Banshees only have 4 range now. That's from something to do with playing against other terrans, or protoss? Is it too powerful in the early TvT game, as some people have stated previously, even if it's not much different from SC2 that way?
Oh, I was completely forgetting to mention it, but all the enemy SCVs are bright pink, apart from the blue lights from the boosters on their backs. Graphic glitch fixed in HotS patch?
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Additional explanations regarding the patch
@Terran
I wanted to achieve three things with Terran:
- Give them earlier map presence
- Make bio units more useful in all match ups.
- Make bio + mech combinations more useful in all match ups.
Reapers offer earlier map presence and harassment options. By giving them spider mines, bio suddenly got something extremely useful in every match up.
Hellions replaced Vultures since the splash attacks encourages enemy units to split up.
Hellbats is the new Firebat.
Since Medics can heal Hellbats, bio units, and use Matrix on any unit, I hope that mech + bio compositions will be more viable, which hopefully leads to more dynamic strategies, unit compositions, build orders etc for Terran. (Compared to only pure bio or pure mech)
@PF
The normal version of PF shuts down harassment so well in Starbow. I want to encourage harassment and smaller engagements. A PF would completely nullify that. Now when it has a timed attack, more dynamic scenarios may arise: the enemy can lure or bait the opponent to use the PF, Terran must decide when to use it etc.
As you point out, I don´t want the PF to be a worthless investment. So it must still give value for the money invested in it. Hopefully this can be archieved via balance. Currently, the PF has the same stats as in SC2.
@Guardians & Devourer
Guardians are cheaper, weaker and faster now, compared to the clumpsy Brood lords. Broodlings spawned by brood lords have always been so annoying, especially since it messes so hard with unit AI. Reavers vs lategame zerg armies keep shooting at the broodlings. I don´t like when the AI takes away control of players units. (Same thing with Carriers interceptors) I have tried different changes on the BL, to minimize the "annoying" parts of broodlings, but I never felt satisified. So I instead took a step backwards and decided to include the more simple Guardians, which basically functions as in SC1.
I had already turned Corruptors into Devourers - splash damage, high HP etc. This is mostly a replacement of the model, since the new Devourer model looks soooo good ^^
@Income
The income now is the same as in the last patch, just that I removed the ca 12% slowdown that was built into it. So players will generate faster income. Not sure how well it will work.
+ Show Spoiler +
I would prefer if bases were easier to grab, required fewer workers, gave less income, since that together would create a gameplay where both players becomes strecthed out early.. each one gets an "empire" across the map, and not just two-three heavily centralized areas where the income is gathered.. It would probably encourage harassment, attacks at multiple locations, make area control more important and so on.. But I do not know how to achieve this, and maybe it would change the game too much. But all of you have already heard this talk so much from me :p
@Short attack range of units
I still stay with the concept of having short attack range on units. This is mainly to make ranged units not as good when clumped up in deathballs. (Since not everyone can shoot over their comrades.) Most ranged units in the game have decreased range, so even the banshee. (I do consider to add a range upgrade to the banshee though, to make it even better as a harasser and combat unit, later in the game.)
@Pink SCV
O_o
Can you upload a screenshot?
I will get the patch uploaded later today, maybe 6-8 hours from now, when I get home.
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I noticed that after being hit by tanks (but only sometimes??) lurkers can lock up and stop attacking and during this period, they have the status label "passive". Is this a new (for me, anyway) feature/change, a glitch or something accidentally applied to siege tanks when changing other settings? The 'Passive' label appeared for all remaining lurkers when this happening.
EDIT: Ahhh, I just noticed that ability, basically Hold Fire, you did put it in, only I didn't notice the button and obviously pressed the hotkey ('F" for me it seems, when trying to hit H for Hold or R for burrow, something like that).
Pink SCVs, Passive Lurkers and floating money in Starbow
I just realised though, that with marines having 45 hit points again (from 40) and Combat Shields available, Lurkers can no longer 2-shot marines no matter how many missile upgrades they get (once marines have Combat Shields). :"(
I agree about Broodlings from hits but I liked the Broodlings from deaths. Did you find people were using Brood Lords enough so that masses of broodlings were coming out of things? I can only really imagine seeing and experiencing more coming from buildings and even they didn't cause all that many broodlings to spawn considering how rare it was to be able to siege a base with enough Brood Lords for long enough so that many broodlings would pop out, let alone have that be useful (such as have the broodlings pop out of a nexus right as protoss forces arrived).
