|
Abstract
"Starcraft Improved" is an on-going project to improve the existing gameplay. We focus on 3 aspects: economy, micro and balance, but try to avoid introducing new units or abilities. In the core we use an adjusted Hot Mineral Harvesting for economy, and include some ideas presented in "Depth of Micro" [6] and Starbow mod [1] (with permission). This is however only the beginning.
We incrementally improve the core with better solutions. However, we acknowledge that neither we nor any other individual or small group is able to know all solutions. For that reason, in this thread, we discuss each step of the improvement with you, before it is applied.
We need your help, your ideas, your critique!
Table of Contents
News
Looking for players from all leagues to have some matches!
We would like to have more gameplay tests, tune up some numbers, balance the game a bit and make a push into the "master" branch. But for that - we need games!
SCI - Coda LE
Coda LE with explicit use of SCI mod has been published. The map uses SCI-specific loading screen which briefly summarizes all the changes introduced to SCI. This way a new player has a hint of what is going on.
SCI extension mod is and will remain available as well if you want to use SCI with other maps. However, extension mods themselves cannot modify the loading screen (or at least, I don't know how)
SC Imrpoved Group
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/h5K72nH.png) SC Improved
"SC Improved" group available in US and EU region. Help us by joining and testing the mod!
|
State of Our Discussion
We want to avoid discussing about everything at every single point in time. We believe the most effective way to discuss the "Starcraft Improved" project is one topic at a time. We will set the current area of interest, as well as maintain a "TODO" list of all topics set for later discussion.
If you think a topic is missing - say so, so we can include it in the TODO list.
If you think an existing topic in TODO is not necessary - just wait till we start discussing it. Things may change when we reach it. And even if it is not, your reason will require some argumentation, most likely leading to a discussion.
The point of this list and our approach is that we want to avoid discussing two topics at the same time. Even if they are related it is good to separate them, because in balance discussions every 2 topics are related. We need to bring order to chaos.
If you think the form of the discussion could be improved - let us know - so that we can put it on top of TODO list and discuss as fast as possible. But I think the flaws will become apparent only after we actually try the approach first.
Current Topic (frequently updated)
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved?page=12#222
Tank as a space-controlling unit
It's intended role is a slow, area-denial unit. Unfortunately, it can't really hold on its own. On the other hand, the unit is slow and would be good to be able to leave it in a key position to - at least - slow the enemy a bit.
In LotV they add aditional mobility by allowing a tank to be loaded into a medivac while it is sieged. In my opinion this just leads to a gimmicky play. Fun, but gimmicky. It does not help the tank to be an area-of-denial unit in any way. It just helps an annoying harassment a bit.
So what could we do?
During the course of this thread I have seen some suggestions already:
On July 08 2015 16:20 RoomOfMush wrote:
I would also recommend giving each race some strong positional units that can hold the ground, like Siege Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers from BW. These units can be positioned at an expansion to defend it cost efficiently against much larger forces of enemies. At the same time these units are not imbalanced because they need to be set up to be used.
On July 04 2015 16:35 RoomOfMush wrote:
1) Buff the damage
2) Buff the splash
3) Make the Weapon Cooldown longer
4) Make the Siege / Unsiege time longer
On July 06 2015 02:22 xPrimuSx wrote:
I also wanted to throw out a random suggestion when it comes to damage modifiers, all the ones in the game are X +Y, but what about X -Y? Having a unit that deals bonus damage to everything but a certain type of unit allows for a bit more flexibility in constructing matchups. I know we are tabling the discussion on Siege Tanks for right now, but I think that is a unit that would benefit from this as you can make it deal more damage to everything but light (for instance) to have its damage be high against everything, without having it absolutely murder light units.
On July 14 2015 09:15 LastWish wrote:
* Siege Tank Siege Mode
- buff single target damage to +20(the splash remains the same)
- also I like the reduced supply cost you mentioned
Also, Clear Word mentions that:
On October 13 2015 06:13 Clear World wrote:
The armor tag removal [of Stalker]. This affects way more than just marauders. The Siege tank and immortal also now rather meh against the Stalker, or possibly pointless when considering blink play.
Combining all those comments of yours leads me to the following suggestion
- In old WoL patch 1.1.0 in 2010 Siege Tanks were nerfed. Damage was reduced from 50 down to 35 + 15 vs Armored. Let us revisit it as: Damage = 50 -15 vs Light.
This would make Siege Tanks a threat to a wider array of units, not only those which are armored (Stalker (after our change), Archon, Ghost, Baneling). However, popular light units such as zerglings, marines, zealots would remain intact.
- Maybe buff the damage further a bit? 60 perhaps?
- Reduce speed: 2.25 -> 2 and/or increase sieging time 4s -> 5s. This makes the tank a bit harder to use, encouraging more the leapfrogging tactic rather than siege/unsiege everything.
- Reduce supply cost 6 -> 5 (effectively 3 -> 2.5)
- Reintroduce Siege Tank upgrade that was removed in HotS beta balance update #1 (January 2013). The extra firepower should not be available too early.
However, if you disagree or have a different idea for a Tank - share your thoughts!
We will also need to change the Immortal a bit to be less hard-countery against Tanks. I would love to see Tanks viable in TvP...
Things to Discuss (frequently updated)
- Infestor abilities
Infestor is a shadow of itself from the WoL era. Much less common unit. We think we should revitalize some of its abilities to be significant again!
- Swarm host as space controlling unit?
Swarm hosts remain problematic. In low numbers they are very weak, in high they can control half of the map from very high distances. Many dislike the unit for various reasons. Maybe there is a way to tweak the unit to fit a different role and redeem itself?
- Oracle harrasment
Originally, Oracles were meant to harass indirectly, but Entomb didn't work well. As a quick fix, it became an efficient direct-harras air unit, which became a problem early game and annoyance later. Further balance changes had been made to bandaid it (decreased turrent requirements). However, maybe the original goal of oracle can be achieved in a different way?
- Carriers/Battlecruisers to arrive
These two do not come often. What are their roles? Inspired by "Strat Chat".
- Ghost abilities
Snipe seems to be underperforming. The unit usability is mostly limited to a single matchup and is not seen often. Maybe we can do something about it.
- Revisit unit supply costs
From RoomOfMush: "Something that I would certainly recommend is looking at unit supply counts, for example the supply costs of ultralisks, thors, carriers, cattlebruisers and siege tanks. (perhaps others too) I was always baffled why SC2, the newer game, had LESS units on the field compared to SC:BW. We should definitely try to make 200/200 armies an exception instead of the norm. If 200/200 is too easy to hit there will never be a reason not to wait until 200/200 to move out. (I mean from a psychological point of view)".
We are now at 400 due to supply doubling, but the topic is valid nevertheless. We could also consider increasing the supply count to 500 (more "round" number), which would be an equivalent to 250 - something I have seen suggested few times in other threads too.
- Worker supply cost
Perhaps experiment with a reduced worker supply cost.
- Revisit the role of Void Rays
VRs are rather weak in big battles. What their role should be then, apart/instead of DPS unit?
Raised by Clear World
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved?page=11#215
- Photon Overcharge Role
Should it be a last-resort ability or a commonly used defense tool? If last-resort, having a tech requirement seems like a bad design, since you shouldn't tech in that direction in the first place. If the former - common attacks do not threaten the Nexus itself that often.
Raised by Clear World
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved?page=11#215
- Zealots early game
Zealots seem to be underperforming against ranged units in the early game because they can be kited to death. At the same time, a swarm of Chargelots can be problematic to deal with. We may want to explore options to balance it better. Perhaps changes are needed on the early game ranged units instead?
Raised by Clear World
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved?page=11#215
- Stalker as an AA
Clear World suggests to apply a buff/nerf combination to a Stalker to make it better as an AA than anything else. Is that possible? Also, how other gateway units could fill up the gaps left by the Stalker?
- Hellion vs melee interaction. We recently buffed the unit by setting the damage point to 0. It makes it easier and more enjoyable at microing, but it could be overpowered as a result. Its interaction during harassment and against zerglings should be investigated.
|
Starcraft Improved
"Symbiotic link established. You improved."
Introduction
Ever since the Double Harvesting mod was released, we read that such a mod alone --- while sound on paper --- is not going to improve Starcraft itself. Why? It requires additional balance adjustments because of the different economy. One of the main issues of DH was an early 8-worker aggression that was hard to scout in time. This however is hard to fix by an economy mod itself without compromising the goals that the mod was invented in the first place. These sceptical opinions appear in DH successor, Hot Mineral Harvesting, as well. A lot of balancing is needed, and Blizzard won't do it for us.
Some believe that this is the end and the concept of degrading mining efficiency should be abandoned altogether. But there is another way: much harder, but also more interesting and rewarding - doing the necessary balancing ourselves. And if we are doing this big step already, why not go a bit further and address other issues, not related to economy, as well?
We have plenty of ideas ready to be included in the project. Throwing everything at once, however, can be overwhelming and early bad decisions can compound to a complete flop near the end. For that reason we have chosen to build "Starcraft Improved" incrementally, with the community having a look at each step of the process. This should also give an important explanation of why given change is applied, allowing you to evaluate if the goal is met.
Finally, we think that one person, or a small group designing everything - it is not going to work. We need a collaborative project, with the community involved as much as possible, from the very beginning till the end. It is in the community were we can find great players understanding the intrinsics of the game best. It is here were we can find new solutions which none of us thought about before. For that reason, while we want to keep the authority of making a final decision in order not to go completely astray in our discussions and changes, it is you and your ideas that matter!
Related Work
There are a few extensive mods which maintain the core RTS gameplay (construct bases, gather minerals, build army and fight). Probably the most well known is Starbow [1]. But the goal of Starbow is not to improve SC2 but to be "an expansion to BW built in the SC2 engine". To attain this goal, Starbow introduces many helpful mechanics (e.g. high ground advantage), but also includes many new units and abilities, making an almost completely new RTS game. It has a stable playerbase and regular small-scale tournaments are being held.
A SCynergie project [2] has similar goals of bringing SC1 principles to SC2 environment. OneGoal [3] is another mod, focusing a bit more on SC2 improvement rather than becoming a new game. It still mixes some of SC2 with SC BW units and changes the tech tree, but keeps the Standard economy. CustomCraft [4] is a recent approach, also including several interesting units and abilities. Unfortunately, these mods seem to have lost their momentum.
There are other, more theoretical works which are not mods. Recently launched show "Strat Chat" [5] discuss many important aspects of game design. We hope that at least some of their points we will be able to incorporate in "Starcraft Improved"
SCI Goals and Constraints
The goal of SCI is to improve SC2 HotS - and in the future - LotV as well. We want to offer a better game experience, higher positional importance, and higher decision variety.
However, unlike the existing approaches, we want to achieve it with small incremental adjustments. We want to avoid major structural changes such as:
- Adding or completely removing units.
- Adding or replacing abilities.
- Completely repurposoing a unit.
We cannot guarantee that either of those will never happen. Some units or abilities are particularly problematic. Still, we hope to explore as many opptions as possible of maintaining the current unit and ability composition before crossing them out.
Moreover, a mod that replaces many game components would be hard to integrate with next expansion and their updates.
SCI on the other hand should be applicable to LotV when it gets public. It will require some further adjustments, but it should not throw the mod completely upside down.
SCI Aspects
There are 3 foundations upon which we want to build SCI.
- Economy. Bread and butter of any RTS game. We want to improve SC by incorporating the Hot Mineral Harvesting model and balancing the game around it. HMH may require further tuning for SCI specifically.
- Micro. The way battles are fought. We want to step away from I-win button abilities and focus on positioning and movement as key elements of combat.
- Balance. We want to step away from the "hard counter" mind set, making more compositions viable. We want to have a look at least used units and abilities to make them more common. Still, certain groups will be less viable than others, obviously.
With all the changes planned, we expect that a lot of balancing and testing will be needed. For that reason "Starcraft Improved" is not a mod that is released and we are done. Instead, it is an on-going project that we hope to build with you!
We Need You!
We believe that most, if not all problems of SC2 can be resolved within the constraints laied above.
We have some cool ideas that we want to share with you.
But we don't claim to know all the solutions, and we are open to be proven wrong in the soltuions we have. We need your help, and we need it a lot!
Here is how we see this could work.
If we would just discuss everything all the time - this will be chaos and we won't get anywhere.
For that reason, we will direct the discussion. The process would look as:
- Set up an area of focus we want to implement in SCI.
- Within the area of focus - we first identify goals and problems.
- We propose a solution if we have one, or search for a new one with you.
- We discuss it "on paper" to check if it pushes us in the right direction.
- When we agree that a solution is viable - we implement it in an "experimental" branch.
- We try it, discard or improve until we are satisfied.
- Important: at this point we don't worry about balance. A possibility of good balance is the only requirement. Why? A change in one area may affect another which we do not want to focus on just yet.
- When ready, we move it to "stable" branch.
- Periodically we visit the "stable" branch to ensure that all components are balanced and good gameplay is achieved.
- When balance is achieved, we push changes to "master" branch.
- "Master" becomes an official version release of "Starcraft Improved"
A change may cause problems in other areas. Unless there is an obvious and instant fix, we delay those "cascading imbalances" for a later discussion, following the same process as above. We will keep a "TODO list" to keep a track of things. It may also happen that we need to revisit old topics, readjust the changes or even revert them.
Why Doing It?
There are many reasons:
Ideas are cheap! There are tons of ideas on how to improve SC floating on various forums every day. Some are good, some are bad... It is easy to throw an idea. It is harder to actually implement it and test it.
Ideas as separated. Each idea, separated, is not going to improve SC much. All units and their abilities are connected. A change to each one is either not significant, or puts some sort of unwanted imbalance. You have to perform several changes simultaneously to make a significant impart on the gameplay that won't throw it off-balance. An example: sentry forcefields. If you just make them weaker, protoss gateway army will become underpowered to similar armies of Zerg and Terran. If you just make gateway army stronger, sentry-less all-ins and cheese suddenly becomes that much more strong. This kind of change requires you looking at multiple factors at the same time to make it work.
Existing mods create new games. Starbow [1], OneGoal [3] and others... They replace units, introduce new ones, change the tech tree. As a result, players have to re-learn the game from scratch, posing a major obstacle to new players. By improving rather than replacing gameplay components we hope to create a mod that may be hard to master, but little learning is required form those already familiar with Starcraft.
HotS getting abandoned. When HotS was announced, WoL freezed in not so well state and is no longer maintained. Those who opted to stay with WoL are no longer supported. We hope to avoid such scenario for those who may want to stay with HotS and not buy LotV expansion.
Last but not least - Blizzard. It won't help pointing fingers why it happened, what matters is were we are at now. And now they don't have time and resources to abandon their foundations and try a different approach.
We believe that with different foundations, game can be made better. With the mod we hope to show that it is not an empty claim and we actually mean it. We hope to show that the community is able to make a constructive, complex contribution to the game and not just bitch around on the forums.
Currently Published Files[/blue
- "SC Improved" - main "master" mod file
- "SCI-Micro" - a dependency file addressing only the micro.
- "Dynamic Air Separation" - a dependency file implementing the dynamic air separation
- "SCI-Economy" - a dependency file addressing the macro and economy aspect.
- "Hot Mineral Harvesting" - the underlying harvesting mod.
If you want to use just one of those to build upon in your own, unrelated, mod - go for it! 
FAQ
There is little difference to Standard play, but this will be always inferior because of lack of ranked play
While each planned difference may be small, I expect that all things together will have a significant impact on how you play the game, especially at higher levels. I hope we will see interesting showmatches and tournaments which will back up for the lack of ladder.
It would be great, if Blizzard would enable custom ladders, tied to custom maps or mods. Or maybe groups? I am sure the Starbow team would welcome that as well! Maybe someone could talk to Blizzard about it?
Why discussing one topic at a time in this thread? We could have separate threads for each
When everyone involved in SCI focuses on the same topic, we can have a healthy discussion and reduce a chance that one's voice is omitted.
Secondly, there are tons of topics to discuss. I expect and respect that not everyone on TL forums is interested in SCI. I don't want to spam them.
Yet another mod? This separates the community!
This is an unfortunate consequence of people trying new things separately. The constraints of SCI, as well as collaborative approach are are different than the existing approaches, which warrants - in my opinion - starting a new project.
[blue]References
[1] Starbow by Kabel. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/starcraft-2/440661-starbow
[2] SCynergie by TheDwf. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/488129-scynergie-project
[3] OneGoal by ItWhoSpeaks, RiFT, FoxyMayhem, topsecret221, DeadlyCraft, itsbecca. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/388155-onegoal-a-better-sc2-project-hub
[4] CustomCraft by RoomOfMush. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/485664-sc2-custom-craft
[5] Strat Chat with Teoita, Whitewing, SC2John http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/starcraft-2/488490-tl-strategy-presents-strat-chat
[6] Depth of Micro by LaLuSh. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/starcraft-2/433944-depth-of-micro
|
SCI Master Branch Changes
Here we describe all changes introduced in "Starcraft Improvied", currently published as a "Master Branch". Master Branch is changed infrequently, allowing you to build strategies around it and have a consistent play.
More experimentation is occuring in Experimental and Stable branches.
General
- Using Hot Mineral Harvesting.
When 2 or more workers mine from the same mineral patch, the patch becomes hot after a short period of time. Reducing the number of workers to 1 makes it cold.
- Cold patch:
- 5 minerals per trip (7 for gold)
- 2.786s -> 2.42s harvest time
- 0.5s -> 0s return delay
- Hot patch:
- 4 minerals per trip (6 for gold)
- 2.786s -> 2.76s harvest time
- 0.5s -> 0s return delay
- Gas harvest time: 1.981s -> 2.1791s
- UI: Indeal worker count per patch 3 -> 2. 3rd worker still helps a bit, but is not very effective.
+ Show Spoiler +
- 8 starting workers
+ Show Spoiler +
It saves a few boring seconds from early game without removing too many openings or affecting scouting. We have chosen 8 because 9-th worker is where typically the early scouting begins.
- High Ground Advantage / Low Ground Disadvantage: shooting uphill reduces the damage output by 50%. Armor is scaled by 0.5 as well.
+ Show Spoiler +There was a lengthy discussion how to apply the high ground advantage. We considered 50% random miss chance (as in Starbow), regular missing of every second shot, range changes, etc... Damage redunction, when implemented correctly with correct scaling of the armor, seems to be the most consistent in terms of behavior and advantage. Range change, for example, is beneficial only in those situations when the opponent is dancing on the range edge. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved#7
- Dynamic Air Separation: when on the move, air separation set to 0.05, allowing the units to clump more. When idle, the units spread out.
- Scan range on all ranged units increased to be +1 of its weapon range.
- Supply multiplied by 2
- All units consume twice as much supply (no more 0.5 supply units)
- Pylon, Supply Depot, Overlord, Hatchery, Lair, Hive produce twice as much supply.
- Supply cap set at 400
Zerg
- Macro mechanic: Larva injection
- Is on autocast (phantomfive's suggestion)
- Can be casted only on the hive clusters which have at most 3 larvae (thank you PurpleStreak for implementation)
- Spawn Larvae duration: 40s -> 60s
- Spawn Larvae energy cost: 25 -> 35
- Queen starting energy: 25 -> 33
+ Show Spoiler +It is our solution to remove the meaningless clicks of manual larvae spawn, while keeping Zerg players attention to when extra larva actually pops. Keeping surplus larva means lost time, but spending them requires a meaningful decission. Opponent is still able to benefit from wrong spending of the extra larvae. Moreover, unlike manual spawn larvae ability, morphing larvae does not require moving the viewscreen (although doing so may help getting right units from the right bases). Overall 33% nerf is combined with similar nerfs in other races. Macro mechanic discussion we had: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved?page=6#103
- Hydralisk:
- Damage Point 0.2080s -> 0.01s
- Supply cost 4 -> 3 (equivalent to 1.5)
+ Show Spoiler +
Reduced supply cost is intended to promote Hydralisk usage in general, and as a form of Anti-Air in particular.
- Corruptor:
- Uses Dynamic Air Separation
- Damage Point: 0.167s -> 0s
- Mutalisk:
- Uses Dynamic Air Separation
- Regeneration Rate: 1/s -> 0.2734/s
- UI: Removed Tissue Regeneration icon
+ Show Spoiler +In the process of buffing ground-to-air and nerfing air-to-air we identified the faster regeneration rate of Mutalisk as a major obstackle. GtA tends to hit harder than AtA but for a short period of time, often leaving the target damaged but alive. If Mutalisk is allowed to regenerate fast, it can hit again very soon, rendering ground-based defences rather ineffective and forcing the opponent to go for AtA. We want to avoid situations when there is only a single effective response to given threat. Discussion we had regarding GtA and AtA: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved?page=8#153Also, check Strat Chat #1
- Viper: Uses Dynamic Air Separation
Terran
- Macro mechanic: MULE calldown
- Energy cost: 50 -> 100
- Casting Range: 20
- Cooldown: 30s (xPrimuSx's suggestion)
- Harvest amount: 30 -> 24
+ Show Spoiler +
- Thor
- Removed high payload mode
- Javelin Missiles:
- No homing (RoomOfMush idea), but shoots at predicted unit location (big PurpleStreak help)
- Range: 10 -> 11
- Number of attacks: 4 -> 2
- Refire rate: 3s -> 2s
- Damage (and DPS): 14 + 4 vs Light
- 3 splash ranges:
- 100% at 0.5
- 50% at 1.0
- 25% at 1.5
- Reintroduced 250mm Strike Cannons from WoL
+ Show Spoiler + In every situation there is one correct answer which to use: Javelin Missiles or High Payload. Since there is no cost for having one or another, the distinction between those two seems to be a completely unnecessary complexity of the unit. The only real reason for High Impact seems to be a way to use the Thor's back canons after the removal of 250mm Strike Cannons from WoL. We decided to bring Javelin Missiles handle both use cases decently. We removed tracking to promote micro on the receiver's end, while prediction shot and increased splash range keep the missiles useful. We reintroduce 250mm Strike Cannons from WoL but intent to repurpose that ability in the future. Javelin Missiles have been discussed as a part of ground-to-air topic at: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved?page=8#153
- Hellion
- Turret tracking
- Damage Point: 0.25 -> 0.01
- Backswing: 0.75 -> 0
- Siege Tank (Tank Mode)
- Turret tracking
- Backswing: 0.5 -> 0
- Damage Point: 0.167 -> 0
- Siege Tank (Siege Mode)
- Damage delay: 0s -> 0.15s
- Viking
- Uses Dynamic Air Separation
- Damage Point: 0.167 -> 0
- Range: 9 -> 7.5
+ Show Spoiler +
- Banshee
- Uses Dynamic Air Separation
- Damage Point: 0.167 -> 0
- Raven: Uses Dynamic Air Separation
Protoss
- Macro mechanic: Chronoboost
- Requires: Cybernetics Core
- Energy cost: 25 -> 50
- Can be casted on any building: friendly, ally, hostile
- Speeds up production time, research time, fire rate, shield regeneration and energy regeneration
+ Show Spoiler + Overall 50% nerf (energy cost) is combined with similar nerfs in other races. Cybernetics Core requirement reduces strength of 2-gate proxying and cannon rushing (it can buff cannons temporarily). This allowed us the actually reduce the gateway zealot production time without risking it coming too fast. The ability to cast it on any building and give shield, energy and fire rate buffs makes the ability a bit more versatile. Discussed multiple times:
- Gateway/Warpgate
- Gateway-to-Warpgate: mineral cost set to 100. No change to transformation time. (based on Ball656's idea)
- Removed back-to-Gateway button
+ Show Spoiler +
This high additional cost aims to reduce the strength of warpgate-based all-ins which significantly reduce the defender's advantage. At the same time, we reduce the warping time of units (see at each unit) when in a gateway form, so that all-ins with tranditional movement from your to enemy's base remains viable. This also makes 6- 7- 8- warpgate aggression harder to pull as well.
