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On September 07 2012 23:00 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2012 22:09 OxyGenesis wrote:
My assessments of the maps. Baring in mind that I am by no means an expert, I have only been mapping for a couple of months. I just wanted to have a go at breaking down these new maps and describing what I believe their issues are. I welcome counter points to the issues I raise.
I'll give it my best shot  Howling Peaks - The options for a 3rd base might not be as bad as people seem to think, the linear one has collapsible rocks at its door, and the forward one is very close to the natural. As for the natural itself, I think it's an experiment of sorts by Blizzard, to see if natural expansion design still needs to be as stringent as it is now, since the main problems with base design concern Protoss, who now have the Mothership Core. Even if it doesn't work, I think they're absolutely right to try it out. Akilon Wastes - I don't see that much wasted space, this just seems like a complaint that people just sort of echo, without really understanding. Also, when it comes to airspace, it tends to be less significant balance-wise when it's next to a late-game base, which is the case here, so I don't see it as an issue. Also, having 4 XNT's on a 2-spawn map is really cute. :D Star Station - I'm not sure I get why everyone's saying the textures will be hard to mix with. The cliffs, maybe, but there are some really solid textures in this set that can be used in cool combinations. My main concerns with this map are horizontal rush distances, which appear to be the shortest of the 3 setups, and the airspace on the left and right, which looks a bit much. The Xel'Naga towers are going to be important for holding 3+ bases, but I also worry slightly about the 12/6 bases. I think it's pretty solid overall though. Korhal City - This is another map that I think they were correct in making, which is to say it is highly experimental. There are some factors which mitigate the deathball-ness of this map I think, the distance between late-game expansions being one. Also, there isn't really a choke outside your first 2 bases, but rather a large area, which will still enable runby's and other such things(until the armies get really big). The airspace might also act to encourage more air-play, which with Protoss of course means less deathball units. The main is another curiosity, another experiment that I definitely think Blizzard needed to do. I really hope, as strange as this may sound, that this map works out in the long run.
Fractured Glacier - This is perhaps my least favorite of the 5. It just looks hastily thrown together compared to the others. I do think, though, that there is some potential on the part of the attacker for abusing the rocks on the natural's ramp, which is something also worth exploring imo. Overall, I like their new maps a lot, because they're trying to expand the gameplay, not conform to it. They all have fascinating designs that push the boundaries of convention, which is exactly what they should be doing for HotS.
The first 3 maps aren't terrible but I think the points that I raised still stand. There are issues that me, as a novice map maker who does it in their spare time picked up on. Blizz has a team of paid professionals. I disagree about Korhal City, if you manage to make it past 5 minutes (due to the double width ramp) you should have a fairly easy time of getting up 3 or even 4 bases by just parking your army at the bottom of your ramp. I get that it's an experimental map, that's cool, but it's definitely a deathbally map too. As long as they take the things they learn from this map and it is never seen beyond beta that's fine. That's pretty much the case for all these maps tbh, experimentation is great, but these maps really aren't very suitable for competitive play (at least by community standards, blizz have their own (low) standards)
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On September 08 2012 00:04 OxyGenesis wrote:
The first 3 maps aren't terrible but I think the points that I raised still stand. There are issues that me, as a novice map maker who does it in their spare time picked up on. Blizz has a team of paid professionals. I disagree about Korhal City, if you manage to make it past 5 minutes (due to the double width ramp) you should have a fairly easy time of getting up 3 or even 4 bases by just parking your army at the bottom of your ramp. I get that it's an experimental map, that's cool, but it's definitely a deathbally map too. As long as they take the things they learn from this map and it is never seen beyond beta that's fine. That's pretty much the case for all these maps tbh, experimentation is great, but these maps really aren't very suitable for competitive play (at least by community standards, blizz have their own (low) standards)
You're missing out on something extremely important here. Yes, the Blizzard team is a professional one, and that gives them a huge responsibility as the mapmakers for one of the greatest e-sports in the world. You have to realize, however, that Starcraft 2 is, above all, a game. If the key to mapmaking were simply cracking the balance formula we'd have been done making new maps a long time ago, there'd have been no point to continuing. Blizzard does something with each of their maps that few here seem to appreciate - they focus on everything. I've noticed that the outlook on mapmaking here is very analytical, almost to the point of excess, and I suppose that has something to do with it being TeamLiquid. Blizzard is responsible for making a game that allows for competitive play, but it means nothing if the maps don't add to the gameplay experience. The short of it - they need to be fun maps too. Whether these new maps are viable in a competitive environment remains to be seen - it's newly in beta, and even the unit balance is nowhere near final yet. And yet, all of these maps look more fun to play on than just about any map I've seen on TL. Look at Caldeum, a map made by one of the top Korean mapmakers. Balance is easy, capturing what makes a map fun and unique, one that adds to the gameplay and makes it worth watching, that is the hard part, and whether or not you remember it, it's the reason all of us got into mapmaking in the first place.
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Let me just say that Korhal city is VERY ugly, they're using manmade cliffs not in the right way. It looks horrid on the overview as well.
Also, it seems like a 2v2 map ;_;
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I really like Fractured Glacier, for the very simple reason that there's a dude face smiling in the midle.
But overall, even tough this maps might not be very balanced, i think they'll bring a nice change. The game will be imbalanced at it's launch anyway. Just hope they change the maps accordingly to the evolution of the game..
