Recently I have been a little inspired by the VLOGs on Penny Arcade's "Extra Credits" and FilterSc.
When I came across this thread is was because I searched on "Counter-Play" to see what the folks on the Blizzard Forums, Reddit, and here had to say on the topic.
I think it is important to keep in mind that the design and balance goals of LoL and SC2 are quite different and I hope this effort isn't designed to turn SC2 into LoL.
Where the developers of LoL see Hard counters as "bad", and Soft counters being "good", it is to drive their niche market of getting players to continue to pay at regular more frequent intervals. Like Magic the Gathering.
The developers at Blizzard have stated they see SC2 as a game of both Hard and Soft counters. Not that they are good or bad, just it is the nature of game format, and they make adjustments based on a different "skill" model due to how they monetize the game.
Where FilterSC comes in here is his view on the current state of the game, he has taken a bold stance to say that TvT match-ups offer the widest diversity of match-ups currently, where skillful play leads to a victory, not a mistake by your opponent due to build order or poor attack vector alone.
The question is, does Blizzard intend for "perfect" balance like they got with Brood War eventually, perfect imbalance where LoL seems to be heading to drive sales, or a "Hybird" so some races have natural advantages for players with less skill in some aspect of their game (Cannon Rush anyone).
I think the premise of this thread is that SC2 has a problem with coin-flip issues due to the lack of skill required to execute hard counters verses soft counters and the goal is to increase the effectiveness of soft counters through the magic of "Counter-Play", thus increasing the skill needed to execute more effective counter plays to both soft and hard counters.
What I think eSports viewers seek is "diversity of effective strategy" for each match-up and dominate strategies be addressed with a mixture of hard and soft counter changes, not just soft counters like LoL seens to be heading.
The question is will HotS's new units address the diversity of strategy issue between the races, and is this effort focused on that or just addressing coin-flip issues to appease the eSport / skill audience.
I am not saying that this effort is bad, just how will you know when you are successful, or will you ever know?
I think you, and blizzard are mistaking on one point : broodwar was interesting and balanced because it had solid and simple basics. Both oneGoal and HotS are adding a lot of complexity. I think this is bad for the game. For example, broodwar had one type of attack, WoL have mostly 2, you're trying to go around with three (with units not affected by either light or armored bonused weapons). I think 1 was the key, making it more about playing well with your units than having the good side of the coin in the hard counter. I think it's this hard counter oriented style that kills the diversity. Things like this, immortals shields (that you are making more common ...) are reducing diversity by hard countering a strategy.
Th deathball issue is another problem, mainly caused by differences in the engines. Units are more stacked naturally in SC2 so blizzard had to nerf aoe spells really hard (see storm nerfs at the start of the game), thus allowing to go through them with your deathball. BW had really powerful aoe spells, but units were less stacked : you had to land more spells/hits to kill a complete group of units, but each well placed hit had a positive outcome in units killed, making each success more valuable (for example, good storms).
On January 01 2013 10:16 Nyvis wrote: I think you, and blizzard are mistaking on one point : broodwar was interesting and balanced because it had solid and simple basics. Both oneGoal and HotS are adding a lot of complexity. I think this is bad for the game. For example, broodwar had one type of attack, WoL have mostly 2, you're trying to go around with three (with units not affected by either light or armored bonused weapons). I think 1 was the key, making it more about playing well with your units than having the good side of the coin in the hard counter. I think it's this hard counter oriented style that kills the diversity. Things like this, immortals shields (that you are making more common ...) are reducing diversity by hard countering a strategy.
Th deathball issue is another problem, mainly caused by differences in the engines. Units are more stacked naturally in SC2 so blizzard had to nerf aoe spells really hard (see storm nerfs at the start of the game), thus allowing to go through them with your deathball. BW had really powerful aoe spells, but units were less stacked : you had to land more spells/hits to kill a complete group of units, but each well placed hit had a positive outcome in units killed, making each success more valuable (for example, good storms).
Um if by types of attack you mean bonuses (i.e in SC2 + vs armoured) brood war had 'three types of attack', since there was three types of units (small, medium, large). For example vultures did concussive damage, which meant they did 100% damage to light, 50% to medium, and 25% to small. This is actually one of the things I really think is good with onegoal, since while it adds some complexity, it gives the developers a greater tool kit to balance with without confusing users too much.
