[Mod] Fixing the game again "More supply per Race" - Page 3

On March 08 2013 04:48 SiskosGoatee wrote:
My thoughts honestly, that's why if this becomes a attainable I'll raise it and raise it. There's a performance concern of course but tha'sit.

Surely it's the inverse? As I detailed, because you only have 200 pop to work with people have been figuring out how to max on units which cost the least supply possible. Which is I believe why people have been massing infestors or ghosts in TvP lately. Both units just cost almost no supply so it basically becomes a contest of who can get the most expensive max by using only units that cost very little supply.

On March 08 2013 06:45 EatThePath wrote:

Well you also have to consider maps filling up with 400 supply of units like caustic said. And other things. But yeah, about the cap itself:

I was trying to say what others are saying in a different way, using your own thought. Which is that it's a process of composition tuning. This doesn't change even if you have no cap. It just changes what you buy with your money, because supply isn't a consideration other than adding a marginal cost for supply structures. E.g. a marauder actually costs 125/25 because he uses 25% of a depot.

The point is, adjusting or removing the cap doesn't alter the underlying gameplay, when the argument is really about Lalush's position, namely that the economic system doesn't reward map control and expansion like it did in BW, which allowed a strategic axis that is severely stunted or nonexistent in SC2. By taking more bases and getting better mining from your workers, you could throw away money as a strategy that didn't depend on already having a bank lead (real or virtual). This only happens in SC2 when one player has a substantial lead and wants to shut down options for the opponent, closing the lid on the game.


If anything, the "one fix" simple mod worth trying for an otherwise unaltered SC2 would be to use the worker bouncing script from SC2BW, because this addresses the max out 3 base problem from the roots.

The supply cap adjustment isn't totally ineffective, it just doesn't get at the problem really.

On March 08 2013 07:41 moskonia wrote:
Wow you guys likes to argue, I say we simply take a test? Someone make a map and lets play a few games, if you can still stay on 3 bases and win versus a 5 base player (like its possible in the current 200 max pop), then this does nothing and we can look at other ways to improve the game. Theorycrafting and bashing each other leads to nowhere, actual testing might lead to fun and exiting new discoveries!

On March 08 2013 10:36 EatThePath wrote:

All you're going to find is that there are new timings at 4 bases on the way to maxed out. The game won't fundamentally change at all. And you'll get clogged up battles on maps made for 200 supply. And zergs would suffer a lot on some maps for lack of a viable 5th and 6th base.

On March 08 2013 11:36 moskonia wrote:

How can you know? I really don't get it, you can theorycraft all you want, but until you actually try it you can't know if you are right. Personally I think that there are many ways for this to turn out, but you guys are discarding it only because sisko was the one who came up with it. I am not saying it will make the game any better, but I am just saying it should get a few trys before everyone says its no good.

On March 08 2013 12:24 EatThePath wrote:

Well, I'd love to see what happens and I'm open to being wrong, but this has been discussed about and thought about a lot before and set aside for good reasons. They might not be the end-all reasons, but they're good reasons. Siskos is just the latest one to bring it up in earnest.

If you want to know why it's easier to be confident about the theorycrafting, go the other direction. What if there was a 100 supply cap? Two base game where you take another base for gas sometimes (50 instead of 44 workers), probably involving lots of static defense if you're not terran (marines) while getting lots of upgrades and tech units, trading off tier 1 units with harass maneuvres when possible. Another composition game.

On March 08 2013 10:36 EatThePath wrote:

All you're going to find is that there are new timings at 4 bases on the way to maxed out. The game won't fundamentally change at all. And you'll get clogged up battles on maps made for 200 supply. And zergs would suffer a lot on some maps for lack of a viable 5th and 6th base.

On March 08 2013 16:45 SiskosGoatee wrote:
Of course the game won't fundamentally change at all, is that not the point of this solution with respect to FRB? The point is to make 3 base turtling a non viable strat without fundamentally changing anything thereby requiring the least amount of balance re-adjusting possible. Actually altering the mining behaviour of the map requires vast amounts of rebalancing.

Do you earnestly not concede that almost surely increasing the pop cap will make 3 base turtling a non viable strat?

On March 08 2013 17:56 Fatam wrote:
Yeah agreed, I don't see how anyone can argue that turtling would still happen as much. Anyone with half a brain can see that it wouldn't.

Would the change affect some other things negatively? That is the question. But it would certainly deal a blow to turtling and the deathball.. at least to some degree.

On March 08 2013 17:57 EatThePath wrote:

In an imaginary 300cap pro SC2 metagame on the maps we currenly have (I guess this is an accurate account of the present hypothetical?), the longterm would probably leave 3 base turtle behind. But...

At first you'd expect that since you can get 5 full bases that getting 66% more income than a 3baser would mean the 3baser has no chance. But it still takes time and investment to get 5 bases running, and still more time and investment to get the production to use that economy, and investment to defend those bases (cost of static defense, and cost of rebuilding units for fights, and the hit your composition takes due to both of those). Moreover, all the upgrades in the game can be got on 3-4 bases long before 5 bases fully kicks in, and as mentioned above the expander will be behind in tech/composition/production/something. So, I'm not sure about the math but I think a player could "turtle" on 3 bases and just dedicate themselves to producing a deathball. Even if the 5 base player maxes first, I doubt their army would win outright. It might lose outright. So I think, especially at first, 3 base would be perfectly viable. It might even be a mainstay for terrans who can make OCs for their supply and mule during the extra time it takes to get to 300/300.

However, I would assume that macro play would eventually dominate after timings were figured out, and more or less leave 3basers behind. Except for one thing, which is the maps. If it were played on the maps we have now, you'd never be able to 4 and 5 base. Why?

No one is going to "turtle" on 3 bases while their opponent takes a 4th and 5th. In that scenario, you're no longer stuck defending your 3 bases if your opponent is trying to invest further into things that aren't right-now-army. You're going to do a 3 base timing attack (if you don't want to expand too). It might not be quick, you might even let them get 4 bases running, or 5, but your goal is to win the game in one blow. This might be a killing sweep or just a base snipe with worker kills. If you have a better deathball and they wasted money on bases, workers, and production they can't use, you can easily play that lead into a win.

So with respect to FRB, I don't blame Barrin for taking this whole thread as a sleight because it comes off as a joke at best, no gratuitous disrespect intended. Neither this nor FRB maintains balance, but at least FRB admitted as much and specifically addressed maps as well, which is even more of a problem for higher supply cap.