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fractured glacier looks like its another [og] terminus. wide open forward base, right in the middle of the attack path. so dumb.
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On September 08 2012 00:51 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2012 00:04 OxyGenesis wrote:
The first 3 maps aren't terrible but I think the points that I raised still stand. There are issues that me, as a novice map maker who does it in their spare time picked up on. Blizz has a team of paid professionals. I disagree about Korhal City, if you manage to make it past 5 minutes (due to the double width ramp) you should have a fairly easy time of getting up 3 or even 4 bases by just parking your army at the bottom of your ramp. I get that it's an experimental map, that's cool, but it's definitely a deathbally map too. As long as they take the things they learn from this map and it is never seen beyond beta that's fine. That's pretty much the case for all these maps tbh, experimentation is great, but these maps really aren't very suitable for competitive play (at least by community standards, blizz have their own (low) standards) You're missing out on something extremely important here. Yes, the Blizzard team is a professional one, and that gives them a huge responsibility as the mapmakers for one of the greatest e-sports in the world. You have to realize, however, that Starcraft 2 is, above all, a game. If the key to mapmaking were simply cracking the balance formula we'd have been done making new maps a long time ago, there'd have been no point to continuing. Blizzard does something with each of their maps that few here seem to appreciate - they focus on everything. I've noticed that the outlook on mapmaking here is very analytical, almost to the point of excess, and I suppose that has something to do with it being TeamLiquid. Blizzard is responsible for making a game that allows for competitive play, but it means nothing if the maps don't add to the gameplay experience. The short of it - they need to be fun maps too. Whether these new maps are viable in a competitive environment remains to be seen - it's newly in beta, and even the unit balance is nowhere near final yet. And yet, all of these maps look more fun to play on than just about any map I've seen on TL. Look at Caldeum, a map made by one of the top Korean mapmakers. Balance is easy, capturing what makes a map fun and unique, one that adds to the gameplay and makes it worth watching, that is the hard part, and whether or not you remember it, it's the reason all of us got into mapmaking in the first place.
I agree that making a balanced map is easy. But I also think making an unbalanced fun map is pretty easy too. You seem to equate fun maps as ones that are exploitable, to which some degree I agree with. It's fun to have a bunch of unique features that 'add to the gaming experience' by making it varied. However once they have been figured out and can be exploited it becomes at worst imbalanced and at best kinda annoying. As Blizz seems content to stick with years old maps that have been completely figured out and done to death, I would rather have balanced maps than fun-at-first-but-ultimately-pretty-annoying-further-down-the-line maps. Of course the best of both worlds is possible, having a balanced but uniquely featured map, and I think that is usually what we strive for on this forum. Saying that I honestly wouldn't mind if less balanced, more interesting maps were in the map pools now and again for a while and then rotated out, that would actually be awesome, then we wouldn't need to be so finicky about balance.
I think there is a 3rd element to maps which is similar to balance but slightly different, and that is the sort of games that they create. Starcraft, as well as being a game, is a spectator sport. For a spectator sport to succeed it needs to have good games. For this to happen firstly you need 2 good, evenly matched players (with evenly matched races). Then comes the map that they play on. A best maps are ones that reward the best players in all aspects of the game; harassment, micro, macro, positioning, game sense etc etc. Cloud Kingdom is a good example of a map that on the face of it is incredibly standard but consistently produces amazing games. The amount of times I have seen someone barely hold their 4th and then push back into their opponent's 4th or maybe they lost their 4th but still manage to push back and reestablish. This kind of dynamic play where you get tugs of war and razor edge engagements is more exciting than any unique 'fun' features and is something that all maps should strive for. It's also something that most blizzard maps lack.
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On September 08 2012 02:09 OxyGenesis wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 08 2012 00:51 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2012 00:04 OxyGenesis wrote:
The first 3 maps aren't terrible but I think the points that I raised still stand. There are issues that me, as a novice map maker who does it in their spare time picked up on. Blizz has a team of paid professionals. I disagree about Korhal City, if you manage to make it past 5 minutes (due to the double width ramp) you should have a fairly easy time of getting up 3 or even 4 bases by just parking your army at the bottom of your ramp. I get that it's an experimental map, that's cool, but it's definitely a deathbally map too. As long as they take the things they learn from this map and it is never seen beyond beta that's fine. That's pretty much the case for all these maps tbh, experimentation is great, but these maps really aren't very suitable for competitive play (at least by community standards, blizz have their own (low) standards) You're missing out on something extremely important here. Yes, the Blizzard team is a professional one, and that gives them a huge responsibility as the mapmakers for one of the greatest e-sports in the world. You have to realize, however, that Starcraft 2 is, above all, a game. If the key to mapmaking were simply cracking the balance formula we'd have been done making new maps a long time ago, there'd have been no point to continuing. Blizzard does something with each of their maps that few here seem to appreciate - they focus on everything. I've noticed that the outlook on mapmaking here is very analytical, almost to the point of excess, and I suppose that has something to do with it being TeamLiquid. Blizzard is responsible for making a game that allows for competitive play, but it means nothing if the maps don't add to the gameplay experience. The short of it - they need to be fun maps too. Whether these new maps are viable in a competitive environment remains to be seen - it's newly in beta, and even the unit balance is nowhere near final yet. And yet, all of these maps look more fun to play on than just about any map I've seen on TL. Look at Caldeum, a map made by one of