On January 26 2014 10:43 NapkinBox wrote: I don't think adding in quirks is necessary to show rice uniqueness. I think it's better to just focus on keeping the gameplay between each race different. Terran being the most versatile and mechanics heavy, Protoss being very powerful, expensive, and focusing so much on unit compositions, and Zerg being cheap, weak, but comes aplenty (and I find Zerg units waaay too strong in Starbow).
I do like the faster Shield Regen, though. Perhaps add in Shield Battery? :D
Out of curiosity, did you play more Brood War or SC2?
I only ask because I think SC2 really did the zerg a disservice design wise. In Brood War, yes some zerg units were weak (zergling, hydra, and kind of muta), but zerg had plenty of strong units too (lurker, ultra, guardian). SC2 zerg has no equivalent to the lurker (a unit that really dominates in the mid game) and the ultra (a unit that really dominates in the late game). So, terrans and protoss don't ever REALLY feel threatened letting zergs take that map and a huge economy advantage in SC2 as long as they can get the perfect deathball that can crush zerg in a 200/200 fight.
I loved that in Brood War, terrans and protoss had a lot of pressure to push out at the right timings in order to stop the zerg from becoming an unstoppable force. This created a lot of battles throughout the match, because toss and terran couldn't just turtle on 3 bases, and zergs couldn't be 100% passive, because they couldn't let terrans and toss take 4ths and 5ths without contesting them.
I personally think having the zerg being 99% weak units like in sc2 is a big design mistake for the reasons stated above. 200/200 zerg should be a very scary thing for toss and terran to deal with -- so that harassment or pushes become a must.
Well I always considered the units like the zerglings, hydras, etc. as the "core" Zerg units as they are weak but are strong in higher numbers. Then, there are the much stronger support units that will help make the core units even more powerful and cost-efficient like the lurkers, defilers, etc. It just feels like in Starbow, those core zerg units are just much stronger all around to the point where their critical mass hits harder than the others races, even without those support units.
I played more SC2, btw. I played a couple weeks of BW when I took a short break from SC2 and god DAMN how fucking fun I was having with Zerg. Nothing feels better than trying to engage a huge Terran army and tank line with Defilers, Ultras, Lurkers, and Lings.
...Then there's those moments where you're pretty damn sure you made hundreds of units but you have no idea where they are.
Fair point. I somewhat agree in a sense. Something about lurkers in starbow seems a bit off. It seems like bio has a harder time fighting against lurkers (even though they had a hard time in BW too, it somehow felt more of a give and take). But I can't decide if its because lurkers are too good/easy to use, or if terrans haven't learned when to engage and how to micro bio against them
Given how good Marauders, Tanks and Vessels are at killing Lurkers, i would say Terrans probably haven't adjusted yet. Marines are a bit worse than in BW, so it would be logical to suspect that Terrans are overly relying on pure marine atm.
-I couldn't find your extension mod on EU (you said it should be called "Spread Out Movements")
-I did find the arcade test map (titled "Spread out movement Fighting Spirit" for those who were unsure)
-Small to medium sized armies look very natural moving around and attacking
-Huge late game armies can't be forced to clump unless your movement command lands on a unit, issuing a follow command. If you click a bare patch of ground, before your units quite reach SC2-level clumping, the whole army begins to bounce off each other trying to spread back out. From what I understood, your mod is supposed to be applied over the SC2 pathing system, not over the Starbow one. In this test map, at least, it seems like your changes might be applied over the Starbow pathing system.
-Viper Nest and Defiler Mound are missing in your Fighting Spirit test map. I only tested as Zerg, but I'm guessing that means for Terran and Protoss any structures not based on WoL/Hots will be missing too.
On January 27 2014 17:54 Beef Noodles wrote: Something about lurkers in starbow seems a bit off. It seems like bio has a harder time fighting against lurkers (even though they had a hard time in BW too, it somehow felt more of a give and take).
