EPT[A] Starbow - Page 291
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saddaromma
1129 Posts
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Hider
Denmark9407 Posts
I don't think a huge redesign is necessary. I think they can be differentiated just by balance changes. For example, Banelings can become faster, or Lurkers become slower, so there is a more clear speed difference between them. I think the problem with increasing the movement speed of banelings is that it will be a huge battle-buff rather than just a mobility buff. The best approach I have been able to think of is to give the banelings two modes. Mode 1: Movement speed increased by 25% but not damage taken is increased by 75% Mode 2: The normal mode. The zerg player can instantly switch between these 2 modes with no cost or upgrade requirement. My intention is that good zerg players will use mode 1 when not in a battle and switch to mode 2 just before they engage. It is also possible to use mode 1 against a player who isn't target firing the banelings. Lurker: Movement speed decreased by 0.25, but HP is increased by 40. This will make it stronger as a positonal unit as the opponent can't attack a couple of well postioned lurkers as easily as before. Hydras should definitely get a buff if zealots does. Zealots are surprisingly cost effective vs Hydras atm, even if the hydralisks are decently microed. Speedlots also comes at the same time, or even earlier than hydra speed, so speed hydras are usually an advantage that is short lived. We just have to carefull not to make the hydras so good that they can deal with bio. We don't want them to be the "stalkers" of zerg (see what I did there? ) But I agree on giving zealot the tanky role and weaken stalkers slightly. Yes they should. I wonder if it would be broken to just let them start with the movement speed upgrade from the start of the game? | ||
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Xiphias
Norway2223 Posts
On June 05 2013 05:18 Hider wrote: Lurker: Movement speed decreased by 0.25, but HP is increased by 40. This will make it stronger as a positonal unit as the opponent can't attack a couple of well postioned lurkers as easily as before. +1 for that one. Lurkers feel weaker in Starbow than they did in Brood War, especially vs Protoss. And if zealots get a buff.... well... lurkers are suppose to counter zealots. I don't mind losing some mobility for the lurkers. | ||
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decemberscalm
United States1353 Posts
Used as just pure combat units they make for really short lived battles compared to lurkers. | ||
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Hider
Denmark9407 Posts
On June 05 2013 06:21 decemberscalm wrote: I like that SBOW banes are currently better for defensive play on creep. Used as just pure combat units they make for really short lived battles compared to lurkers. But why even have banelings at all then? Why not just go with pure lurkers if they accomplish the same thing. | ||
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Izerman
Sweden99 Posts
On June 05 2013 05:18 Hider wrote: @Stalker/zealot: Yes I guess your suggestions could work Kabel. I think the problem with increasing the movement speed of banelings is that it will be a huge battle-buff rather than just a mobility buff. The best approach I have been able to think of is to give the banelings two modes. Mode 1: Movement speed increased by 25% but not damage taken is increased by 75% Mode 2: The normal mode. The zerg player can instantly switch between these 2 modes with no cost or upgrade requirement. My intention is that good zerg players will use mode 1 when not in a battle and switch to mode 2 just before they engage. It is also possible to use mode 1 against a player who isn't target firing the banelings. Lurker: Movement speed decreased by 0.25, but HP is increased by 40. This will make it stronger as a positonal unit as the opponent can't attack a couple of well postioned lurkers as easily as before. Yes they should. I wonder if it would be broken to just let them start with the movement speed upgrade from the start of the game? Oh god... this is just getting silly.. | ||
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SmileZerg
United States543 Posts
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decemberscalm
United States1353 Posts
On June 05 2013 14:19 SmileZerg wrote: Again, let me reiterate - if the problem is that Banes are overshadowing Lurkers, that is an issue. If Lurkers are overshadowing Banes, that's fine. They still have a place in ZvZ and enable certain cheeses and timing attacks in the other match-ups that would otherwise be impossible. Baneling busts are possible as well that lurkers simply cannot do. | ||
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SmileZerg
United States543 Posts
On June 05 2013 14:51 decemberscalm wrote: Baneling busts are possible as well that lurkers simply cannot do. Exactly, that's what I meant by certain cheeses, although Bane busts can also be used as part of legitimate backstab attacks in the mid-game too. | ||
