Some people talk about removing the smartcast and owering the unit selection limit.
I believe this is the wrong appropach, the Starbow developers already stated that this is neither BW, nor SC2. They try to create a BW extension in the SC2 engine. There has to be changes from BW, otherwise we could just call this SC2BW and move forward.
The unit selection limit is a cheesy thing. It worked in BW, but many things that worked there shouldn't/couldn't work here. It would be a great step back to implement this. Even old RTS (ra2, aoe2 (? didn't play so much)) had more than 12 units selectable. This shouldn't be a problem and the game should be balanced / edited allowing more than 12 units to be selected.
Smart casting, on the other hand, while it would also seem like a drawback to have it implemented, is a different story. In this mod, the spellcasters are very strong and they are at the top of the chart when it comes to making the difference between good and great engagements. They can create awkward situations (Dark swam the PF while trying to kill it, plague your army (does this work? Sorry, I have played like 5 games of Sbow in this patch), storm your army etc.). One way to level up the difficulty of it would be to disable the smart cast, but as I said, it could be considered a cheesy solution by many of the (new) players, and I can see why. The better solution should be to balance the design of the abilities around the fact that an experienced player could abuse them to their maximum potency. Somebody said to just lower the time and mana of spells, so that you'd have to "spam" them a little more. That could work, but as far as I heard Dark Swarm is already nerfed from it's BW counterplay (less duration).
I'm looking forward to see how the balance/develop guys react to this "challenge".
Small bugs I've found: - Defilers don't have burrow option (is this intended?) - Sometimes there are 2 Vultures on the production tab, but only 1 is produced.
On January 16 2014 10:03 Zaphod Beeblebrox wrote: Once 2.1 is out you would probably be able to play this on any map...
Except maps by default have the standard SC2 8m2g bases and Starbow is balanced for 7m1g, with 9m1g mains. I highly doubt the extension mod would be capable of automatically removing a mineral and a geyser from each base and adding an extra mineral at the mains.
Actually it should be possible, triggers can be run from extension mods, they can add/remove resource units and mains are marked with Start Locations which are just Points that you can use in triggers
Map design is the biggest problem. Playing SBOW on Akilon Wastes would be downright broken.
SC2 maps in general are much larger than SBOW maps. We like to see pokes without mothership core or rift being a real recquirement.
On January 16 2014 10:03 Zaphod Beeblebrox wrote: Once 2.1 is out you would probably be able to play this on any map...
Except maps by default have the standard SC2 8m2g bases and Starbow is balanced for 7m1g, with 9m1g mains. I highly doubt the extension mod would be capable of automatically removing a mineral and a geyser from each base and adding an extra mineral at the mains.
Actually it should be possible, triggers can be run from extension mods, they can add/remove resource units and mains are marked with Start Locations which are just Points that you can use in triggers
Map design is the biggest problem. Playing SBOW on Akilon Wastes would be downright broken.
SC2 maps in general are much larger than SBOW maps. We like to see pokes without mothership core or rift being a real recquirement.
We can just Upload our Starbow maps as melee maps, and note that these maps are designed to be played with the extension mod "Starbow". Overall I don't see much reason why we shouldn't make Starbow an Extension mod.
On January 16 2014 17:01 nucLeaRTV wrote: Some people talk about removing the smartcast and owering the unit selection limit.
I believe this is the wrong appropach, the Starbow developers already stated that this is neither BW, nor SC2. They try to create a BW extension in the SC2 engine. There has to be changes from BW, otherwise we could just call this SC2BW and move forward.
The unit selection limit is a cheesy thing. It worked in BW, but many things that worked there shouldn't/couldn't work here. It would be a great step back to implement this. Even old RTS (ra2, aoe2 (? didn't play so much)) had more than 12 units selectable. This shouldn't be a problem and the game should be balanced / edited allowing more than 12 units to be selected.