I agree about expansion and just wondered if going back to 8 minerals per return would be better than 7, but I'm just one person.
I agree about spreading out, but I found that trying to saturate all the bases with enough workers (which is a large number again now that they don't gather quite as quickly AND there are more minerals in the mains, or at least on Blue Storm) cost a lot of minerals with all the drones, macro hatcheries, queen here and there and I'm not sure if all zerg tech paths are appropriately gas heavy. I think I'd just make Swarm Guardians* cost more than 100 gas.
*one of the reasons it was good to have BLs/Guardians called Brood Lords rather than Guardians
Do you think maybe Hatcheries (and quite possibly Nexu§ and CCs) should cost 50 less minerals with this expansionist play? Maybe that would be too much, but it's just a thought.
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@8 minerals
Well, that is the 12-15% increament I am talking about ^^ It is now 8 minerals per trip instead of 7.
@expansions mineral cost
I experimented with this some weeks ago:
- cheaper main bases by 100 minerals
- faster BT on workers so bases are saturated faster
- lower income from each base
I tried vs computer. I had to expand a lot to obtain a good income. So far so good.
The downsides:
- people are used to 400 and 300 mineral main bases since it is such a classic value in Starcraft.
- this effects many other parts of the races and would require a lot of rebalance
But maybe it is worth a try to see how it works with human players. Who knows.
The patch will be up in ca 3 hours from now
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All right. Kabel, you think you to publish my maps with future patches? I can remove them, so you decide when to change my maps with the new. My maps were published in "unlocked" so that anyone can take advantage them. Give me an answer.
Even if they are not very present, I look at the forum on a daily basis.
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Send me your maps so I can publish them with the new patch!
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I thought of cheaper baseas as well. Would be interesting (once you have time) to just make a testmap with it and see how it works out.
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I might aswell try it right now with the patch. It is such an easy change and if it does not work I can just revert it. I will probably need to get another patch up within the next few days anyway. (Since there is always something I have missed.)
I got curious now when I started to think about it again.
Two problems though:
- It is a change that will take long time before players get used to?
- What kind of negative side effects will this have?
If I go with this:
- cheaper main bases by 100 minerals
- faster BT on workers so bases are saturated faster
- lower income from each base
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Btw hatcheres shouldn't receive the same reduction as nexu's/CC' (rather make it in terms of percentages). And then you also need to reduce larva spawn on hatcheres efficiency to reduce sideeffect. Anyway, I guess I would have prefered just 50 mins cheaper cc/nexus and 25 minerals cheaper hatcheres, which will be rleatively less drastic, but make it a bit easier to take new bases.
Btw why couldn't you get nulifier to work
And does scourge not do aoe to nearby ground units?
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50 minerals reduction would barely make any difference?
Well, I could get the Nullifier to work. But I found no line up of spells that felt good enough.
Scourge works as normal. It might get AoE in the future, but atm I did not have time to solve it properly, since it caused some problems for me.
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On April 05 2013 23:21 Kabel wrote:
50 minerals reduction would barely make any difference?
Well, I could get the Nullifier to work. But I found no line up of spells that felt good enough.
Scourge works as normal. It might get AoE in the future, but atm I did not have time to solve it properly, since it caused some problems for me.
Yeh but in order to not really have any sideeffect the change must be relatively small (as zergs maybe will have too much larva).
What about the vertical line ability + trap thing. Why didn't it work?
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Vertical-attack-line-ability destroyed mineral lines.
Trap ability had no good model and felt too much like spider mines.
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On April 05 2013 23:27 Kabel wrote:
Vertical-attack-line-ability destroyed mineral lines.
Trap ability had no good model and felt too much like spider mines.
Regarding the vertical line attack. How much time did it take from the start of the attack to the attack ended? What did you experiment with?
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On April 05 2013 23:17 Hider wrote:
Btw hatcheres shouldn't receive the same reduction as nexu's/CC' (rather make it in terms of percentages). And then you also need to reduce larva spawn on hatcheres efficiency to reduce sideeffect. Anyway, I guess I would have prefered just 50 mins cheaper cc/nexus and 25 minerals cheaper hatcheres, which will be rleatively less drastic, but make it a bit easier to take new bases.