the top Korean mapmakers. Balance is easy, capturing what makes a map fun and unique, one that adds to the gameplay and makes it worth watching, that is the hard part, and whether or not you remember it, it's the reason all of us got into mapmaking in the first place. I agree that making a balanced map is easy. But I also think making an unbalanced fun map is pretty easy too. You seem to equate fun maps as ones that are exploitable, to which some degree I agree with. It's fun to have a bunch of unique features that 'add to the gaming experience' by making it varied. However once they have been figured out and can be exploited it becomes at worst imbalanced and at best kinda annoying. As Blizz seems content to stick with years old maps that have been completely figured out and done to death, I would rather have balanced maps than fun-at-first-but-ultimately-pretty-annoying-further-down-the-line maps. Of course the best of both worlds is possible, having a balanced but uniquely featured map, and I think that is usually what we strive for on this forum. Saying that I honestly wouldn't mind if less balanced, more interesting maps were in the map pools now and again for a while and then rotated out, that would actually be awesome, then we wouldn't need to be so finicky about balance. I think there is a 3rd element to maps which is similar to balance but slightly different, and that is the sort of games that they create. Starcraft, as well as being a game, is a spectator sport. For a spectator sport to succeed it needs to have good games. For this to happen firstly you need 2 good, evenly matched players (with evenly matched races). Then comes the map that they play on. A best maps are ones that reward the best players in all aspects of the game; harassment, micro, macro, positioning, game sense etc etc. Cloud Kingdom is a good example of a map that on the face of it is incredibly standard but consistently produces amazing games. The amount of times I have seen someone barely hold their 4th and then push back into their opponent's 4th or maybe they lost their 4th but still manage to push back and reestablish. This kind of dynamic play where you get tugs of war and razor edge engagements is more exciting than any unique 'fun' features and is something that all maps should strive for. It's also something that most blizzard maps lack.
I don't like to think I make any such equations about features vs. concepts. I don't want to get into a vague discussion which feels detached from reality, so I have no interest in equivocating aspects of a map vs. balance. I'm not saying that if a map is fun, it is therefore a gimmicky one and is imbalanced, I very much have been striving for this middle ground, though you wouldn't see it for how painfully standard Cerberus was. I am not saying Blizzard maps are all balanced and good in a world of statistics, they aren't, because balance is not the extent to which they think about a map, and that's fine. We actually need to have a group of mapmakers which does this, in my humble opinion. They focus a lot on the gameplay, just as Superouman did with Cloud Kingdom(just as an example). Blizzard, however, has a different philosophy from Superouman, one that attempts to cater for players of all skills, going from the top down, whereas Cloud Kingdom was designed more or less for top level play, and the positional games that the top players engage in. Mostly though, they think about more than just balance, which is why their maps don't always cater to standard games. For the debut of Heart of the Swarm, their approach is honestly best.
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On September 08 2012 02:22 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2012 02:09 OxyGenesis wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 08 2012 00:51 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2012 00:04 OxyGenesis wrote:
The first 3 maps aren't terrible but I think the points that I raised still stand. There are issues that me, as a novice map maker who does it in their spare time picked up on. Blizz has a team of paid professionals. I disagree about Korhal City, if you manage to make it past 5 minutes (due to the double width ramp) you should have a fairly easy time of getting up 3 or even 4 bases by just parking your army at the bottom of your ramp. I get that it's an experimental map, that's cool, but it's definitely a deathbally map too. As long as they take the things they learn from this map and it is never seen beyond beta that's fine. That's pretty much the case for all these maps tbh, experimentation is great, but these maps really aren't very suitable for competitive play (at least by community standards, blizz have their own (low) standards) You're missing out on something extremely important here. Yes, the Blizzard team is a professional one, and that gives them a huge responsibility as the mapmakers for one of the greatest e-sports in the world. You have to realize, however, that Starcraft 2 is, above all, a game. If the key to mapmaking were simply cracking the balance formula we'd have been done making new maps a long time ago, there'd have been no point to continuing. Blizzard does something with each of their maps that few here seem to appreciate - they focus on everything. I've noticed that the outlook on mapmaking here is very analytical, almost to the point of excess, and I suppose that has something to do with it being TeamLiquid. Blizzard is responsible for making a game that allows for competitive play, but it means nothing if the maps don't add to the gameplay experience. The short of it - they need to be fun maps too. Whether these new maps are viable in a competitive environment remains to be seen - it's newly in beta, and even the unit balance is nowhere near final yet. And yet, all of these maps look more fun to play on than just about any map I've seen on TL. Look at Caldeum, a map made by one of the top Korean mapmakers. Balance is easy, capturing what makes a map fun and unique, one that adds to the gameplay and makes it worth watching, that is the hard part, and whether or not you remember it, it's the reason all of us got into mapmaking in the first place. I agree that making a balanced map is easy. But I also think making an unbalanced fun map is pretty easy too. You seem to equate fun maps as ones that are exploitable, to which some degree I agree with. It's fun to have a bunch of unique features that 'add to the gaming experience' by making it varied. However once they have been figured out and can be exploited it becomes at worst imbalanced and at best kinda annoying. As Blizz seems content to stick with years old maps that have been completely figured out and done to death, I would rather have balanced maps than fun-at-first-but-ultimately-pretty-annoying-further-down-the-line maps. Of course the best of both worlds is possible, having a balanced but uniquely featured map, and I think that is usually what we strive for on this forum. Saying