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On September 11 2012 17:15 Zombo Joe wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2012 11:03 OrganicDoom wrote: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?
I was around and it was really bad. These maps are leaps and bounds better. Their very aggressive and its much harder to defend expansions. A great change of pace from the WoL three base, turtle and death ball we currently have.
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United Kingdom281 Posts
Destiny on the new maps:
The statements below are almost indisputably factual, and I am confident that 95% of professional players would agree with them.
Bunker time needs to be increased to at least 40 seconds. Siege tanks should be able to “overkill” units, rather than smart-targeting other units and not wasting shots. Siege tank range should be nerfed by at least 3. Marine build time needs to be increased at least 5 seconds. Colossus need to lose the range upgrade. Forcefield should cost 125 energy per sentry. Protoss should not be able to warp in away from their base.
These statements seem pretty radical, but how else can Zerg possibly win the game? Marine rushes are unstoppable. 4gate is impossible to stop. The game is flawed and unbalanced on so many levels that it makes playing Zerg a joke.
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Do these argument seem relatively unreasonable? Not as unreasonable as you may think. In fact, these statements are perfectly reasonable, provided that our map pool is Steppes of War, Kulas Ravine, Delta Quadrant and Lost Temple.
One thing that people seem to forget sometimes when speaking about Starcraft 2 balance is that a lot of the progress we’ve made in arriving at this relatively balanced point in the game has come from a better map pool. Close positions have been stricken from all but blizzard maps. The absurdly small maps no longer find themselves deciding tournaments. Rocky thirds that only hurt Zerg are gone. Open naturals that make it impossible for Protoss to safely expand are unwelcome.
Starcraft 2 can be an entirely different game based upon what the current map pool is. It can be incredibly unforgiving to certain races (Zerg and Protoss are the two that are most affected by the map pool), or it can provide countless entertaining and closely-matched games. Even though people might not talk about it anymore, a lot of people would agree with these points, especially members of the mapmaking community (I’m looking at you, ESV.Diamond).
So why do I bother bringing it up?
Heart of the Swarm is currently being balanced on maps that would be laughed out of the Wings of Liberty community.
Let’s go over just a few of the basic problems with these maps.
Akilon Wastes
This is the only moderately balanced map in the map pool.
Howling Peak
The natural has two entrances. This makes walling off or defending Zerg all-ins as Protoss disproportionately harder than any other map in the pool.
Fractured Glacier
Rocks in front of the natural favors two base play. Chance for close position spawns absolutely ruins some matchups. Gold base favors T in TvZ, and Z in ZvP.
Star Nation
Third base is incredibly exposed, making it very hard for Protoss to defend Z all-ins. Close spawns (horizontally) destroys some matchups.
Korhal City
Internal natural expansion make defending as Protoss and Terran incredibly easy, makes for much greedier play than ordinary. Large ramp makes for boring ZvZs as ling/baneling becomes incredibly powerful (remember ZvZ on Tal’Darim altar?)
Obviously we don’t expect Blizzard to make perfect maps, and we know that once HotS is released the community will be releasing maps that are much more suitable for tournament play, but the main problem is that Blizzard is trying to achieve balance through patching on fundamentally bad maps.
No one wants to play a SC2 where Zerg is strong enough to hold off all-ins in close position, because that would make them absurdly powerful in far positions. If Protoss are able to cover open naturals and open thirds in close positions, imagine the impossibility of destroying them in far positions. The only way to balance races on such broken maps is to essentially make them “too powerful” for more conventional maps.
I really, truly hope that Blizzard doesn’t make any more significant patches to HotS without importing some maps from WoL, or at least inviting members of the mapmaking community to create some new maps for HotS. It’s impossible to know how good Swarm Hosts, Reapers, or the Mothership Core actually are without seeing them on maps that don’t grossly favor certain races in certain positions.
source - http://www.destinysc2.com/achieving-balance-on-an-uneven-scale/
reddit discussion - http://www.reddit.com/r/starcraft/comments/zy1ng/bunkers_siege_tanks_colossus_forcefields_all_too/
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So what? Destiny is pro player, not a map maker, he does not understand that Blizzard tries to check out weird map features to make the gameplay varied, and not the same in every map. Another thing is that the metagame will be very different in HotS, therefore some map features that are a must in WoL are not a requirement in HotS, of course the maps would be imbalanced if they were played in WoL, but they are not.
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Well honestly by Blizzard standard, these maps are okay. Of course i'd take community map over them any day of the week though. I can't wait to see what Kespa map makers will do in the future, if they finally decide to do so. They made some kick ass map on BW.
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On September 16 2012 22:56 moskonia wrote:
Another thing is that the metagame will be very different in HotS, therefore some map features that are a must in WoL are not a requirement in HotS
such as?