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Hider
Denmark9407 Posts
On June 05 2013 14:19 SmileZerg wrote: Again, let me reiterate - if the problem is that Banes are overshadowing Lurkers, that is an issue. If Lurkers are overshadowing Banes, that's fine. They still have a place in ZvZ and enable certain cheeses and timing attacks in the other match-ups that would otherwise be impossible. Yes I understand that is a fine argument. But I just don't think its enough. For instance I suggested a hypothetical unit that should be implemented into starbow which only had utility in the first 10 minutes of one matchup, would that be enough for you? Wouldn't you conclude one of two things; 1) I don't like the way it changes in that specific matchup and therefore it's a terrible suggestion or 2) I like how it changes that matchup, but lets try to further improve upon the idea to increase its overall utility. What I am suggesting is the latter. I want to keep the zvz baneling wars, but further differentiate it from the lurker in other ways. What I want is that the opponent should react quite differently depending on whether you go lurkers or banelings (I will descrive what I mean a bit more in deal later on). Baneling busts are possible as well that lurkers simply cannot do. I briefly "covered" that argument it in one of my previous post. But I simply have to ask; Is that really your argument for why we shouldn't refine the baneling (because it can be used in allins)? Why not further try to refine the idea of having a more mobile map control type of unit in the baneling, and a slower positional but stronger unit in the lurker? | ||
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Hider
Denmark9407 Posts
I have for a long time wanted to write a post discussing how we can make the game even more awesome and fun to play and watch. However, while I always feel like I have understood some of the ingredients required in awesome games, I didn't really feel like I properly understood the whole package. But after having thought about gamedynamic/design on a daily basis for a couple of months, I think I have obtained a decent knowledge of the various factors which determine how players play during a matchup. Therefore I have written a quite lenghty post where I discuss the neccesary factors, relate them to Starbow and come up with suggestions and how we can improve Starbow. To limit myself, this post will only focus on the TvZ matchup. Characteristics of a fun/awesome game. + Show Spoiler + Let me first try try to present the elements I want to see in a matchup. 1) A very action- and multitaskpacked game where Tasteless wouldn't have time to talk about his favourite pokemon (which implies that there is also action early in the game). 2) A game where different types of strategies for each race are viable (players can opt between offensive and defensive strategies) 3) A dynamic matchup where both races have viable options to pressure/attack/harass the opponent. It shouldn't just be a one-way thing. So how do we create such a matchup + Show Spoiler + There are two overall types of ways this can be done; Approach 1: Overbuff harass-units which will make it efficient to harass the opponent rather than attacking with your deathball. Approach 2: This approach has two steps. The first is to create the right incentive. To understand the importance of incentive we can look at the TvZ HOTS matchup. IMO this matchup is probably the most actionpacked matchup in any RTS ever developed (ok, I am talking just sc2, starbow and BW. I have no clue about other games). While this mathcup isn't particularly dynamic as zerg for the majority of the game can't really attack/pressure the terran player in any non-allinsh'h way. But lets ignore that for now, and just focus on understanding why it is so actionpacked... Based on my observartions and play, the terran player has such a strong incentivie to army trade and harass the opponent for three reasons; 1) His 200/200 army is worse than the muta/bling 200 food army as widow mines (while cost effective) are supply ineffective. This means that he doesn't want the zerg to ever be maxed (especially not with a bank). 2) While bio + mines can trade somwhat evenly with muta/bling, they are quite cost ineffective vs infestor + ultra's, which creates a "clock" on the bio player. Basically he needs to be at an advantageous position when zerg has tier 3 units out. 3) Trading armies generally favor the more mobile army, and in this case the bio/mine/medivac army is actually more mobile than the bling/muta army (+infestor/ultra) army. The intuition behind this logic is that it is easier for the more mobile army to harass a 4base 130 food zerg army thats static defenses than a 180 food zerg army with lots of static defenses. The combinations of the above 3 factors, results in giving the terran player a really strong incentive to trade armies with the zerg player. However, in it self these 3 factors doesn't imply that he can do it. In WOL for instance you could argue that the terran player had the a similar incentive vs broodlord/infestor. However, they simply couldn't harass/trade