that I honestly wouldn't mind if less balanced, more interesting maps were in the map pools now and again for a while and then rotated out, that would actually be awesome, then we wouldn't need to be so finicky about balance. I think there is a 3rd element to maps which is similar to balance but slightly different, and that is the sort of games that they create. Starcraft, as well as being a game, is a spectator sport. For a spectator sport to succeed it needs to have good games. For this to happen firstly you need 2 good, evenly matched players (with evenly matched races). Then comes the map that they play on. A best maps are ones that reward the best players in all aspects of the game; harassment, micro, macro, positioning, game sense etc etc. Cloud Kingdom is a good example of a map that on the face of it is incredibly standard but consistently produces amazing games. The amount of times I have seen someone barely hold their 4th and then push back into their opponent's 4th or maybe they lost their 4th but still manage to push back and reestablish. This kind of dynamic play where you get tugs of war and razor edge engagements is more exciting than any unique 'fun' features and is something that all maps should strive for. It's also something that most blizzard maps lack. I don't like to think I make any such equations about features vs. concepts. I don't want to get into a vague discussion which feels detached from reality, so I have no interest in equivocating aspects of a map vs. balance. I'm not saying that if a map is fun, it is therefore a gimmicky one and is imbalanced, I very much have been striving for this middle ground, though you wouldn't see it for how painfully standard Cerberus was. I am not saying Blizzard maps are all balanced and good in a world of statistics, they aren't, because balance is not the extent to which they think about a map, and that's fine. We actually need to have a group of mapmakers which does this, in my humble opinion. They focus a lot on the gameplay, just as Superouman did with Cloud Kingdom(just as an example). Blizzard, however, has a different philosophy from Superouman, one that attempts to cater for players of all skills, going from the top down, whereas Cloud Kingdom was designed more or less for top level play, and the positional games that the top players engage in. Mostly though, they think about more than just balance, which is why their maps don't always cater to standard games. For the debut of Heart of the Swarm, their approach is honestly best.
I completely agree I just wanted to explain why I thought the maps were uncompetitive and should not be used as standard in tournament play.
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On September 06 2012 06:27 Plexa wrote:
Almost every map has stuff on it that I hate. Tons of proportion issues, weird ramps and other oddities. The maps are no better than the first batch of WoL maps.
This.
Despite technical issues with the maps, I'm still glad to see the textures and tileset on the protoss-style map.
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I think the most depressing thing here is that this probably means that they won't be using many/any community-made maps for ladder when HOTS comes out (which there are plenty of good ones that are better than theirs).
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I'm laughing at people making "extensive breakdown analysis" on these maps. If they don't have abusive shit, they're OK for a while.
HotS is for try out new things. We don't have a stabilished metagame to even start to make assumptions about these news maps. 2 entrances to a wide open Natural is bad for Toss and Terran against in WoL, right? But you cannot forget that both Toss and Terran can make units that could considerably increase their defenders advantage in the early game (BH, Warhounds, MSC).
I'm happy to see so much experimental things. The WoL map scene is so stagnated. All popular maps look the same and all maps that are trying something new are being rejected.
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On September 08 2012 11:00 Herect wrote:
I'm laughing at people making "extensive breakdown analysis" on these maps. If they don't have abusive shit, they're OK for a while.
HotS is for try out new things. We don't have a stabilished metagame to even start to make assumptions about these news maps. 2 entrances to a wide open Natural is bad for Toss and Terran against in WoL, right? But you cannot forget that both Toss and Terran can make units that could considerably increase their defenders advantage in the early game (BH, Warhounds, MSC).
I'm happy to see so much experimental things. The WoL map scene is so stagnated. All popular maps look the same and all maps that are trying something new are being rejected.
WoL map scene has stagnated due to lack of support from blizzard and tournaments, not due to lack of good maps. The fact is that some of the best map makers stopped making maps because they knew it was futile when there was no opportunity to get their maps used.
As for breaking down the beta maps, I'm a mapper, I like to analyse maps, sue me. I know they are trying new things out, but some of blizzard's decisions still don't make sense even in that context. This is a forum for discussing maps, I'm not sure what you expected.
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A lot of these maps make some steps backwards (close positions enabled with imbalanced spawning positions) but with things like the mothership core I don't feel like it's a bad idea to experiment with some things like larger ramps or flat entrances to the natural (like Tal'Darim) again to see if the mothership core will change PvP enough to make maps like that viable enough to where a map pool could have say one map on it without a ramp to the natural and still not be an auto-veto for PvP.
Also OxyGenesis is right about the map scene stagnating because the process to get new maps in tournaments is so arbitrary and difficult. The highlight of the WOL community map scene was probably TLMC and the season 6 ladder pool, and nothing has really happened since then. Blizzard needs to be doing something like the TLMC every season, or seriously support a community effort to test new maps and get them added to ladder/tournament pools. The map pool is what will keep SC2 going after its production cycle is finished. With the added strategic depth HOTS provides, every new map that is proven 'good' can offer a larger range of interesting play that keeps viewers engaged. It's important for Blizzard to realize that now so the map scene can thrive once all the expansions are out and balance patches are done.
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On September 09 2012 09:12 OxyGenesis wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2012 11:00 Herect wrote:
I'm laughing at people making "extensive breakdown analysis" on these maps. If they don't have abusive shit, they're OK for a while.