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On September 17 2012 00:44 a176 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2012 22:56 moskonia wrote:
Another thing is that the metagame will be very different in HotS, therefore some map features that are a must in WoL are not a requirement in HotS such as?
Could be the FFE if Blizzard can manage to tune the Mothership core right. Thus multi-entry naturals might not be as big a problem.
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![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/J7y0z.jpg)
right, can someone tell me how the fuck do you ffe on this map
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On September 21 2012 13:42 a176 wrote:
right, can someone tell me how the fuck do you ffe on this map
The ramp is 3 FF wide, just like on Entombed - it's very awkward to wall and takes a lot of buildings, but it's definitely possible.
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I actually like 3x ramp actually, but only if there's one entrance. Since there are more than one, I think it should be 2x.
And you can definitely FFE on this map, pretty easily actually..
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The HotS maps are way better than the original WoL maps. They are close to the map pool we currently have but less turtley. I think that is good though because when every game is a turtle fest there is a stagnation in spectator interest.
Unless of course you enjoy 30 min deathball wars, then by all means, fight for your right to have turtle maps.
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On September 21 2012 13:42 a176 wrote:+ Show Spoiler +right, can someone tell me how the fuck do you ffe on this map
I smell a new mapping meme.
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United Kingdom12022 Posts
I actually like the thirds on some of these maps. They promote army movement to go take them rather than them being a second natural...
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Who goes FFE in hots? It's now gateway expand era with mothership core.
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On September 21 2012 23:26 Adonminus wrote:
Who goes FFE in hots? It's now gateway expand era with mothership core.
Really? Sounds bleak!
I love the new maps, but would be persuaded to change my mind at the price of just one beta invite  ... I think the Star Station looks so freakin' cool I'm going to have a home team advantage on it!
Excitement aside, I do see the same problems with the maps, especially related to my FFEs and how easy it might be to take a third sometimes. The in-base natural map is bad for PvP, since the ramp can't be managed by the usual number of sentries, but again, no HotS key so I don't know how mothershipcore affects PvP.
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It's safe to say that each of these maps have some kind of problem. But I do have to say that they are at least decent. They are not great, and probably not even good, but I can safely say that they are decent. The thing I like though is how Blizzard is trying out some new things with these maps. In-base natural, rock-able ramp... It's interesting just for the reason that we are able to see how these will play out in high-level ladder.
Also, I'm interested to see how people will be using collase-able rocks. I definitely think that they have a lot of potential and that mapmakers could think of really unorthodox ways to utilize them.
I would have to say that our of the first batch, the map that I like the most would have to be Howling Peaks. Yes, there are some problems with it. The FFE is hard. If you think back though, people used to FFE on Metalopolis too. They would just build their buildings between the Nexus and the ramp. Even if the natural is a problem, I've seen some truly great games on streams on this map. I really like the middle, where armies could circumvent each other. And the base flow is pretty cool I think. I dunno, but all the best games of HotS that I have seen so far have been on this map.
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On September 21 2012 15:01 -NegativeZero- wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2012 13:42 a176 wrote:
right, can someone tell me how the fuck do you ffe on this map The ramp is 3 FF wide, just like on Entombed - it's very awkward to wall and takes a lot of buildings, but it's definitely possible.
its possible but doing kinda hurts you since you have to put so much into it to get the wall to work correctly and then you much more open to getting buildings picked off for free
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To be honest.
The only good thing about new Blizzard "maps": More textures for map designer.
The amout of real blizzard maps in tournament games is very low. And theres a reason for it.
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On September 23 2012 10:02 Iatrik wrote:
To be honest.
The only good thing about new Blizzard "maps": More textures for map designer.
The amout of real blizzard maps in tournament games is very low. And theres a reason for it.
Do most even use blizzard maps? or just modified ones...Now that I think about it...cant think of any
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On September 23 2012 10:23 SuperYo1000 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2012 10:02 Iatrik wrote:
To be honest.
The only good thing about new Blizzard "maps": More textures for map designer.
The amout of real blizzard maps in tournament games is very low. And theres a reason for it. Do most even use blizzard maps? or just modified ones...Now that I think about it...cant think of any
Entombed Valley comes to mind
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On September 23 2012 10:25 Iatrik wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2012 10:23 SuperYo1000 wrote:On September 23 2012 10:02 Iatrik wrote:
To be honest.
The only good thing about new Blizzard "maps": More textures for map designer.
The amout of real blizzard maps in tournament games is very low. And theres a reason for it. Do most even use blizzard maps? or just modified ones...Now that I think about it...cant think of any Entombed Valley comes to mind
As do Antiga Shipyard and Shakuras Plateau.
The number of Blizzard maps isn't that indicative of the problem though. What matters more is a fresh map pool, that's current with the metagame(as well as being potentially innovative), that can make for new, interesting games.
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EPT