Pretty much what GattAttack said. BW and one Goal's damage systems are very similar. There are Massive, Bio, Psionic, and Mech tags as well, but we feel that these shouldn't be the topic of damage bonuses for standard attacks given that they generally encourage hard counters.
The underlying damage system doesn't have to be simple. What needs to be simple (but deep, like Go is) is unit interactions on gameplay level. E.g. Firebats own Zerglings, but if surrounded, they die in no time. Marines get evaporated by Banelings, but if Marines get split etc. they can deal with Banelings just fine. How that's achieved in terms of stats and attack/armor types is not a priority.
Just because a game has complicated attack/armor system doesn't mean it can't be intuitive on unit interaction level. You shouldn't be supposed to deduce the best unit composition vs. some other composition on theoretical grounds. You should experiment and/or watch what better player do in certain situations. The attack/armor system should predominantly be a tool for developers to tweak the balance (assuming the core gameplay is fine).
Armies of Exigo is a great example of that. It had like a dozen types of arrmor and attack, but on unit interaction level it was just as intuitive as BW.
On January 02 2013 03:24 maybenexttime wrote: The underlying damage system doesn't have to be simple. What needs to be simple (but deep, like Go is) is unit interactions on gameplay level. E.g. Firebats own Zerglings, but if surrounded, they die in no time. Marines get evaporated by Banelings, but if Marines get split etc. they can deal with Banelings just fine. How that's achieved in terms of stats and attack/armor types is not a priority.
Just because a game has complicated attack/armor system doesn't mean it can't be intuitive on unit interaction level. You shouldn't be supposed to deduce the best unit composition vs. some other composition on theoretical grounds. You should experiment and/or watch what better player do in certain situations. The attack/armor system should predominantly be a tool for developers to tweak the balance (assuming the core gameplay is fine).
Armies of Exigo is a great example of that. It had like a dozen types of arrmor and attack, but on unit interaction level it was just as intuitive as BW.
Yes, you're right. I'm just afraid that onegoal will introduce as much hard counters as there is in wol at the moment. For example, I'm really worried of the shield upgrade for dragoons. Added to the fact that it feels like a big, powerful unit capacity, not something you should have on a core gateway unit. Maybe I'm wrong though, with them having only 100 shield. But it makes them hardcounter tanks, and makes ghosts hardcounter them ... The pdd working on their attacks is a nice touch, though. Them attacking air makes them really versatile too, having the basics uses of the stalker with a lot of added toughness, making air play really hard against protoss, especially late game, with armored air units.
On January 02 2013 03:24 maybenexttime wrote: The underlying damage system doesn't have to be simple. What needs to be simple (but deep, like Go is) is unit interactions on gameplay level. E.g. Firebats own Zerglings, but if surrounded, they die in no time. Marines get evaporated by Banelings, but if Marines get split etc. they can deal with Banelings just fine. How that's achieved in terms of stats and attack/armor types is not a priority.
Just because a game has complicated attack/armor system doesn't mean it can't be intuitive on unit interaction level. You shouldn't be supposed to deduce the best unit composition vs. some other composition on theoretical grounds. You should experiment and/or watch what better player do in certain situations. The attack/armor system should predominantly be a tool for developers to tweak the balance (assuming the core gameplay is fine).
Armies of Exigo is a great example of that. It had like a dozen types of arrmor and attack, but on unit interaction level it was just as intuitive as BW.
The most intelligent post regarding game design I've come across. This is truly how the game should be balanced.
May the better player be victorious, even with an inferior combination of units. The losing player must be awed and inspired by his opponent's success and superior battlefield management. Currently, most players just assume that the game design heavily favours their opponents when they lose consistently against a particular set of units, rather than concluding that they themselves could have employed a better tactic with the same army composition.
The Firebat + Zergling micro management you so clearly mentioned is a better example that could be used for improving the game design whilst still maintaining the notion of a counter. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem that Blizzard is ever going to change their stance on hard counters.