HotS is for try out new things. We don't have a stabilished metagame to even start to make assumptions about these news maps. 2 entrances to a wide open Natural is bad for Toss and Terran against in WoL, right? But you cannot forget that both Toss and Terran can make units that could considerably increase their defenders advantage in the early game (BH, Warhounds, MSC).
I'm happy to see so much experimental things. The WoL map scene is so stagnated. All popular maps look the same and all maps that are trying something new are being rejected. WoL map scene has stagnated due to lack of support from blizzard and tournaments, not due to lack of good maps. The fact is that some of the best map makers stopped making maps because they knew it was futile when there was no opportunity to get their maps used. As for breaking down the beta maps, I'm a mapper, I like to analyse maps, sue me. I know they are trying new things out, but some of blizzard's decisions still don't make sense even in that context. This is a forum for discussing maps, I'm not sure what you expected.
Well if what we have currently is a state of stagnation, then what we had before was massive oversaturation. The fact the story of the Starcraft 2 map scene, is that way too many maps are being created for the tournement scene to ever be able to use them all. You can argue that they aren't changing maps fast enough and i would tend to agree.
I can't blame Blizzard for using only their own maps for this test. Fact of the matter is that maps are not only part of the balance, but also part of the tuning process. They need maps that are experimental, to try out their new toys and see how stuff have changed. But they also need maps that are milestones and define what should be balanced.
If i were to take a guess i would say Star station is a map designed to be a milestone. Distance from naturals to naturals are relatively even, the conditions for the fourths are all the same and you can always take it away from your opponent. The only difference is the distances from the third, and it isn't that big. If this map isn't balanced they will make it so, through unit adjustment. Thats my theory anyway.
Korhal city is clearly an experimential map through. It got everything, larger ramps, inhouse bases, rocks of all kinds on the thirds/fourths, massive air space(in a game with 22 range air units). if they expected this to have perfect 50/50 balance they would be nuts.
Also OxyGenesis is right about the map scene stagnating because the process to get new maps in tournaments is so arbitrary and difficult. The highlight of the WOL community map scene was probably TLMC and the season 6 ladder pool, and nothing has really happened since then. Blizzard needs to be doing something like the TLMC every season, or seriously support a community effort to test new maps and get them added to ladder/tournament pools. The map pool is what will keep SC2 going after its production cycle is finished. With the added strategic depth HOTS provides, every new map that is proven 'good' can offer a larger range of interesting play that keeps viewers engaged. It's important for Blizzard to realize that now so the map scene can thrive once all the expansions are out and balance patches are done.
Blizzard can't do a TLMC every format it would be impossible. Rememper it took a large voting process, and afterwards took 2 formats to implement the maps. I think the best we could ever hope for is that it could be an annual event. Well on the years where Blizzard aren't busy with an expansion.
As for season 6 it both shows the highlights and the pitfalls of mappools decided by community vote. There are 2 problems.
For one community mappers aren't really content to follow the "ladder rules" when they havn't got strict orders to do so(Like in the TLMC). I don't really wanna argue about if the "ladder rules" should be there, just wanna state that Blizzard seems to enforce them strict when it comes to their ladder maps. Point is both season 6 picks was adjusted slightly for their ladder version, which caused some degree of uproar.
Second and probably more important is metropolis. I have said this a ton of times, but metropolis is the disaster that couldn't be allowed to happen to community mapping. It did. It was a brand new GSL map when the voting on which GSL maps should be taken in started. Not much play had occured but pros were already a bit concerned with how turtlely games it seems to make. But noone could imagen how broken the map was. First of all the balance. Metropolis is so favored for ZvT that it becomes absurd. Blizzard might as well make the maps themself if this is the balance they aim for. But the true problem was the lag, and it have caused problems everywhere. Metropolis is the second map ever to be thrown out of the ladder pool mid-season for this, and now it is also out of the GSL.
Point is the map should never have been voted in, and if there was a reason for Blizzard not doing votes in S7 and S8 this could be it.
Phew another novel done. I need to learn to restrict myself.
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Blizzard did try to adapt their map to current play which is nice to see.
I would still rather see them take a step off on map-making and let the pro map makers (lsprime & others) make the competitive maps.
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On September 10 2012 05:57 Sumadin wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2012 09:12 OxyGenesis wrote:On September 08 2012 11:00 Herect wrote:
I'm laughing at people making "extensive breakdown analysis" on these maps. If they don't have abusive shit, they're OK for a while.
HotS is for try out new things. We don't have a stabilished metagame to even start to make assumptions about these news maps. 2 entrances to a wide open Natural is bad for Toss and Terran against in WoL, right? But you cannot forget that both Toss and Terran can make units that could considerably increase their defenders advantage in the early game (BH, Warhounds, MSC).