- Zealot:
- Shields: 50 -> 60
- Charge:
- base speed: 2.75 -> 3.0
- charge speed: 6.05 -> 4.5
- Gateway build: 38s -> 32s
- Warpgate build: 28s -> 32s
+ Show Spoiler +
- Stalker:
- Removed "Armored" attribute
- Damage point: 0.361s -> 0s
- Gateway build: 42s -> 36s
- Warpgate build: 32s -> 36s
+ Show Spoiler +
- Sentry:
- Force Field:
- Cast range: 9 -> 5
- duration: 15s -> 8s (suggested by Edyworth)
- Guardian Shield:
- casted on ground (thanks to RoomOfMush for implementation)
- Cast range: 9
- appies to all units, including enemy (be careful where you cast it)
- energy cost: 75 -> 100
- Hallucination cost: 100 -> 75 (suggested by egrimm, Clear World)
- Gateway build: 37s -> 32s (same as Warpgate)
+ Show Spoiler + We are seriously nerfing the forcefield as in the original form it was a very one-sided spell. It is relatively easy to cast where you want it and there is not much the enemy can do with it. We reduce casting range so that FF can be used defensively, but its offensive usage (e.g. split the enemy army in half) is much harder to pull off. We also give it shorter duration, making it harder to chain them forever. The nerfs are further needed when coupled with buffs to core gateway units. At the same time, other Sentry spells are promoted. Guardian shield is easier to use giving more survivability to other Protoss units. The opponent cannot snipe the casting Sentry, but the shield bubble is immobile. Discussed in "Situation of Protoss": http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/489163-project-starcraft-improved?page=3
- High Templar: gateway build 55s -> 45s
- Dark Templar: gateway build 55s -> 45s
- Immortal:
- Turret tracking
- 20 + 30 vs Arm -> 25 + 15 vs Arm
- Colossus:
- Beams now scorch the ground in the Colossus view direction, rather than perpendicularly (similar to Lurker attack)
- Beam scorches earth at distances 2 to 6, regardless of how far the target is
- Extended Thermal Lance increase the maximum scorching range to 9
- Beam impact movement speed reduced: 10/s -> 5/s
- Fire cooldown: 1.65s -> 2.2s
- Minimum fire range: 0 -> 2
- "Rain from Above" passive ability ignoring the uphill shooting penality
+ Show Spoiler +
- Oracle:
- Uses Dynamic Air Separation
- Damage point: 0.167s -> 0s
- Damage delay: 0s -> 0.07s
+ Show Spoiler +
We make the unit more nimble, permitting more intense micro. Damage delay permits overkill giving more predictable behavior when oracles move in a bigger group (see "Depth of Micro")
- Phoenix:
- Uses Dynamic Air Separation
- Fire cooldown: 1.1s -> 1.6s
+ Show Spoiler +
Phoenix sustained DPS gets a direct nerf, as a part of weakening Air-to-Air combat. Single shots, such as when lifting workers, is not affected much.
- Tempest: Uses Dynamic Air Separation
- Void Ray:
- Uses Dynamic Air Separation
- Charge-up mechanic reintroduced, but resets every time target is changed.
- Base damage: 6+4 vs Arm -> 5+3 vs Arm
- Three charge levels: 5+3, 7+5, 9+7
- Charge level increases after 1.8s (3 damage cycles)
- UI: damage is properly shown
+ Show Spoiler +The iconic charging up mechanic from WoL is reintrodicued. However, since retargetting resets the charge, it no longer is able to tear through mass of small units (e.g. marines). The charging serves as an anti-deathball mechanic, as doubling the number of VRs gives diminishing returns (retargetting happens more often)
- Mothership Core: removed
+ Show Spoiler +
We are in general against removing units and if we find a good option for MSC we would like to bring it back. At the moment however there is nothing good for it.
We don't want a hero unit, but at the same time MSC in plural can be a serious air threat that is hard to deal with early game.
- Mothership:
- Built directly at the Nexus
- No limit of their number, apart of its normal supply cost
- Photon Overcharge:
- Researched at Cybernetics Core (50/50/80s)
- Casted at Nexus on itself (egrimm suggestion)
- Duration: 60s -> 15s
- Energy cost: 100 -> 75
|
SCI Stable Branch Changes
Here are changes that are more-or-less final, but may require rebalancing. Note: there is no absolute final ever - we may realize that even the oldest change we made may require further corrections!
No changes as of yet. We just pushed everything to Master Branch.
|
SCI Experimental Branch Changes
Here are changes that we currently experiment upon. This will change most often and we test stuff which may be completely broken.
No changes as of yet. We just pushed everything to Master Branch.
|
I highly dislike the random miss change for high ground units. Anything random in an RTS makes me go awry. I dont see why a percentage based damage reduction would be such a bad idea, or a range buff for high ground units.
|
On July 02 2015 18:43 RoomOfMush wrote:
I highly dislike the random miss change for high ground units. Anything random in an RTS makes me go awry. I dont see why a percentage based damage reduction would be such a bad idea, or a range buff for high ground units.
I understand your concern. To this I actually rely on Starbow's people expertese: they did try other approaches and ultimately fell back to this one.
A percentage-based damage reduction is problematic when you consider receiver's armor. The % reduction is applied before armor. Thus consider the senario:
- A marine is dishing out 6 damage, dealing 7 damage per second.
- It is shooting at an ultralisk which has 3 armor.
On even ground it deals 3.5 damage to the ultralisk per second.
When shooting upwards it deals (6*0.5)-3 = ... zero. Oups...
A 50% miss chance, when repeated, boils down to 50% damage reduction but after armor is applied.
A range increase when on high ground (or reduction on low ground) may be a bit difficult to implement and its impact will vary from unit to unit as well.
Still, the 50% miss chance is not set in stone. We can change it, if we find a better solution. I am just worried, that many clever people already played with it and came up empty.
Update: I am now wondering if fire rate reduction could do a trick?
|
I can see your point.
Then why not make it so, that every 2nd attack against any target on high ground will deal 0 damage?
That should be fairly easy to implement and serve the same purpose.
When a unit attacks a target on high ground, add a behavior that reduces attack power to 0. This behavior will be removed after the next attack against a target on high ground, or before the next attack against a target on the same cliff level.
This should have the same effect as your 50% miss chance but without the random factor. In fact, I would reduce it to 33% because 50% is pretty huge.
|
I think I found an alternative solution to high ground: when a unit is on the low ground, its fire rate is reduced to 50%. This effectively sets the DPS to 50%. Note however that it impacts only sustained fire. The first shot behaves normally. So, if you want, for example, snipe a unit with a single shot - high ground won't interfere.
Also, during sustained fight, you may micro a unit in and out of range to negate the effects of the high ground.... which may be an interesting option, buffing positional microing
I still would like to hear an opinion from Starbow authors. I know they experimented a lot. I would like to avoid pitfalls that they encountered
|
You mean all low-ground units will permanently have their attack speed halved? Even when fighting against other targets on the low-ground? If so then that sounds horrible.
|
On July 03 2015 02:27 RoomOfMush wrote:
You mean all low-ground units will permanently have their attack speed halved? Even when fighting against other targets on the low-ground? If so then that sounds horrible.
No no no... that would be horrible indeed
A ranged unit has a damage output D and a cooldown C.
When a unit fires uphill, it deals damage D, but has a cooldown set to 2*C for that single instance.
When a unit fires again, the uphill debuff is removed, unless - of course - the unit fired again uphill.
|
That does punish uphill battles, but how exactly would you explain that? Why does shooting uphill make weapons go slower?
|
On July 03 2015 03:23 RoomOfMush wrote:
That does punish uphill battles, but how exactly would you explain that? Why does shooting uphill make weapons go slower?
I don't know... you need more time to aim? Except that is a time applied after rather than before the shot. High values before the shot, known as "damage point" are actually harmful for gameplay, as shown in "Depth of Micro".
If explanation is what you are after, then the Starbow model should be perfect
Gameplay-wise I think this approach might be actually better. It is consistent and gives an avenue for more positional micro to negate the debuff.
|
What is with my suggestion? It gives a 50% miss chance without the randomness by simply making 50% of attacks miss. Its robust, reliable and accountable.
|
On July 03 2015 03:48 RoomOfMush wrote:
What is with my suggestion? It gives a 50% miss chance without the randomness by simply making 50% of attacks miss. Its robust, reliable and accountable.
It is a hidden, persistant unit state that makes me concerned. Imagine you shoot once, then micro your unit away.... a minute later you give it another order to shoot upwards. At that point you no longer remember that your unit is in a "changed" state and its shot will do no damage.
That's also one of the drawbacks Double Harvesting had - workers having hidden mineral patches.
I think it would be good to have a 3-rd person opinion on these though....
|
I would also advice on a timing based fade-out of the state. The timing would be above any weapon cooldowns, so somewhere around 4.0 HotS-seconds would do.
The situation you describe is also not that bad in my opinion. The same can happen with a 50% miss chance. Suddenly your unit misses its target and deals no damage at all. But with my model you could actually have an influence on this behavior. It could be one more way to distinguish between a good and a great player. Completely new ways of micromanagement where missing shots are targeted at full-life units and shots that will hit are targeted at high priority low-life targets to kill them off.
|
Chiming in to say I agree with adding the Starbowesque 50% miss chance in this mod, against the opinion of the other commenter. Will it be combined with vanilla SC2 high ground vision mechanics?
I think you went a bit far on some of the damage point changes, particularly for the Hellion and the Roach. Some units' attacks should feel a bit sluggish, in order to communicate a certain aspect of the unit itself.
In relation to your stated influence from OneGoal and your intention to make Gateway units less dependent on the Sentry, I think you should consider swapping the Sentry and the Immortal (with changes to each!) in the tech tree.
Good call about revisiting GtA and AtA on principle. This was a large part of what made the Goliath an interesting unit in BW, and why I think it would probably make SC2 worse if it was just copied and pasted into it without further changes to the game.
|
First, I really like the idea here: sc2, but tweaked (not a fan of drastic changes like new units/abilities).
I also agree that I'm NOT a fan of the %50 miss chance. How would this affect abilities like storm or fungal?
The flat damage % example of marine vs ultra is pretty much "worst case". I'm curious how a lower damage reduction would work? Maybe look at doing 66% damage uphill.
|
Hey guys, really happy you jumped in here to comment!
On July 03 2015 06:38 Pontius Pirate wrote:
Chiming in to say I agree with adding the Starbowesque 50% miss chance in this mod, against the opinion of the other commenter. Will it be combined with vanilla SC2 high ground vision mechanics?
And how do you feel about the increased cooldown between shots when fighting uphill?
I didn't look at vision at all; what we have is the default "vanilla HotS vision"? Or did you mean "vanilla SC1 vision"? We can certainly have a look at that!
On July 03 2015 06:38 Pontius Pirate wrote:
I think you went a bit far on some of the damage point changes, particularly for the Hellion and the Roach. Some units' attacks should feel a bit sluggish, in order to communicate a certain aspect of the unit itself.
Admitedely, I was in a mindset "high damage point = bad" and just cycled through all units to fix that. We can certainly revert that in a Roach. Which other units you would prefer to see them with a more sluggish behavior? Ghost?
In the hellion case however, it is meant to be a fast, agile unit that a player may want to micro extensively. Shouldn't it have a low damage point?
On July 03 2015 07:12 y0su wrote:
I also agree that I'm NOT a fan of the %50 miss chance. How would this affect abilities like storm or fungal?
The miss chance is applied only to basic attacks. Other methods (e.g. increased cooldown) would apply only to basic attacks as well.
On July 03 2015 07:12 y0su wrote:
The flat damage % example of marine vs ultra is pretty much "worst case". I'm curious how a lower damage reduction would work? Maybe look at doing 66% damage uphill.
We can experiment with any value, sure, but it won't change the fact that uphill damage reduction will hurt low-damage high-refire rate units the most. Ultralisk was the most extreme case, but there are other units that have +1 or +2 armor at the start.
I am currently inclined towards the cooldown increase. It has one nice additional property over miss chance or RoomOfMush's idea: when you see the unit firing - it actually fires and always deals damage. The effect is consistent with the animation.
|
On July 03 2015 14:45 BlackLilium wrote:Hey guys, really happy you jumped in here to comment! Show nested quote +On July 03 2015 06:38 Pontius Pirate wrote:
Chiming in to say I agree with adding the Starbowesque 50% miss chance in this mod, against the opinion of the other commenter. Will it be combined with vanilla SC2 high ground vision mechanics? And how do you feel about the increased cooldown between shots when fighting uphill? I didn't look at vision at all; what we have is the default "vanilla HotS vision"? Or did you mean "vanilla SC1 vision"? We can certainly have a look at that!
Most of my issue with it is one of feeling. It doesn't feel right to see units slow down their firing rate against a unit of equal distance uphill as on the same plane. It also misses out on the unique element of miss chances that allow a player to decide to take a risk with small numbers of units in minor engagements to chance fighting up a hill against similar-sized forces in the interests of picking off a few units. With a cooldown increase, it makes poking back and forth too reliable for picking off individual units. Basically, the optimal technique in almost all small engagement scenarios is that they're going to dash towards a cliff, fire on a unit with no more firepower than absolutely necessary, and retreat against any returning fire from other units not picked off, thus circumventing the consequences of the main effects of the cooldown increase. Yes, in major engagements, it will end up having a statistically similar (in fact, nearly identical) effect as a 50% miss chance, but I think you'll find that it does not accomplish the same goals in regards to minor scraps.
From playing Starbow a fair bit (mostly a long time ago, but I got a couple games in since 1.0), I've come to decide that SC1 vision is SC1 vision and SC2 vision is SC2 vision. I see no need to mess with a system that this particular game is built around that already works well for its particular, specific goals.
Show nested quote +On July 03 2015 06:38 Pontius Pirate wrote:
I think you went a bit far on some of the damage point changes, particularly for the Hellion and the Roach. Some units' attacks should feel a bit sluggish, in order to communicate a certain aspect of the unit itself. Admitedely, I was in a mindset "high damage point = bad" and just cycled through all units to fix that. We can certainly revert that in a Roach. Which other units you would prefer to see them with a more sluggish behavior? Ghost? In the hellion case however, it is meant to be a fast, agile unit that a player may want to micro extensively. Shouldn't it have a low damage point?
From that description alone, obviously the answer is yes. However, it has a very unique method of dealing damage. It's not like the Vulture, where a slow damage point would pretty much entirely ruin the whole point of the unit. Hellions can deal a ton of damage to a huge crowd of units, all at once, if they're positioned correctly (for you, not for your opponent of course!), so putting too much control in the hands of the Hellion user can lead to scenarios such as Hellions infinitely kiting Zerglings, units that are technically faster than them. Another issue is that they can zoom into a mineral line and hold their fire until the workers are pulled away and then unleash the hot death and get the workers at the exact moment that they line up, which is not a practical technique with their current damage point. I agree with the notion that harass units should generally be hair-trigger, instant response units, but I maintain that the unique splash pattern of the Hellion means it should be designed for finesse, rather than raw reaction time.
Unless of course, you plan to greatly redesign the unit. A redesign of moderate, but not severe, scope would be to institute gliding shot on Hellions, and set their acceleration to somewhere around 3.5 to 4, so that they can initiate their attack animation while decelerating, so timing your stop commands and attack commands will do much to determine whether you achieve a total BBQ or a slightly rare drone. This was almost exactly what the Jackal did during the WoL alpha, before the transition to the wheeled vehicle we all know and feel ambivalent towards.
|
On July 03 2015 18:13 Pontius Pirate wrote:
Most of my issue with it is one of feeling. It doesn't feel right to see units slow down their firing rate against a unit of equal distance uphill as on the same plane. It also misses out on the unique element of miss chances that allow a player to decide to take a risk with small numbers of units in minor engagements to chance fighting up a hill against similar-sized forces in the interests of picking off a few units. With a cooldown increase, it makes poking back and forth too reliable for picking off individual units. Basically, the optimal technique in almost all small engagement scenarios is that they're going to dash towards a cliff, fire on a unit with no more firepower than absolutely necessary, and retreat against any returning fire from other units not picked off, thus circumventing the consequences of the main effects of the cooldown increase. Yes, in major engagements, it will end up having a statistically similar (in fact, nearly identical) effect as a 50% miss chance, but I think you'll find that it does not accomplish the same goals in regards to minor scraps.
The whole point of removing randomness is so that the player does not have to take risks caused by it. The only risk factor is the opposing human's reaction.
That being said, you are bringing a valid point. Both mine, and RoomOfMush's propositions to high ground allow micro to reduce the negative effects. You can target single unit, snipe them off and retreat. The question is, if it is something to be desired or not? On one hand it does nullify the high ground, on the other - it rewards micro: move army in, fire a single shot, move army out. That's what I call "positional micro", as opposed to ability micro based on special unit abilities. So, the question is - what do we prefer: high ground to have a guaranteed impact (miss chance/damage reduction approaches) or encourage positional micro as a way to negate the hight benefit (slow fire/guaraneed 2nd miss)? I honestly don't know.
On July 03 2015 18:13 Pontius Pirate wrote:
From playing Starbow a fair bit (mostly a long time ago, but I got a couple games in since 1.0), I've come to decide that SC1 vision is SC1 vision and SC2 vision is SC2 vision. I see no need to mess with a system that this particular game is built around that already works well for its particular, specific goals.
So, unless someone objects - let's stick to what SC2 provides in term of unit vision
Regarding Hellions: we can definetely have a closer look at that particular unit in the future. Reevaluate what the unit should and should not be able to do. Being able to kite zerglings to death with a very intensive micro is not necessairy a bad thing (or is it?). However, I would leave it to a later discussion. Shall I add it to TODO list?
To my knowledge, however, it is hard to make ground units glide and act as if they were hovering. Unless someone knows a solution --- any mod that accomplishes it?
|
@Black
As for high ground, think about how unintuative gaming the highground is. If it encourages very strange micro to occur, people are going to find it incredibly silly and dislike it just for that reason alone. It breaks the logic of the game. Guaranteed impact gives a more abstract wargame feel to highground. It feels like a terrain modifier and is easier to both understand and rationalize what is happening.
I favor a cleaner visual language when having something strongly effect how units micro other than simply being up on a highground. If a unit were to shoot twice as fast on highground I'd prefer some kind of protossy time slow field on top of that cliff. If units were to miss every 3'rd shot, I'd prefer to see some kind of smoke and shroud effect that occurs.
Wargaming abstract logic vs matter of fact physics declaring logic.
Purely my preference for these sorts of things.
Depth of Micro doesn't say EVERYTHING should be zero damage point. Damage point should be on the table as well as backswing and turn rate for establishing a units personality. The damage point on a hellion is key to giving him his positional feel and allowing zergling surround micro to take place. On dragoons and hellions damage point works particularly well. Understand that the depth of micro encourages damage point to be played with and change how a unit micro's rather than leaving them at the default damage point. You can have a game where everything is zero damage point, no backswing, no turn rate to increase the agility of everything but then you would have a great lack of diversity in the personality of units.
|
When I was searching what other people have done in terms of high ground advantage I stumbled upon this marvelous mod:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-maps/335595-mod-high-ground-advantage
It shows that damage reduction can be implemented to handle armor nicely. It also avoids using triggers, which is a bonus. The downside is that it required inspecting every single ground unit and their ranged weapons - but that's something players don't see.
The mod requires updating to HotS (already on it). Integrating it with other changes to weapons (e.g. no-smart-fire) may require a bit of attention but it is definetely do-able. I contacted the author for permission, but he hasn't been around on TL for a year. The project is also officially abandoned by him.
Given that % damage reduction is again viable - do we agree that this is the best approach to high ground? No randomness, no micro that can bypass the effect.
|
I personally prefer the micro approach since it opens up another avenue for a player to shine without forcing you to do it.
But of course, my initial plan was too to reduce the damage of units attacking up a cliff so I am not against that either.
Reducing attack range sounds like a really nice idea because it just makes sense and is easy to understand. I never tried to do it because it sounds like something difficult to implement.
----------------------------------------------
I would also propose a balance change:
Change the Siege Tank. Make it more important in positional play, that means the following:
1) Buff the damage
2) Buff the splash
3) Make the Weapon Cooldown longer
4) Make the Siege / Unsiege time longer
This makes it more costly to use siege tanks because you have to use the timing just right, but attacking into a fortified siege position will cost you.
|
If damage reduction - how much? 30%? 40%? 50%?
50% miss chance is essentially 50% DPS reduction....
Regarding Siege Tank - it is already in the TODO list. Let's discuss it then, but I am thinking in the same direction as you are.
Experimental branch changes
- High ground advantage: Replaced 50% miss chance when shooting upwards, with 30% damage reduction. The solution correctly scales the armor of targeted unit as well.
- Reverted Damage Point on the units: Siege Tank (Siege Mode), Roach, Dark Templar, Immortal, Ghost.
Note, this is "experimental" - we can easily change it if you think different values would be better. I feel 30% damage reduction may be too little.
How do you feel about the Damage Points on other units?
For the air I think it is wise to keep it low. Same goes for Tank (tank mode), Stalker, Hellion (may require further balance adjustments later) as heavy micro on these may introduce some interesting games.
I am also leaving low damage point on Hydralisks, since they are so squishy. Also it is one of few ground-to-air Zerg units, and when shooting air you cannot wait too long!
|
In the hellion case however, it is meant to be a fast, agile unit that a player may want to micro extensively. Shouldn't it have a low damage point?
Your first priority should be to create fun, simple and unique micro interactions. If the Hellion can kite Speedlings infinitely while taking no damage in the proces that isn't fun. On the other hand if a "big unit" has a damage point that prevents it from doing "moving-based" micro that it otherwise would be capable of, then it shouldn't have a damage point in the first place.
Trying to fit lore in with damage point is extremely inefficient in my opinion. Use movement speed instead as the primary variable to accomplish that, but even then don't overdo it. E.g. I find the 1.8 movement speed of the Thor too low as well and I think it would benefit from both a higher speed and lower damage point.
Also, be careful about trying to make every single unit different when it comes to damage point and turn rate. Only differentiate units on those variables if you have identified a specific improvement you can make. Otherwise you should follow the general rule of 0 damage point on ranged unit as it simply feels a ton better (imo - i assume you agree with that).
My point here is that you shouldn't make a unit feel worse for the sake of diversity. Only add diversity (both in terms of strategies and micro) if it adds choices between fun interactions.
Tip 1 If you balance the game around 0 damage point on ranged units, it makes them better at kiting. This means that you need to increase the movement speed of melee units to compensate.
Tip 2: Don't make number changes based on what people tell you on the forum. Instead spent hours in the editor testing how a change to varius variables impact micro interactions. Don't make this only a "theoretical discussion". Learn by doing instead.
|
How much damage reduction is enough and how much is too low is not an easy question to answer.
In the end it boils down to what exactly you want to achieve with it. Should a player be punished for attacking up a cliff, or should it become impossible to make cost efficient trades when attacking up a cliff? 30% is already a punishment, anything above 0% is.
If it gets too high it might make the game more stale because players will not dare to attack, they will barricade themselfs on top of a cliff and wait until maxed out. Think swarm host + static D but for every matchup from both opponents.
In general I would tell you to just choose one value and go with it. Then, wait for people to play it and tell you how they feel about it. Make changes based on observations and tests.
|
On July 05 2015 04:21 Hider wrote:
Trying to fit lore in with damage point is extremely inefficient in my opinion. Use movement speed instead as the primary variable to accomplish that, but even then don't overdo it. E.g. I find the 1.8 movement speed of the Thor too low as well and I think it would benefit from both a higher speed and lower damage point.
Also, be careful about trying to make every single unit different when it comes to damage point and turn rate. Only differentiate units on those variables if you have identified a specific improvement you can make. Otherwise you should follow the general rule of 0 damage point on ranged unit as it simply feels a ton better (imo - i assume you agree with that).
My point here is that you shouldn't make a unit feel worse for the sake of diversity. Only add diversity (both in terms of strategies and micro) if it adds choices between fun interactions.
I hope to avoid adding senseless changes. If you spot one - let me know!
However, since we are affecting grand-scale components, such as economy and terrain influence, there may be wide-range changes affecting every single unit. For example: increase/decrease prices of all units by X%. Or change their speed. Or DPS... I don't know yet.
On July 05 2015 04:21 Hider wrote:
Tip 2: Don't make number changes based on what people tell you on the forum. Instead spent hours in the editor testing how a change to varius variables impact micro interactions. Don't make this only a "theoretical discussion". Learn by doing instead.
Don't worry, I spend more time in the editor than on the forums
But I do value the opinion of the community. I may disagree with some of the opinions, but it allows me to look at things from different perspective. For example - the high ground advantage and ways of achieveing it - it helped me search for new solutions and highlight problems that I didn't consider too problematic. The final solution is also not mine, the main credit is to urashimakt and his High Ground mod from 3 years ago. It is a pity he is no longer around here.
Speaking of which:
Experimental branch change
- Damage reduction when shooting uphill is set to 50%
- Bug fix: Siege Tank in tank mode didn't have uphill penalty applied correctly
It may seem high, but keep in mind that there are two primary stats of a unit: attack and health. Only one is affected. As a result (tested with single unit type in small numbers):
- 3:2 army size is (barely) enough to win an uphill battle. Usually micro decides who has the final blow.
- less than 2:1 army size allows you to win an uphill battle with equal losses.
Yes, it can create a bit stale fight if the players just focus on that one uphill battle. However, unlike swarm hosts, you cannot move a hill. High ground is very localized, and can be often bypassed by the enemy. It is also something that map-makers can control. Adding the fact, that we intend to work with HMH economy model, there usually should be more than one place where you may want to attack.
Secondly, being able to defend a spot with a bit smaller army promotes army splitting, positional play and more aggressive expanding.
In the end - that's the theory. As RoomOfMush rightfully says - in the end you need people to play it to evaluate.
Experimental branch change
- Colosus has "Rain from Above" trait which negates the uphill fight penality
- I am considering adding "Rain from Above" to Siege Tanks in Sieged mode
It gives these two units a specific, situational role - breaking an uphill sieged line. It fits the domain of the Colosi as a unit that bypasses cliffs.