I agree 100%. But if you read my earlier posts I argued why I didn't like your change to the raven, thor and BC (and I think EMP and snipe could be make a lot better as well from a design POV - though redesigning the ghosts should have a lower priority). Players won't be able to express their skills with those new abilities (and the opponent won't be able to remicro which makes them boring). Can you explain your thoughts of these new abilities (besides what is written in the OP).
On January 02 2013 12:15 topsecret221 wrote: @Nyvis Last I checked, Immortals have 80 shields, and 2 supply, the same as a stalker.
You mean OneGoal immortals, right ? That's not what is written on the first page (3 supply, 100 shield), but we don't have the map on Eu so I can't check if it changed.
Regarding the "expression of skill" as you put in your vod; do roaches have a lowered attack priority when burrowed? I remember blizzard decreased the attack priority on the mines in order to make them more interesting, in that for engagements you had to manually focus them down, or kill everything around them.
If this is not already the case, I think roaches should have a lower attack priority when burrowed. For example;
blink does not take away the priority on that unit, it simply takes it out of the fight for a split second to where the attacking units lose the target and have to manually re-select that stalker to attack. I think roaches could be more interesting if there was something similar with them, where burrow micro meant that the attacking unit lost the priority on the roach while it was burrowed, letting the other roaches take the fire while it retreated underground.
As is, I've yet to see effective burrow micro from any zerg (TLO uses lings T_T) because detection makes this micro obsolete. Why burrow a roach mid-battle if its just going to die anyways because detection makes the EPM spent on the unit worthless. If roaches had a lower priority, then there could be an entirely new breed of tactics involving standard burrow micro (reminiscent of blink micro), distracting defenses while burrowed roaches close in the gap (similar to how widow mines are bought a little time to close the gap in HotS with other units covering them in engagements), burrowed roach/baneling traps, and more I can't think of at the moment.
This change WOULD NOT help burrowed roaches just waltzing up into a base by themselves, which is already done to very little extent. Even though they have a lowered attack priority, by themselves the priority makes no differences and defenses would automatically attack them anyways. Detection alone would not be enough to deal with burrow-micro roaches (I.E. I build this unit, so you can not do this.) It would demand more interaction between both players and the roaches in order to be utilized to its fullest potential.
ZvT, 7 Roaches are countering the Terran (Lets say on Cloud Kingdom), Terran is defending with a wall, a bunker, 3 marauders, a tank on the high ground, and a turret. Roaches run in, take some damage from the tank, and proceed to bust down the bunker. Zerg player burrows the roach that took the tank volley, pulls him back from the fight. The Terran units lose the target, and start firing on the rest of the pack. Terran has detection, so he MANUALLY targets the fleeing roach with the tank. However, the roach is away from the rest of the pack, so no splash is done, and its toughened armor plus regen means it takes 2 more shots to kill it while burrowed. It leaves the range of the tank, and Terran essentially wasted a tank shot. Marauders stim, and run into bunker. Roaches start taking heavy damage, but the bunker goes down. Zerg pulls injured roaches behind the pack, but its too much damage. Roaches are dying even when burrowed. Suddenly, a swell of lings swoop in (just a few, like 5-10), sacrifice themselves against the marauders and wall. The roaches burrow, and the Terran, microing his main army across the map, does not re-aquire the target on the retreating roaches, and loses his chance to kill another 5 or so roaches. They fully regen hp, and proceed to rejoin the main fight, unburrowing on top of and sniping some tanks in the back.
Doesn't that sound more exciting than roaches ran up against the defenses, they got shot, tried to burrow away, but were obliterated without doing anything.
} Dont even get me started on OneGoal Burrow Roach vs Stalker immortal (Stalkers tanking shots for the Immortals, and blinking back to conserve hull damage)
EDIT: holy heck, all this for one unit's one ability :O One goal FTW
Hider, I agree that EMP and snipe could use updating. With skill expression focused on battle micro rather than macro and fighting the interface, both are from the old school of thought where you get to just deal damage to your enemy and they have little non-preventative options of counterplay. Yuck.