Smart casting, on the other hand, while it would also seem like a drawback to have it implemented, is a different story. In this mod, the spellcasters are very strong and they are at the top of the chart when it comes to making the difference between good and great engagements. They can create awkward situations (Dark swam the PF while trying to kill it, plague your army (does this work? Sorry, I have played like 5 games of Sbow in this patch), storm your army etc.). One way to level up the difficulty of it would be to disable the smart cast, but as I said, it could be considered a cheesy solution by many of the (new) players, and I can see why. The better solution should be to balance the design of the abilities around the fact that an experienced player could abuse them to their maximum potency. Somebody said to just lower the time and mana of spells, so that you'd have to "spam" them a little more. That could work, but as far as I heard Dark Swarm is already nerfed from it's BW counterplay (less duration).
I'm looking forward to see how the balance/develop guys react to this "challenge".
Small bugs I've found: - Defilers don't have burrow option (is this intended?) - Sometimes there are 2 Vultures on the production tab, but only 1 is produced.
Implementing a unit selection limit is not an option anyway, the guy behind SC2BW tried to do it but the only way to do it was with triggers that removed units from the selection server side, which meant that there is a small amount of time where more than 12 units are selected.
Limited control groups and single building selection are fundamentally different from Smart Casting. The former pair are artificial limitations imposed on the UI - you can box-select more than 12 units and more than 1 building, but the programming places a cap on it. Smart Casting is more of a feature, much closer to automatic formations from other RTS games.
When you select a group of units and issue a move command, does only one unit respond? Or do all of them? How about with an attack command? The common sense and consistent application of the basic UI functions would be no Smart Casting. Removing it would not be artificially handicapping the UI. Including it is adding a feature that is specifically designed to make micro easier, just like auto formations.
Does that mean Smart Casting is inherently worse for the game than no Smart Casting? No. Whether or not Smart Casting is good or bad for gameplay is an opinion entirely subjective to the person answering that question. For another look at the same issue, consider the feature as it related to multi building selection: all Protoss and Terran unit production is Smart Cast. Select 5 barracks, press M once and only one barracks responds. If MBS stays and Smart Casting spells goes, you have to discuss the function of Terran production buildings and decide which method is best for the type of gameplay you prefer.
In both instances, Smart Casting is a feature added onto the basic UI for sole purpose of reducing the mechanical difficulty of a specific action. However, mechanical difficulty for difficulty's sake is not a good thing, otherwise people would be arguing for single unit selection and no keyboard hotkeys and if you find someone who wants that, they are most likely just a robot from the future. So, when you discuss Smart Casting, discuss it on its own merits and consider all of its effect and implications. If you can't do that and you have to lump it in with other UI elements or ignore some of its less talked about effects in order to justify your reasoning for its inclusion or exclusion, then your reasoning is probably pretty fucking stupid.
Hmm, gonna have to figure out how to play this and what builds work. Even if both people are playing it like it's BW it still doesn't play anything like BW in terms of how the builds play out.
Storm seems hard to use against zerg because the pathing and ability to put everything on one control group just allows hydra to run away and just storm your own zealots. Storm also doesn't seem to kill lings nearly as quick/efficiently, but that may also have to do with them skating through it more efficiently due to pathing.
Storm seems hard to use against zerg because the pathing and ability to put everything on one control group just allows hydra to run away and just storm your own zealots. Storm also doesn't seem to kill lings nearly as quick/efficiently, but that may also have to do with them skating through it more efficiently due to pathing.
Storm is harder to use (and easier to micro against) than in BW as it deals damage over 6 seconds instead of 4 seconds.
1. Maybe Oracle model give sentinel ? and collosus portrait to reaver xD ... 2. Why not give BW mechanics to StarBow example: limited units selection ?
Please creator or director of Starbow to answer my questions
Is it only me or does Vultures seem quite a bit stronger vs armored units and buildings than they are in Brood War? The Dragoon vs Vulture fights in Starbow seems to be alot more even than it was in BW.
Also, +1 for removing smart casting. It would make casting good storms, stasis, emp etc. feel so much more rewarding.