We will have a look at the balance of that specific unit in the future. I believe that by granting it this specific trait, we will be able to apply a mild nerf for a straight battle, without nullifying the unit completely.
Finally, although a bit less important - it fits the lore and animation of the unit.
|
Secondly, being able to defend a spot with a bit smaller army promotes army splitting, positional play and more aggressive expanding.
Here is my issue with this approach in order to create a positional game. If you rely on map features for players to be able to split their army (so a lower army size can beat a higher army size), you are actually restricting map makers, as there needs to be hill in certain locations.
I think its far more advantageous to create a defenders advantage through macromechanics and abilities (Dark Swarm best example of this). This way you can have any typs of map you want and the positional playstyle will always be there when you need it.
Further, remember that high ground is a double edged sword too. Not only does it make a smaller army capable of beating a larger sized army. It also makes a larger sized army capable of snowballing a smaller sized army even harder if - for instance there is a drop in your base and you need to defend it by moving up a ramp. I think this is hardly the desired type of gameplay you are looking at.
Imo it's better to look at whether there are more efficient solutions than can provide the same advantages without the disadvatnages.
Colosus has "Rain from Above" trait which negates the uphill fight penality
I am considering adding "Rain from Above" to Siege Tanks in Sieged mode
I think you just started walking on a dangerous path by making new rules that increase the learning barrier. I am not saying you can never do that (because obviously its part of a mod), but you need to seriously evaluate disadvantage and advantages. Players won't be able to figure out that these rules exist by learning by playing unless you make a clear visual indication that its the case. They will just "have to know it", which imo is a nono when it comes to (simple) game design.
So you have to ask your self, do these new rules really add such awesome interactions while significantly improving the gameplay dynamic?
Isn't there a simpler way of giving the Colossus a unique role in the game?
As RoomOfMush rightfully says - in the end you need people to play it to evaluate.
By playing. Noone has any clue whether 20% or 40% are the right numbers when they speak from a purely theoretial discussion
|
On July 05 2015 22:12 Hider wrote:
Here is my issue with this approach in order to create a positional game. If you rely on map features for players to be able to split their army (so a lower army size can beat a higher army size), you are actually restricting map makers, as there needs to be hill in certain locations.
We added another map feature. We didn't remove anything.
Map makers may choose to use the feature or completely ignore it, e.g. by making a map completely flat. There are other, albeit less pronounced ways to positional game already present, such as chokes or differences in route length for defender vs attacker. All this is still in the arsenal of map maker.
I can guess (correct me if I am wrong) that you are worried that we will balance the mod with an assumption that map features elevated spots at certain positions, and if suddenly they are gone, map becomes broken. I hope it is not going to come to that. Nevertheless, certain map constraints are already present, such as an elevated main, or at least natural with a tight ramp connecting them. I don't think we are going to make matters worse with the high ground advantage.
On July 05 2015 22:12 Hider wrote:
I think its far more advantageous to create a defenders advantage through macromechanics and abilities (Dark Swarm best example of this). This way you can have any typs of map you want and the positional playstyle will always be there when you need it.
The existence of high ground mechanics does not limit us in terms of what abilities are present. We can have a look at abilities at later time (can't talk about everything at the same time). I wonder what macromechanics could be used to influence this. We have building placement... what else?
On July 05 2015 22:12 Hider wrote:
Further, remember that high ground is a double edged sword too. Not only does it make a smaller army capable of beating a larger sized army. It also makes a larger sized army capable of snowballing a smaller sized army even harder if - for instance there is a drop in your base and you need to defend it by moving up a ramp. I think this is hardly the desired type of gameplay you are looking at.
If you put a smaller army at a disadvantageous position (regardless of what game mechanic define such position) - you are bound to loose. After the change players will need to recognize new threats and avoid them. If it is proven impossible or too coin-flippy, we can then try to influence it.
Show nested quote + Colosus has "Rain from Above" trait which negates the uphill fight penality
I am considering adding "Rain from Above" to Siege Tanks in Sieged mode I think you just started walking on a dangerous path by making new rules that increase the learning barrier. I am not saying you can never do that (because obviously its part of a mod), but you need to seriously evaluate disadvantage and advantages. Players won't be able to figure out that these rules exist by learning by playing unless you make a clear visual indication that its the case. They will just "have to know it", which imo is a nono when it comes to (simple) game design.
The "Rain from Above" trait has an icon in the command card indicating its presence. Anyone who commands a Colossus at least once should be able to notice it quickly. Those few who never try Protoss should be able to learn from those who did.
The general rule that there is some high ground advantage is harder to communicate since there is no visual feedback.
Frankly, when I was at school, playing Broodwar, I had no idea that there is a miss chance for high ground! I learned it only few years later.
Isn't there a simpler way of giving the Colossus a unique role in the game?
Colossus is designed to be a simple unit (some say: "boring unit"). Build, move, shoot, die. No special abilities. The introduction of high ground mechanic gives a chance for Colossus to do something special - which by the animation and lore fits perfectly.
Anyway, other changes to Colossus - let's leave it at some later time, OK?
|
On July 05 2015 22:12 Hider wrote:
I think its far more advantageous to create a defenders advantage through macromechanics and abilities (Dark Swarm best example of this). This way you can have any typs of map you want and the positional playstyle will always be there when you need it.
Considering the stated goals of this mod I don't think adding additional abilities is really the way to go about handling this, especially when we have other options. Like BlackLilium I wasn't aware of the high ground mechanic in BW for some time after I started playing it so I don't think it's that big a deal here. At most, maybe you could do something that would slightly muffle the weapon sounds? If you hear your units weapons fire being quieter when firing up hill it's a subtle way of indicating that something is going on.
On July 05 2015 23:52 BlackLilium wrote:Show nested quote +On July 05 2015 22:12 Hider wrote:On July 05 2015 23:52 BlackLilium wrote: Colosus has "Rain from Above" trait which negates the uphill fight penality
I am considering adding "Rain from Above" to Siege Tanks in Sieged mode I think you just started walking on a dangerous path by making new rules that increase the learning barrier. I am not saying you can never do that (because obviously its part of a mod), but you need to seriously evaluate disadvantage and advantages. Players won't be able to figure out that these rules exist by learning by playing unless you make a clear visual indication that its the case. They will just "have to know it", which imo is a nono when it comes to (simple) game design. The "Rain from Above" trait has an icon in the command card indicating its presence. Anyone who commands a Colossus at least once should be able to notice it quickly. Those few who never try Protoss should be able to learn from those who did.
Well I also think it makes sense seeing as how the Colossus is a rather unique unit in the game as it can be attacked by anti-air and is one of the few where even when it is uphill it can still be seen by units on low ground. Given all of those unique behaviors for a ground unit, it not suffering from the low ground to high ground damage reduction makes sense and I don't think players will have a problem with it.
I also wanted to throw out a random suggestion when it comes to damage modifiers, all the ones in the game are X +Y, but what about X -Y? Having a unit that deals bonus damage to everything but a certain type of unit allows for a bit more flexibility in constructing matchups. I know we are tabling the discussion on Siege Tanks for right now, but I think that is a unit that would benefit from this as you can make it deal more damage to everything but light (for instance) to have its damage be high against everything, without having it absolutely murder light units.
|
In BW the high ground advantage had a pretty clear visual representation. When your units missed an attack the sprite of the projectile actually missed visibly and hit the ground or the cliff. I think it should be obvious to see that some of your goons shoot at the ground and your enemy not taking damage that something is going on.
The next unit I would like to discuss is the Ghost. In Blizzard SC its not a viable unit to produce. My suggestion:
* Make EMP a missle so that enemy player has a little bit more counter micro ability.
* Change the nuke to either make it much stronger (to break siege positions) or much weaker but cheaper at the same time (to allow you to use it for harassment). As it is nobody ever uses it.
* Either make them cheaper or make their normal attack stronger to make them more versatile and cost effective
* Change Snipe to deal 50 damage (like before the nerf) but it can not be used on massive units. Blizzard didnt want Snipe to be too strong versus ultralisks and brood lords. With 50 damage it can be used to harass worker lines, kill marines, banelings, etc.
|
I don't like the idea of an ability like snipe that can't be used on all targets. I can shoot a siege tank but can't shoot a Thor? I think this would be a good place for the negative damage bonus, snipe can do -X damage to massive. It even makes lore sense since the odds of a sniper round dealing critical damage to some giant thing is much lower than to a person or smaller machine. Like IRL, a 50 cal (anti-material) sniper rifle will turn a person to paste while only punching a hole in a tank.
|
The Core Setup - Closing Report
Uphill battle penality: The original proposed approach of 50% miss chance when firing uphill raised concern of high randomness in small battles. After some discussion and experimentation in the editor we discarded the uphill miss chance in favor of damage reduction. We found an mod High Ground Defender by urashimakt that implements it well - in particular, it scales the armor of the receiving unit accordingly.
There is a concern that such high damage reduction may lead to stale play and become a required element of every map. We don't share this opinion, although no evidence is available to decide what will actually happen. This will require actual games to be played.
In addition we introduce a "Rain from Above" trait which ignores the uphill penality. Currently we applied it only to Colossus. It gives the unit a unique in-combat trait. Further adjustment to the unit will be required. We considered RfA for Siege Tanks as well, however a concern was raised that RfA itself may be unintuitive, so we decided to keep in on Colossus only - at least at the moment.
Damage point: The original proposed approach set the damage point to almost all units to near-zero value. It was pointed however that some units do not absolutely need it, and the change seemed to be just for the sake of a change. We keep 0 damage point on small air units, as well as Hydralisk, Hellion and Siege Tank (tank mode). 0-point Hellion raises concerns that it may be too good against zerglings. This will require further investigation at a later time.
New topics in the TODO list:
- Investigate Hellion 0 damage point. In particular its function during harassment and interaction with zerglings.
- Investigate Ghost usability (request of RoomOfMush). This is however a detailed look on a single unit, not related to our current changes - thus I am putting it on a low priority.
The changes in the Experimental branch have been pushed to Stable branch.
|
Economy: HMH 5-4 or HMH 6-4? Other?
We need to decide which economy model are we going to use.
The default Hot Mineral Harvesting was designed with default HotS units in mind which gives us additional constraints. In particular:
- We tried to maintain mineral-to-gas ratio as much as possible. With Starcraft Improved however we can afford having a different mineral-to-gas ratio and rebalance the prices on some or all units.
- In early game we did not want to exceed 100% mining rate compared to Standard. That means, 8 workers in HMH should not mine faster than 8 workers in HMH. Why? As we have seen in Double Harvesting tournaments, higher incomes, around 110%, lead to 8-worker cheeses and all-ins that are hard to scout and stop. In Starcraft Improved there we can introduce mechanisms to slow down all-ins even with higher economy (higher unit production time, more costly basic buildings, etc.).
Things to consider:
- A) How much income do we want at 8 workers, compared to Standard?
- B) How much income do we want at 16 workers, compared to Standard?
- C) How far should efficiency drop at 16 workers compared to 8?
- D) What should be the maximum possible harvesting speed (at 24 workers)? This cannot be too high, since we want 3-rd round of workers to give even less income than 2nd round.
- E) How much each round of workers contribute in terms of their efficiency?
Options on the table
- Current HMH 5-4 75%. (W=0.6, H=2.686, HotH=3.17), where
HMH X-Y Z%
X=Harvesting amount of cold minerals (HotS default: 5)
Y=Harvesting amount of hot minerals
Z=efficiency at 16 workers (HotS default 100%)
W=wait time after harvesting
H=harvesting time in seconds (HotS default 2.786)
HotH=harvesting time of hot minerals
These numbers give us:
- A) At 8 workers it matches Standard
- B) At 16 workers it is 25% behind Standard
- C) Efficiency drop is 75% (as indicated in the name)
- D) Maxing up 30% behind Standard.
- E) 100% - 50% - 33%
- HMH 6-4 75% (W=0, H=3.5, HotH=2.67)
- A) At 8 workers it is 15% ahead of Standard. The workers sits quite long at the mineral patch (3.5s)
- B) At 16 workers it is 12% behind Standard. When paired, the workers sits significantly shorter at the mineral patch (2.67s)
- C) We maintain 75%. With HMH is actually easier to get even worse efficiency but we believe it would be too much!
- D) Maxing up at 17% behind Standard.
- E) 100% - 50% - 36%
- HMH 7-5 75% (W=0, H=3.1, HotH=2.76) - a bit more extreme solution, but has lower difference in harvesting times. This gives us saturated base income much closer to Standard, but early game is much higher.
- A) At 8 workers it is 43% above Standard - thus, lots of balancing will be required!
- B) At 16 workers it is 7% above Standard
- D) Maxing up at 1% above Standard
- E) 100% - 50% - 33%
- HMH 5-4 75% (W=0, H=2.34, HotH=2.76) - an idea we came up only recently. This is actually based on the current HMH and the difference is only in the harvesting times!
- A) At 8 workers it is 15% above the Standard
- B) At 16 workers it is 14% behind Standard
- C) The 75% efficiency is maintained
- D) Maxing up 20% behind Standard
- E) 100% - 50% - 33%
Overall, some early-time balancing will be required, but it should not have that strong feeling "omg it is so slow!" as the original HMH has. Hopefully.
All the above ideas assume that 75% efficiency is what we should aim for. Double Harvesting 3x3 has an efficiency of 81.5% and some people felt it was not impactful enough. 75% is also around the efficiency of Broodwar. At 75% efficiency it means that the new workers you produce help by a factor of 0.5, i.e. you are producing half-workers. We don't think that going below that is wise.
If you think that other number, between 75% and 81.5% would be better we can easily redo the calcuations with a different efficiency point.
Also, if you think any of the above suggestions should be tuned to achieve some additional effect or constraint - let us know.
|
I'll give you the same answer as before with the uphill damage scaling: This is really just theorycrafting. We can not discuss which values are right and which are wrong, because none of us knows really. You have to feel the numbers out over a long period of time with several games being played.
Dont waste your time giving it too much thought, just pick a reasonable value and then have people try it out.
--------------------------------
On another note, I would like to know what you intend to do with "the protoss situation"? Many people believe that protoss needs a drastic redesign, something that you dont want to do, so how do you adress the protoss balance?
|
Ultimately, everything is about numbers. What we can discuss however are the constraints and goals that we would like to see.
Should the income match Standard at low worker counts or high ones? How much influx of resources at the beginning can we afford (have seen that in games of DH10 and DH9) ? Do we want to permit workers staying much longer at the resource nodes, or not?
Also, one question that I didn't ask earlier is about the number of starting workers. I would go for 8 or 9, because that's the moment when builds start to diverge (9 pylon + scout or no scout, or going up to 10 pylon). Again - numbers, but there is some thought behind them.
The "protoss situation" I am putting on top of TODO list since it is a general, wide-range question that should have an answer early.
|
I would suggest you keep the income the same as HotS for now and only change it if it turns out to be imbalanced or produces boring games. With 8 workers being optimal saturation I would suggest starting with 8 workers.
But really, I think the balance changes are the most important to the majority of people.
|
On July 06 2015 20:46 RoomOfMush wrote:
I would suggest you keep the income the same as HotS for now and only change it if it turns out to be imbalanced or produces boring games.
But there is a problem. HMH income curve is flatter than of HotS. If we match HotS income at 8 workers, we fall behind at 16 by 25%. If we match HotS at 16, we are 33% higher at 8. My last suggestion is somewhere in between: approx. 15% higher at 8 workers, and approx. 15% lower at 16 - that's what I am currently thinking about.
On July 06 2015 20:46 RoomOfMush wrote:
With 8 workers being optimal saturation I would suggest starting with 8 workers.
I remember someone showing that there is a value in data that controls that. Where was it?
On July 06 2015 20:46 RoomOfMush wrote:
But really, I think the balance changes are the most important to the majority of people.
It's easiest to talk about balance changes as it affects the combat directly. Economy change infulences it indirectly and Hight advantage is very broad but situational at the same time.
We will get to balance, don't worry
|
You have to change the "Race" data within the data editor. There are settings for starting workers and buildings for each race. The Race data is not Game data, its considered Advanced data. (or something like that)
|
On July 06 2015 21:59 RoomOfMush wrote:
You have to change the "Race" data within the data editor. There are settings for starting workers and buildings for each race. The Race data is not Game data, its considered Advanced data. (or something like that)
Ah, that's why I was not able to find it! Thank you!
|
Since there are no more comments, it's time to try something concrete.
Experimental branch
- We tuned HMH 5-4 so that early game income is +14% compared to Standard, and saturation is at -14% of Standard.
- Efficiency at saturated base buffed from 75% to 76%.
- 8 starting workers.
- Optimal worker count set to 2 - thus, base shows XX/16
The early +14% and -14% late is probably the best fit of HMH income to Standard. Still, the early +14% can be problematic. That's a number very close to DH 3x3 that has been played in showmatches and 8-worker cheese may be a problem.
I increase the theoretical efficiency from 75% to 76%. It is a small compensation for the mineral distance differences. I am performing real measurements now to confirm that the modified HMH curves match the theoretical predictions.
Edit: To confirm - real tests have shown that the efficiency curve of the new version of the model matches the original HMH 5-4 almost ideally. The only difference is that the income is shifted up by 14.945%
- At 1 worker, income is 51.9M/min (15.2% more than Standard)
- At 8 workers, income is 376 M/min (10.8% more than Standard)
- At 16 workers, income is 569 M/min (14.1% less than Standard)
Update:
Moving the changes to Stable branch
|
The situation of Protoss
When starting this project we were planning that after the big-scale changes (economy, micro mechanics) we would follow with small incremental changes. However, Protoss may require a broader look to make the race more interesting in play. The biggest issue - that we hope you agree with - is the Protoss gateway units.
We feel that Protoss core gateway units are in an awkward spot:
- They can be very strong as an early game cheese tool (e.g. chronoboosted proxy 2-gate).
- In direct mid-game engagement they are fragile and have to rely heavily on Force Fields to come up even. This also discourages army to be split in later game.
- In the late game, gateway units synergy well with robo and air forming a deathball that is hard to stop.
Do we see it right, or is something missing?
If we "attack" only one of the problems, we increase an imbalance in the other area. For example, if we buff zealots, 2 proxy will be that much stronger. If we reduce the strength of robo and air, Protoss may suddenly lack any solid unit and not be able to leave mid-game stage convincingly. We need multiple, coordinated changes at the same time, addressing all the above issues and not creating or strengthening other problems.
Here is a set of changes that we currently have in mind:
- We buff Zealots and Stalkers somehow. The precise way (HP? Attack? Better upgrade scaling?) - doesn't matter at the moment. A Sentryless T1-T1.5 Protoss army should be able to stay even, or just a tiny bit behind equivalent T1-T1.5 army of other races. We need some good benchmarks to measure it. Any recommendations of army compositions to serve as a benchmark?
- We think about changing charge to boost persistent Zealot speed more, while decreasing charging speed. We hope that in late game a zealot-stalker could function as a flanking army efficiently, deemphasizing deathball play. Deathball play would not benefit from zealot speed increase that much.
- A Sentry should give an edge, allowing Protoss to win a situational T1.5 battles, but not be a solution to all problems in every situation. Since we don't want to introduce completely new abilities, I propose the following:
- Reduce the casting range of a forcefield. It remains a convenient tool against melee units, and a purely defensive measure to avoid a battle, or disengage from it. It should be however much harder to use it offensively --- splitting enemy armies or outright trapping few units in a forcefield dougnut. Such operation requires sentries to move much more forward, allowing the opponent to micro before FF happens - either by stepping back or sniping the sentries down. It may encourage Protoss to try to flank with sentries, capturing the opponet off-guard.
Ultimately, while the froce-field itself "kills" micro, we introduce more micro before it is being casted.
- Guardian shield to be casted on-ground. This can be considered a buff as it becomes easier to use and negates the possibility to snipe the shielding sentry. Still, it is an ability that does not kill micro and as such should be the preferred use of the Sentry. It allows the Protoss to temporarily reinforce a spot on the battlefield. The opponent may choose to ignore it, or back off drawing Protoss army away from the reinforced spot. Notice, that the shield cannot move with the army. Ultimately, it encourages changes in army positioning without dealing any direct damage or constricting movement.
- Chronoboost is a "free" ability of the Nexus available from the very start. No other race has an ability available so early, giving the Protoss an additional edge in the very early game. This can be problematic in early all-ins. In Starbow, chronoboost is available only to an upgraded Nexus, not present from the start. We can achieve similar result, by moving chronoboost from Nexus to Mothership Core. This solves the most pressing issue of early all-ins (e.g. proxy 2-gate). You cannot chronoboost your early zealots, making them easier to balance (e.g. can be made stronger). Moreover, chronoboost starts to compete for energy with other abilities of the Core. It is no longer an 'autofire', but a choice if you want to boost your production or prepare for a defense. Finally, assuming that chronoboost has limited casting range, you cannot use it if you use the Core offensively. This reduces PvP offensive capabilities a bit in early game. In PvP most prominently - it gives the defender an additional benefit.
- Inspect supply cost of gateway units. In the current state they seem to be more supply-efficient and less cost-efficient. e.g. 9 stalkers beats 9 roaches (same supply), but loses to 15 roaches (similar cost). The supply cost - especially when we increase their strength - may require an increase (e.g. for Stalkers). By doing this, we should be able to control Protoss strength in late game as the supply cap would hit earlier.
- Buffing core units can also interact with warpgate mechanic, which allow Protoss reinforce its army faster than any other race. I don't see any witty solution to this. Increase warp-in time?
With all the above, we hope to address all 3 indicated issues of the gateway units without making them underpowered or overpowered at any stage of the game. Do you think it will break something else that we didn't consider?
Follow up direction, not directly related to the core problem:
- I would love to see the Mothership Core in a plurar form. You should be able to get multiple numbers of this unit, effectively increasing your macro capabilities (more chronoboosts). This means however that you put more supply and resources in units which are not so good alone in a direct combat. The Standard MC abilities will have to be balanced however, or moved to Mothership itself (time warp looks like a good candidate). With increased strength of gateway units, taking some stuff from MC should not be that much of a problem.
- Further address the deathball play by inspecting robo and air units. However, gateway units do not scale so well with numbers because of their size. That's why I think that the above changes will benefit medium-sized groups more than the deathball, encouraging more splits and positional play. Either way, a series of follow-up balance will definetly be required!
- A separate look is required for blink play. With increased strength of stalkers this can be devastating. The high ground mechanic may further compound the problem. On the other hand, the increased supply cost may be a partial remedy. Some test games will most like be required to evaluate.
|
I dont particulary like some of the changes to protoss that you propose.
First of all, the Mothership Core is a horrible unit, its practically a hero which does not belong in a game like Starcraft. Keeping it this way is a big no-go for me.
Moving the Chronoboost to the Mothership Core is also problematic since it will make Chrono boosting very difficult. Your Mothership Core would need to stand close to your production and could not move out much. Chronoboost is such an important ability in the current balance that not having it would make Protoss a lot weaker.
Buffing Stalkers is also very difficult because of Blink. We already saw that even with the cost inefficient Stalkers a Blink all-in can be devastating. This is mostly due to the high efficiency of Blink and the quick reinforcement through Warp Gates.
You know what kind of changes I would like since you saw my own mod. I am just saying that what you have planned sounds like it will most likely not work out that well. Not saying its completely impossible, but it sounds dubious to me.
|
Mothership Core may be a horrible unit in HotS, but instead of scrapping it I would prefer to make something more Starcraftly-like out of it. If you tune down its abilities, remove the single-unit constraint and add the chronoboost it actually becomes a bit more similar to Zerg's queens: a macro-oriented unit that you build from the main building.
I understand that buffing Stalkers may become problematic because of blink tactics. However, blink was intended to be a "side strategy", but it became a standard go-to in gateway-oriented builds, especially in PvZ. My current focus is on straightforward gateway-unit combat. Once this is set, we can look how blink is problematic, and how can it be fixed. Maybe a solution is to be found in other race's abilities?
Going back in patch history, this is what happened:
- Gateway units were weak and had problems against early stim pushes.
- Stim research time has been increased from 140 to 170 seconds (WoL patch 1.3.0)
- Terran has problems holding blink all-ins
- Blink research time has been increased from 110 to 140 seconds (WoL patch 1.4.0)
- Blink all-ins get perfected and terran still has problems holding against it
- Blink research time has been increased from 140 to 170 seconds (HotS BU #10)
if we are successful resolving the gateway army in straightforward battles - the root cause of this series of balance changes (although probably not the only) - maybe stim research time could be reduced a bit, allowing Terran to defend against blink all-ins more reliably? And that's only one way of many that the problem could be resolved... assuming it even appears!
With a change in eco, change in chronoboost, change in supply cost of a stalker, early blink all-in may be simply less powerful. We don't know. We will need to test it.
Right now what is most important is a straightforward combat, which should be the Standard. A luxury that Protoss simply doesn't have.
|
Okay, so say you make the Stalker a stronger unit that can be used better as a core unit. What exactly will distinguish the Stalker from the Immortal then?