Since we're on the same board here, why don't you (or anyone else) have a go at designing a better battlecruiser. Here's the criteria we've identified:
1) It needs to have an appreciable affect with just having one or two, while not getting ridiculous when adding many of them. 2) It needs to supplemental mech mobility on larger maps (we're trying to support even larger maps through our unit design) 3) Ideally has reactionary counterplay so the opponent can express his skill versus it. 4) Ideally requires skill to use well. Some mid-battle babysit micro is permitted, due to the lower micro demands of mech mid-battle thanks to siege tanks. (Having a demanding BC that's designed mostly to work with bio, requiring a lot of midbattle micro to make effective would be a disaster, as the bio requires the majority of your attention to be effective, and thus would render a micro-heavy BC unusable. However, since it doesn't synergize with Bio in any way, we can design assuming it will be played with mech or sky only). 5) Discourages deathball play. 6) Ideally it slows down fights
Our design hits criteria 1, 2 and 3. -1 is beacuse it only takes one or two BCs to amp up your mech speed by 20% and dps by 10%. -2, because the auras do not stack, so having 20 BC's over your mech doesn't make the ridiculous. -3, thanks to high templar, tempest, vikings, ghosts, corruptors, and vipers being able to kill the BC to shut its aura off, though this would not be true for some sort of instant damage spell, so be careful with those.
It mostly fails on 4 and 5. -On 4, it does require some skill to place them over all the places you want to hold, or micro the advance of you tank line at the high level on very broad maps. It could look so cool. But just having one over a deathball mech is no expression of skill. -On 5 with deathballing, it is a concern. As with all auras, it encourages clumping, so that is bad. There's one thing that helps with that, though: mech often seiges in a line to be most effective, and since mech must siege we see the deathball much less often, and so adding an aura to it is less toxic than something like mothership cloak and colossus.
Behemoth Reactor actually destructive for 6. But there are reasons we made the exception for the time being: a) it helps mech address hardened shields [though this may not even be necessary since hellions gud tanking unit], b) it helped counter the remax effect of zerg. Currently terran mech has extremely slow rebuild rate compared to the other races and bio, meaning in the endgame, each battle is a singe-point failure. 1 supply widow mines and 2 supply siege tanks help address this through buying time and just taking a long time to kill, but by offering mech a late game efficiency booster through Behemoth conduit, it relieves these some, and we were hoping the expression of skill could come through other ways such as how they position and control area in huge maps.
If you or anyone else can build a better BC that addresses these criteria, or identify more criteria, we'd love to see it.
Yes, burrow micro needs to be more rewarding, and the upcomming patch addresses that. We use a different solution, though we have considered yours. I can't type much more today, but I think you will find our implementation even more rewarding.
EDIT: also yay: "holy heck, all this for one unit's one ability :O One goal FTW", but I don't know what you're referencing >.<
I agree totally with what you are saying about macro (and fungal). I agree that spells should allow you to express your skill by their usage because getting them is easy. I wasn't talking about infestors (or spellcasters globally) when I was talking about complexity. Spellcasters have multiple abilities and are by conception complex. A new player knows this and can avoid it. And it's this complexity that makes them key on the field. Fine. I was more talking about the armor type (more "medium" armor unit, with no one having bonus against them) and the non-skill expressive capacities on the units (the shield on the now gateway immortals). This creates complex basic units and interactions, having such a key capacity on a baseline gateway unit seems weird to me.
For the BC, now. I think your choice have some good. I like the "flagship" feel a lot. But making it a mech bonusing unit only feels wierd. Why would it be tied especially to mech? Why limit the interactions and the potential strategies? Plus, I really don't like the choice of bonuses you went for. Yes, it's what mech need as a bonus. But it's making the game faster. And it's just a group mech stim. Plus, it discourages completely a strategy using more than one BC.
I think something more interesting would be to make behemoth conduit a more powerful skill (a bit more movespeed and attackspeed), but make it a one target ability. It won't be insane in big numbers of BC, because you would have few units to empower with it (it should just be balanced so that it wont be too powerful on the BC itself, but still usable to make fast BC strategies doable). It would make the spell really skill intensive, while being powerful to make your tanks hit faster. And might be interesting on thors too. I think it shouldn't be limited to mechanical, because bio units are small enough so that it won't matter at all. It should be long enough so that the speed boost can be used on one unit and then send it scouting, for example. Another possibility is to make it a small area of effect with less powerful effect if the one target thing is too micro-intensive.
