[A] Starbow - Page 258

On April 27 2013 09:50 SmileZerg wrote:
That's an odd way of thinking, in my opinion. I don't see a design problem at all with some units needing to achieve a certain quantity in order to become useful. That's how real war works. You don't send one soldier to accomplish a task that requires a battalion; you don't send one tank to secure a mountain pass. So, you don't send a single Mutalisk or Wraith to harass a defended mineral line. Needing multiple units to make an effective raiding squadron doesn't necessarily have relevance to dull gameplay. BW mutalisk micro is amazingly skill-intensive and extremely exciting to watch but it wouldn't work with just a couple of them, you need a stack.

On April 27 2013 17:33 Xiphias wrote:
I agree. Wraiths (the old ones) were a much bigger commitment because you needed two starports, time and have 2-3 hidden wraiths before you could do anything. One banshee is much less of a commitment. Comparing with mutalisk is silly since zerg production is much different from terran and protoss....

Would it be easier to play in the tournament if it was just one day 8 - player single elimination? Less commitment.

Sounds like what I've been saying since forever... Valkyrie <3 ... Minus the transforming part, of course *cough*

On April 27 2013 18:43 Xiphias wrote:
I have found some uses for the viking, but they are limited:
1. They are an excellent counter to Vipers when going bio Vs Zerg (zerg has pretty much no anti-air when fighting vs bio.
2. They are better at holding off crossairs that are trying to lift up tanks than goliaths.
3. Make one banshee + one viking vs zerg early game and you might get drones AND oevrlords.
4. They are pretty much the only solution vs a zerg player who are MASSING mutalisks for a long time.

I am not saying that this gives the viking a well-defined role, nor that it cannot be replaced, but it's good to keep in mind that they do have some uses atm, even though they are limited and can usually be replaced by other units without losing much effect.

On April 27 2013 19:04 Xiphias wrote:
I'm not too sure if incise of supply is the best way to go around nerfing certain units... I would rather see a unit that is more capable of dealing with mass mutalisk (which in itself is a risky build, because you will be vulnerable for a certain timing window, kinda like trying to go for carriers) like a buffed viking with splash from the start. Would be more expensive and only worth getting for certain scenarios.... not sure if its the right way to go thought.

On the other hand: I do not think vikings are # 1 priority of things that should be changed. I'd rather try to fix the ghost and introduce a nullifier first. The viking could then maybe find a role to counter the nullifier as well, and few fixes would be needed.
.

Lastly: We don't want to make any changes yet until we can churn out a good number of games and get some hard data on the table. This MOD has too much theory crafting and too little data imo.

On April 27 2013 18:43 Xiphias wrote:
I have found some uses for the viking, but they are limited:
1. They are an excellent counter to Vipers when going bio Vs Zerg (zerg has pretty much no anti-air when fighting vs bio.

On April 27 2013 17:25 Xiphias wrote:
Valkyrie ... ??? don't know what u'r talking about *cough*

Edit: Top of the page: JOIN THE TOURNAMENT!!!

http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=409742

Also, I was not able to play Thrusday and Friday. Any good games from those days? Please upload reps in the forum.

On April 28 2013 02:26 Xiphias wrote:
Most people play on EU server, so between 7-8 ish pm and 10-11 ish pm usually. I'll get online soon, hope so see some of you there!

On April 28 2013 15:07 SmileZerg wrote:
As long as this retains all the benefits of the current pathing triggers I'm interesting to see how it works out.

On April 28 2013 15:07 SmileZerg wrote:
As long as this retains all the benefits of the current pathing triggers I'm interesting to see how it works out.

I'm testing a modified version of the unit pathing. Hider you might appreciate this .

Small groups (roughly 12-18) of units will be able to travel in relatively compact groups, with a slight oval shape towards the move command.

Big groups turn into columns.

This retains the massive inefficiency using a deathball with 1A brought, while also still hurting auto surround.

Basic unit movement should be waaaaaay less hindered than before.

A very simple change.

And of course vultures will still be put in as exceptions to the pathing because of how they accelerate. This aspect of vulture micro annoys me. While BW vultures had to accelerate to get to speed, they didn't stop due to unit pathing (trying to avoid units in front of them, and diagonal movement).

Sidenote: For the record. Unit formation diameter was a big change Starbow used pretty much its entire life during WoL. During the transition, either it was put in and taken out, or never added to begin with. Unit formation is the size of the magic box. Increasing it means when you move your army they don't automatically turn into a clump. The best pathing right now in my opinion is default unit formation size, and Mavericks unit pathing triggers but tweaked to how I've got them in my test map. I might make a video showing the difference between every style of pathing if people are interested.

My solution (besides removal of cloack and higher DPS) is an incredible low build time; 20-30 seconds.
If that doesn't break anything (unintended consequences), then I believe the problem is fixed.

So you basically wanna give terran mutalisks (fast, weak alone, massable, versatile AtA and AtG)? Zerg can have unit like this cause of way his production works. His production gotta be spread for everything but can also be used to produce one type of unit, sacrificing all other stuff, and all of that requires only single tech buildings. Banshees are better for terran

On April 28 2013 21:43 decemberscalm wrote:
@Danko
What do you mean by delay?
Blizzard has built in latency for every command you make.
I'm testing in the editor with the current triggers and ther is no delay.
Perhaps the triggers slow the game down in a bigger match (more than standard blizz latency), this should be tested to confirm accuracy.

If that is the case data could be a much better solution.

As for the 12-13 units. There is no arbitrary split off number. It is simply how many units can fit inside the magic box comfterablly enough. Around 20 and a little bit more marines can fit inside comfortably enough, and therefore are only slightly hindered by pathing. When you group 30-50 marines in a single group they all want to be inside the magic box. This causes a lot more traffic collisions resulting into a konga line column towards your target.

@Wraith vs Banshee
A wraith with a buffed attack (not on par with banshee) that is more maneuverable and fun to use would be amazing. My concern as Danko noted is the ability to cloak combined with an air attack, even if its weak (observers from my experience are not very good at taking rockets to the face). I know someone has already suggested, too lazy to go find out who (pretty sure Johnny ^^), nerfed cloak.

A wraith could have a an attack that is somewhere between bw wraith and sc2 banshee so it is actually viable off 1 port, better manuverability, but a cloak that only works in 1 short lived burst.

You could use this cloak to get away. This would be a hell of a lot more interesting than the "banshee in base, no detection, mineral line dead" effect that goes on.
Or we could just make that the banshee, since historically the banshee is the unit that is good at harassing ground units. It would just have an added weak air attack.