Right now the Stalker is a mobile ranged unit with fragile defense but okay offense. The Immortal is a beefy hard hitting ground unit.
If you make the Stalker more beefy and slightly stronger then it will overlap too much with the Immortal in my opinion. Thats why I decided in Custom Craft to switch Immortal and Stalker in the tech tree. The Immortal feels much more like a massable T1.5 unit to me with the Stalker being a harassment focused / micro intensive unit.
Concerning the MSC:
I thought you didnt want to change things too much? You dont want to introduce new abilities, but you are okay with removing old ones? And trading abilities between units? And making a hero unit a non-hero unit and changing its purpose in the game?
Dont you think you are going further then you originally intended to do?
|
What about the OG implementation of the MSC as a soft-capped unit that you can make one for each Nexus?
|
It is general Protoss trait that it has less, but beefier units compared to Terran and Zerg. That doesn't dissalow to have unit diversity.
I don't think that buffing Stalker will make it look like an Immortal. I don't want to double its HP or triple its damage output
A Stalker buff does not need to be directly related to HP either. I am currently thinking about removing its "Armored" and "vs Armored" flags and buffig flat damage a bit. We could also make the unit damage scale better with upgrades. However, I didn't investigate all consequences of this yet.
Those are a few options out of many how Stalker could be buffed. Not every buff is towards Immortal-like.
Swapping Immortal and Stalker is definitely clever. It is also what they did in OneGoal. I would prefer, however, not to make such tech tree swaps. When we exhaust all other options and find no good solution we will probably go this way - but I hope this is not going to happen.
Regarding Mothership Core: What is the current purpose of the unit? I see it as a last-resort defensive unit: "omg we are surrounded! ... Recall. Omg we are under attack and have no units! ... Overcharge." I also see it as a "deathball attractor" as it is a heroic-like unit with powerful localized spells.
There is no doubt that the unit requires some heavy tweaking. One of it is to remove the artificial one-unit cap. You can just do it or not do it. There is also an option that Pontius Prate points out: relating the MSC count to the number of Nexus. While softer, this is still some kind of artifical cap. Unless it is absolutely necessary I would like to avoid it.
I am considering moving some of the abilities in the chain: Nexus -> Mothership Core -> Mothership. These units are directly related. This are the same abilities that no one has to learn what they do. As such it is less than coming up with completely new abilities. I do like yours "Restore Shields" ability. It's simple, straightforward, defensive and relies on the existence of other units. In the context of suggestions made here it makes MSC feel even more like a Queen.
Note that OG also removes "Time Warp", introduces a Shield-related ability and make Overcharge more expensive to cast. So I would say we are all looking in the same direction.
If we went crazy with ability swapping, I would actually advocate moving blink to DT or Adepts (for the LotV) making a Stalker a mobile, but core army rather than a harassment tool. But I think it would be too much in terms of swapping abilities.
|
Sorry if I missed it, but I was wondering if you thought at some point about lowering the cost for main buildings. Imo, models like HMH and DH feel underwhelming in practice because I have a hard time justifying the expand and all its risks (investment, defenses spread thin, etc..) for the sole benefit of mining it with 8 workers, and grab, what, 100 extra minerals per minute or so.
As you take more expands, they become arguably harder and harder to defend (further from your main production facilities, and closer to your opponent's, and not supported by the same map features as a 2nd or a 3rd), and I think an extra main building + static defenses + 8 workers are a pretty high value of assets exposed on the map, for so little reward. Especially when you remember that you can just decide to mine with those 8 workers on a base that you already can defend. Imo, the only races that would benefit from the model are those which can expand uncontested in a matchup (only Z atm?), which is kind of one-sided. It's not like you can expand at will as T (even with bio) or P in the current version of the game, you already have a hard time holding on to your 3 first bases usually. A 5th or a 6th are just too easily caught off guard and one-shotted. I know you're planning a complete overhaul of SC2, so that expands may actually get easier to defend, but I was just wondering if lowering the main building cost was a possibility in your mind.
|
As far as I remember you wanted to not tinker with the purpose and abilities of units too much. You said you want people to instantly know what everything is doing and how it works.
Where exactly do you want to draw the line here? What you propose for the MSC I would call some heavy tinkering. On the other hand, it sure isnt easy to clean up the blizzard mess called protoss.
So what I would like to know is this: What exactly is the maximum extent to which you want to go with the re-purposing of units? You have to make that clear up front.
Edit: @ZenithM
You have to remember the new high ground advantage which makes defensive play easier. (expansions are usually on higher ground with a ramp leading up to it)
I would also recommend giving each race some strong positional units that can hold the ground, like Siege Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers from BW. These units can be positioned at an expansion to defend it cost efficiently against much larger forces of enemies. At the same time these units are not imbalanced because they need to be set up to be used.
|
Hey, ZenithM - happy to see you drop by
Altering building prices is definetely possible although I am not convinced that it is required.
Expansion benefits are hard to balance. Without enough benefit there is no point of expanding, with too high benefit it is dangereous not to expand - i.e. you become forced to expand. We need to find a spot where benefit is noticeable but not game changing. I believe HMH with 75% efficiency at 16 (bigger drop than in DH, mind that) is a high incentive itself to consider expand without being forced to.
Note that "not being force to" implies - by definition - a possibility of 2base-vs-2base or 3base-vs-3base situations as well.
In SCI we also introduced high ground advantage, giving you a chance to defend your territory by placing lesser forces at well chosen spots (ramps, cliffs overlooking passages, etc). While it is not an answer to any possible threat, we believe it should give you a little bit more chance to defend a higher count of bases.
I also plan to have a look at harrasing capabilities of races. But that's a topic for another discussion...
Back to the current discussion, I am wondering how do you feel about the current Protoss gateway army and what could be done to help it.
|
On July 08 2015 16:20 RoomOfMush wrote:
So what I would like to know is this: What exactly is the maximum extent to which you want to go with the re-purposing of units? You have to make that clear up front.
In one sentence: I want as little as it is necessary to achieve a desired effect. MSC is problematic so the extends steps much further away than - say - marines, or roaches which are probably where they should be.
If there is a way to keep Chronoboost on Nexus - that would be great! So, for the purpose of the discussion, let us assume that we don't touch chronoboost. What else can we do to reduce proxy all-ins strength, especially in the view of some gateway buffs?
I would also recommend giving each race some strong positional units that can hold the ground, like Siege Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers from BW. These units can be positioned at an expansion to defend it cost efficiently against much larger forces of enemies. At the same time these units are not imbalanced because they need to be set up to be used.
That's in the plans, but we are not there yet.
|
How exactly are proxy gateways overpowered right now? I hardly ever see them when watching pros play (in HotS).
Usually the proxy is only strong against a fast expand strategy. Since there is not yet any meta for your mod I would recommend not trying to fix it yet. First you have to see whether these fast zealots are actually that big of a problem in your mod.
It might turn out that players of your mod will go for less greedy openings, wall off, scout better, etc.
|
Proxy stuff, as well as 4-gate had been a problem in the past, until nerfs came in. I fear that with increased early economy as well as stronger gateway units the problem will resurface itself.
I agree however, that this is purely speculation. Maybe we should try as you suggest: ignore the problem, move forward, test it and then apply the changes only if the problem actually appears.
|
Well then, back to the discussion on the MSC and Protoss in general.
What should the purpose of your MSC be? When do I build it and what do I use it for?
Since you dont want it to be a hero unit it can not have its old purpose of the band aid emergency rescue.
|
On July 08 2015 20:33 RoomOfMush wrote:
What should the purpose of your MSC be? When do I build it and what do I use it for?
Since you dont want it to be a hero unit it can not have its old purpose of the band aid emergency rescue.
My thought was a macro/defense queen-like flying unit, as described before. If we don't give it chronoboost, it would be just a defensive unit. It will still require some heavy changes on its abilities. We could also increase its cost so that it cannot be massed so easily, especially in early game.
My main concern at the moment however are the gateway units throughout the game.
|
Well, you said you want to make the Zealot slightly stronger, which sounds reasonable, and then give the Stalker some love too. Removing the armored tag alone should make the Stalker pretty strong against terran bio. Marauders will suddenly deal only 50% damage against them which is huge.
What I did in Custom Craft is improve the harassment options for the Stalker by increasing the movement speed and the shields but lowering the hitpoints. I too removed the armored tag and changed the attack slightly.
But increasing the movement speed of the Stalker in your mod would probably not be such a good idea since you want to keep the Stalker as a core army unit, right?
For now you should probably try it with the armor change alone then and see how it plays out.
|
The thing is - bio is hardly ever just Marauders. In early game there are just few marauders for tanking and concussive shells, and most of damage is coming from marines.
I was considering replacing the attack 10 + 4 armored to 10 + 4light or even flat 14. However, I agree with you that doing smaller increments and seeing how it plays out is a better approach.
Experimental Balance changes
- Zealot shields: 50 -> 60
- Zealot charge: base speed 2.75 -> 3.0
- Zealot charging speed: 6.05 -> 4.5
- Stalker: removed "Armored" attribute
- Sentry Force Field: cast range 9 -> 5
- Sentry Guardian Shield: casted at target point, cast range: 5 (not working atm!)
I am trying to implement the ground-casted guardian shield, but it seems to be harder than I expected :/
Trying to create the actors and effects from scratch and just use the guardian model... but I get no animation and no desired effect. It's like walking in the dark through all that stuff 
|
Edit: Wrong thread, sorry.
|
Is there a group/channel where people meet and play?
|
Implementing it isnt all that hard. Just take another point target area of effect ability as a base, duplicated it and change the actors / behaviors / buttons and effects. In general you want to duplicate things when you want to make changes to the original game data.
I made the effect as an example for you in the attached map. I actually made the effect a little bit more visual (+5 armor + 100 shields) to see that it actually works. The values (like duration, etc) are probably not correct. I based it off of time warp.
Link to download the example map:
http://www.file-upload.net/download-10751012/GuardianShield-Point.SC2Map.html
|
On July 09 2015 04:12 404AlphaSquad wrote:
Is there a group/channel where people meet and play?
There is an "SC Improved" group available in EU region, but no members apart from me at the moment.
The mod is still an infant.
Thank you for your help, RoomOfMush. I will look into your solution tomorrow.
|
RoomOfMush, I want to thank you again with that guardian shield.
I still have problems with it... sigh.... merging stuff from your map into my mod. I managed to copy-paste all the changes in the raw XML view, but not everything is in XML view - e.g. the default key is missing. It is so tedious to copy stuff between files...
I think I will just clean it up myself, manually.
|
Making that took only about 10 minutes (plus testing). Just remake it from scratch, its actually not that difficult once you get a little bit more used to the editor.
The only problem for me is that I am on a slightly outdated computer and the editor is constantly lagging for me. It sometimes takes several seconds to load certain pages. And starting SC2 to test things can take 2 minutes...
|
Experimental Branch
- Guardian Shield now casted on ground (thanks to RoomOfMush for implementation)
- Guardian Shield appies to all units, including enemy (be careful where you cast it)
- Guardian Shield energy cost: 75 -> 100
- Stalker: supply cost 2 -> 3
How do you feel about a Stalker damage change from "10 (14 vs Armored)" to "13"?
Notable interaction changes:
- vs Marines without combat shield - 4 shots (1 less)
- vs Marines with combat shield - 5 shots (1 less)
- vs Marauder - 11 shots (1 more)
- vs Zergling - 3 shots (1 less)
- vs Roach - 13 shots (1 more)
- vs Mutalisk - 10 shots (2 less)
- vs Zealot - 14 shots (3 less)
- vs Stalker - 14 shots (1 more)
This makes all-around bit better unit rather than AV specialist - which is a strange trait for a Stalker. It is closer to be cost-efficient. However, with the supply cost increase it is harder to mass and a bit more expensive in early game (need more pylons).
It also buffs Protoss AA against Mutalisks by a noticeable amount - something that this race is struggling with + it aligns with a future policy of making Ground-to-Air stronger in exchange of weaker Air-to-Air.
|
Sadly, I see no response
In the meantime I created SC Improved groups and made some images.
Is there a way to set up a custom loading screen for a mod? All I can find on the internet is how to do that for a map...
|
Do you think it's at all viable to change Stalker supply cost to 2.5? That would set up a precedent to allow changing Siege Tanks to 2.5, and possibly Roaches to 1.5.
|
On July 12 2015 08:57 Pontius Pirate wrote:
Do you think it's at all viable to change Stalker supply cost to 2.5? That would set up a precedent to allow changing Siege Tanks to 2.5, and possibly Roaches to 1.5.
Apart from the obvious inconvenience of having a hidden 0.5 there is no reason why shouldn't it happen. We could also multiply the supply cost of all units by 2 or 3 and increase the supply-cap accordingly. It is an interesting idea, so I added it on the top of TODO list.
For a Stalker in particular, however, I fear that 2.5 might not be impactful enough. This functions not only to bring cost-effectiveness closer to supply-effectiveness, but also it functions as a nerf to early blink-stalker all-ins as well as a nerf to deathball play.
Regarding other changes - if there are no other comments, I will be closing this topic soon. If I get no "yes" for the proposed Stalker change (13 flat damage) or any other suggestion around it, I will just keep the standard values and go with RoomOfMush's suggestion to just see how it playes.
|
I dont particulary like the supply increase of the stalker. Higher supply units mean less units in total which means less engagements, harass, defensive units, etc.
It is something I always disliked about SC2, how they made most units more costly in the supply area. Siege Tanks, Hydras, Ultras suddenly cost more supply, Banshees, Thors, etc cost more supply then their BW originals.
In my opinion high supply cost units make it so that players are less likely to station some units defensively at their bases. Because now it would be more supply, and therefore possible army units, wasted on the back lines.
If you instead keep the supply cost per unit low but increase the units cost then it will still be build less but each individual unit will be more valueable, defensive units will become better and the late game armies will become stronger.
------------------------------------------
The 13 flat damage sounds okay. Its hard to really tell, it would have to be played by higher level players to really judge it fairly.
|
|
|
(I think) I understand your concern regarding the supply cost. With higher cost there are less units to spread out, meaning that a higher percentage of your units build the main army instead. In other words, your concern is: if I take 10 units to harass, how much percentage of overall supply budget do I use for that? Is that what you are saying?
The problem you describe can be adjusted by individual unit supply cost, but also by changing the supply maximum or overall, uniform scaling of all supply costs.
By changing the stalker cost I attack a completely different problem: disparity between unit cost and supply cost. It is a different problem, which can lead to unwanted effects. Let's step away from Stalker and do some theorycrafing with an arbitrary unit X. Let consider 3 variants of that unit:
- Balanced X costs 100 minerals and takes 2 supply. We assume that it is well balanced. It is cost- and supply- efficient, right where we want it to be. It will function as a baseline in our discussion.
- Hungry X costs 50 minerals and takes 4 supply. Very cost-efficient, but supply-inefficient.
- Rich X costs 200 minerals but takes 1 supply. Very supply-efficient, but cost-inefficient.
Let us further assume that you can exchange 100 minerals for an 8 supply budget.
Consider 3 races, each having access to only one of the variants of X. In early game the limiting factor is money. You need to create Supply and Army while having limited income.
- BX effectively costs 125 minerals. Once you trade with your opponent, you can get more for 100 minerals.
- HX effectively costs 100 minerals. You can trade cost-efficiently with your opponent, and rebuild for half the price.
- RX effectively costs 212.5 minerals. You don't get supply-blocked so easily but have hard time getting an army of similar strength. Trading cost-efficiently is hard and even when that happens, rebuilding your army is problematic.
In this scenario HX can play aggressively early-game and do some serious damage to RX.
Things change in the late game. Money is no longer the prime factor, but the supply cap.
- You can get 100 BX units.
- HX will max up early, with just 50 units. You better make use of them before enemies overpower you!
- Getting max up with RX is very expensive, but when you do you have an army of 200 RX which is hard to stop.
The above reasoning was purely theoretical. Numbers are extreme and in real game there are (fortunately) so many other factors (e.g. unit size, usability in big numbers, ability to shoot air, special abilities, attributes and counters, etc...) However, this underlying theory can still shine through all that additional stuff and I believe this is the case with Protoss in general: in early game sentryless Protoss has survavibility problems, but if it manages to hit the late game, chances for Protoss win are usually higher than of any other race. This matches the profile of Rich X.
Secondly, we identified that Stalker is more supply-efficient than cost-efficient. In SCI, so far, Stalker received bufs only:
- Lower Damage Point
- Removed "Armored" flag
- Blink more powerful due to High Ground Advantage
- Considered buffing flat damage to 13 (and remove armor bonus), making it a more reliable all-round unit.
For the reasons stated earlier I claim that if we want to reflect the bufs somehow in the unit price, it should be done through its supply cost rather than the price.
Thus I came with the conclusion that "2->3" is the way to go.
Giving it more thought though I am not 100% convinced. As you point out, it limits the number of mobile units available to Protoss player, potentially encouraging more deathball-style play. Maybe in the end the 2.5 as suggested by Pontius Pirate would be a good compromise?
Thanks for the link. Frankly, I missed that thread, I will have a good read!
|
What you describe is true and well known, but you fail to describe why it would be a bad thing to have a "rich" unit as you call it.
It simply is a different kind of design that differentiates protoss from the other races. Of course, extremes are always bad, thats why they are called extremes, but I dont think we have reached an extreme yet.
Even though your Stalker has received quite a few buffs, none of them were of grand effect. The lower Damage Point doesnt change late game engagements, only early game micro intensive battles. The removed armored flag makes the Stalker stronger against certain kinds of units, but not against others. And the changed damage output also makes the Stalker weaker against certain targets.
As you see, whether the unit really got stronger or not depends heavily on the situation it is used in. Overall it might have become more useful and more powerful in most situations, but I dont think the buff was so powerful that a supply cost increase of 50% or 25% is fair.
I would suggest, instead of making the Stalker weaker / more costly to counter-balance the buff, make a change to the Sentry and Force Field or MSC to balance things out. On their own, Stalkers were fairly weak before. They only shine when used in combination with Force Fields or the MSC to grant high ground vision in an early all-in. Weakening these compositions instead of individual units might be a better route.
|
Mmmm I remind when we were discussing about Protoss macro in many posts LiLium XDD. We have so close ideas.
|
I have to say I really like the idea of doubling the supply of all units and supply structures in order to not have to worry about .5 supply unit changes. Not only that, but now Zerglings and Banelings will be properly represented in the supply count. Even if the worker supply change doesn't go through, and even if the same (roughly) number of units are still required to make a maxed-out army, I think it would feel like a nice quality of life change.
On July 12 2015 18:30 RoomOfMush wrote:
I dont particulary like the supply increase of the stalker. Higher supply units mean less units in total which means less engagements, harass, defensive units, etc.
It is something I always disliked about SC2, how they made most units more costly in the supply area. Siege Tanks, Hydras, Ultras suddenly cost more supply, Banshees, Thors, etc cost more supply then their BW originals.
In my opinion high supply cost units make it so that players are less likely to station some units defensively at their bases. Because now it would be more supply, and therefore possible army units, wasted on the back lines.
If you instead keep the supply cost per unit low but increase the units cost then it will still be build less but each individual unit will be more valueable, defensive units will become better and the late game armies will become stronger.
------------------------------------------
The 13 flat damage sounds okay. Its hard to really tell, it would have to be played by higher level players to really judge it fairly.
I'm all for supply increases to specific units who seem like they might need them, so long as it's coupled with a total supply cap increase. For instance, I'm okay with the Roach (in its current state) being at 2 supply if the maximum supply is 300.
I get the sense that the improved performance of Roaches against Stalkers with this theoretical 13 flat damage shot will have to be compensated by greater access to anti-armor for the Protoss player. Is this an alright time to bring up moving the Immortal to the Gateway?
|
On July 13 2015 02:49 RoomOfMush wrote:
What you describe is true and well known, but you fail to describe why it would be a bad thing to have a "rich" unit as you call it. It simply is a different kind of design that differentiates protoss from the other races. Of course, extremes are always bad, thats why they are called extremes, but I dont think we have reached an extreme yet.
While not an extreme, many say that Protoss as an advantage once a late game is reached. I don't think it is a good thing, it puts other races on a clock. While having timings and different win changes depending on game duration is not necessairly bad, but everything should converge to 50% in the late late game.
Protoss is designed to have fewer, but beefier units. This can be achieved without the "rich" property - simply the cost and supply have to be proportional to what the unit can do.
However, with all the arguments presented and my own thoughts, I think it will be better to revert Stalker supply to 2 and not apply a damange change - at least for the moment.
Experimental Branch
- Stalker: supply cost reverted back to original (2)
Stable Branch
Experimental Branch pushed to Stable branch. This includes the following changes:
- Zealot shields: 50 -> 60
- Zealot charge: base speed 2.75 -> 3.0
- Zealot charging speed: 6.05 -> 4.5
- Stalker: removed "Armored" attribute
- Sentry Force Field: cast range 9 -> 5
- Sentry Guardian Shield now casted on ground (thanks to RoomOfMush for implementation)
- Sentry Guardian Shield appies to all units, including enemy (be careful where you cast it)
- Sentry Guardian Shield energy cost: 75 -> 100
|
Warpgate Cost
Warpgate decreases the defender benefit. This is particularly visible in PvP. We are looking for ways to make a Warpgate a choice rather than a must-have, at least in the early-to-mid stages of the game.
One of the most common suggestion is to have warpgate have an additional cooldown cost when spawning units, rather than having it decreased. In our view it becomes merely a small inconvenience rather than a solution. Unless, of course, the difference is huge - but we don't wan that either. You still want to warp in units at the field rather than wait for full cycle to produce from the base and then spend valuable time to move. Warpgates still decrease the defender's advantage. You still get a round of units a cycle earlier, compared to a non-Warpgating Protoss and only after few cycles of constant production the higher cooldown starts to matter.
Ball656 in the other thread proposes a different solution: make a gateway-to-warpgate transformation cost money - say 100 minerals. In early game this is an important investment which effectively reduces your army strength by a Zealot per each Gateway. This gives a tangible difference between a potential Warpgate aggressor and a Nonwarpgate defender.
While Warpgate remains a "must-have" at a later stage of the game, it would not necessarily be a must-rush-to technology early game.
It might even open us a possibility to change the role of Mothership Core in the future, without reverting PvP to WoL state, which revolved heavily around 4-warpgating.
For reference, the original Ball656 post:
On July 13 2015 02:31 Ball656 wrote:
There's a legitimate worry about the power of warpgate if you increase the stats on gateway units. Not only can a warp in occur anywhere with a pylon or deployed warp prism, it also gives you the unit around thirty seconds earlier than traditional production. This is why the timing of warp gate research finishing could decide games in WoL PvP (3 or 5 stalkers vs 7 is very tough). Some have suggested changing warpgates to be less efficient at making units than gateways, but I think there might be a simpler way to take the edge off of early warpgate aggression while still allowing the gateway units themselves to be more powerful. And that is: make transforming each gateway to warpgate cost the minerals and build time of a zealot. A warpgate is more useful than a gateway, so it makes sense that it would cost more. Since it gives you the units it produces almost a production cycle early, and with more flexibility with regard to location, it makes sense that this additional cost would match up with the cost of one unit. An 8 gate that has to spend 800 extra minerals transforming its gateways to warp gates would be much less powerful, but still a bit better than an 8 gate that declines to transform its gateways, spends the time waiting for its units to finish and then walks across the map (or arrives at the same time with 8 less units).
Such a change also delays the Protoss maxing out and makes the maxed out bank smaller at any particular point in time just by nature of being extra infrastructure cost, so the power of remaxing with zealots and stalkers as compared to units which must wait their full build time to be produced is indirectly addressed. Since it's the warp gate itself that enables most of the strongest independent applications of gateway units it makes sense that it would be the warp gate that would have additional cost rather than zealots and stalkers suffering a tax on their effectiveness in all situations.
There might even be room to experiment with bringing back the WoL alpha's 2 gate proxy pylon with warp gates able to be placed on the map without research for 250 minerals and a build time of 95 seconds. That might demand a shift to very aggressive openings in PvP, though, just to be safe from a proxy pylon.
|
On July 13 2015 18:37 BlackLilium wrote:
However, with all the arguments presented and my own thoughts, I think it will be better to revert Stalker supply to 2 and not apply a damange change - at least for the moment.
What was the logic behind the idea to put the Stalker at 13 flat damage instead of 14 flat damage? I feel like this Stalker supply change is an idea that deserves further consideration, especially if other supply changes start getting made. On a related note, I see the difference between 11 flat and 12 flat damage to be the biggest difference-maker, since that's when Stalkers 3-shot Zerglings. Also, was your plan to keep the upgrade scaling at +1, or were you thinking of moving it to +2?