armies efficiently back then, so this means that the second requirement in approach 2 is to give the players the tools to "follow their incentive". The main difference between approach 1 and 2, is that in approach 1 the harass/army-trading needs to be costeffective while it just needs to be efficient in Approach 2. For instance, if you have a much better economy it can be efficient to trade armies at a 70% cost efficiency. Why this is relevant for the lurker/baneling debate + Show Spoiler + This is highly relevant because we need to think about how the matchup will work depending on how we change the units. But lets first look at how TvZ in Starbow currently works. - Does it use Approach 1? Reapers and banshee's I think are examples of "overpowered" cost-efficient harass units. However, I don't 2 units are enough to give it the "Approach1-effect". - What about approach 2: One could argue that the zerg player has a strong incentive to army-trade vs the mech'ing player. But are his tools really that strong?, and does the zerg player really have a strong enough economy to make costineffective armytrading efficient? I am not convinced thereof. What about when the terran goes bio; Who is the more mobile in muta/bling vs bio? I would argue that the muta-bling player is a bit more mobile as the zerg player (unlike in BW) can get a lot more than 12 mutalisks which makes it quite hard for the terran player to move out. Thus in theory the bio player shouldn't be interested in army trading vs that composition and instead try to become more cost effective by mixing in tanks and SV's. The clock will be on the zerg player here as he needs to do damage before the terran gets a critical mass of tanks and vikings to deal with mutas (or w/e unit Kabel will come up with). However, the problem in Starbow (unlike in in WOL anno 2011 where the tank/marine vs muta/bling was really dynamic and interesting) is that the zerg player going muta/bling simply doesn't have a stronger economy than the terran player. So he can't really army trade efficiently. Thus he needs to play a bit carefully and look for cost effective engagements when/if the terran player is caught of guard. This isn't easy as bio is still quite mobile. So to sum up; The problem is that muta/bling and biological heavy units are too similar in terms of their strenghts and disadvantages. What about when the zerg player uses lurker instead of banelings? Isn't it the exact same thing? The bio player still needs to play somewhat defensively and tech to tanks and SV's. His best-response is the exact same thing as when he plays vs banelings, and I don't think that is particularly good game design. My suggestions + Show Spoiler + I think it should be clear by now that the TvZ Starbow matchup isn't working optimal. While it isn't terrible by any means, Approach 2 could be improved upon by quite a lot by giving the players the tools and the incentive to create a more actionpacked game. Suggestion 1: Further increase the mobility of muta/bling to improve its tools. Also consider reducing the efficiency of his 200/200 food army by increasing baneling supply from 0.5 to 1 as this will put a clock on the zerg player. Suggestion 2: Reduce mobility but increase cost efficiency of the lurker to make the terran bio player more mobile than the zerg if he opts for Lurkers. Suggestion 3: The counter to lurkers shouldn't just be based on the pure quantity of Scicence vessels as that will remove the "clock-effect" of bio. Make irradiate a soft-counter to Lurkers instead of a hard-counter. But even with these 3 suggestions, the matchup won't work properly as the zerg player still won't have a strong enough economy to make a cost-ineffective trade efficient with muta/bling. Again, this wasn't a problem in BW as the zerg (when going mutas) wasn't as mobile due to the unit selection max. And, as should be clear by now, the mobile race needs a significantly stronger economy than the immobile race. And in the end I don't see that I can do anything else, but conclude that the Starbow zerg economy doesn't work. In order to create the correct incentives, the zerg player needs to have at least +10 worker lead advantage while going muta-bling. I don't see the any other potential solution than; Suggestion 4: Buff larva-generation efficiency of the zerg economy. Suggestion 5: Reduce cost efficiency of speedlings (this is a neccesary change if suggestion 4 goes through). Obviously this will probably be an unpopular suggestion in this forum, because some people like BW over Sc2, and in BW you would do XX with zerg. However, if you respond to this suggestion, please look at this logically rather than basing your arguments on nostalgia Thanks in advance. | ||
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isaachukfan
Canada785 Posts