I'm happy to see so much experimental things. The WoL map scene is so stagnated. All popular maps look the same and all maps that are trying something new are being rejected. WoL map scene has stagnated due to lack of support from blizzard and tournaments, not due to lack of good maps. The fact is that some of the best map makers stopped making maps because they knew it was futile when there was no opportunity to get their maps used. As for breaking down the beta maps, I'm a mapper, I like to analyse maps, sue me. I know they are trying new things out, but some of blizzard's decisions still don't make sense even in that context. This is a forum for discussing maps, I'm not sure what you expected. Well if what we have currently is a state of stagnation, then what we had before was massive oversaturation. The fact the story of the Starcraft 2 map scene, is that way too many maps are being created for the tournement scene to ever be able to use them all. You can argue that they aren't changing maps fast enough and i would tend to agree. I can't blame Blizzard for using only their own maps for this test. Fact of the matter is that maps are not only part of the balance, but also part of the tuning process. They need maps that are experimental, to try out their new toys and see how stuff have changed. But they also need maps that are milestones and define what should be balanced. If i were to take a guess i would say Star station is a map designed to be a milestone. Distance from naturals to naturals are relatively even, the conditions for the fourths are all the same and you can always take it away from your opponent. The only difference is the distances from the third, and it isn't that big. If this map isn't balanced they will make it so, through unit adjustment. Thats my theory anyway. Korhal city is clearly an experimential map through. It got everything, larger ramps, inhouse bases, rocks of all kinds on the thirds/fourths, massive air space(in a game with 22 range air units). if they expected this to have perfect 50/50 balance they would be nuts. Show nested quote +Also OxyGenesis is right about the map scene stagnating because the process to get new maps in tournaments is so arbitrary and difficult. The highlight of the WOL community map scene was probably TLMC and the season 6 ladder pool, and nothing has really happened since then. Blizzard needs to be doing something like the TLMC every season, or seriously support a community effort to test new maps and get them added to ladder/tournament pools. The map pool is what will keep SC2 going after its production cycle is finished. With the added strategic depth HOTS provides, every new map that is proven 'good' can offer a larger range of interesting play that keeps viewers engaged. It's important for Blizzard to realize that now so the map scene can thrive once all the expansions are out and balance patches are done. Blizzard can't do a TLMC every format it would be impossible. Rememper it took a large voting process, and afterwards took 2 formats to implement the maps. I think the best we could ever hope for is that it could be an annual event. Well on the years where Blizzard aren't busy with an expansion. As for season 6 it both shows the highlights and the pitfalls of mappools decided by community vote. There are 2 problems. For one community mappers aren't really content to follow the "ladder rules" when they havn't got strict orders to do so(Like in the TLMC). I don't really wanna argue about if the "ladder rules" should be there, just wanna state that Blizzard seems to enforce them strict when it comes to their ladder maps. Point is both season 6 picks was adjusted slightly for their ladder version, which caused some degree of uproar. Second and probably more important is metropolis. I have said this a ton of times, but metropolis is the disaster that couldn't be allowed to happen to community mapping. It did. It was a brand new GSL map when the voting on which GSL maps should be taken in started. Not much play had occured but pros were already a bit concerned with how turtlely games it seems to make. But noone could imagen how broken the map was. First of all the balance. Metropolis is so favored for ZvT that it becomes absurd. Blizzard might as well make the maps themself if this is the balance they aim for. But the true problem was the lag, and it have caused problems everywhere. Metropolis is the second map ever to be thrown out of the ladder pool mid-season for this, and now it is also out of the GSL. Point is the map should never have been voted in, and if there was a reason for Blizzard not doing votes in S7 and S8 this could be it. Phew another novel done. I need to learn to restrict myself.
1. You're actually right - the TLMC process wasn't exactly efficient and even the "winners" were not chosen purely on how good the map was. The map "Haven's Lagoon" comes to mind as a map that won because of its idea (all expands decreased in altitude from the main), but to this day I feel that was a poor choice because in all of SC2 the TLMC was the one chance community maps had a chance of finding a way into the Blizzard map pool and Haven's Lagoon wasted the chance a good map could've had into making it into the current pool and taking out extremely dated maps such as Shakuras/Tal'Darim/etc.
That being said, I am convinced that if significant effort was put into it a more streamlined method could be created to determined good/better tournament maps at a faster rate (though I'll be 100% honest and say I'm not sure what that method could be). If mappers knew their maps would have a fair chance in getting exposure and eventually get into the Blizzard map pool and tournaments, there would be more maps being made.
2. You're also right about community mappers not following 'ladder guidelines' - this is something that needs to be changed in the future if Blizzard wants to keep an active healthy ladder after SC2's production cycle is over. Things such as having different mineral/geyser amounts per expansion add as much to the depth of strategy in a map as any other facet of the map. IIRC David Kim has said once Heart Of The Swarm comes out they can make the ranked 1v1 map pool more geared towards high end play as they can use a dumbed down map pool for unranked play, I hope this is the case - either way now more than ever the idea that all expands have to use 8m/2g is silly because you can now see the max amount of harvesters an expansion can have on the command center and gas geysers. The idea that low level players would be confused by the amount of minerals is no longer true - they no longer have to make the logical jump to realize that less mineral patches = less workers for optimal saturation, the information is explicitly shown to the player.
In fact, whereas before I was slightly on the fence about Blizzard showing how many workers were mining on minerals, I would be 100% okay with it if it meant Blizzard would be open to having maps that had non 8m/2g expansions in the map pool. The benefits of added depth of strategy would far outweigh any con (that I can see).
3. I don't think community votes are the absolute best way either so I won't argue with your point about Metropolis - I do think that it would be in everyone's best interests if Blizzard regularly worked or conferred with map making teams.
And no need to restrict yourself, I think these conversations are important to have because maps are a huge part of Starcraft II and often don't get as much as attention as balance/theory crafting.