In relation to Warp Gates, would there be much value in increasing the Gateway to Warp Gate conversion time to the build time of a Zealot too, or would this simply lead to Protoss players stocking up their resources and making a larger flood of units at the end of the conversion time to compensate? My hope was that making it a long conversion time would effectively compensate the issue of Protoss players gaining a one-time production cycle bonus over their opponent at the time that Warp Gate research completes. You mentioned that you didn't feel that increasing the Warp Gate cooldown was an effective way of dealing with this, but what if these multiple solutions were combined in some way?
|
Random ideas for units and balance:
Terran:
* Siege Tank Siege Mode
- buff single target damage to +20(the splash remains the same)
- also I like the reduced supply cost you mentioned
* Ghost
- buff snipe damage to organic
- emp larger radius, however spawn delay - so it can be dodged (the forming of the emp will be visualized to enemy plr)
- cost back to 150, 150; more caster like unit, more powerful but less affordable
* Viking
- reduce air range slightly
- add small splash to their air attack
- ground viking +1 range
* New unit Science Vessel
- air spell caster
- Defensive matrix(75) -> cast on allied unit to gain sort of immortal like shield for 15 seconds
- Radiation field(125) - cast on a large area; radiation field that slowly grows in strength over 10 seconds, last 30 seconds total, 5 max damage/second vs biological ground units, no effect on mechanical, bypass shields(e.g. zealots), friendly fire, burrowed units are unaffected
* Thor new ability - Shrapnel after 1.5 second fires shrapnels to a target area dealing 25 damage to any ground target(friendly fire)
Zerg:
* Viper
- pulling large units distance shortened, the larger the unit the more the pull range is reduced
- blinding cloud chanelling ability with 50% reduced cost
* New unit Beetle
- ground slow moving aoe damager
- deals 10+10a damage to large ground area, very slow attack
- attack also decrease armor of all units(sort of acid spores, max 3 spores on unit)
- cost 125/125/3, available at lair tech
Protoss:
* remove oracle
* Mothership new ability - Globe of Protection - cast on a huge ground area, makes any ground unit or building under this area immune to air attacks for 30 seconds; also applies to colossus attacks(as they are sort of air to ground attack)
* Tempest
- halve bonus damage to massive
- increase damage by +5, +20 bonus damage to building
* New unit Reaver
- slow moving ground unit
- ammunition - scarabs cost 10 minerals to make
- after 1.5 seconds fires a scarab in ballistic trajectory(projectile moves slow) that after landing deals 55 damage to all enemy ground units
- the target is a ground area so units can avoid being hit by moving
- does have attack ground ability so you can also target terrain
- damage can be upgraded to +15, does 40 bonus damage to buildings
* Photon Cannon - 25 damage, 125 hp, 125 shields
|
On July 14 2015 06:40 Pontius Pirate wrote:Show nested quote +On July 13 2015 18:37 BlackLilium wrote:
However, with all the arguments presented and my own thoughts, I think it will be better to revert Stalker supply to 2 and not apply a damange change - at least for the moment.
What was the logic behind the idea to put the Stalker at 13 flat damage instead of 14 flat damage? I feel like this Stalker supply change is an idea that deserves further consideration, especially if other supply changes start getting made. On a related note, I see the difference between 11 flat and 12 flat damage to be the biggest difference-maker, since that's when Stalkers 3-shot Zerglings. Also, was your plan to keep the upgrade scaling at +1, or were you thinking of moving it to +2?
I was looking at Stalker vs Marine:
- Currently Stalker needs 5 shots against unshielded Marine and 6 shows for shielded one (I mean "combat shield" upgrade)
- With 11 flat damage that will be 5 damages regardless of the shield upgrade
- With 12 and 13 flat damage that makes 4/5
- With 14 flat that makes 4/4
That's why I was considering only 12 or 13 flat damage. On the other hand we have Stalker vs Zergling interaction which I believe is in a very good spot. +2 upgrade scaling is also an option, but we have to be careful with buffing Protoss late game.
In the end, there was so little discussion on the topic, I thought it would be safer not to change the damage (yet).
Now that you asked it, it made me thinking about flat 12 and buffining Zergling to have 37 HP (3x12+1). Baneling light damage and Ultralisk damage would have to be set at 37 as well - but those are last cascading changes which should have no further negative effects.
LastWish, thank you for your thoughts! Looking at your suggestions I think we will agree on some and disagree on others. However, we will discuss those when we get there. I don't want to split this discussion into multiple topics at the same time.
|
My 3 cents regarding sentry changes:
Forcefileds:
On June 14 2015 00:37 egrimm wrote:
I think that FF are fine as long as there are only couple of them cast in a fight. FF are not a problem neither in PvT nor in PvP as Protoss'es usually go for only 2-3 sentries and use them for guardian shield and some FF to grab imporant picks (like immortals or groups of marauders). Also later in the game they are less important and easier to bypass or destroy with massive units. Only in PvZ we still see a lot of sentries which seem necessery for proper defense + are really usefull when pushing in mid-game against zerg units because most of them are short range (roaches, zerglings).
IMO we could go for slight nerf to FF and sentries in general to allow protosses do not rely so heavily on them in PvZ BUT that would have to go in pair with some buff to P's core units/other defensible mechanic.
My take on slight sentry nerf would be one or combination of changes listed below:
1. FF on top of energy requirement would also have a cooldown which would be ~3 sec shorter than FF duration.
That change would mean that You cannot cast more FF at once than You have sentries = less spammable ability.
2. FF cannot be casted on parts of buildings or terrain like rocks etc. only on 'simple' ground.
Protosses would have to be more precise with their FF usage and could not simply FF on top of pylon or bunkers.
3. FF cannot be casted on ground where units are standing.
No more 'pushing' units with FF, 'FF donuts' etc. Casting FF would require carefull planning for both Protoss and enemy army movement.
Guardian Shield:
Problem with guardian shield is that it promotes clumping your units around sentry which leads to more deathball-ish play and also GS does not require micro other than repositioning your units to be inside of the bubble. In other words using GS is more beneficial when You have more units which can be affected by the ability.
What would be more ideal is to have other version of GS which aids Protoss units in small skirmishes instead of big fights. Actually sentry does work like that: 1-2 FF is not that detrimental and would not help in small skirmish either. The same is with GS.
I saw that You already made some changes to GS however I'd like to propose mine
Instead of GS sentry does have ability that works on single target. What it could do is one of following:
1. Instantly recharge shields of targeted unit.
2. Instantly add shield to targeted unit (for example +100)
3. Cast Hardened shield (immortal ability) on single unit (with tweaked stats) or defensive matrix from BW's Science Vessel
4. Have passive ability which would heal shields (like medic/medivac)
ofc such ability would have to burn less energy as it is probably much weaker that GS but that is also what We are looking for: stronger Zelot/Stalker & weaker Sentry.
Also I'd Propose small cost reduction to Hallucination:
100 -> 75
That way hallucination might be usefull in small engagements to draw more fire of enemy's units.
|
Protoss mechanics (WG/MsC/Chrono Boost)
Chrono Boost
I think that CB should not be available right from the start of the game. Queens require spawning pool, mule's require barracks & CC. It makes sense to add some kind of tranformation to nexus (similar to gate->warpgate) which would give access to CB. That way:
1. Production time of gateway units could be slightly buffed (for example zelot production time was nerfed in WoL beta because of proxy 2 gate + CB)
2. We might add some other spell to nexus: tension between CB or other ability, smth that is lacking right now.
I actually would like to see recall from MsC moved to "planetary Nexus" with radius similar to FF/Storm.
Warpgate
First of all:
Ball656's take on WG mechanic is really good I'd definitely like to see it tested.
What I'd like to see additionally:
A. Move WG to TC
1. WG timings are not gonna be such a problem anymore because thay gonna hit later and also without blink or charge.
2. There is gonna be tension between upgrades on TC. Which to choose first? Blink or WG? Maybe Charge? Right now You always want to have WG asap.
3. More room for buffs to gateway units
B. Production time of Gateway units unified (the same for gateway and warpgate) but transforming into Warpgate cost as in Ball656's idea.
MsC
I myself do not like MsC/MS because they are hero units which do not belong to SC imho. Additinally Photon overcharge also is not really interesting/exciting ability even if curent balance needs it. With Recall on Nexus, stronger (and maybe build faster) gateway units and WG moved later and also hallucination cheaper allowing for faster scout, there may be not a necessity for MsC existence
|
|
|
egrimm, I think that some of the ideas that you bring to the discussion are worth considering, such as FF cooldown/cost change or Hallucination cost change. However, changing Guardian Shield to be a (shield) healing ability or act as a Defensive Matrix from Science Vessel - that may be too different ability and I would really like to avoid that.
I too think that Chronoboost early game introduces imbalances, such as buff to proxy gating. I remember myself the patch in WoL which nerfed Gateway production time because of that. I think we will discuss it further during the "Macro mecanics" section which is currently 2nd in the TODO list.
On July 15 2015 04:01 Barrin wrote:
The thing is I absolutely refuse to introduce new units/abilities. Players would have a seamless transition (identical mechanics, costs) from regular SC2 to my mod.
How close to this ideal do you plan on keeping in this project?
I don't think I am planning to be that absolute.
- New units? Never ever, although some of the existing ones may need some heavy tweaking changing their purpose a bit (Mothership Core, Swarm Host).
- New abilities? I don't want to add them just for the sake of adding stuff. However, some are really problematic and may require a change. I would also like to explore some of ideas of WoL or HotS beta that didn't make to the final product. For example - Oracle was originally intended to be an indirect harassment unit, but ended up being a direct worker killer, partially overlapping with Phoenix. Another example: Thor. Originally it had the 250mm Strike Cannons - an ability that was seldom used, currently replaced by a non-tactical "do more damage to X" button. I would like to explore reintrodice the Strike Cannons albeit with a different mechanic.
- Changing ability mechanics or costs? Yes, I do want to tweak them. Keeping all abilities exactly where they are would be too constraining in my opinion. A cost change might be surprising at first to a new player, but I don't think it would be a gamebreaking problem that a potential player cannot figure out. Like right now: we are considering adding a mineral cost to a gateway-to-warpgate transition.
So, ultimately, there will be some changes in abilities - but I hope to remain reasonable with them. The ease of transition from SC2 is also one of the objectives of SCI.
However, I would be more than happy to listen to your ideas! I value your opinion and hope to see you here, at least from time to time.
|
A couple thoughts:
Guardian Shield
- I agree with egrimm that it promotes balling up of Protoss units and was in favor of it being castable like it currently is in SCI, but rather than creating a shield dome it adds the extra armor to the units that are affected, after which they can move around with that protection until the effects run out.
- With it now affecting enemy units too I worry about Zerg getting a lot of benefit. lings, blings, ultras (particularly an issues with the high armor they will have in LotV), locusts, and broodlings, the latter two of who can be inserted into your army, can all benefit since they all easily get right up into your army.
Warpgate
- In order to nerf it somewhat, how about applying a temporary debuff on warped in units? All warped in units are slowed (attack and movement) for X seconds after being warped in. This reduces the ability to be aggressive with warped in units but maintains warpgate as a production tool.
Chronoboost
- Not in favor of removing it or making it harder to get to seeing as how Protoss is balanced around that too. Mules add additional eco without taking supply (and effectively build instantly), and zerg can store tons of larvae to produce large bursts of workers (or units) while probes only ever build one at a time. A result of this is needing more stable macro enhancement to keep pace.
- You could add a requirement (cyber core?) to allow chronoboost to be used on anything other than a Nexus to again affect upgrades and other unit builds.
|
On July 15 2015 10:40 xPrimuSx wrote:Guardian Shield- I agree with egrimm that it promotes balling up of Protoss units and was in favor of it being castable like it currently is in SCI, but rather than creating a shield dome it adds the extra armor to the units that are affected, after which they can move around with that protection until the effects run out.
- With it now affecting enemy units too I worry about Zerg getting a lot of benefit. lings, blings, ultras (particularly an issues with the high armor they will have in LotV), locusts, and broodlings, the latter two of who can be inserted into your army, can all benefit since they all easily get right up into your army.
Guardian Shield gives you +2 defense against ranged attacks. If your opponent uses a combination of ranged/melee then it is more a challenge to use the guardian shield properly - which I think it is a good thing. However, against link+baneling+ultralisk you shouldn't use the shield at all as it gives you no benefit.
I am also not in favor of letting the units keep the +2 benefit after they leave the dome. The hole idea of casting guardian shield on the ground is that you reinforce a spot. An enemy has an option to step away from it or run into it, partially negating the effect.
However, if you change the GS to be "give units +2 armor for 15 seconds" without location constraint - this does not give any option for the enemy to play around it. It would become a straightforward (boring) "make units stronger" button, similar to HotS prismatic beam or LotV Immortal barrier.
Also note, that the SCI version of Guardian Shield is immobile. You cannot just hug a sentry and move forward.
On July 15 2015 10:40 xPrimuSx wrote:Warpgate- In order to nerf it somewhat, how about applying a temporary debuff on warped in units? All warped in units are slowed (attack and movement) for X seconds after being warped in. This reduces the ability to be aggressive with warped in units but maintains warpgate as a production tool.
I to was thinking about some king of debuff, such as - warpgating units spawn without shields.
For a small X I fear that it will be just a small inconvenience. You will be still able to produce more units close to enemy base, giving only X extra seconds to enemy to prepare for it. If X is big, that will be a huge annoyance in other scenarios probably defeating the purpose of having warpgates in the first place.
On July 15 2015 10:40 xPrimuSx wrote:Chronoboost- Not in favor of removing it or making it harder to get to seeing as how Protoss is balanced around that too. Mules add additional eco without taking supply (and effectively build instantly), and zerg can store tons of larvae to produce large bursts of workers (or units) while probes only ever build one at a time. A result of this is needing more stable macro enhancement to keep pace.
- You could add a requirement (cyber core?) to allow chronoboost to be used on anything other than a Nexus to again affect upgrades and other unit builds.
We are rebalancing stuff. If we change chronoboost, we will have to make sure that Protoss is strong enough for the new condition. But that's what we are doing here anyway, right? We will look at all macro mechanics (chronoboost, mules, inject) soon
Experimental Branch
- Gateway-to-Warpgate: mineral cost set to 100. No change to transformation time. (based on Ball656's idea)
- Warpgate: removed back-to-Gateway button
|
On July 15 2015 04:57 BlackLilium wrote:
egrimm, I think that some of the ideas that you bring to the discussion are worth considering
Thx!
On July 15 2015 04:57 BlackLilium wrote:
However, changing Guardian Shield to be a (shield) healing ability or act as a Defensive Matrix from Science Vessel - that may be too different ability and I would really like to avoid that.
I understand Your concerns as it is quite big change but it would help sentry to work in small skirmishes early in the game instead of big balls of units, which is what Protoss really needs to trade efficiently with gateway units. I'm afraid that SCI version of GS, even if better than SC2 one, does not really adress that btw passive shield-healing ability on sentry is implemented in LotV campaign
On July 15 2015 04:57 BlackLilium wrote:
I too think that Chronoboost early game introduces imbalances, such as buff to proxy gating. I remember myself the patch in WoL which nerfed Gateway production time because of that. I think we will discuss it further during the "Macro mecanics" section which is currently 2nd in the TODO list.
Glad to hear it
|
Experimental Branch pushed to Stable
0.5 supply
It is a small pecuriality known among Zerg players. A single Zergling and a Baneling takes 0.5 supply. While you originally produce Zerglings in pairs, you may lose an odd number of them. In the end your supply is a non-integer number, but it is not shown in any way in the UI. Pontius Pirate raises a question if this issue could be resolved by simply multiply all supply by 2. Cap would be at 400; pylons, overlords and supply depots would give 16 supply; marine, reaper, observer, would take 2 supply, etc... This would make each zerg consume 1 full supply solving the above problem.
However, this change would also allow us to better balance units in terms of their supply costs. There has been suggestions to make Roach take 1.5 supply or a Tank to take 2.5 in the past. With the x2 supply change, we could realistically consider these changes (I don't claim we should or should not. I just state the possibility.)
Worker supply cost
Assuming the above becomes true, I would like to revisit one of other economy model ideas, proposed by phantomfive: How to reward players for expanding a lot.
The idea is simple: reduce the supply cost of workers by 50%. With the above change this becomes viable.
Early game is speeded up by this change, but only by a small bit: it allows you to spend few more minerals at something different than pylons/depots/overlords.
In late game, it allows you to stay on 3 bases and have a maxed-up army about 25% stronger than in Standard.
However, it also allows you to have 4 or 5 fully saturated bases while maintaining strong maxed-up army.
While it does not negate the need for HMH, it streatches up how far can you go with greed. More options to play - more interesting game
If we go this way, however, there are some details which we may need to look at. A straight x2 supply on main buildings will allow strange play of a CC/Nexus first before a pylon. It is also very hard to get supply-blocked ever when just producing workers. This can buff Zerg's greedy builds - which may require a look on its own. On the other hand, if we keep the original supply bonus of main buildings, as an exception of x2 rule, it won't affect the Zerg since Zerg is starting with an Overlord anyway.
|
On July 17 2015 04:25 BlackLilium wrote:
If we go this way, however, there are some details which we may need to look at. A straight x2 supply on main buildings will allow strange play of a CC/Nexus first before a pylon. It is also very hard to get supply-blocked ever when just producing workers. This can buff Zerg's greedy builds - which may require a look on its own. On the other hand, if we keep the original supply bonus of main buildings, as an exception of x2 rule, it won't affect the Zerg since Zerg is starting with an Overlord anyway.
In relation to Zerg's greedier builds, could this be balanced by lowering the supply conferred by each Overlord, but not by Depots or Pylons?
|
I am late to this thread, but here is another idea I've had. Instead of just the concept of "high ground" and "low ground," I think there should be a type of ground called "fortified ground," which would reduce damage by 50% to defenders. So we would have three types of ground:
Normal ground: normal ground
High ground: affects vision
Fortified ground: 50% damage reduction (or miss rate)
Fortified ground can be a type of ground that mapmakers can either decide to use or not, giving them more freedom. It could be combined with high ground or low ground.
Thinking in terms of traditional military tactics, we could also have slow ground, like swamps (like the Roman Pontine marshes), or fast ground that affect the speed of an army moving across them. We could also have 'hot' ground that slowly depletes the health of armies that cross it. These are things that mapmakers could use, or not use, giving us more variation)
|
Completely different supply costs... even if it is just multiply by 2. It will confuse people.
I expect situations were people quickly glare at the supply, and seeing that they still have 8 supply, think that it is a lot - when it is not. The higher the numbers, the hard it is for human to comprehend them.
I am worried about the previous change though. With warpgates so costly, Protoss will now have really hard time in early and mid game, having so few units in the map.
|
On July 17 2015 14:50 BrokenSegment wrote:
Completely different supply costs... even if it is just multiply by 2. It will confuse people.
I expect situations were people quickly glare at the supply, and seeing that they still have 8 supply, think that it is a lot - when it is not. The higher the numbers, the hard it is for human to comprehend them.
I'm going to tell you something......I still get confused by the new game timer speed.
|
News
SCI - Coda LE
Coda LE with explicit use of SCI mod (stable branch) has been published. The map uses SCI-specific loading screen which briefly summarizes all the changes introduced to SCI. This way a new player has a hint of what is going on.
SCI extension mod is and will remain available as well if you want to use SCI with other maps. However, extension mods themselves cannot modify the loading screen (or at least, I don't know how)
SC Improved Group
I would like to remind you that if you are interested in playing the mod, there is a group "SC Improved" available. Hopefully this will help you find opponents
|
On July 17 2015 16:27 phantomfive wrote:Show nested quote +On July 17 2015 14:50 BrokenSegment wrote:
Completely different supply costs... even if it is just multiply by 2. It will confuse people.
I expect situations were people quickly glare at the supply, and seeing that they still have 8 supply, think that it is a lot - when it is not. The higher the numbers, the hard it is for human to comprehend them. I'm going to tell you something......I still get confused by the new game timer speed.
???
What did they change? I didn't notice anything.
|
On July 17 2015 23:36 BrokenSegment wrote:Show nested quote +On July 17 2015 16:27 phantomfive wrote:On July 17 2015 14:50 BrokenSegment wrote:
Completely different supply costs... even if it is just multiply by 2. It will confuse people.
I expect situations were people quickly glare at the supply, and seeing that they still have 8 supply, think that it is a lot - when it is not. The higher the numbers, the hard it is for human to comprehend them. I'm going to tell you something......I still get confused by the new game timer speed. ??? What did they change? I didn't notice anything.
In LOTV, seconds last an entire second.
|
On July 18 2015 01:31 phantomfive wrote:Show nested quote +On July 17 2015 23:36 BrokenSegment wrote:On July 17 2015 16:27 phantomfive wrote:On July 17 2015 14:50 BrokenSegment wrote:
Completely different supply costs... even if it is just multiply by 2. It will confuse people.
I expect situations were people quickly glare at the supply, and seeing that they still have 8 supply, think that it is a lot - when it is not. The higher the numbers, the hard it is for human to comprehend them. I'm going to tell you something......I still get confused by the new game timer speed. ??? What did they change? I didn't notice anything. In LOTV, seconds last an entire second.
lol OK. I see how a second lasting a second can be confusing 
but actually different supply costs and bigger increments may surprise people in bad way.
|
Out of all the changes that this mod is introducing, supply should be the easiest one to adjust to. You always see the supply in the UI. There is no hidden mechanic or count.
I am a bit more concerned about the reduced worker supply cost. It makes macroing a little bit cheaper and it reduces the benefit for someone cutting workers early. I would really like some other people's opinion on this one!
|
On July 18 2015 06:07 BlackLilium wrote:
I am a bit more concerned about the reduced worker supply cost. It makes macroing a little bit cheaper and it reduces the benefit for someone cutting workers early. I would really like some other people's opinion on this one!
I think
that reduced worker supply cost is such a big change, that it's hard to say what will happen without a lot of play testing. My own tests were positive, but I think we need more than that to say definitively it is a good thing.
I think the best way to approach these changes is to start with the ones that are obviously better. I'm interested in the changes to warp gate, that might be a good place to start. What is the best way to reward a player for not converting gateways to warp gates?
|
On July 19 2015 00:04 phantomfive wrote:
I think the best way to approach these changes is to start with the ones that are obviously better. I'm interested in the changes to warp gate, that might be a good place to start. What is the best way to reward a player for not converting gateways to warp gates?
By giving Gateways something that Warp Gates dont have. Warp Gates have an advantage but no disadvantage.
In my own mod I changed it so that Gateways produced units much faster then Warp Gates did. You would use Gateways to build an army. You would use Warp Gates to harass the enemy or reinforce during the battle.
You have to constantly switch between the two depending on situation, or keep some as Gateways and some as Warp Gates. This encourages different play styles and rewards good macro. You also need to have a good understanding of when to transform them.
I think this is the best solution, but some people disagree.
|
On July 19 2015 00:49 RoomOfMush wrote:
By giving Gateways something that Warp Gates dont have. Warp Gates have an advantage but no disadvantage.
In my own mod I changed it so that Gateways produced units much faster then Warp Gates did. You would use Gateways to build an army. You would use Warp Gates to harass the enemy or reinforce during the battle.
I am not convinced that it would really help.
In early game: Consider you do a 4-gate PvP. This is what you do:
- Keep gateways a while longer
- Push forward, while transforming to warpgates
- Perform a single warp-in
- Attack the enemy
At this point the defender has absolutely no advantage. If he didn't go warpgates himself, he is one warp-in cycle behind and his round of units are still being produced. If the defender manages to hold off the initial push, his faster gateways will slowly start to pay off, but the real benefit will be visible after another cycle of two.
In the late game: since money is less of an issue you are likely to just build few more warpgates to compensate for a higher cooldown time. When hitting maxed-up army, the cooldown becomes less of a problem anyway unless you are continuously trading.
Currently in SCI I proposed another solution: by adding an extra cost for Gateway-to-Warpgate transformation. An early-game 4-gate requires an additional 400 one-time mineral cost. That means he can include 4 less zealots or 3 less stalker. In early game this is a substantial difference.
In the late game the additional one-time cost becomes no-difference of course.
|
You think warpgate should be nerfed even more than it already is here???
|
Experimental and Stable branches
- Supply count doubled overall. Worker supply cost doubled as well
I put it in stable immediately as it does not really change anything, besides UI.
You are right, that we should first focus on more pressing changes. Reducing worker count to 1 would be a wild experiment, and not necessarily good. Still, with the doubled supply overall we open the possibility to try it in the future.
|
Macro mechanics
knyttym in "Hot Mineral Harvesting" thread said:
As for macro, it is way too easy to use all your money off of three bases. I'm guessing Starbow already had this issue which is why they already have a solution in place for this exact issue. I would just copy their solution. They retooled macro mechanics and forced players to both look at their base more often and click buildings rapidly/accurately.
While there are many ways how macro mechanics could be affected, the most direct one are the tools of each race that allows them to boost their income and/or army production. More specifically: Larva Inject, MULE, Chronoboost. From what I have seen and heared from various players of different skills here are some problems:
- Larva Inject
- Injection is a tiresome, repetitive operation without any decission involved.
- Injection allows you to stockpile a lot of larva which then can all be utilized almost immediately
- MULE
- An easy-to-use "give 300 minerals" button. Unlike Larva Inject, being sloppy does not penalize you as much.