1) His 200/200 army is worse than the muta/bling 200 food army as widow mines (while cost effective) are supply ineffective. This means that he doesn't want the zerg to ever be maxed (especially not with a bank). 2) While bio + mines can trade somwhat evenly with muta/bling, they are quite cost ineffective vs infestor + ultra's, which creates a "clock" on the bio player. Basically he needs to be at an advantageous position when zerg has tier 3 units out. 3) Trading armies generally favor the more mobile army, and in this case the bio/mine/medivac army is actually more mobile than the bling/muta army (+infestor/ultra) army. The intuition behind this logic, is it is easier for the more mobile army to harass a 130 food zerg army that is on 4 bases without any static defenses than a 180 food zerg army with lots of static defense. There is a good theme between these points, but I think there is more to them than just these three points. All of these points were also true with WOL PvZ (Protoss player had a clock before infestor brood lord, Protss 200/200 was less effective, trading favoured protoss in general) I;m not saying the points are wrong, simply that they are not just a be all end all. | ||
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Hider
Denmark9407 Posts
On June 05 2013 20:25 isaachukfan wrote: There is a good theme between these points, but I think there is more to them than just these three points. All of these points were also true with WOL PvZ (Protoss player had a clock before infestor brood lord, Protss 200/200 was less effective, trading favoured protoss in general) I;m not saying the points are wrong, simply that they are not just a be all end all. Your absolutely right, but I suspect you didn't read my whole post. Below is a quote from my post: The combinations of the above 3 factors, results in giving the terran player a really strong incentive to trade armies with the zerg player. However, in it self these 3 factors doesn't imply that he can do it. In WOL for instance you could argue that the terran player had the a similar incentive vs broodlord/infestor. However, they simply couldn't harass/trade armies efficiently back then, so this means that the second requirement in approach 2 is to give the players the tools to "follow their incentive So there are two requirements for Approach 2: 1) The incentive. 2) The tools. Neither terran nor protoss really had the tools in Wol. The main reason why WOL was so fucked up was that both the terran and protoss army were less mobile than the zerg army, and it doesn't make sense at all to give them a "clock". It should be the mobile army army which has a "clock" running against it. | ||
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Hider
Denmark9407 Posts
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SmileZerg
United States543 Posts
On June 05 2013 18:51 Hider wrote: Yes I understand that is a fine argument. But I just don't think its enough. For instance I suggested a hypothetical unit that should be implemented into starbow which only had utility in the first 10 minutes of one matchup, would that be enough for you? Wouldn't you conclude one of two things; 1) I don't like the way it changes in that specific matchup and therefore it's a terrible suggestion or 2) I like how it changes that matchup, but lets try to further improve upon the idea to increase its overall utility. What I am suggesting is the latter. I want to keep the zvz baneling wars, but further differentiate it from the lurker in other ways. What I want is that the opponent should react quite differently depending on whether you go lurkers or banelings (I will descrive what I mean a bit more in deal later on). I briefly "covered" that argument it in one of my previous post. But I simply have to ask; Is that really your argument for why we shouldn't refine the baneling (because it can be used in allins)? Why not further try to refine the idea of having a more mobile map control type of unit in the baneling, and a slower positional but stronger unit in the lurker? Because Lurkers are not slow. Zerg as a race, with a few exceptions, is not slow. You cannot simply change a units identity. Lurkers should be just as much about map control as lings and speed hydras, because they always have been. Banelings, besides their extreme necessity for the dynamics of ZvZ, should be more about surprise attacks - burrow them as mines, drop them from Overlords, hide a few lings in the corner of a base during a runby and morph a couple to sneak into the mineral line a minute later, knock down a wall when your opponent doesn't expect it and flood him for a counter attack. These are things Lurkers aren't as effective at. If there is one way that we could differentiate these units further, I would say give Lurkers bonus damage vs Armored units so they can better fight Firebats/Stalkers, which is something that Banelings absolutely cannot do at the current time. Edit: Also, don't forget how quickly and easily Zerg can make tech switches compared to the other races. If you want the opponent to have to react completely differently to their two main AoE options, you might be giving them too much of an advantage, assuming we could find a way to make that happen. | ||
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Xiphias
Norway2223 Posts