This would make more than one BC useful, without making BC stack a broken strat, I think.
On January 03 2013 05:47 FoxyMayhem wrote: Hider, I agree that EMP and snipe could use updating. With skill expression focused on battle micro rather than macro and fighting the interface, both are from the old school of thought where you get to just deal damage to your enemy and they have little non-preventative options of counterplay. Yuck.
Since we're on the same board here, why don't you (or anyone else) have a go at designing a better battlecruiser. Here's the criteria we've identified:
1) It needs to have an appreciable affect with just having one or two, while not getting ridiculous when adding many of them. 2) It needs to supplemental mech mobility on larger maps (we're trying to support even larger maps through our unit design) 3) Ideally has reactionary counterplay so the opponent can express his skill versus it. 4) Ideally requires skill to use well. Some mid-battle babysit micro is permitted, due to the lower micro demands of mech mid-battle thanks to siege tanks. (Having a demanding BC that's designed mostly to work with bio, requiring a lot of midbattle micro to make effective would be a disaster, as the bio requires the majority of your attention to be effective, and thus would render a micro-heavy BC unusable. However, since it doesn't synergize with Bio in any way, we can design assuming it will be played with mech or sky only). 5) Discourages deathball play. 6) Ideally it slows down fights
Our design hits criteria 1, 2 and 3. -1 is beacuse it only takes one or two BCs to amp up your mech speed by 20% and dps by 10%. -2, because the auras do not stack, so having 20 BC's over your mech doesn't make the ridiculous. -3, thanks to high templar, tempest, vikings, ghosts, corruptors, and vipers being able to kill the BC to shut its aura off, though this would not be true for some sort of instant damage spell, so be careful with those.
It mostly fails on 4 and 5. -On 4, it does require some skill to place them over all the places you want to hold, or micro the advance of you tank line at the high level on very broad maps. It could look so cool. But just having one over a deathball mech is no expression of skill. -On 5 with deathballing, it is a concern. As with all auras, it encourages clumping, so that is bad. There's one thing that helps with that, though: mech often seiges in a line to be most effective, and since mech must siege we see the deathball much less often, and so adding an aura to it is less toxic than something like mothership cloak and colossus.
Behemoth Reactor actually destructive for 6. But there are reasons we made the exception for the time being: a) it helps mech address hardened shields [though this may not even be necessary since hellions gud tanking unit], b) it helped counter the remax effect of zerg. Currently terran mech has extremely slow rebuild rate compared to the other races and bio, meaning in the endgame, each battle is a singe-point failure. 1 supply widow mines and 2 supply siege tanks help address this through buying time and just taking a long time to kill, but by offering mech a late game efficiency booster through Behemoth conduit, it relieves these some, and we were hoping the expression of skill could come through other ways such as how they position and control area in huge maps.
If you or anyone else can build a better BC that addresses these criteria, or identify more criteria, we'd love to see it.
Thank you for your thoughts. As always I agree very much with your design philosphy, and I think none of your suggested units are directly bad. Some, though are more boring with others as they don't fulfill 4 and 5.
EDIT: also yay: "holy heck, all this for one unit's one ability :O One goal FTW", but I don't know what you're referencing >.<
That was just me realizing that I did a (longer than expected) post on one aspect of a single unit. The fact that OneGoal is spawning these types of discussions is pleasing to me :D + Show Spoiler +
Starbow does the same too, which is why I like both.
Channeling ability: Initial cost of 25 energy (Energy degen about as much as health loss of a building being consumed. Too much? Too little?)
Targeted mechanical units and the BattleCruiser (max of 3) within a range of 9 receive an increase in armor (+1), attack speed (+.3 secs) and movement speed (+.25) increase. Should the affected units OR the BattleCruiser move out of 12 range of each other, or the BattleCruiser reaches 0 energy, or dies while the channeling is occurring, the units will be stunned for 2 seconds and unable to fire or move. Does not stack.