On January 16 2014 17:01 nucLeaRTV wrote: Smart casting, on the other hand, while it would also seem like a drawback to have it implemented, is a different story. In this mod, the spellcasters are very strong and they are at the top of the chart when it comes to making the difference between good and great engagements. They can create awkward situations (Dark swam the PF while trying to kill it, plague your army (does this work? Sorry, I have played like 5 games of Sbow in this patch), storm your army etc.). One way to level up the difficulty of it would be to disable the smart cast, but as I said, it could be considered a cheesy solution by many of the (new) players, and I can see why. The better solution should be to balance the design of the abilities around the fact that an experienced player could abuse them to their maximum potency. Somebody said to just lower the time and mana of spells, so that you'd have to "spam" them a little more. That could work, but as far as I heard Dark Swarm is already nerfed from it's BW counterplay (less duration).
I believe there is three things that have to be looked at for smartcasting. First of all balancing out strong spellcasters as you said which it would be a solution for but there are other solutions. Secondly it further makes you differentiate your skill level from other players which is very important for the players for obvious reasons but again there's other things you can do. However seeing skill actually transfer to superior micro is the number one most satisfying thing for spectators in an RTS (whether that's a result of you being able to micro better or simply macro/multitask faster and have more time for micro). Thirdly another point for spectators and this one contradicts the bolded part in your quote: We want to spells casted that really matter and have a lot of impact. That gets you really excited about whether or not that one really important storm is going to hit well and seeing it kill everything under it in a heartbeat is satisfying and exciting. Nobody wants to watch people cast a whole bunch of spammy, weak storms all the time that barely hurt units.
In summary when spectating I want to think "WOW these storms really killed EVERYTHING! WTF! - BUT the player really deserved it because he has such a good Templar micro."
Actually this is a good measurement whether a unit (especially a spellcaster) is well designed for a spectator sport like Starcraft, are people actually infamous for using them really well?! (and no, Destiny going mass infestors is not what I mean lol)
On January 16 2014 17:01 nucLeaRTV wrote: Some people talk about removing the smartcast and owering the unit selection limit.
I believe this is the wrong appropach, the Starbow developers already stated that this is neither BW, nor SC2. They try to create a BW extension in the SC2 engine. There has to be changes from BW, otherwise we could just call this SC2BW and move forward.
The unit selection limit is a cheesy thing. It worked in BW, but many things that worked there shouldn't/couldn't work here. It would be a great step back to implement this. Even old RTS (ra2, aoe2 (? didn't play so much)) had more than 12 units selectable. This shouldn't be a problem and the game should be balanced / edited allowing more than 12 units to be selected.
Smart casting, on the other hand, while it would also seem like a drawback to have it implemented, is a different story. In this mod, the spellcasters are very strong and they are at the top of the chart when it comes to making the difference between good and great engagements. They can create awkward situations (Dark swam the PF while trying to kill it, plague your army (does this work? Sorry, I have played like 5 games of Sbow in this patch), storm your army etc.). One way to level up the difficulty of it would be to disable the smart cast, but as I said, it could be considered a cheesy solution by many of the (new) players, and I can see why. The better solution should be to balance the design of the abilities around the fact that an experienced player could abuse them to their maximum potency. Somebody said to just lower the time and mana of spells, so that you'd have to "spam" them a little more. That could work, but as far as I heard Dark Swarm is already nerfed from it's BW counterplay (less duration).
I'm looking forward to see how the balance/develop guys react to this "challenge".
Small bugs I've found: - Defilers don't have burrow option (is this intended?) - Sometimes there are 2 Vultures on the production tab, but only 1 is produced.
Just go play Brood War if you're going to mess with SC2 mechanics that are this fundamental.
However, I do like the idea of changing the spells to reflect the ease of use of Smart Cast. Having Storm be half the mana and half the duration would mean that you'd need to be really snappy with storms, and it increases both the microability of using the spell, and avoiding it.
EPT