As an aside because the first part of your comment wasn't directed to me but I've actually been thinking about that as well: you were right that for a short while there was surely an oversaturation of maps. IPL4 (IIRC) and NASL S3 pre-season had a ridiculous amount of new maps, and not all were tested. This hurt all of those maps in the long run because there was no way players could practice on the new maps, or give the tournaments enough time to determine map balance. Maps either ended up being taken out en-masse (NASL S3) or most/all maps were vetoed (IPL4). ESVDiamond did a pretty great post (that I imagine you read) that goes into detail how a 5 map pool is optimal, and having one of those 5 maps be considered new or different is enough to have a fresh map pool. If every tournament did that, the map pool would be fresh, yet not over saturated. However it seems most tournaments are either adding way too many, or none at all.
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On September 10 2012 06:19 DrowSwordsman wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2012 05:57 Sumadin wrote:On September 09 2012 09:12 OxyGenesis wrote:On September 08 2012 11:00 Herect wrote:
I'm laughing at people making "extensive breakdown analysis" on these maps. If they don't have abusive shit, they're OK for a while.
HotS is for try out new things. We don't have a stabilished metagame to even start to make assumptions about these news maps. 2 entrances to a wide open Natural is bad for Toss and Terran against in WoL, right? But you cannot forget that both Toss and Terran can make units that could considerably increase their defenders advantage in the early game (BH, Warhounds, MSC).
I'm happy to see so much experimental things. The WoL map scene is so stagnated. All popular maps look the same and all maps that are trying something new are being rejected. WoL map scene has stagnated due to lack of support from blizzard and tournaments, not due to lack of good maps. The fact is that some of the best map makers stopped making maps because they knew it was futile when there was no opportunity to get their maps used. As for breaking down the beta maps, I'm a mapper, I like to analyse maps, sue me. I know they are trying new things out, but some of blizzard's decisions still don't make sense even in that context. This is a forum for discussing maps, I'm not sure what you expected. Well if what we have currently is a state of stagnation, then what we had before was massive oversaturation. The fact the story of the Starcraft 2 map scene, is that way too many maps are being created for the tournement scene to ever be able to use them all. You can argue that they aren't changing maps fast enough and i would tend to agree. I can't blame Blizzard for using only their own maps for this test. Fact of the matter is that maps are not only part of the balance, but also part of the tuning process. They need maps that are experimental, to try out their new toys and see how stuff have changed. But they also need maps that are milestones and define what should be balanced. If i were to take a guess i would say Star station is a map designed to be a milestone. Distance from naturals to naturals are relatively even, the conditions for the fourths are all the same and you can always take it away from your opponent. The only difference is the distances from the third, and it isn't that big. If this map isn't balanced they will make it so, through unit adjustment. Thats my theory anyway. Korhal city is clearly an experimential map through. It got everything, larger ramps, inhouse bases, rocks of all kinds on the thirds/fourths, massive air space(in a game with 22 range air units). if they expected this to have perfect 50/50 balance they would be nuts. Also OxyGenesis is right about the map scene stagnating because the process to get new maps in tournaments is so arbitrary and difficult. The highlight of the WOL community map scene was probably TLMC and the season 6 ladder pool, and nothing has really happened since then. Blizzard needs to be doing something like the TLMC every season, or seriously support a community effort to test new maps and get them added to ladder/tournament pools. The map pool is what will keep SC2 going after its production cycle is finished. With the added strategic depth HOTS provides, every new map that is proven 'good' can offer a larger range of interesting play that keeps viewers engaged. It's important for Blizzard to realize that now so the map scene can thrive once all the expansions are out and balance patches are done. Blizzard can't do a TLMC every format it would be impossible. Rememper it took a large voting process, and afterwards took 2 formats to implement the maps. I think the best we could ever hope for is that it could be an annual event. Well on the years where Blizzard aren't busy with an expansion. As for season 6 it both shows the highlights and the pitfalls of mappools decided by community vote. There are 2 problems. For one community mappers aren't really content to follow the "ladder rules" when they havn't got strict orders to do so(Like in the TLMC). I don't really wanna argue about if the "ladder rules" should be there, just wanna state that Blizzard seems to enforce them strict when it comes to their ladder maps. Point is both season 6 picks was adjusted slightly for their ladder version, which caused some degree of uproar. Second and probably more important is metropolis. I have said this a ton of times, but metropolis is the disaster that couldn't be allowed to happen to community mapping. It did. It was a brand new GSL map when the voting on which GSL maps should be taken in started. Not much play had occured but pros were already a bit concerned with how turtlely games it seems to make. But noone could imagen how broken the map was. First of all the balance. Metropolis is so favored for ZvT that it becomes absurd. Blizzard might as well make the maps themself if this is the balance they aim for. But the true problem was the lag, and it have caused problems everywhere. Metropolis is the second map ever to be thrown out of the ladder pool mid-season for this, and now it is also out of the GSL. Point is the map should never have been voted in, and if there was a reason for Blizzard not doing votes in S7 and S8 this could be it. Phew another novel done. I need to learn to restrict myself. 