More like because they have 23 base damage up from 20 and a bit more HP than normal
On January 27 2014 18:57 Gaius Baltar wrote: Some testing feedback for the AnteZ pathing mod:
-I couldn't find your extension mod on EU (you said it should be called "Spread Out Movements")
-I did find the arcade test map (titled "Spread out movement Fighting Spirit" for those who were unsure)
-Small to medium sized armies look very natural moving around and attacking
-Huge late game armies can't be forced to clump unless your movement command lands on a unit, issuing a follow command. If you click a bare patch of ground, before your units quite reach SC2-level clumping, the whole army begins to bounce off each other trying to spread back out. From what I understood, your mod is supposed to be applied over the SC2 pathing system, not over the Starbow one. In this test map, at least, it seems like your changes might be applied over the Starbow pathing system.
-Viper Nest and Defiler Mound are missing in your Fighting Spirit test map. I only tested as Zerg, but I'm guessing that means for Terran and Protoss any structures not based on WoL/Hots will be missing too.
-I didn't experience any abnormal lag
Keep up the experiments. Looks really promising.
Hi thanks for the feedback! Its not an extension mod. You can only find it in the editor and then apply it to a map. The intention for the mod was just to demonstrate the new movement and then integrate the changes directly into starbow if they proove viable. The mod wasnt intendet to exist on its own for long
Do you consider not being able to clump up you army a good thing or bad thing? And i don't get what you are saying about starbow movement and sc2 movement. The only change ist autospreading while idle and a larger formation radius. I did keep the larger formation radius but no idle spreading.
I am aware that zerg is broken on the map. There is a proper test map coming up though.
Ok, I thought you meant there was an extension mod in addition to the test map. I misread.
I wasn't commenting on whether the ability to clump is good or bad, I was just letting you know I couldn't do it successfully because I wasn't sure whether you intended for it to be that way or not. Again, I noticed this most when my army was large.
Since you ask, I think having the choice to clump can be a good thing, but that clumping all the time by default is bad. I find a high formation radius to be an appealing solution here.
When I said Starbow movement, I was just referring to idle autospread. I had guessed maybe idle autospread had something to do with the aggressive unclumping I experienced when trying to force my 200/200 army to clump. So, if it's not idle autospread, it's gotta be the invisible blockers causing this behavior, right?
The only real critique I have here is that the unclumping is a tad on the frenetic side. I mention this because it seems your approach to pathing is to find a subtle and elegant solution.
On January 27 2014 18:57 Gaius Baltar wrote: Some testing feedback for the AnteZ pathing mod:
-I couldn't find your extension mod on EU (you said it should be called "Spread Out Movements")
-I did find the arcade test map (titled "Spread out movement Fighting Spirit" for those who were unsure)
-Small to medium sized armies look very natural moving around and attacking
-Huge late game armies can't be forced to clump unless your movement command lands on a unit, issuing a follow command. If you click a bare patch of ground, before your units quite reach SC2-level clumping, the whole army begins to bounce off each other trying to spread back out. From what I understood, your mod is supposed to be applied over the SC2 pathing system, not over the Starbow one. In this test map, at least, it seems like your changes might be applied over the Starbow pathing system.
-Viper Nest and Defiler Mound are missing in your Fighting Spirit test map. I only tested as Zerg, but I'm guessing that means for Terran and Protoss any structures not based on WoL/Hots will be missing too.
-I didn't experience any abnormal lag
Keep up the experiments. Looks really promising.
Hi thanks for the feedback! Its not an extension mod. You can only find it in the editor and then apply it to a map. The intention for the mod was just to demonstrate the new movement and then integrate the changes directly into starbow if they proove viable. The mod wasnt intendet to exist on its own for long
Do you consider not being able to clump up you army a good thing or bad thing? And i don't get what you are saying about starbow movement and sc2 movement. The only change ist autospreading while idle and a larger formation radius. I did keep the larger formation radius but no idle spreading.
I am aware that zerg is broken on the map. There is a proper test map coming up though.