Oi, you can't give CCs and Nexu§~ a greater reduction in price than hatcheries! :Þ
Zerg need them for production of everything...well, at least to me that says they should get the same reduction, not less (if either get any).
Why would scourge get splash against ground? With banshees only having 4 range, they will be even closer to mineral lines when harassing and have even less hope of getting away from scourge. What makes people say scourge need to splash? (and why to ground? :S)
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On April 05 2013 23:10 Kabel wrote:
I might aswell try it right now with the patch. It is such an easy change and if it does not work I can just revert it. I will probably need to get another patch up within the next few days anyway. (Since there is always something I have missed.)
I got curious now when I started to think about it again.
Two problems though:
- It is a change that will take long time before players get used to?
- What kind of negative side effects will this have?
If I go with this:
- cheaper main bases by 100 minerals
- faster BT on workers so bases are saturated faster
- lower income from each base
Please only 50 min for nexus/cc and 25 for hatch as a start. I know it's not drastic, but it will have an impact. No need for the two others changes I think atm.
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On April 05 2013 23:34 Fuchsteufelswild wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2013 23:17 Hider wrote:
Btw hatcheres shouldn't receive the same reduction as nexu's/CC' (rather make it in terms of percentages). And then you also need to reduce larva spawn on hatcheres efficiency to reduce sideeffect. Anyway, I guess I would have prefered just 50 mins cheaper cc/nexus and 25 minerals cheaper hatcheres, which will be rleatively less drastic, but make it a bit easier to take new bases.
Oi, you can't give CCs and Nexu§~ a greater reduction in price than hatcheries! :Þ Zerg need them for production of everything...well, at least to me that says they should get the same reduction, not less (if either get any). Why would scourge get splash against ground? With banshees only having 4 range, they will be even closer to mineral lines when harassing and have even less hope of getting away from scourge. What makes people say scourge need to splash? (and why to ground? :S)
Its too easy too use irradiate vs zerg IMO.
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@Hider
I never created the ability. I am not skilled enough to do it. I usually ask XiA to create advanced abilities for Starbow. I did not want to bother him with a concept that only maybe would be used in the game. Instead I "experemented" with pen and paper. Looked at what kind of situations it would be useful in, what players potentially could use it to do. The concept of having a quite early game flying unit that can launch an AoE-attack inside the enemy players mineral line, even before Reavers are out, felt like a broken concept.
Now, of course there are ways to overcome this. But since I am so limited on time, I put it on the bottom of my "to-do-list" for the patch. I prioritized a lot of other things, since I rebuilt everything from scratch. I decided to get the patch up now, despite that everything is not complete. Otherwise we will have to wait even more weeks : /
@Scourge
Long ago I mentioned some potential changes to units that would encourage players to split their units, flank, and not move in deathballs. One idea was to remake Scourge to do splash damage. Another idea was to also make their splash damage affect ground units below an air unit that explodes! In this way, Scourge can punish Terran that clump Vessels + Marines into a blob. But this idea never got to life.
@Reduce main base cost
50 and 25 mineral reducution feels so obsolete. And it is such an ugly number on main bases: Nexus 350 minerals, CC 350 minerals, Hatchery 275 minerals. How would this small reduction improve the gameplay?
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Please only 50 min for nexus/cc and 25 for hatch as a start. I know it's not drastic, but it will have an impact. No need for the two others changes I think atm.
This. Lets just test this and see how it works out. I guess queens may need to a minimal spawn larva efficiency compensation in order for zerg players to not be better off building hatcheries rather than queens.
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I think the Nullifier can work. But it obiviously requires a lot of tweaking and testing. To make it less efficient vs workers you could tweak stuff such as;
- Duration of attack animation.
- Slight setup time before attack begins.
- Put damage below 40 so it doesn't one shot workers.
- Make it a ground unit instead of air.
- Compensate any nerfs by reducing cooldown of the ability/bufifng HP of the nullifier etc.
I think the trap thing can work very different from spider mines. For instance my Trap suggestion would make it have a very different role than spider mines. Spider mines you typically have in front of your army in defensive positions in order to absorb damage/win time to protect your tanks.
My suggested trap differed in two ways; Large radius and you can activiate it anytime you want to. This makes it much more usefull to have out in the middle of the map rather than just in front of your army.
Im interested though, what were your reasoning for not choosing my trap idea? Which flaws did you see in it?
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One hour remaining to publish!
I fix the maps now!
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EPT