*Numbers in bold are easily changeable and can be adjusted for balance. Numbers not in bold have a more significant impact on the design.*
Ideally, this is targeted on siege tanks, vikings, and other CattleBruisers. (Thors if they manage to stay in the mod too) -Really the unit that most needs help with mobility is the siege tank. The buff increases movement speed, allowing tanks to get into a good position faster, or out of a bad one. -As it does not stack and can only be used on a few units at a time, getting more battle cruisers will only supplement your existing army, not exponentially increase the efficiency to the point where mass BCs is over powered (like WoL Infestors) Choosing what units to use it on, and when, can be a matter of skill, because using it on expendable or endangered units (endangered like a surrounded sieged tank. No amount of movement speed will save it ) would be a waste of energy. -Also, some interesting tactics can be brought forth where a BC giving OCD can be used as bait, and if it's being focused fired, then it can be turned off right before it goes down, saving the units it was attached too and serving (as BCs are supposed to) as a tank for the rest of the army to do damage. More tactics can be spawned with better players :D
Effects on the enemy and battle: (Points 3, 5, and 6) + Show Spoiler +
This ability is a very strong ability, as it should be, befitting the Terran Fleet's Flagship. -However, like many terran strengths, it has some blatant weaknesses to it as well. (Stim does dmg, siege and hellbats destroy mobility, seekers and mines CAN do splash damage, etc). The weaknesses I feel are equally strong for its strengths, but really depend on the opponent's ability to exploit them. Example: Feedback will set the energy to 0. Abduct will remove the BattleCruiser from within range of its forces, stunning them. Or Abduct will pull a unit out of range of the BattleCruiser, stunning that 1 unit. Tempests, Vikings, and ther Yamato BCs all have THE POTENTIAL (not automatically) to snipe the Command Cruiser, which leads to interesting counter play of keeping the Command Cruiser at max range out of the fight, and the opponent either finding and neutralizing it, or exploiting the fact that there is a BC not firing and participating in a fight. - It doesn't matter how clumped together your units are, since the ability only targets a few units at a time. (Anti Deathball, like the Viper :D).
-Does the ability make fights last longer? To be seen. I think the armor and the "point of interest" generated by the Command Cruiser has the potential to make fights last longer, but the other buffs might speed up the engagement on the ground. However, there are new tools to help slow down fights as well. (Blinding cloud, beefy T1.5 Protoss Immortal, Widow mine zone control, etc.)
If all else fails, how awesome would it be for commentators to say that there is a squadron of OCD CattleBruisers making its way to the zerg base. Terrans should be the race that has very helpful, but also harmful abilities. Notice how the basic Terran units both take drugs before they go to fight. Heck the only reason zerglings ever get on crack is from absorbing/eating the genetic material from Terran Marines, Firebats, and Marauders. Have you ever listened to the dialogue that Blizzard gave the BattleCruiser Captain? (If not just click on 1 BC a bunch of times and listen). There is no possible way he is not on SOME-thing. And hes supposed to be commanding the rest of the Terran armada? He must be taking and dealing some OCD :D
I like the idea of having a downside on it. I'm not sure about giving the BC the advantages of it too. And will the BC get it more than one time if it casts it on multiple units? Another problem I see with having the possibility to cast it on multiple units : you can't cancel it on one given unit. Or even cancel it at all, I think. At least with one ability button. That's why I was talking about a one time cast instead of a channel, but after seeing yours, I don't like the fact that you won't need to focus the BC.
Here is another version, with a bit of both :
Surcharge : X energy : Targeted units (maybe only mechanical, it's more fitting with the theme, but it's not really a problem balance wise to allow it on bio, and it could give some very interesting strats, like buffing a ghost to go emp for example) within a range of x receive an increase (I like the armor/movespeed/attackspeed, but it isn't the only option) for x seconds. The buff ends if the battlecruiser dies. At the end of the buff, the unit is stunned and suffers x damage.
You won't be able to cancel it, but it would make casting it on multiple units easier. It could create interesting strategies like buffing hellions to go harass vs zerg (that's why I removed the range limit).
can someone post a link to somewhere where all the changes that have been made are available for viewing? I've tried searching and got nothing, and the mega design thread links in the OP spoilers are not links.
EPT
) would be a waste of energy. 