Hey I just wanted to ask are the Starbow guys considering implementing this to Starbow and if they are what is the stage you are currently at?
Hey I just wanted to ask are the Starbow guys considering implementing this to Starbow and if they are what is the stage you are currently at?
As I understand it, one of the problems with Extension Mods is that it can load any map. Starbow relies on choky maps with modified mineral and gas layouts, so I think they have concerns that somone will load up the wrong map and then give up because the game is imbalanced.
If there was a way to identify Starbow appropriate maps (maybe GameHeart's new hash function) then I'm sure they will jump at making a mod.
The only way i see how a extension mod could work is with a two step system, you make a trigger for the mapmakers to install on their starbow melee maps, this trigger would detect if the Starbow extension mod is being applied to the map, if the mod is being applied then it deletes predetermined extra mineral fields/gas/xel'nagas that would be used for the sc2 version of the map. Now if the extension mod does not detect the right starbow trigger in the map then it shows an alert to the players that the map is not an official starbow map and that it will not work for starbow, that or you could find a way to straight up don't load the starbow dependencies to the map, i don't know if that second part could work tho, the triggers are my biggest flaw as a mapmaker sadly :/
On January 27 2014 17:54 Beef Noodles wrote: Something about lurkers in starbow seems a bit off. It seems like bio has a harder time fighting against lurkers (even though they had a hard time in BW too, it somehow felt more of a give and take).
More like because they have 23 base damage up from 20 and a bit more HP than normal
Yep I think there are a few factors:
1) Lurkers do more damage 2) Lurkers have more hp (and can survive an irradiate which is a big deal). 3) I've also wondered if the medic heals as quickly as it did in SC, it seems to me that ling and hydra can do more damage to a marine/medic army than it could in SC.
Disclaimer: This was done in the Starbow unit tester AFTER the latest patch (The one called patch 5 on reddit), but I know that the unit tester had not been patched yet, so if this was fixed in the latest patch, without being in the patch-notes, then this should not happen anymore. But I found no info on this in the latest patch notes.
On January 29 2014 20:54 baba44713 wrote: I love the "oh, this is for Starbow" final comment. Without it everyone would think that it's HotS that is having the Lurker bug.
Well... it could have been SC2BW But I see your point
Someone pointed out that this is not a bug but intentional. Not sure it is good for the game though. I think the detection range of canons should be a tad larger regardless.
Hi, it is time for another update on the spread out movement front. So in playing around a bit with in my preliminary test map and watching other people play I thought there was something not quite right with terran bio. It was spread out too much and didn't feel right. Of course that was just my personal opinion but it prompted me to investigate how the different parameters of the spread out movement system affect unit behaviour and formation patterns. I am posting this here so it doesn't get lost and to illustrate that what we have right now is not set in stone but can still be tweaked. Keep that in mind if you are unhappy with some part of the modified movement.
Here are my results. Testing units were usually the marine and the tank.
- using the chance parameter of the createBlockerDelay effect. (Blocker units will only be spawned with chance < 1) -------- formation spreads out slower -------- amount of spread is slightly lower after long walks ( but 0.5 chance != 0.5 spread. more like 0.8) -------- more clumping in the end position - adjusting BlockerUnit speed -------- no influence on twitching units -------- spreading is SLOWER with extremely fast blockers (160.0 tested) - adjusting BlockerUnits collsision size -------- large effect on spreading -------- large blockers will create little squads of units. -------- small blockers create very homogeneous formations -------- for large blockers, spreading looks very abrupt -------- problem with pushing other units through blockers - setting overlap index to 1 -------- no obvious difference. Formation probably slightly tighter - changing mover (ground/air) -------- no obvious difference -------- with ground, blocker scoot around a lot
While doing the experiments it occured to me that this might go much farther than "just" spreading out the units. By adjusting the parameters, we might be able to tune the formation patterns of various unit compositions giving each a distinct feel. Adding depth to the unit micro (at the cost of added complexity, of course). Let me know your thought on that one.
EPT
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/Mj2uXgA.jpg)