HP reduction will not matter vs zealots but it will matter vs marines, who now can more easily pick them off. If they don't, however, they will now one-shot marines. They were still only good vs zealots if you managed to get the baneling to detonate within a group of zealots instead of a-moving them. It was not too hard, but required some micro, which is always nice. We ended up not including them since zerg was doing OK vs zealots anyway. If zealots do get a buff to be more tanky vs bio and compensate for a loss of HP in stalkers, then hydras and lurkers should get a buff as well. (And maybe slow down lurkers slightly. I know you want them to be fast smileZerg, but lurkers are faster than banelings with speed atm which seems odd... (3 (lurkers) Vs 2.6 ish (banelings with speed))) <--- Dat parantacies... If Zealots are still too good vs zerg then this baneling change banelings could be the new answer, giving them a slightly redefined role. This would also make them more fragile vs terran, but more deadly when they land, opening more effective harass as well. | ||
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SmileZerg
United States543 Posts
On June 05 2013 19:50 Hider wrote: My suggestions I think it should be clear by now that the TvZ Starbow matchup isn't working optimal. While it isn't terrible by any means, Approach 2 could be improved upon by quite a lot by giving the players the tools and the incentive to create a more actionpacked game. Suggestion 1: Further increase the mobility of muta/bling to improve its tools. Also consider reducing the efficiency of his 200/200 food army by increasing baneling supply from 0.5 to 1 as this will put a clock on the zerg player. Suggestion 2: Reduce mobility but increase cost efficiency of the lurker to make the terran bio player more mobile than the zerg if he opts for Lurkers. Suggestion 3: The counter to lurkers shouldn't just be based on the pure quantity of Scicence vessels as that will remove the "clock-effect" of bio. Make irradiate a soft-counter to Lurkers instead of a hard-counter. But even with these 3 suggestions, the matchup won't work properly as the zerg player still won't have a strong enough economy to make a cost-ineffective trade efficient with muta/bling. Again, this wasn't a problem in BW as the zerg (when going mutas) wasn't as mobile due to the unit selection max. And, as should be clear by now, the mobile race needs a significantly stronger economy than the immobile race. And in the end I don't see that I can do anything else, but conclude that the Starbow zerg economy doesn't work. In order to create the correct incentives, the zerg player needs to have at least +10 worker lead advantage while going muta-bling. I don't see the any other potential solution than; Suggestion 4: Buff larva-generation efficiency of the zerg economy. Suggestion 5: Reduce cost efficiency of speedlings (this is a neccesary change if suggestion 4 goes through). Obviously this will probably be an unpopular suggestion in this forum, because some people like BW over Sc2, and in BW you would do XX with zerg. However, if you respond to this suggestion, please look at this logically rather than basing your arguments on nostalgia Thanks in advance. Suggestion 1: Increasing Zerg mobility fits within the theme of the race, if this would also improve gameplay I can get behind it. I am not fond of upping supply counts on Zerg units, but as the Baneling is a suicide unit it might be a good exception to make. Keep in mind though, that maxed out army counts are rarely supposed to ever happen in Starbow. Maxing is not a good thing and no one should be aiming to do it, because that implies they aren't losing forces and therefore aren't engaged in some sort of action. BW very rarely saw 200/200 armies. SC2 does all the time because of Deathball Syndrome and a bad economic model. Suggestion 2: Lurkers should stay mobile. The gas cost however should prohibit them from being used alongside a muta composition, which plays entirely differently due to being air heavy. Suggestion 3: I definitely think the efficiency of Sci Vessels is just too damn good right now. They are easily the best caster unit in Starbow. It also makes burrow-centric tactics like sneaky Infestor use, Baneling mines and tunneling Zerglings kind of obsolete because they are so standard in every TvZ match - compare that to how rarely Ravens are seen. While we don't want SVs to become that scarce by any means, there needs to be some sort of additional limiting factor to them. I would look into increasing the build time, gas cost or both. Suggestion 4: If the Zerg economy is really a problem right now, this is the very first place we should be looking. However, it is an EXTREMELY finicky area to mess with - a slight tweak to larvae could have massive unintended consequences. We would have to be very slow and careful about adjustments there. Suggestion 5: Probably unnecessary as long as the appropriate counters exist. Banelings, Firebats and Zealots should all continue to do fine against Speedlings. Just wanted to give my input on this, despite the fact that we should probably wait to discuss the dynamics of entire match-ups until after Kabel's huge patch goes live. | ||