- Very big income spikes
- In late late game mass CC can be used to reduce worker count. A single base can easily be saturated with mules.
- Chronoboost
- Early game access permit all-ins. Gateway production time is hard to balance.
- Easy-to-use with little downside from being sloppy.
- No decission on wether to use chronoboost. The only question is: on what.
- Little use in late game
Is there any other problem with these? Or do you think some of those is a non-issue?
Here are some suggestions I have:
- Larva Inject
- Need help on this one! I have no good idea at the moment...
- MULE
- Reduce casting range from global to some reasonable radius, e.g. 20. It should be far enough to easily cast it within a single base, even if you have multiple CCs there. It should however not permit to throw MULEs in other bases.
- Reduce maximum energy on CC, e.g. to 100, so that MULEs cannot be stockpiled as much.
- Chronoboost
- Move Chronoboost to Mothership Core. Make Mothership Core massalbe unit. Reduce cast range of Chronoboost.
- If the above is too big of a change: add Cybernetics Core as a requirement for Chronoboost, or even add a research in Cybernetics for Chronoboost.
- Increase Chronoboost cost and effect to make it more impactful late game. e.g. 50 energy, and 100% speedup for the same time duration (instead of 25/50%).
|
On July 19 2015 18:00 BlackLilium wrote:[*] Larva Inject - Injection is a tiresome, repetitive operation without any decission involved.
- Injection allows you to stockpile a lot of larva which then can all be utilized almost immediately
It should be made auto-cast. For example, much like SCVs have an option to turn on auto-repair, the queen can be set to automatically cast inject on the nearest hatchery as soon as it has energy.
The more boring mechanics can be automated, the more players can focus on strategy, the more fun the game is.
|
A start for larva inject would be to forbid more than 7 larva per Hatchery. This way, it becomes harder to stockpile huge amounts of larva without huge amounts of bases or macro Hatcheries. If you feel like it, could could institute a change where Lair can support up to 11 larva and Hive can support up to 15, but while this makes a lot of thematic sense, I'm not entirely sure how much (if at all) that minor Lair/Hive detail would actually improve the game.
In relation to Mules, I really like the Starbow detail that calling down an SCV still costs 50 minerals, although I wouldn't like that exact change in SC2. The Mule is a temporary unit, so it may have some slightly different needs. Therefore, the basic idea (one that will surely require further fine tuning and detailing) that I'd like to propose is that the Mules last long enough for 3 more trips on a close mineral patch and 4 more trips on a medium or far mineral patch, but they cost 100 minerals to call down, as well as them not being able to mine from a patch that a Mule is already mining from. The hope behind this is that Terran players will no longer feel at liberty to call down Mules upon a newly-taken and largely undefended base, as this would be both a waste of energy and a direct backfire in terms of income. It forces players to use Mules a bit more judiciously. They'll be getting roughly the same amount of total income from Mules, but it will be slightly less of an early game income boost, and more of a delayed, yet consistent source of income.
I don't think there's a problem with chronoboost itself, but if it were a spell that was taken from the same energy pool as other spells such as Photon Overcharge, or maybe some sort of shield recharging spell, I feel it would add some excellent energy-management dynamics to its use. More to the point, this would use chronoboost to help make PO a more interesting ability. I'm not a huge fan of the idea of tooling it more for lategame use by itself, but a Twilight Council unlocked upgrade for make chronoboost more effective seems worthwhile.
|
On July 20 2015 04:25 Pontius Pirate wrote:
A start for larva inject would be to forbid more than 7 larva per Hatchery. This way, it becomes harder to stockpile huge amounts of larva without huge amounts of bases or macro Hatcheries.
I'm interested, how would that improve the game?
|
On July 20 2015 03:12 phantomfive wrote:Show nested quote +On July 19 2015 18:00 BlackLilium wrote:[*] Larva Inject - Injection is a tiresome, repetitive operation without any decission involved.
- Injection allows you to stockpile a lot of larva which then can all be utilized almost immediately
It should be made auto-cast. For example, much like SCVs have an option to turn on auto-repair, the queen can be set to automatically cast inject on the nearest hatchery as soon as it has energy. The more boring mechanics can be automated, the more players can focus on strategy, the more fun the game is.
I agree that mundane, choiceless mechanic should be automated if possible. On the other hand, auto-casted Spawn Larvae would permit Zerg not to look into its own base ever and promote sloppy play. With Protoss and Terran, if you stop production you waste time. In case of Zerg, you just stockpile larva which then can be all used in a single burst. And that is the reason why, I think, Blizzard still didn't put Spawn Larva under autocast: it requires Zerg to actively do something, or they loose production time the same way as other races.
For that reason, Spawn Larvae alone is not a good solution. However, if we couple it with another change: say - the limited amount of stockpiled larvae as Pontius Pirate suggests - this may work as intended. Zerg still has to regularly make use of the larvae or they lose time. Stockpiling is possible only to a certain extend after which you need a macro hatch or more of them.
On July 20 2015 04:25 Pontius Pirate wrote:
In relation to Mules, I really like the Starbow detail that calling down an SCV still costs 50 minerals, although I wouldn't like that exact change in SC2. The Mule is a temporary unit, so it may have some slightly different needs. Therefore, the basic idea (one that will surely require further fine tuning and detailing) that I'd like to propose is that the Mules last long enough for 3 more trips on a close mineral patch and 4 more trips on a medium or far mineral patch, but they cost 100 minerals to call down, as well as them not being able to mine from a patch that a Mule is already mining from. The hope behind this is that Terran players will no longer feel at liberty to call down Mules upon a newly-taken and largely undefended base, as this would be both a waste of energy and a direct backfire in terms of income. It forces players to use Mules a bit more judiciously. They'll be getting roughly the same amount of total income from Mules, but it will be slightly less of an early game income boost, and more of a delayed, yet consistent source of income.
I like the last sentence argument of MULEs being an initial investment which pays off only after a few seconds. However, I am not sure that it would stop Terran from spamming MULEs into a new undefended base. I also wonder what Terran-main players would say about this.
|
On July 20 2015 14:41 BlackLilium wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2015 03:12 phantomfive wrote:On July 19 2015 18:00 BlackLilium wrote:[*] Larva Inject - Injection is a tiresome, repetitive operation without any decission involved.
- Injection allows you to stockpile a lot of larva which then can all be utilized almost immediately
It should be made auto-cast. For example, much like SCVs have an option to turn on auto-repair, the queen can be set to automatically cast inject on the nearest hatchery as soon as it has energy. The more boring mechanics can be automated, the more players can focus on strategy, the more fun the game is. I agree that mundane, choiceless mechanic should be automated if possible. On the other hand, auto-casted Spawn Larvae would permit Zerg not to look into its own base ever and promote sloppy play.
Meh. People said the same thing about worker auto-mine.
And they were right, worker auto-mine does reduce the necessary APM and allows players with worse mechanics to do better.
|
On July 21 2015 01:08 phantomfive wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2015 14:41 BlackLilium wrote:On July 20 2015 03:12 phantomfive wrote:On July 19 2015 18:00 BlackLilium wrote:[*] Larva Inject - Injection is a tiresome, repetitive operation without any decission involved.
- Injection allows you to stockpile a lot of larva which then can all be utilized almost immediately
It should be made auto-cast. For example, much like SCVs have an option to turn on auto-repair, the queen can be set to automatically cast inject on the nearest hatchery as soon as it has energy. The more boring mechanics can be automated, the more players can focus on strategy, the more fun the game is. I agree that mundane, choiceless mechanic should be automated if possible. On the other hand, auto-casted Spawn Larvae would permit Zerg not to look into its own base ever and promote sloppy play. Meh. People said the same thing about worker auto-mine. And they were right, worker auto-mine does reduce the necessary APM and allows players with worse mechanics to do better.
The next sentence after the one you quoted is more important: "With Protoss and Terran, if you stop production you waste time. In case of Zerg [if auto-cast SL was present], you just stockpile larva which then can be all used in a single burst."
I am Platinum player and one of the main reasons why I am stuck here is that I forget to keep producing workers and units the moment a fight starts. As a Zerg I keep forgetting about Spawn Larvae. An auto-casted "Spawn Larvae" could be compared to auto-casted "keep building this unit".
Just to be clear: in general, I am not against auto-casted Spawn Larvae, because there is absolutely no choice in that (in contrary to unit building). What I am saying is that if we introduce auto-casting for Larvae, we need to reintroduce some other mechanic, hopefully with a meaningful choice, that would separate Platinum players like me who forget stuff from Diamond player who are on the point with that.
|
I agree that mundane, choiceless mechanic should be automated if possible. On the other hand, auto-casted Spawn Larvae would permit Zerg not to look into its own base ever and promote sloppy play.
Does that imply you think a higher mechanical entrance barrier is always better? Or are there some situations where mechanics doesn't make the game better, and if so, what are they?
|
On July 21 2015 02:44 Hider wrote:Show nested quote +I agree that mundane, choiceless mechanic should be automated if possible. On the other hand, auto-casted Spawn Larvae would permit Zerg not to look into its own base ever and promote sloppy play. Does that imply you think a higher mechanical entrance barrier is always better? Or are there some situations where mechanics doesn't make the game better, and if so, what are they?
I do not really want to talk in such general game design problems here unless it is going to somehow influence the mod.
In this particular case, I expanded and explained the problem in the post right above yours: the sloppyness permission between different races. Yes, let's simplify Spawn Larvae, but we need to give some other - hopefully meaningful - thing to do in the base. Otherwise, I fear that Zerg would become the simplest race to play macro-wise.
|
On July 20 2015 06:01 phantomfive wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2015 04:25 Pontius Pirate wrote:
A start for larva inject would be to forbid more than 7 larva per Hatchery. This way, it becomes harder to stockpile huge amounts of larva without huge amounts of bases or macro Hatcheries. I'm interested, how would that improve the game?
Zerg players would be forced to plan for their remaxes more thoughtfully, as they'd either need a fuckton of bases in order to have enough larva stockpiled, or they'd have to have deliberately invested resources into building many additional macro hatches. As it currently stands, it's not uncommon to just accidentally have ~150 larva sitting around at several bases + 1 or 2 macro Hatcheries, with Queens at each. It institutes a higher game planning and thinking skill cap without introducing a tougher mechanical skill floor.
On July 20 2015 14:41 BlackLilium wrote:
I like the last sentence argument of MULEs being an initial investment which pays off only after a few seconds. However, I am not sure that it would stop Terran from spamming MULEs into a new undefended base. I also wonder what Terran-main players would say about this.
Oops, I forgot to include the qualifier that Terran players would be discouraged from dumping more than 8 mules on a newly taken base at a time, not that they wouldn't dump mules on new bases at all. So it really only comes to effect during really really heavy-economy lategame situations. This particular aspect is kind of a minor detail, but I feel it would reduce the severity of one particular Terran-specific quirk, while not really handicapping the Terran in normal game scenarios. That having been said, I think that in a close game, the Terran player would not always want to take the risk of dumping even a few Mules on an undefended base, provided that they know the opponent has already scouted it. The loss of both ~800-1100 potential minerals + Orbital Command energy and 300-400 direct minerals would do a lot to dissuade careless Mule usage.
|
I think a big issue with the macro mechanics is energy tension as they are all designed to be forgiving to a certain extent, inject is combined with stockpiling, mules are combined with being able to spam it, and chronoboost with applying to nearly everything in the protoss side of macro. Trying to heavily reduce this degree of forgiveness seems counter-productive versus what Blizzard is likely to adapt should this mod become really popular.
A Terran player will have some degree of wanting to save energy for scan vs using mules, but once the anticipated crisis is gone they can just spam mules. The easiest thing in this regard would be to add a cooldown to the ability so that you can't just spam out the energy. Alternatively you could do something like remove Supply Calldown and add another ability that is actually used more frequently, maybe bring back defensive barrier, or maybe something that improves production temporarily to help them to remax in late game (unit cost reduction, build time decrease, adds more parallel lines of production like a reactor, calls down copies of a selected unit to site, etc... ?).
As has been made very clear in numerous posts in this thread and others, a Zerg player can just sit on extra larvae, provided they didn't miss an inject, and energy tension can be resolved by just producing more Queens which end up useful for late game armies given their other abilities. Tension is resolved in this case quite quickly by producing more Queens as the game goes on and making Queens more expensive or increasing their production time would likely not have the desired impact. The spells are already pretty useful so I personally can't think of a way to change it up to maintain tension. Maybe change the ability to produce 2 larvae and speed up standard larvae production so the benefit is delayed and stretched out over time. Another idea I had would be that the Queen produces "enhanced" larvae that start with essentially +1/+1 (temporarily, permanently?) for whatever unit is produced by them, but they build slower. A Zerg player would not want to produce enhanced Drones or Overlords if they can avoid it, creating a need to make sure you're using the right kind of larvae at the right time. However, this does make remaxing a nightmare with an army of enhanced Zerg. although the build time increase might be a saving grace.
For Protoss, as pointed out by BlackLilium, the only option is to chronoboost. To this end I think the big issue would be to add some kind of energy tension by adding a spell (at least 1) to the Nexus. To this end I nominate Forcefield and call for removing it from the Sentry at the same time. FF would have a hard time being spammed considering you need Nexus energy, while creating big tension between using chronoboost to enhance production or saving precious energy for FF. Having FF available so early won't really change anything since a Nexus can only provide so many, and in fact would end up nerfing Protoss early game, leaving room for other buffs. Also, old Nexii would definitely have a purpose in the late game with each expansion also giving you greater battlefield control.
|
On July 21 2015 15:58 xPrimuSx wrote:
I think a big issue with the macro mechanics is energy tension as they are all designed to be forgiving to a certain extent, inject is combined with stockpiling, mules are combined with being able to spam it, and chronoboost with applying to nearly everything in the protoss side of macro.
I think this is a very valid observation. I think the macro mechanics should be somewhat forgiving, but only to a certain extend. I am also looking at it from a different angle - what the opponent can do to prevent or reduce the effectiveness of the macro mechanic.
Forgiveness:
- MULEs are very forgiving. You can stockpile up to 4 of them and then use them all at once for the same, albeit delayed, benefit. MULE has global cast allowing you to use all Orbitals in the map to mine from a single location of your choosing. You start to lose only when you actually reach 200 energy and keep it there.
- Chronoboost is quite forgiving as well. You can also stockpile 4 charges of it. You reach the maximum energy faster and you use it multiple times on the same building at the same time. Location is irrelevant since chronoboost has global cast.
- Spawn Larvae as it is now is very unforgiving. Every second you delay the cast is something that you will have never a chance to redeem. Moreover, spawn larvae is a short-range spell and you need to cycle through all your bases to properly cast it on all your hatcheries.
Opponent's response:
- Opponent can prevent MULEs from happening only by forcing scans. The alternative is to kill an orbital, which is much harder task. Once MULEs are on the ground they can be harassed the same way as normal worker lines. However, due to global cast, MULEs can appear anywhere on the map and the defender may be prepared to defend them.
- Chronoboost cannot be stopped in any way, apart from killing the Nexus.
- Spawn Larvae is the easiest to stop - by killing the Queen which has much less HP than a Hatchery. Early-game harassment can also delay the spell, because Queens at that time often have to contribute to the front.
I see some interesting suggestions out here. Let me comment on these:
MULE
- Pontius Pirate suggests adding a mineral cost for a MULE, while at the same time increasing the lifetime of it so that overall net income remains the same. This way, casting a MULE is an investment and may not be suitable to cast at any moment. This will temporarily reduce Terran's ability to come back from a situation when nearly all workers are dead. In the long run however, the difference will be minimal: extra minerals are in the bank. The downside is that heavily-MULEd base run out of minerals faster (by MULE cost that was initially subtracted from the bank).
- Pontius Pirate suggests to prevent MULE from mining from the same patch when another MULE is already mining from it. Unfortunately, to my knowledge, it is already the case: no 2 MULEs can mine from the same mineral patch at the same time. They can still interleave - e.g. one is mining while the other is returning. Preventing interleaving - that sounds like a weird rule that won't help much.
- xPrimuSx suggests adding a cooldown. How long the cooldown should be? A value of 90s (same as MULE being alive) would put Terran closer to where Zerg is: every second wasted cannot ever be redeemed. Maybe something in between would be better - around 30s? This gives you a chance to use up the energy over time but not instantly. On the other hand, the possiblity to use up all energy instantly can be a trap - preventing Terran to use scan ability for a while.
- Finally, my own suggestion that no one commented on yet: reducing the cast range to 20 (or so). This reduces the Terran ability to choose a single dump place for all MULEs. They have to be spread out. It also forces Terran to put Orbitals closer to front mining bases if he chooses to get extra Orbitals to replace SCVs. More meaningful building management and a bit easier target for opponent.
At this point I am inclining combining the cooldown and limited cast range. What is your opinion on this?
Spawn Larvae
- phantomfive suggests auto-casted Spawn Larvae. This single change will transform this macro ability from most unforgiving to most forgiving one. Either something else is needed, or this autocast has to be combined with something as well.
- Pontius Pirate suggests putting a limit of 7 larvae per hatchery. This way, between each Spawn Larva spell, at least 4 larvae must be changed into units - or eggs at least. xPrimuSx suggests changing the amount of larva spawned and speed of autoproduced larvae. I think this may be a good counter-balance to auto-casting. You have to make something or you lose larvae.
I am thinking about outright preventing Spawn Larva on hatcheries which have more than 3 larva available.
- xPrimuSx gives another option of "enhanced larvae" which would give some bonus to units that are produced. I share the fear of xPrimuSx that it could overcomplicate macroing however
I am thinking about adding the auto-cast + no-spell on over-3-larva hatchery. What do you think about it?
Chronoboost
- xPrimuSx suggests adding a Forcie Field to Nexus to create tension of energy. While I agree with the tension part, I am not sure about FF there being a good thing. What would be its cast range? Global? That would become a blocker that the opponent has absolutely no way of predicting or avoiding. FF would come out of nowhere. Even if its range would be limited to some high number (e.g. 20) - attacking Protoss early game would be nearly a suicide, probably more painful than Photon Overcharge itself.
- My own suggestion of moving chronoboost to MSC didn't receive many comments. Pontius Pirate likes the idea of having the same energy pool for both Chrono and Photon Overcharge (or other defensive spells that we have or might have in the future). In addition to that, Chronoboost would be easier to counter (kill those (potentially plural!) MSCs) and a bit more complex to use (you need MSCs next to buildings you hope to chronoboost).
Effectively MSCs would become Protoss flying counterparts of Queens.
I am a bit concerned myself however, that it is a bit more extensive change (moving spells between units) than I originally planned for the SCI project. On the other hand, MSC is such a problematic unit that it may require a bit more drastic changes.
Ultimately, I still think that Chronoboost on MSC, coupled with unlocking MSC count, nerfing their defensive abilities and reducing unit build time in Gateways to match Warpgates is the way to go. However, I would really like to hear "yes" or "but...-s" from your side before proceeding.
On July 21 2015 15:58 xPrimuSx wrote:
Trying to heavily reduce this degree of forgiveness seems counter-productive versus what Blizzard is likely to adapt should this mod become really popular.
My goal is for the community to like the changes, while at the same time not having too much problems when transitioning to and from standard SC2. However I do not want to compromise because of Blizzard's politics.
|
I believe my fix/solution for Spawn Larva back in the day was: 50 energy spawns 3 instant Larva.
But this might create a problem when you go mass Queens and thus effectively have endless energy for endless Larva.
Spawn Larva creating "lesser" temporary Larva (that die over time) was another idea that more people have had over the years.
Another idea was Spawn Larva "overheating" the Hatchery, so that it won't spawn any Larva for x time, perhaps even deal damage to it. This was a cool spell I once had, where the caster forces the Hatchery to poop out Larva, which places the Hatchery into a grumpy mood
|
At the pro level, gamers do stockpile larva. That's already the dynamic. Autocast would merely make that strategy available to people of lesser mechanics.
|
On July 22 2015 14:10 phantomfive wrote:
At the pro level, gamers do stockpile larva. That's already the dynamic. Autocast would merely make that strategy available to people of lesser mechanics.
Which reduces the difference between Gold Zerg and Master Zerg.
I don't claim that a meaningless mechanical decision should be the differentiation, but that there should be some differentiation. Reducing the amount of stockpile, which may convince Master Zergs to get more macro hatcheries may be a solution. I am not sure if it is enough, but it is a good try at least.
|
OK... trying to implement all that stuff... but I am having problem with a Validator which would check the larvae count assigned to a given hatchery. I would like to prevent the Queen "Spawn Larva" on Hatcheries which already have more than 3 larvae.
Any ideas? Thanks!
|
Why dont you change Spawn Larvae so that instead of giving you larvae instantly it speeds up the automatic larvae regeneration.
Then, the Lair and Hive get 4 and 5 Larvae as max Larvae limit respectively.
This way you encourage Zergs to build macro hatcheries if they want to pool larvae and you give incentives to upgrade hatcheries. At the same time the Spawn Larvae ability still gives a bonus to zerg macro as long as you keep constantly producing units.
As to your question: I would make one behavior for each amount of larvae that a hatchery could have and then check for the behavior in the validator.
|
On July 23 2015 01:41 RoomOfMush wrote:
As to your question: I would make one behavior for each amount of larvae that a hatchery could have and then check for the behavior in the validator.
I thought about that too. But then I need the larva itself to remove the behavior whenever it is morfed to an egg or dies. Which means, that the larva has to remember from which hatchery it spawned from. I am not sure if there is such a thing in Data.
On July 23 2015 01:41 RoomOfMush wrote:
Why dont you change Spawn Larvae so that instead of giving you larvae instantly it speeds up the automatic larvae regeneration.
Then, the Lair and Hive get 4 and 5 Larvae as max Larvae limit respectively.
This is an interesting take on the subject indeed!
Now that you mention it, I believe Starbow uses a similar method?
P.S. Happy to see that you keep an eye on this thread
|
On July 23 2015 02:04 BlackLilium wrote:
This is an interesting take on the subject indeed!
Now that you mention it, I believe Starbow uses a similar method?
I dont know what StarBow does. I read through their changes once but I forgot most of it by now.
On July 23 2015 02:04 BlackLilium wrote:P.S. Happy to see that you keep an eye on this thread
Of course I am. I told you all I want is a better SC2 experience. One way or another.
Even if it wont be me who does it I can still dream that somebody can do it eventually.
|
I'm no pro at the editor myself and it's always difficult to know for sure what one is trying to accomplish, but have you tried tinkering with "Hatchery Spawn Larva" under requirements? It says "CountUnit(Larva,CompleteOnlyAtUnit) < 3"
So it counts the amount of Larva the target unit (Hatchery) owns which must be less than 3. Either this is already what you need, or you need to edit it slightly.
|
I am not a pro either, learning stuff as I need them. That's why I am asking those questions
The problem with Requirements is that while they are flexible, they can be used only in few places. I didn't find any field in an ability or effect that would take a Requirement as a type. Instead, Validators are more often used.
The inject larva effect has an effect "Queen - Spawn Mutant Larva (Apply Timer Behavior)". Within it there are 3 validators:
- Is Hatchery Lair or Hive
- Not Spawning Mutant Larva (checks that inject larva is not already in effect on the given building)
- Not Contaminated
I need a 4th one which would check the number of spawned larva, checking if it is less than 4. Unfortunately you cannot put a Requirement over there.
In the meantime I got a PM from PurpleStreak who may have a solution how to track origin hatchery from larvas. I will experiment his approach.
Edit: he actually solved the whole problem. I just need to learn exactly how it works and reimplement it in the mod.
Many thanks!!
|
Experimental Branch changes
- Terran
- MULE casting range set to 20
- MULE cooldown set to 30s (xPrimuSx's suggestion)
- Zerg
- Queen Larva Inject is now auto-casted (phantomfive's suggestion)
- Spawn Larvae can be casted only on Hatcheries (Lairs, Hives) that have 3 or less larvae (thank you PurpleStreak for implementation). When extra larvae hatch, Zerg players need to utilize them as soon as possible in order to enable another Larva Injection. (based on Pontius Pirate's idea)
- Queen starting energy: 25 -> 23. This minor change gives Zerg a chance to "grab" the Queen before it auto-injects, if the player has a different job for it (e.g. plant a creep tumor)
- Protoss
- Chronoboost is now an ability of the Mothership Core
- Chronoboost cast range set to 5
- Chronoboost energy cost: 25 -> 50
- Chronoboost speedup: 50% -> 100% (effectively: same energy cost for same time gain, but in shorter time span)
- Chronoboost can be casted on any building: friendly, ally, hostile
- Chronoboost speeds up production time, research time, fire rate, shield regeneration and energy regeneration
- Photon Overcharge duration: 60s -> 15s
- Photon Overcharge can be combined with Chronoboost for double DPS but half duration (7.5s)
- Time Warp removed from Mothership Core (still available in Mothership)
- Mass Recall removed from Mothership Core (still available in Mothership)
- Any number of Mothership Cores can be built
- Any number of Motherships can be built
- Warpin time of Gateway units in a Gateway now matches Warpgate
Yeah, the changes to the Mothership Core are rather big, but the unit really needs it. Hopefully that kind of changes will be the first and last of that kind.
|
Quick update: The stand-alone map "SCI - Coda LE" now uses the Experimental branch as well. The loading screen has been updated to include the newest changes.