1. You're actually right - the TLMC process wasn't exactly efficient and even the "winners" were not chosen purely on how good the map was. The map "Haven's Lagoon" comes to mind as a map that won because of its idea (all expands decreased in altitude from the main), but to this day I feel that was a poor choice because in all of SC2 the TLMC was the one chance community maps had a chance of finding a way into the Blizzard map pool and Haven's Lagoon wasted the chance a good map could've had into making it into the current pool and taking out extremely dated maps such as Shakuras/Tal'Darim/etc. That being said, I am convinced that if significant effort was put into it a more streamlined method could be created to determined good/better tournament maps at a faster rate (though I'll be 100% honest and say I'm not sure what that method could be). If mappers knew their maps would have a fair chance in getting exposure and eventually get into the Blizzard map pool and tournaments, there would be more maps being made. 2. You're also right about community mappers not following 'ladder guidelines' - this is something that needs to be changed in the future if Blizzard wants to keep an active healthy ladder after SC2's production cycle is over. Things such as having different mineral/geyser amounts per expansion add as much to the depth of strategy in a map as any other facet of the map. IIRC David Kim has said once Heart Of The Swarm comes out they can make the ranked 1v1 map pool more geared towards high end play as they can use a dumbed down map pool for unranked play, I hope this is the case - either way now more than ever the idea that all expands have to use 8m/2g is silly because you can now see the max amount of harvesters an expansion can have on the command center and gas geysers. The idea that low level players would be confused by the amount of minerals is no longer true - they no longer have to make the logical jump to realize that less mineral patches = less workers for optimal saturation, the information is explicitly shown to the player. In fact, whereas before I was slightly on the fence about Blizzard showing how many workers were mining on minerals, I would be 100% okay with it if it meant Blizzard would be open to having maps that had non 8m/2g expansions in the map pool. The benefits of added depth of strategy would far outweigh any con (that I can see). 3. I don't think community votes are the absolute best way either so I won't argue with your point about Metropolis - I do think that it would be in everyone's best interests if Blizzard regularly worked or conferred with map making teams. And no need to restrict yourself, I think these conversations are important to have because maps are a huge part of Starcraft II and often don't get as much as attention as balance/theory crafting. As an aside because the first part of your comment wasn't directed to me but I've actually been thinking about that as well: you were right that for a short while there was surely an oversaturation of maps. IPL4 (IIRC) and NASL S3 pre-season had a ridiculous amount of new maps, and not all were tested. This hurt all of those maps in the long run because there was no way players could practice on the new maps, or give the tournaments enough time to determine map balance. Maps either ended up being taken out en-masse (NASL S3) or most/all maps were vetoed (IPL4). ESVDiamond did a pretty great post (that I imagine you read) that goes into detail how a 5 map pool is optimal, and having one of those 5 maps be considered new or different is enough to have a fresh map pool. If every tournament did that, the map pool would be fresh, yet not over saturated. However it seems most tournaments are either adding way too many, or none at all.
I have read that thread(Here is a link: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=338532 ), infact if i recall i am the last one that commented on that thread. That was a while ago. Not to worry it usually gets bumped around the time MLG announces their next season and the changes to their map pool(Or lack of thereof).
As for getting tournement maps in faster, it is a tough task. Blizzard doesn't really wanna take in untested community maps, and now that their own map pool have gotten so good tournements don't wanna take map in that isn't used by Blizzard. The TLMC was a huge event that took a massive voting and brought us... 2 maps. Blizzard actually took in one more but tournements rejected it, and it was soon after disposed aswell. If they are to hold another TLMC it must be with higher efficiantcy in mind. Personally i think preassure must be put on some of the major tournements("Cough" MLG) to take in some more community maps.
I don't entirely agree with 5 being the optimal number for a map pool through. It decreases map variety and I don't like map reruns. But that is mostly because even those tournement rarely that run less than 7 maps don't have sufficiant creativity in their map pool. IMO 7 maps is the absolute minimum if all the maps you got are tried and tested( This of course doesn't apply to tournements that are purely BO5 or below). In the thread i refer to the "ladder six" which is basicly the 6 maps from ladder that tournements use today. It is kinda annoying, but we seems to be moving on a bit now, with metropolis getting trashed both by Blizzard and the GSL.
I don't think it is entirely bad to have the ladder guidelines there. Mappers will do alot to try and balance flawed concepts. My best example would be Xel'Naga fortress a GSL map no less(Well former GSL map). Its design made it extreme terran favored initial, their solution? Have the center watchtower have a timer that would destroy the tower after 7 min, so that the center wasn't so siege tank friendly late game. Nevermind that terrans got Sensor towers and scans that could replace it once gone.
Because of this i think it is fine that Blizzard define what is okay, and what you aren't getting through to ladder with. I never really bought the " We reject half-bases for lowbies" I think they reject half bases because they don't wanna try and determen balance around the altered income.
Blizzard did try to adapt their map to current play which is nice to see.
I would still rather see them take a step off on map-making and let the pro map makers (lsprime & others) make the competitive maps.
You gotta rememper that whoever is doing Blizzards mapmaking is on their payroll. Blizzard can't really have them sit around.
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On September 08 2012 10:09 Fatam wrote:
I think the most depressing thing here is that this probably means that they won't be using many/any community-made maps for ladder when HOTS comes out (which there are plenty of good ones that are better than theirs).
I'm actually happy about it. A whole new map pool revitalizes the game.
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terrible maps, blizz still don't know how to do them.
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On September 11 2012 11:03 OrganicDoom wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2012 10:09 Fatam wrote:
I think the most depressing thing here is that this probably means that they won't be using many/any community-made maps for ladder when HOTS comes out (which there are plenty of good ones that are better than theirs). I'm actually happy about it. A whole new map pool revitalizes the game.
Not when its composed of horrible maps. Were you around when Blizzard still used the original stock maps on the ladder?
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EPT