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SmileZerg
United States543 Posts
On June 06 2013 02:41 Xiphias wrote: Just throwing another thing out here in regard to this discussion. A few patches ago me and Dec were adressing the "are zealots too good vs lings" issue. We experimented with a baneling that had only 20 hp (it has 30 now) but did 50-55 dmg instead. This way it would 3-shot zealots, instead of 4 (not when they get a buff I think). HP reduction will not matter vs zealots but it will matter vs marines, who now can more easily pick them off. If they don't, however, they will now one-shot marines. They were still only good vs zealots if you managed to get the baneling to detonate within a group of zealots instead of a-moving them. It was not too hard, but required some micro, which is always nice. We ended up not including them since zerg was doing OK vs zealots anyway. If zealots do get a buff to be more tanky vs bio and compensate for a loss of HP in stalkers, then hydras and lurkers should get a buff as well. (And maybe slow down lurkers slightly. I know you want them to be fast smileZerg, but lurkers are faster than banelings with speed atm which seems odd... (3 (lurkers) Vs 2.6 ish (banelings with speed))) <--- Dat parantacies... If Zealots are still too good vs zerg then this baneling change banelings could be the new answer, giving them a slightly redefined role. This would also make them more fragile vs terran, but more deadly when they land, opening more effective harass as well. Quick response on the speed thing: Lurkers are faster than rolling Banelings, but they can't attack until they burrow. This creates a different dynamic than a slower unit that deals damage instantly upon connecting at melee range. I don't think it's a problem. If anything, we should just be buffing the speed upgrade for blings, since they are so much slower in Starbow than SC2. In regards to the overall suggestion of lower HP, high damage blings: I like it. This would lessen Banelings effectiveness as a straight-up combat unit and further incentivize using them as surprise strike units. | ||
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Hider
Denmark9407 Posts
On June 06 2013 02:52 SmileZerg wrote: Suggestion 1: Increasing Zerg mobility fits within the theme of the race, if this would also improve gameplay I can get behind it. I am not fond of upping supply counts on Zerg units, but as the Baneling is a suicide unit it might be a good exception to make. Keep in mind though, that maxed out army counts are rarely supposed to ever happen in Starbow. Maxing is not a good thing and no one should be aiming to do it, because that implies they aren't losing forces and therefore aren't engaged in some sort of action. BW very rarely saw 200/200 armies. SC2 does all the time because of Deathball Syndrome and a bad economic model. Suggestion 2: Lurkers should stay mobile. The gas cost however should prohibit them from being used alongside a muta composition, which plays entirely differently due to being air heavy. Suggestion 3: I definitely think the efficiency of Sci Vessels is just too damn good right now. They are easily the best caster unit in Starbow. It also makes burrow-centric tactics like sneaky Infestor use, Baneling mines and tunneling Zerglings kind of obsolete because they are so standard in every TvZ match - compare that to how rarely Ravens are seen. While we don't want SVs to become that scarce by any means, there needs to be some sort of additional limiting factor to them. I would look into increasing the build time, gas cost or both. Suggestion 4: If the Zerg economy is really a problem right now, this is the very first place we should be looking. However, it is an EXTREMELY finicky area to mess with - a slight tweak to larvae could have massive unintended consequences. We would have to be very slow and careful about adjustments there. Suggestion 5: Probably unnecessary as long as the appropriate counters exist. Banelings, Firebats and Zealots should all continue to do fine against Speedlings. Just wanted to give my input on this, despite the fact that we should probably wait to discuss the dynamics of entire match-ups until after Kabel's huge patch goes live. Im not actually talking about a general mobility buff to zerg, but instead I want to make zerg even more diferent from bio by making muta/bling increasingly mobile and give them a clock against bio/tank (which means that they need to army trade/make something happen). Lurker IMO needs to be even more cost effective but less mobile than bio as that puts the clock on bio --> Gives them an incentive. Did you disagree with me in my logic that there needs be strong incentives in the game? I think making lurkers less mobile will also make the matchup more dynamic. Let's say you go mech as a terran; Then you know you will always be more immobile than your opponent and that's okay as you chose that your self. But then once in a while you wanna mix things up and you opt for bio. However, IMO it's a problem if bio is also less mobile than most of the stuff the zerg can throw at you. My suggestion is based on the logic that bio