With the amount of changes that we already did in the "Starcraft Improved" I think it is time to do some playtesting - at least to get a feel where we are at. For that reason I am looking for opponents for some testing games. Or maybe some of you already played - in which case, can you share your experience and replays?
|
I can't believe I didn't think of this before, but what if Warp Gates, upon finishing, were caught in the middle of cooldown?
|
On July 24 2015 06:13 Pontius Pirate wrote:
I can't believe I didn't think of this before, but what if Warp Gates, upon finishing, were caught in the middle of cooldown?
It would be the same as increasing the Gateway-to-Warpgate transformation time. Or ... ?
|
On July 24 2015 14:16 BlackLilium wrote:Show nested quote +On July 24 2015 06:13 Pontius Pirate wrote:
I can't believe I didn't think of this before, but what if Warp Gates, upon finishing, were caught in the middle of cooldown? It would be the same as increasing the Gateway-to-Warpgate transformation time. Or ... ?
Ooh, I didn't explain this very well. What I'm trying to get at is that producing a unit causing the Gateway/Warpgate to enter Warpgate cooldown, regardless of whether that unit was finished via warping in or via Gateway production time. That way, you can still convert your freshly built Gateways to Warpgates in the lategame with no production stalling, but converting from Gateway to Warpgate doesn't give you an extra production cycle at the point of conversion. In my head, it seemed like a way of eliminating the frustrating part for the opponents without including new grievances for the Protoss player, aside from that specific, targeted nerf to production cycles.
|
On July 23 2015 07:53 BlackLilium wrote:Experimental Branch changes[*] Protoss - Chronoboost is now an ability of the Mothership Core
- Chronoboost cast range set to 5
- Chronoboost energy cost: 25 -> 50
- Chronoboost speedup: 50% -> 100% (effectively: same energy cost for same time gain, but in shorter time span)
- Chronoboost can be casted on any building: friendly, ally, hostile
- Chronoboost speeds up production time, research time, fire rate, shield regeneration and energy regeneration
- Photon Overcharge duration: 60s -> 15s
- Photon Overcharge can be combined with Chronoboost for double DPS but half duration (7.5s)
- Time Warp removed from Mothership Core (still available in Mothership)
- Mass Recall removed from Mothership Core (still available in Mothership)
- Any number of Mothership Cores can be built
- Any number of Motherships can be built
- Warpin time of Gateway units in a Gateway now matches Warpgate
Yeah, the changes to the Mothership Core are rather big, but the unit really needs it. Hopefully that kind of changes will be the first and last of that kind.
I agree about the tension on chronoboost vs other spell/ability to create some decisions and that is what you did. But I do not agree about moving it to MsC. I believe that much simpler solution would be to move MsC abilities to Nexus instead.
There should be an upgrade to nexus (similar to orbital command for Terran) which grants access to chronoboost and small recall (with radius of FF). Additionally some form of defensive ability (like photon overcharge or shield battery) could be a 3rd ability. All abilities would use energy form same pool and therefore create a tension between those spells. Then MsC could be removed.
What I propose actually is in fact what Starbow did and I think that is the best approach without strange and gimmicky units like MsC.
|
The proposals for protoss macro mechanics are:
1) Make protoss like zerg (build special unit from main building with 3 abilities)
2) Make protoss like terran (upgrade main building to get 3 abilities)
Why dont you instead try to make protoss like protoss? I can not believe there is no third option here to diversify the races.
|
I do like the Starbow solution as well. They introduce a new upgrade to Nexus and they completely remove the Mothership Core. However, in the spirit of keeping the HotS units I favor the solution which repurposes the MSC, rather than replaces it with a building upgrade. But the spirit is not the only reason:
Mothership Core has offensive abilities, which significantly influence the battle. If we move any of them to the Nexus, or introduce a new one (e.g. I have seen suggestions of having force-fields tied to Nexus) then we eliminate the possibility of the opponent to counteract them by killing the MSC. Moreover, the range of these abilities becomes a problem: either it is short reducing their usefulness, or they come "out of the blue" for the opponent.
I would also like to draw your attention of a new use of the SCI Chronoboost. It speeds everything, including the fire rate. When casted on a photon cannon, it will double its DPS. This is my response to what I have seen in:
"Would you like to see additional Chronoboost use?"
but with that, chronoboost itself should also not come "out of the blue".
On July 24 2015 17:53 RoomOfMush wrote:
The proposals for protoss macro mechanics are:
1) Make protoss like zerg (build special unit from main building with 3 abilities)
2) Make protoss like terran (upgrade main building to get 3 abilities)
Why dont you instead try to make protoss like protoss? I can not believe there is no third option here to diversify the races.
To my defense: the idea of building Mothership Core from the Nexus is not mine - blame Blizzard
I am just giving MSC more of a macro functionality. I would argue that it now stands somewhere between Terran and Zerg: MSC construction halts normal operation of Nexus (like Terran), you get a macro unit (like Zerg) which is flying (unique) and iteracts with other buildings (unique).
True, it is not something completely different but I believe it keeps a fair amount of uniqueness... On the other hand, one of goals of "Starcraft Improved" is to avoid creating something completely new that has no similarities in SC WoL/HotS/Betas.
I think it all ties together nicely, resolving multiple problems at the same time (expanded chronoboost usage, energy competition, MSC massability and repurpose, Gateway construction time vs proxy cheese OP-ness). However, I am willing to discuss and possibly change or revert some things if you think another solution would be better. However: new buildings and addons, or complete unit removal - that is something I really want to avoid.
What I am currently worried about is that Protoss early game is a bit slow, but it is hard to compare to other races without a proper testing. Also, the normal MSC damage output may be a problem. You can now build 4 of those things and rush the opponent. It's slow and costly, but without any AA it may be a problem.
We need to playtest this. RoomOfMush, egrimm, Pontius Pirate or anyone else reading it - would you be willing to play a couple of matches? Where? When?
|
On July 24 2015 17:17 Pontius Pirate wrote:Show nested quote +On July 24 2015 14:16 BlackLilium wrote:On July 24 2015 06:13 Pontius Pirate wrote:
I can't believe I didn't think of this before, but what if Warp Gates, upon finishing, were caught in the middle of cooldown? It would be the same as increasing the Gateway-to-Warpgate transformation time. Or ... ? Ooh, I didn't explain this very well. What I'm trying to get at is that producing a unit causing the Gateway/Warpgate to enter Warpgate cooldown, regardless of whether that unit was finished via warping in or via Gateway production time. That way, you can still convert your freshly built Gateways to Warpgates in the lategame with no production stalling, but converting from Gateway to Warpgate doesn't give you an extra production cycle at the point of conversion. In my head, it seemed like a way of eliminating the frustrating part for the opponents without including new grievances for the Protoss player, aside from that specific, targeted nerf to production cycles.
Do I understand it correctly: so, after a unit is built, a gateway cannot be converted to a warpgate for X seconds?
I am not sure if it will change much. When rushing your opponent, you usually stop production anyway when warpgate tech is nearly finished. You move out, put a proxy pylon, spend extra money for extra gateways and when warpgate finally finished, you have a pylon and army already near the opponent. You reinforce with a round of warpin and push.
|
On July 24 2015 18:35 BlackLilium wrote:
I do like the Starbow solution as well. They introduce a new upgrade to Nexus and they completely remove the Mothership Core. However, in the spirit of keeping the HotS units I favor the solution which repurposes the MSC, rather than replaces it with a building upgrade.
Well from the spirit point of view I understand, still however I find SB solution more elegant and also less problematic 
You already mentioned a problem with flying, massable (non-hero I mean) unit in early game. It may be tricky to find proper balance. Also mind You that originally MsC was intended as a unit "attached" to a Nexus without ability to move, only to teleport between Nexi and probably made singular because Mothership is a hero unit itself.
Mothership Core has offensive abilities, which significantly influence the battle. If we move any of them to the Nexus, or introduce a new one (e.g. I have seen suggestions of having force-fields tied to Nexus) then we eliminate the possibility of the opponent to counteract them by killing the MSC. Moreover, the range of these abilities becomes a problem: either it is short reducing their usefulness, or they come "out of the blue" for the opponent.
To be honest I am not a fun of offensive MsC abilities which in fact is simply Time Warp. I think Protoss can manage fights without it with simply tiny tweaks to gateway units which I believe are to come with conjunction to Warp gate mechanic changes.
From the defensive standpoint there is Recall & photon overcharge. I believe that moving recall to nexus is a non-issue, it is true that you can possibly snipe MsC when recalling but that happens very rarely and also opponents rarely try to do so.
I agree to some extent about PO (or other defensive spell introduced instead) and no counter play if placed on Nexus. Ideally I would scrap PO entirely because it is not fun nor entertaining ability and its sole purpose is to help Protoss survive Gateway timings and Terran onslaughts. but this is only possible with warpgate mechanic changed + gateway units buff OR introduction of other, more interesting ability instead of PO.
My proposal would be small "buff" ability like shield recharge or energy refill. Both with range 10-20 and channel of let's say 5-10 sec. There would be a counter play with opponent pushing protoss and seeing crucial unit being recharged/refill could try to snipe it.
I would also like to draw your attention of a new use of the SCI Chronoboost. It speeds everything, including the fire rate. When casted on a photon cannon, it will double its DPS. This is my response to what I have seen in: " Would you like to see additional Chronoboost use?" but with that, chronoboost itself should also not come "out of the blue".
I read that thread but I must say that I don't agree about increasing CB usefulness as it is really flexible ability already. what is needed thou is previously mentioned "tension" with other abilities creating choices and decisions. CB is fine I believe - it is strong enough to make a difference but not ground-breaking. Also it is why guys in SB used it as a foundations for macromachnics of all races :
We need to playtest this. RoomOfMush, egrimm, Pontius Pirate or anyone else reading it - would you be willing to play a couple of matches? Where? When?
I can play However it is always a matter of time as I'm going on vacation next week :D Other than that I would gladly help
|
I played some quick computer matches yesterday with Zerg, and although having autocast Spawn Larva felt like a massive weight was lifted off my shoulders, I felt like there was also 0 decision making involved. The Queens pretty much made sure every Hatchery now has 7 Larva instead of 3. (or max 7 versus max 19 (?) in HotS)
To this end I once again want to propose temporary timed life Larva that die if you don't make use of them quick enough. This would be in line with MULE's lifespan and Chrono Boost also not lasting forever.
Either that or indeed as I said Hatchery's entering a nerf-buff cooldown state after Spawn Larva or something like that.
I also think some going back to the drawing board is required. What exactly do we want? Do we want to be able to stockpile Larva? Do we want to cast a dozen Spawn Larva only at times when we need them?
Bah, I'm glad I removed MULE, Chrono Boost and Spawn Larva from my mod
|
On July 24 2015 21:16 Masemium wrote:
I played some quick computer matches yesterday with Zerg, and although having autocast Spawn Larva felt like a massive weight was lifted off my shoulders, I felt like there was also 0 decision making involved. The Queens pretty much made sure every Hatchery now has 7 Larva instead of 3. (or max 7 versus max 19 (?) in HotS)
To this end I once again want to propose temporary timed life Larva that die if you don't make use of them quick enough. This would be in line with MULE's lifespan and Chrono Boost also not lasting forever.
You are right, that the burden of spawn-larva is lifted. However, have you noticed that you cannot inject more larva until your larva count drops down to 3 or less?
Consequently, you lose potential larva and you get your queen energy up not by forgetting the injects, but by forgetting to use up the extra larva immediately. Contrary to injection, however, using up larva is a more meaningful choice that should be performed in a timed fashion. You need to chose the unit you want, you need resources, supply and tech.
In an action-packed match, when you constantly produce and trade fighting units (e.g. ZvZ zergling/baneling fights) the changes will be a clear buff - giving you a bit more time for microing all that stuff. But in a more passive play when you macro up and do heavy techs, this may actually nerf you. You cannot just sit on larva and build emergency army when attacked. You need to either make an earlier decision to build an army, or you need extra macro hatches.
Consequently, I think that while with the changes we reduced a couple of meaningless clicks, the timed attention (every 40 game-seconds) to what you have is still required.
|
On July 24 2015 21:09 egrimm wrote:
To be honest I am not a fun of offensive MsC abilities which in fact is simply Time Warp. I think Protoss can manage fights without it with simply tiny tweaks to gateway units which I believe are to come with conjunction to Warp gate mechanic changes.
I think so too. That's why SCI version of MSC does not have Time Warp. Massing Time Warp bubbles could be problematic. We kept them on Mothership though.
On July 24 2015 21:09 egrimm wrote:
From the defensive standpoint there is Recall & photon overcharge. I believe that moving recall to nexus is a non-issue, it is true that you can possibly snipe MsC when recalling but that happens very rarely and also opponents rarely try to do so.
Sometimes the opponent does try to snipe it off, especially when he has air. However, Mass Recall on Nexus can be problematic for other reasons too:
- Recall becomes available to fast-moving groups - in particular: Stalkers. Imagine a group of 20 blink stalkers running into your base, sniping 1 or 2 key buildings and then... puff.... disappear, right the moment you got them cornered.
- Recall on Nexus would allow you to use recall multiple times, negating any attempts of the opponent splitting his army and attacking into 2 or more bases simultaneously. That's also the reason why the massable MSC does not have this ability either.
- And simply: having access to teleport without a unit to manage it would be so much easier
On July 24 2015 21:09 egrimm wrote:
My proposal would be small "buff" ability like shield recharge or energy refill. Both with range 10-20 and channel of let's say 5-10 sec. There would be a counter play with opponent pushing protoss and seeing crucial unit being recharged/refill could try to snipe it.
In general I like the idea of shield recharge ability (on either Nexus or MSC). But that would be a completely new ability.
|
With those nerfs to MSC you will really need to buff the gateway units now! Or at least bring back recall. Or we will see Protoss being super passive again...
|
On July 25 2015 01:53 BrokenSegment wrote:
With those nerfs to MSC you will really need to buff the gateway units now! Or at least bring back recall. Or we will see Protoss being super passive again...
They are already buffed by a tiny bit. Also: you now produce them faster from regular Gateways.
This should, hopefully, give Protoss a fighting chance before warpgates, both defensively and offensively.
At this point we need matches to verify where gateway units stand right now.
|
On July 24 2015 18:40 BlackLilium wrote:Show nested quote +On July 24 2015 17:17 Pontius Pirate wrote:On July 24 2015 14:16 BlackLilium wrote:On July 24 2015 06:13 Pontius Pirate wrote:
I can't believe I didn't think of this before, but what if Warp Gates, upon finishing, were caught in the middle of cooldown? It would be the same as increasing the Gateway-to-Warpgate transformation time. Or ... ? Ooh, I didn't explain this very well. What I'm trying to get at is that producing a unit causing the Gateway/Warpgate to enter Warpgate cooldown, regardless of whether that unit was finished via warping in or via Gateway production time. That way, you can still convert your freshly built Gateways to Warpgates in the lategame with no production stalling, but converting from Gateway to Warpgate doesn't give you an extra production cycle at the point of conversion. In my head, it seemed like a way of eliminating the frustrating part for the opponents without including new grievances for the Protoss player, aside from that specific, targeted nerf to production cycles. Do I understand it correctly: so, after a unit is built, a gateway cannot be converted to a warpgate for X seconds? I am not sure if it will change much. When rushing your opponent, you usually stop production anyway when warpgate tech is nearly finished. You move out, put a proxy pylon, spend extra money for extra gateways and when warpgate finally finished, you have a pylon and army already near the opponent. You reinforce with a round of warpin and push.
Not quite. It gets converted to a Warpgate just fine, so it doesn't interfere with their macroing process. But to do a specific example,
1) you produce a Stalker and then
2) you immediately convert the Warpgate.
3) The Warpgate completes and
4) is stuck in "warpgate cooldown" for 32 seconds, the time it would be stalled out for had you just warped in a Stalker, the type of unit that you had just finished building from the Gateway. Does that make sense?
|
On July 24 2015 23:06 BlackLilium wrote:Show nested quote +On July 24 2015 21:09 egrimm wrote:
From the defensive standpoint there is Recall & photon overcharge. I believe that moving recall to nexus is a non-issue, it is true that you can possibly snipe MsC when recalling but that happens very rarely and also opponents rarely try to do so. Sometimes the opponent does try to snipe it off, especially when he has air. However, Mass Recall on Nexus can be problematic for other reasons too: - Recall becomes available to fast-moving groups - in particular: Stalkers. Imagine a group of 20 blink stalkers running into your base, sniping 1 or 2 key buildings and then... puff.... disappear, right the moment you got them cornered.
That's why I proposed really small radius (like Forcefields) for Recall "field" You cannot "contain" 20 blink stalkers in such small area, especially that stalkers have also bigger model than zelots I believe? You would be able to recall max 6-8 units with properly set radius on ability.
[*] Recall on Nexus would allow you to use recall multiple times, negating any attempts of the opponent splitting his army and attacking into 2 or more bases simultaneously. That's also the reason why the massable MSC does not have this ability either.
SB has that ability called Rift which is basically recall but You can only recall max 5 units. I suggested just smaller radius to achieve similar effect (allow to recall only small packs of units) but it seems more natural and logical than hard cap on units.
Remember that It costs energy (probably a lot) which could be used for chrono boost your tech or production or you could use that "defensive-ability-on-nexus". What I want to say is that it works in SB and I think that with right energy cost + small radius + recall taking more time for example it is possible to balance it
[*] And simply: having access to teleport without a unit to manage it would be so much easier
Well that is true You have no Arbiter/MsC so It may be slightly easier to manage but is it necessarily that bad in the end?
|
On July 25 2015 04:48 Pontius Pirate wrote:
Not quite. It gets converted to a Warpgate just fine, so it doesn't interfere with their macroing process. But to do a specific example,
1) you produce a Stalker and then
2) you immediately convert the Warpgate.
3) The Warpgate completes and
4) is stuck in "warpgate cooldown" for 32 seconds, the time it would be stalled out for had you just warped in a Stalker, the type of unit that you had just finished building from the Gateway. Does that make sense?
OK, now I understand. But that doesn't change much. The scenario I described remains valid.
I fear it would just cause more confusion than help
On July 25 2015 05:25 egrimm wrote:That's why I proposed really small radius (like Forcefields) for Recall "field" You cannot "contain" 20 blink stalkers in such small area, especially that stalkers have also bigger model than zelots I believe? You would be able to recall max 6-8 units with properly set radius on ability.
OK, I see what you want to do. That make sense, although I am still not fully happy about an ability that lands "out of the blue" that the opponent can't do anything about it. Scenarios like: chasing stray collosus... puff... gone - come to mind.
But let us assume that we have Recall/Rift and Chronoboost on Nexus. What do we do with MSC? Completely remove it?
On July 25 2015 05:25 egrimm wrote:Show nested quote +[*] And simply: having access to teleport without a unit to manage it would be so much easier Well that is true You have no Arbiter/MsC so It may be slightly easier to manage but is it necessarily that bad in the end?
People are complaining that Protoss is an "easy race". I don't really want to debate that, but making it easier is probably not what we want to do
P.S. Did you check PM I sent you regarding testing?
|
On July 25 2015 06:01 BlackLilium wrote:Show nested quote +On July 25 2015 05:25 egrimm wrote:That's why I proposed really small radius (like Forcefields) for Recall "field" You cannot "contain" 20 blink stalkers in such small area, especially that stalkers have also bigger model than zelots I believe? You would be able to recall max 6-8 units with properly set radius on ability. OK, I see what you want to do. That make sense, although I am still not fully happy about an ability that lands "out of the blue" that the opponent can't do anything about it. Scenarios like: chasing stray collosus... puff... gone - come to mind.
Yes that may be a problem. I hope that some tweaking of stats for Recall will be sufficient. For example time when units are trying to be recalled can be still attacked during that period. Increasing duration of that "phase" we can make Recall ability less forgiving as Colossus from your example would have to stand and "wait" for being recalled and doing nothing while oppenents army could try to snipe it or at least deal some dmg to it.
But let us assume that we have Recall/Rift and Chronoboost on Nexus. What do we do with MSC? Completely remove it?
To be honest I've never liked MsC idea nor Mothership even so I would promote removal-way
MsC is slow, expensive and does not feel good to micro it. Also it is "hero unit" which I do not like in SC and on the other hand if allowed to build en masse may cause problems as it flies and is available in early game.
It's sole function is to carry crucial spells. If we distribute those across the protoss arsenal there is no purpose for MsC.
On July 25 2015 05:25 egrimm wrote:Show nested quote +[*] And simply: having access to teleport without a unit to manage it would be so much easier Well that is true You have no Arbiter/MsC so It may be slightly easier to manage but is it necessarily that bad in the end?
People are complaining that Protoss is an "easy race". I don't really want to debate that, but making it easier is probably not what we want to do
Haha yeah that argument holds some truth
P.S. Did you check PM I sent you regarding testing?
Done
|
I am actually inclined to forgo my setup and go for yours. For one reason: yours resembles more WoL - something that at least some players will be familiar with. Mine on the other hand is more new and unique, breaking the initial constraints of SCI as well.
I would love to hear other people's opinion on these, it's hard to be unbiased when your own solutions are being considered.
Options we currently have:
- Current SCI model: massable Mothership Core with Chronoboost and shorter Photon Overcharge, no Recall no Time Warp
- egrimm model: no Mothership Core, Chronoboost, Recall on Nexus. Shorter Photon Overcharge would end up being on Nexus as well. Probably all would be unlocked through Cybernetics Core
|
On July 25 2015 14:59 BlackLilium wrote:
I am actually inclined to forgo my setup and go for yours.
Thx, I hope for the best!
On July 25 2015 14:59 BlackLilium wrote:- egrimm model: no Mothership Core, Chronoboost, Recall on Nexus. Shorter Photon Overcharge would end up being on Nexus as well. Probably all would be unlocked through Cybernetics Core
That may work just fine but I also thought about small upgrade for Nexus. You would have to transform each Nexi separately, similarly to Orbital Command. Cost 50-100 minerals + 10-35 sec transform time (gate->warpgate takes 10 sec, CC->OC takes 35 sec).
Other way to do this is to add upgrade to Cybernetic Core and then after the reserach You can transform all your Nexi without a cost, only transformation time. Same as Warpgate research works in HotS.
Both solutions somehow coincide with gate->warpgate transformation especially with proposed earlier change to also add small fee to warpgates That way it feels more coherent and there is some flavour to race
I suppose that later on, after changes to Warpgate and gateway units, We might also rethink Photon overcharge. There might be room to change it to other defensive ability which would complement redesigned Protoss or just simply completly remove if Protoss would work fine without it. As of now I'd keep it with shorter duration and maybe slightly reduced cost ?
|
I don't want an upgradable Nexus. That implies a new mechanic and a new addon/building, like the Starbow's Khaydarin Citadel. On the other hand I firmly believe that Chronoboost shouldn't be instantly available due to proxy gateway (with lower unit build time) problem .
I suppose that later on, after changes to Warpgate and gateway units, We might also rethink Photon overcharge.
Warpgate and gateway units are already changed. Unless you have some further changes in mind?
|
On July 25 2015 16:36 BlackLilium wrote:
I don't want an upgradable Nexus. That implies a new mechanic and a new addon/building, like the Starbow's Khaydarin Citadel.
Fair enough
On the other hand I firmly believe that Chronoboost shouldn't be instantly available due to proxy gateway (with lower unit build time) problem .
Totally agree. May I ask does lower build time for gatway units is already implemented?
I suppose that later on, after changes to Warpgate and gateway units, We might also rethink Photon overcharge.
Warpgate and gateway units are already changed. Unless you have some further changes in mind?[/QUOTE]
Sorry, I somehow missed that. I thought these changes are still under development
I think right now it would be good idea to playtest current build with changes to warpgate, gateway units and protoss macro mechanics and only after that think about possible further changes to gateway units.
|
All changes that are listed under blue "Experimental" or "Stable" branch (posts 4-6) are already implemented, that includes gateway changes, economy changes, uphill shooting etc...
If you look for "SC Improved" mod you will find
- "SC Improved" - that's master branch, including only "master branch" changes
- "SC Improved Stable" - that includes "master branch" and "stable branch" changes
- "SC Improved Experimental" - that includes all changes.