should be much more mobile than anything but muta/bling. Muta/bling vs pure bio will be a slight mobility advantage to the zerg player, however as the terran needs to add in tanks, then his army composition will also be significantly less mobile than the zerg player. So the intention behind my suggestions is not just to strenghten incentivies, but also to make different playstyles a lot more important which will increase the dynamic of the game. I am glad though you agree with me regarding SV's. A change there will be quite a buff to lurkers. Regarding maxed armies, I know a lot of people think that the too easy max thing is the case of the deathball, but IMO that's kind of a slight misunderstanding. What was/is the problem in Sc2 was that your "army supply / base count"-ratio was too high. This had the effect of reducing the efficiency of the opponents tools as he couldn't abuse immobility very efficiently. But it is important to note that army supply can increase as long as the basecount increases as well so the ratio stays relatively low. So while there is a huge problem with being maxed on 3 bases, there is not really any problem with being maxed on 5 bases. When that is said, adjusting the supply count from 0.5 to 1 is probably not a very efficient change in Starbow as maxing out is rarely ever a concern for zerg. However, nevertheless it is a goanna be a (small) step in the right direction by increasing the "clock"-feeling when playing zerg. Also an economy buff to zerg will make them max out quicker, and a baneling supply increase is also indirectly a mineral increase (need more overlords) which will make them less cost efficient (which is important as the mobile playstyle should be less cost effective). Regarding suggestion 5, it's a neccesity if zerg econ gets changed. Because Lurkers are not slow. Zerg as a race, with a few exceptions, is not slow. You cannot simply change a units identity. Lurkers should be just as much about map control as lings and speed hydras, because they always have been. I don't like these types of arguments. First of all, let's focus on what creates an awesome game rather than sticking to certain (irrational) rules.. I think I have put up so many reasons now for why making lurkers less mobile will improve Starbow, so you can begin by looking for potential logical flaws in my reasoning. Secondly, who decides what's the identity of the lurker? You? I actually think of the Lurker as a cost effective, relatively immobile unit (and apparently Xiphias does this as well based on his first post). In fact it is actually more mobile than people think, but if the identity of the unit is based upon how people think of it, then the identity that you have of the Lurker is probably wrong. So actually I would argue that my suggestion will strenghten the "supposed identity" of the lurker rather than changing it. Banelings, besides their extreme necessity for the dynamics of ZvZ, should be more about surprise attacks - burrow them as mines, drop them from Overlords, hide a few lings in the corner of a base during a runby and morph a couple to sneak into the mineral line a minute later, knock down a wall when your opponent doesn't expect it and flood him for a counter attack. These are things Lurkers aren't as effective at. Do you really want a unit which is almost purely a gimmick/cheesy unit? Again, I am not implying that it can't/shouldn't be used in this way. But I think we should have a goal of increasing its overall utility by differentiating it from Lurkers. If there is one way that we could differentiate these units further, I would say give Lurkers bonus damage vs Armored units so they can better fight Firebats/Stalkers, which is something that Banelings absolutely cannot do at the current time. That is another way of course. IMO it all comes down to what will create the best type of games. Edit: Also, don't forget how quickly and easily Zerg can make tech switches compared to the other races. If you want the opponent to have to react completely differently to their two main AoE options, you might be giving them too much of an advantage, assuming we could find a way to make that happen. Regarding reaction, I am only too some extent thinking about unit composition, but more about whether the terran palyer should opt for an offensive approach or defensive approach. Just wanted to give my input on this, despite the fact that we should probably wait to discuss the dynamics of entire match-ups until after Kabel's huge patch goes live. Probably. I just wanted to highlight the importance of not thinking about unit-changes/designs isolated. Instead, we need to change the approach to a more top-down approach. 1) What kind of game dynamic to we want for each matchup. 2) Which type of units can accomplish that. 3) Discuss/analyze specific unit designs proposals. | ||
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Denmark9407 Posts
Early game/early midgame: Opponent is incentivized to force the zerg player into making army units instead of drones. Leaving the zerg alone is not particularly punishing currently in Starbow, however it will be quite bad after a zerg econ change (this will incentivize early game action). Midgame: Assuming that the zerg player in an average game will end up with a better econ than the opponent, but less cost effective and that he will scale inefficetly (e.g. against a bio heavy player with just 1-2 tanks he will do pretty okay'ish. but against 6-7 tanks he will do pretty bad). Compared to WOL zvt, A muta/bling zerg in Starbow is actually an advantegous position in terms of tools available as the opponent needs to bases quicker in Starbow which will make abusing immobility more efficient for the zerg player. On the other hand he will be a bit less cost effective (TvZ at least) due to medi's and stronger tanks. Late game: If the zerg does a pretty decent job of further strenghen his lead in the midgame, he can either opt for the killing blow or use his economical advantage to tech into higher tier units. That will too some extent change the clock from the zerg player to the therran player. This is what I call a dynamic game; When the clock can switch from one player to another multiple times over the cause of a single game. However, it should be important to stress out that it must not be optimal for the zerg player to tech directly into tier 3 and thus skip the whole midgame proces. This tier 3 tech switch must be something which requires a midgame-advantage (too avoid the whole 14minute broodlord thing from WOL). But let me ask: Does anyone consider the above game dynamic to be bad, because at least from a theoretical POV adopting an Sc2 zerg'ish economy will fit perfectly into Starbow (it will work better than in Sc2 I think). Let me also try to redefine what I imply by tools: I see 4 overall types of tools: Type 1: Cost effective army trading Type 2: Risk-free harass/engaging (which occurs when you can always escape. This tool in it self is not particular efficient though). Type 3: Abuse of immobility Type 4: Having a significant better econ so you can afford to trade cost ineffectively. Though one could argue that the "cost effective army-trading"-tool contradicts with the fact that the more mobile army needs to be cost ineffective, it's actually not that simple afterall. We need to take a more nuanced POV to understand how incentives and tools work. In HOTS the terran can actually trade armies cost effective against a zerg player. This is a neccesary requirement for the terran player in HOTS as his econ typically will be slightly worse in the midgame than the econ of the zerg player. But instead, the threat of letting the zerg tech to tier 3 ultras + the supply inefficiency incentives the terran player to army trade. His tools are actually a combination of all 3 of them. He can abuse immobiltiy with medivacs, but that factor in it self only works when your army is significantly more mobile than the muta/bling army. The MMMM army is only slightly more mobile than the muta/bling army, so the terran player needs the two other factors as well in order to have effective tools. So when taking the role as a game designer with a topdown approach we need to analyze the overall value of the tools in a given matchup. For instance lets relate this to the current Starbow TvZ matchup. We clarified previously that neither player really had strong incentivies to do anything. Bio + SV's + a couple of tanks are cost effective enough to deal with most stuff. Too some extent the bio player will probably at a disadvantage when ultras are out, thus there is a bit of a clock running against him, but its not particularly strong. But now, let's look at his tools the terran player has avaiable against a muta-bling player; - Should he invest 100/50 in dropships to abuse immobility (the 3rd type of tool)? Well probably not untill the zerg is on 5+ bases (because it is just too easy to deal with them with mutas when you as a zerg player isn't spread out thinly). - Can he army-trade efficiently when going pure bio? Not really (unless your marineking), thus we can conclude that pure bio really (theoretically) isn't that good of a unit composition against muta-bling. So instead he will (should) mix in tanks which puts the clock on the zerg player. However, what kind of tools does the zerg have? - Is the abuse of immobility with banelings being of medium mobility really strong enough? - Are mutalisks harass really strong enough in them selves to make the abuse of immobility efficient? Personally I think that the answer to the above 2 questions is; "Too some extent, but not enough". As we already established that the zerg player can't efficiently army trade (which mean there is no type 1), it seems that we either should further strenghten mobility of the zerg army or increase the cost effectiveness (type 1), buff its econ (type 4) or/and improve its mobility (type 3). I believe we should choose the latter two options (eco buff and mobility). Again this was a long post, but I think an understanding of this subject is extremely important if we want to develop an awesome game. We can't just cross fingers and hope that everything will turn out awesome. | ||
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