This way we can test and compare all the things discussed, and get a better understanding and feeling of them. This also allows me to fast potential bugs quicker. At the same time, I am open to changes or even rollbacks - especially in the experimental branch. This way the mod is created iteratively and incrementally, rather than throwing a big group of changes and then getting lost in it.
|
Oh Gosh the "Make Protoss pay 100 Minerals" for every Gateway to Warpgate is such a nice, easy and simple idea to promote Macroplay over "GATEWAY Aggression" while not taking away the possibility.
|
Sorry, I didn't read all 8 pages, but regarding the high ground miss rate I agree with comments like these:
I think you just started walking on a dangerous path by making new rules that increase the learning barrier. I am not saying you can never do that (because obviously its part of a mod), but you need to seriously evaluate disadvantage and advantages. Players won't be able to figure out that these rules exist by learning by playing unless you make a clear visual indication that its the case. They will just "have to know it", which imo is a nono when it comes to (simple) game design.
So what about changing targeting/vision instead. Either make it so that low ground units have to get up closer while the high ground units are already firing at them, or make it so that instead of "missing" they simply aren't able to get a shot off. Both of these would be much more obvious to the player.
This mod seems really great though. Is the only way to play to get a friend to play with?
|
On July 26 2015 09:09 MaximilianKohler wrote:Sorry, I didn't read all 8 pages, but regarding the high ground miss rate I agree with comments like these: Show nested quote +I think you just started walking on a dangerous path by making new rules that increase the learning barrier. I am not saying you can never do that (because obviously its part of a mod), but you need to seriously evaluate disadvantage and advantages. Players won't be able to figure out that these rules exist by learning by playing unless you make a clear visual indication that its the case. They will just "have to know it", which imo is a nono when it comes to (simple) game design. So what about changing targeting/vision instead. Either make it so that low ground units have to get up closer while the high ground units are already firing at them, or make it so that instead of "missing" they simply aren't able to get a shot off. Both of these would be much more obvious to the player.
I agree with the statement you quoted as well. For that reason we are limiting the effects that do not have a clear visual feedback to a minimum. However, the high ground advantage is one of few that players simply need to know. Note, however, that uphill shooting never miss anymore, but the damage is reduced to 50%.
On July 26 2015 09:09 MaximilianKohler wrote:
This mod seems really great though. Is the only way to play to get a friend to play with?
Glad to hear you are liking it. We are just starting though and there is still a long road ahead.
Playing games would really help us, but the mod is not popular yet to be able to easily find an opponent. You can simply host a match and make it public, but my experience so far was rather poor: either people immediately quit, or they play at bronze-level. Only once I faced a competent opponent who crushed me with forcefields (duh...). Sentries still have a play in PvZ, but they are harder to manage.
Anyway, if you look for an opponent, why don't you join "SC Improved" group? Whenever I am online, I am there.
You can also try to find me directly: LiliumAtratm#442 (no 'u' at the second-last position due to name length constrains)
|
You don't think the vision or not being able to get a shot off, would be more obvious to new players? Do you see any problems with those options?
|
On July 27 2015 04:42 MaximilianKohler wrote:
You don't think the vision or not being able to get a shot off, would be more obvious to new players? Do you see any problems with those options?
Vision-related benefit is a fragile benefit. Once you gain vision in any way, there is no benefit at all.
Range difference is either minor or huge, depending on the units involved. +1 for roach is different than +1 on a siege tank. This makes it also more binary: depending on the army composition, the high ground will have little-to-no influence, or it will completely change the result.
A damage change is the most consistent from it all. To my knowledge, Starbow developers also explored other solutions and they ended up changing the damage output as well (through a miss chance).
Back to the current topic of macro mechanics and Mothership Core. I implemented some changes proposed by egrimm and removed my own. Reason for that is, that making Mothership Core massable gives Protoss very early access to a flying unit, that can be hard to respond to. A 4-MSC rush into a Zerg base can be particularly hard to stop.
Delaying MSC or increasing its cost would delay Chronoboost too much. Other solution would be to significantly reduce the strength of the MSC, but no matter how low it is, it will be always a problem if you just can't shoot up.
Finally, I got a feeling that no one likes the idea of a Chronoboost on the Mothership Core.
So, now we have:
Experimental Branch
- Chronoboost is once again at Nexus
- Chronoboost uses original stats (25 energy, 50% speed boost)
- Chronoboost requires Cybernetics Core
- Chronoboost can still be casted on any building
- Photon Overcharge is casted by Nexus.
- Photon Overcharge requires a research (50/50/80s) at Cybernetics Core.
- Photon Overcharge runs on the Nexus where it is activated. PO cannot be casted on a different Nexus.
- Photon Overcharge energy cost 100 -> 75
- Duration remains at 15s (down from 60s in HotS)
- Mothership Core completely removed
- Mothership is constructed directly at Nexus, same as in WoL
SCI - Coda LE still uses an old loading screen. I will update it in few hours.
Still hoping for some players to fight against, using SCI
|
Since I don't see any complaints anymore about the proposed changes, I am pushing the Experimental Branch to Stable Branch and closing this topic.
Ground-to-Air vs Air-to-Air
In Strat Chat #1 it was remarked that Air-to-Air is currently more effective than Ground-to-Air. As a result, the best counter to air to get more air... This becomes particularly true when fighting mutalisks - which are not only fast, but have a high regeneration rate.
In theory however ground-to-air can, and probably should, be stronger. This is because air units can easily bypass terrain obstacles in such a direction where ground units cannot follow them. On the other hand, air-to-air units can follow and stick to their target, allowing them to do damage for a longer period of time - thus DPS can be lower, while remaining viable.
Finally, there is a Colossus: in PvZ and PvT the highest damage is received from units that the Colossus cannot shoot back. This causes a painful hard-counter situation. Either Colossus is too strong, or it becomes utterly useless.
However, when asked in Strat Chat about the situation, hoping to learn more I got this response:
On July 29 2015 15:53 Whitewing wrote:
Frankly, I'd just remove the bonus regeneration on the mutalisks. Right now, the only air army that protoss can't even attempt to fight with ground only units is mass muta. High templar are a good ground to air unit, and while stalkers and archons aren't great, they do okay in decent numbers. The issue is that mutalisks don't care with their regen rate, they fly in, do damage, run away and are back to full health in no time. While terran's anti-air DPS is so high mutas just plain die when they get close, Protoss is more based on high health lower damage units, so they can't just shred mutalisks.
Ground vs air isn't an issue in PvT. In TvZ it is with brood lords, but that's mostly because the goliath was replaced with the viking. That's not inherently problematic, since the viking is very weak vs. ground units and isn't extremely powerful straight up (it's strength is its range, not it's damage output), but brood lords still die if marines get under them pretty quickly, so I'm not too concerned about it.
Right now, the only real offender is the mutalisk.
Hydralisks and infestors do pretty well until the late game comes into fruition, for the most part. Spore crawlers help out a great deal as well. In HOTS it can be hard to deal with after the change to the swarm host, but in LOTV they have that new viper spell. Zerg doesn't have trouble vs air heavy armies until they start being super late game max air armies, and by then they can field vipers, infestors, mass corrupter, and a whole host of issues.
Zerg ground based anti-air does fine for most of the game, so it's okay for the most part.
This poses a question: should we balance GtA vs AtA or not? Seems the Strat Chat people are not sure either.
What is your opinion regarding GtA vs AtA, and individual units with an anti-air capabilities?
- I would like to have a look at least at Thor. It currently has 2 anti-air weapons, each being good at certain particular enemy air compositions. There is no real choice, because at each moment in time one is clearly better than another, and you can switch between attack modes freerly. That's why I am thinking about reverting the Thor back to WoL state, with anti-air dealing high damage and having splash. The old Thor 250mm Strike Cannons would be brought back and we could, later on, decide what to do with that ability.
We could also strengthen Thor's AA capabilities (damage? range?) at the cost of anti-ground reduction, making the unit a damage tanker more than anything else in the ground combat.
- I think we should be careful when tweaking Queen AA capabilities. The problem is, that Queens are already present at every base for other reasons. As a result, this form of AA is guaranteed to be there, even without Zerg detecting an air threat.
- We could consider indirectly buffing hydralisk AA by reducing hydralisk supply cost. We now operate with doubled supply, so making hydralisk cost 3 supply (equivalent to old 1.5) is more viable.
- Protoss has very few GtA units: Stalker, High Templar, Archon. Stalkers already have many other functions, templars act as AA only through storm. Buffing Archon attack would most likely made its ground strength too high. I don't see much room for us here. Maybe making Stalker do flat damage, rather than "10+4 vs Armored" would help in this domain as well?
- In terms of air-to-air, I am thinking about reducing Vikings strength a bit, especially that we reduced it's damage point and it is much more microable right now. Attack range reduction would be my first choice.
- Phoenix is very mobile and fun to play. Putting Graviton Beam aside, as an AA damage dealer they are particularly useful against mutalisks - against other air units not that much... If we succeed in making GtA protoss more viable, I think we could make Phoenix a bit weaker against light.
- Finally, on the receiver's side: I agree with Whitewing, that high regeneration on mutalisk is a problem when defending with ground-to-air, especially for Protoss.
|
High regeneration on fast units is a bad option. Why? Because it allows you to make mistakes without being punished.
In WoL and BW when you attack with mutalisks you have to be careful not to take too much damage. Any damage your expensive mutas take will make them useless for a couple of seconds or up to minutes even. For this reason you have to carefully evaluate where to attack. You can take risks; you can be rewarded or punished for that risk.
If mutalisks regenerate their health quickly this interaction is lost. Why should you care about taking damage? You dont keep it for long. You just move in and move out and nothing is lost as long as the mutas stay alive.
For slow units that might be fine because they are too slow to run away and the enemy might simply keep hitting them on their retreat. For fast moving units, which are, on top of that, air units, the fast regeneration is a bad thing design wise.
For ground anti-air. I have said so many times what I would do with protoss that I am not going to repeat it one more time.
Zerg anti-air seems to be fine right now. The only complaints about zerg anti-air I have ever heard were about no early game mobile anti-air.
Terrans dont seem to do so bad either with their marines. I dislike the thor and would like it to be replaced with a smaller unit, but I guess you are not going to do that. So instead I propose giving the thor bigger splash range (and perhaps higher damage) but making the attack NOT homing. So a thor would not hit targets that move quickly but it will deal very high damage against enemies that stand still or move slowly. I think this will encourage more micro and positional play without introducing any gimmicks and abilities.
--------------------------------------------------
By the way, I do not like the most recent changes but I have no alternative solution that goes without changing the game much further.
|
On July 29 2015 17:55 RoomOfMush wrote:
For ground anti-air. I have said so many times what I would do with protoss that I am not going to repeat it one more time.
Let me reread your suggestions there in this context specifically. Looking at your locked thread:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/closed-threads/489939-a-protoss-redesign-proposal
I see:
- Make the Immortal able to attack air units (together with other changes)
- Increase the movement speed of the Stalker and make the Blink cooldown shorter. (consequently, it would be easier to catch up with hostile air)
Immortal as an AA is definetely an option. Currently the Immortal has two weaknesses: air and a flood of small units (zerglings, marines, etc...). Adding anit-air option would allow the unit to fight armores air units as well. Against mutalisks it won't be that strong since it has no splash and is slow.
I understand in your concept you make a Stalker a dedicated harass unit, similarly to Starbow. Unfortunately, in SCI it remains more of a core unit. For that reason I am a bit worried about buffing its speed, even at a cost of reducing its health pool.
On July 29 2015 17:55 RoomOfMush wrote:
Zerg anti-air seems to be fine right now. The only complaints about zerg anti-air I have ever heard were about no early game mobile anti-air.
Early game you don't need a ton of AA, do you? Zerg has queens... mounting an attack is probably a bit more problematic though. But this is about timings I guess...
On July 29 2015 17:55 RoomOfMush wrote:
Terrans dont seem to do so bad either with their marines. I dislike the thor and would like it to be replaced with a smaller unit, but I guess you are not going to do that. So instead I propose giving the thor bigger splash range (and perhaps higher damage) but making the attack NOT homing. So a thor would not hit targets that move quickly but it will deal very high damage against enemies that stand still or move slowly. I think this will encourage more micro and positional play without introducing any gimmicks and abilities.
Marines do a fine job as a mobile anti-air. However, when Terran opts to go factory-heavy composition, there are less marines and they are not so well upgraded. That's why I am looking at Thor specifically.
I am worried however, that if the missiles are not-homing, it would become utterly useless against mutalisks.
On July 29 2015 17:55 RoomOfMush wrote:
By the way, I do not like the most recent changes but I have no alternative solution that goes without changing the game much further.
We can always revisit recent changes at some later time if we come up with some better ideas
|
Protoss:
You said yourself that protoss has very little ground anti-air. The Immortal is the only viable choice for more ground anti-air other then introducing another unit. But if the Immortal gets anti-air the lines between the Immortal and the Stalker are blurred even further especially since I believe you are going to remove the hardened shield (even blizzard finally saw that it was a horrible ability) and you also want to buff stalkers.
Zerg:
Zerg sometimes need early game mobile anti-air, for example when protoss goes heavy on void rays. Of course zerg could tech up to hydras, but the void rays need to be scouted for that and hydras are very expensive and easy to counter.
But as I said, its not too big of a problem. There are very few people who complain about that. Its not imbalanced, its just annoying.
Terran:
Thats why I suggested to make the splash bigger and increase damage. When I watch terrans use thors against mutalisks the thors usually get taken out by magic boxing mutas. They stay on top of the thors and kill them because thors splash attack only hits one muta at a time. This would become impossible with the proposed changes. Zerg players would now need to constantly keep moving away from the thor, if they ever stay still for just a second they will take heavy damage. And with removed regeneration the damage would hurt that much more.
The thor would not be that much for the damage output and more for scaring the mutas away. They will not dare to engage when thors are around in fear of slipping up with the micro.
|
On July 30 2015 17:18 RoomOfMush wrote:
Protoss:
You said yourself that protoss has very little ground anti-air. The Immortal is the only viable choice for more ground anti-air other then introducing another unit. But if the Immortal gets anti-air the lines between the Immortal and the Stalker are blurred even further especially since I believe you are going to remove the hardened shield (even blizzard finally saw that it was a horrible ability) and you also want to buff stalkers.
I am actually thinking about replacing hardened shield with an energy shield with similar mechanism but limited pool. But that's another story for a later discussion... Still, Stalker remains much more mobile than Immortal and it holds blink. I think a difference between these units remains.
On July 30 2015 17:18 RoomOfMush wrote:
Thats why I suggested to make the splash bigger and increase damage. When I watch terrans use thors against mutalisks the thors usually get taken out by magic boxing mutas. They stay on top of the thors and kill them because thors splash attack only hits one muta at a time. This would become impossible with the proposed changes. Zerg players would now need to constantly keep moving away from the thor, if they ever stay still for just a second they will take heavy damage. And with removed regeneration the damage would hurt that much more.
The thor would not be that much for the damage output and more for scaring the mutas away. They will not dare to engage when thors are around in fear of slipping up with the micro.
Mutas will fight thors not through magic boxing, but by flying in circles. Yes, it will be much more taxing on the attacker, but if done properly, I fear that the defender will be able to do nothing about it.
That's why I think:
- Set damage to "high payload" value
- Keep the splash, increase its range. It should touch nearby mutas during magic boxing, but also touch nearby Collosi when firing at them.
- Keep the homing behavior
|
On July 30 2015 20:12 BlackLilium wrote:Mutas will fight thors not through magic boxing, but by flying in circles. Yes, it will be much more taxing on the attacker, but if done properly, I fear that the defender will be able to do nothing about it. That's why I think: - Set damage to "high payload" value
- Keep the splash, increase its range. It should touch nearby mutas during magic boxing, but also touch nearby Collosi when firing at them.
- Keep the homing behavior
The defender will be able to do nothing about it? How about bringing in more anti-air?
The problem I see with your solution is that it might become a hard counter too easily. Thors > Mutas.
What I wanted with my solution was to give both sides a good chance. Thors can rip through mutas but mutas can still beat thors, it all depends on micro, position and situation.
Even if the missles of the thor are not homing, with a big splash radius and good missle speed they can still potentially deal damage to a flock of mutas, especially if the mutas get too close.
Imagine terrans chasing mutalisks with a thor in a speed boosted medivac and all the micro potential this can create.
|
OK, this will require careful balancing to ensure that it is possible and not OP in either way.
|
It is possible. I made an attack like that for the Vikings in my mod. They fire 4 missles at random offsets around the main target with each missle having a small splash area. The result is that a target may be hit by 1, 2, 3 or all 4 missles at once depending on its movement and speed.
|
4 attacks will reduce the damage output against heavy-armored targets. That's one of the reasons why high-payload is a single shot. I also thought you don't like randomness?
Anyway, I removed homing, didn't change the splash range though. I was able to kill an unmicroed Thor with a single mutalisk. It was a lot of clicking though.
I think the no-homing would work better if the Thor fried at a predicted location of the unit, taking its velocity (at missile launch) into an account. This way, if a fast moving target doesn't change its vector, it takes full damage.
|
On July 31 2015 03:32 BlackLilium wrote:4 attacks will reduce the damage output against heavy-armored targets. That's one of the reasons why high-payload is a single shot. I also thought you don't like randomness?
In my mod the Viking wasnt supposed to be used against heavy armored targets. It was to be used against many lighter units. The banshee had gotten the ability to attack both ground and air and shot only 1 missle instead of 2.
There is also 2 kinds of randomness:
The bad kind: There is a random chance of nothing happening. You wasted your time. But on the other hand something big happens. This makes interactions very binary and frustrating on either side.
The good kind: Different things can happen but they are all equally good. Which event happens is random. This is not bad because each outcome will give you a gain and hurt your opponent but each one might do it differently. It can give a little bit more depth to a situation.
On July 31 2015 03:32 BlackLilium wrote:Anyway, I removed homing, didn't change the splash range though. I was able to kill an unmicroed Thor with a single mutalisk. It was a lot of clicking though.
I think the no-homing would work better if the Thor fried at a predicted location of the unit, taking its velocity (at missile launch) into an account. This way, if a fast moving target doesn't change its vector, it takes full damage.
If you manage to implement that then go for it. I would have done it this way too but I didnt see a way to do it. I didnt really try very hard though so there might very well be a way.
|
Experimental Branch changes
- Thor
- Removed high payload mode.
- Javelin Missiles
- No homing (RoomOfMush idea)
- Range: 10 -> 11
- Number of attacks: 4 -> 2
- Refire rate: 3s -> 2s
- Damage (and DPS): 14 + 4 vs Light
- 3 splash ranges: 100% 0.5, 50% 1.0, 25% 1.5
- Reintroduced 250mm Strike Cannons from WoL (will work on that ability later)
- Mutalisk
- Removed faster regeneration rate
|
No homing makes Thor super useless against fast targets!!
What is the point of range increase, if it can deal damage only to targets which are close?
|
On August 01 2015 16:15 BrokenSegment wrote:
No homing makes Thor super useless against fast targets!!
What is the point of range increase, if it can deal damage only to targets which are close?
I am not that happy with no-homing either
I am currently trying to implement a predicted shot, so that if the target moves at a constant velocity the missile will connect perfectly. This should encourage more microing around the Thor to minimize the damage, while not making them completely useless.
PurpleStreak is helping with it a lot, but he doesn't have a perfect solution just yet. However, if you are experienced map/mod maker and have an idea (or maybe already implemented it in the past?) - please let us know!
In the meantime:
Experimental Branch Changes
- Hydralisk: Supply cost: 4 -> 3 (equivalent to 1.5)
- Immortal attack: targets air
- Immortal attack: 20+30 vs Armored -> 25 + 15 vs Armored
- Viking range: 9 -> 8
The Immortal is now a bit less of a hard-counter to armor and a bit more as a beefy core unit. It is still slow expensive, and produced from Robotics, making it hard to mass and even harder to form an Immortal+Colossus ball (competing slot in production). I hope it is still different enough from a Stalker due to lack of mobility and lack of warp-in.
I hope the supply change to hydralisks will allow us to see a bit more of them used for defense purposes. Also getting a higher number of them should be a little bit less expensive. I don't think a squishy unit should take that much supply as hydralisk previously did.
Viking range reduction is coupled with a reduction of damage point, allowing it to be microed better. I hope it will lead to more interesting battles with this unit, plus it aligns with a general air-to-air nerf we want to make. We will have a look into the Colossus soon as well, hopefully making it a bit less of an issue for Terran - allowing it to be a bit less dependent on Vikings. Maybe, with the change to Immortal, Siege Tanks could be a decent response to Colossus as well?
I checked if Phoenix vs Light damage could be reduced, but it causes many negatives against lifted ground units: it takes more shots to kill workers, marines and hydralisks. I am not sure if such a nerf to a tactic which even now is not that popular (right?) is warranted.
|
I disagree with the removal of Mutalisk tissue regeneration. I think you should've given a chance to the idea of changing Mutalisk regeneration to be like Reaper regeneration + Zerg passive regeneration. I understand that their health is being used as a resource, but I think that the slight level of recklessness that tissue regeneration afforded Zerg players was actually a benefit in creating a slightly more unique style of play with the unit.
|
On August 03 2015 20:18 Pontius Pirate wrote:
I disagree with the removal of Mutalisk tissue regeneration. I think you should've given a chance to the idea of changing Mutalisk regeneration to be like Reaper regeneration + Zerg passive regeneration. I understand that their health is being used as a resource, but I think that the slight level of recklessness that tissue regeneration afforded Zerg players was actually a benefit in creating a slightly more unique style of play with the unit.
In what way does super speedy hp regeneration benefit the game? Its just a way to be sloppy without getting punished.
|
Frankly, I don't see much practical difference between high regeneration (Zerg) and high regeneration with delay (Reaper). Mutalisks are not annoying because they can overheal the damage they take. They are problematic because they can retreat, heal they woulds quickly and return to battle.
That's why ground AA neither kills nor properly deters Mutalisk harassment. Currently, in order to get rid of Mutalisks you need to actually kill them. And to kill a Mutalisk, you need a persistent damage dealer - that is - air.
As a compensation, we could consider changing the Queen healing ability so that it would bounce onto next 2 or 3 units with some reduced healing effect. This way a Zerg would have a chance to heal a moderately damaged flock of Mutalisks. I am not convinced however that it is absolutely necessary....
|
Experimental Branch changes
- Thor
- Javelin Missiles now shoot at a predicted unit location based on its movement vector.
To clarify: when Thor is shooting, it takes 0.1s to measure the velocity of the targetted unit. It then fires his missile at a location where he thinks the unit and his missiles will connect. However, the missiles are not homing: if the unit alters its heading it may be able to dodge the missiles - at least partially. The higher the travel distance, the easier it is to dodge.
Due to high speed of Javelin missiles, it is not an easy task, but we might see some interesting plays from top tier players.
On implementation side - I want to really thank PurpleStreak for spending his time trying to solve the prediction task in the data editor. Unfortunately, it required a lot of effects and a series of enumerated actions. I ended up writing the logic using triggers. However, if we find a better solution in the future, I may swap the implementation.
Any other comments, ideas, suggestions in the domain of Ground-to-Air and Air-to-Air?
I was thinking about reducing the range of a Viking even further, but I don't want to fall into a trap of nerfing units into obscurity...
|
Good to hear, that you managed to do it. I personally think that this is a great mechanic that will greatly improve the possibilities for micro battles while not making it one-sided or a hard counter.
I would not try to touch the viking much more without proper testing. I think you have already made plenty of changes, few of which seem to me to be much more then what you originally wanted to do.
Something that I would certainly recommend is looking at unit supply counts, for example the supply costs of ultralisks, thors, carriers, cattlebruisers and siege tanks. (perhaps others too) I was always baffled why SC2, the newer game, had LESS units on the field compared to SC:BW. We should definitely try to make 200/200 armies an exception instead of the norm. If 200/200 is too easy to hit there will never be a reason not to wait until 200/200 to move out. (I mean from a psychological point of view)
You should also look at the attack scan ranges, that is something that even blizzard has fixed in LotV because of community demand.
|
It will be much harder to attack Protoss from air with all those buffs. Are you sure you don't want to nerf Phoenix somehow?
|
Experimental Branch Balance Changes
- Viking range reduced 8 -> 7.5
- Phoenix fire cooldown 1.1s -> 1.6s
Phoenix damage cannot be reduced because crucial numbers would be altered: e.g. a lifted worker would not longer be 2-shot. However, changing fire cooldown allows to reduce persistent DPS (by around 31%) without affecting those crucial numbers above.
I also ended up reducing Viking range further, but just by a small bit.
If there are no other comments on this subject, I will be closing this topic soon.
On August 05 2015 23:12 RoomOfMush wrote:
Something that I would certainly recommend is looking at unit supply counts...
Adding it to the TODO list
On August 05 2015 23:12 RoomOfMush wrote:
You should also look at the attack scan ranges, that is something that even blizzard has fixed in LotV because of community demand.
Experimental Branch Micro Changes
Scan range set to be +1 compared to actual weapon range.
The following units have been affected
+ Show Spoiler +
Stalker
Banshee
Battlecruiser
Broodlord
Carrier
Colossus
Corruptor
Sentry
Ghost
Hellion
Hydralisk
Immortal
Infested Terran
Tempest
Marauder
Marine
Missile Turret
Mothership Core (despite we remove it)
Photon Cannon
Point Defense Drone
Oracle
Mothership
Queen
Siege Tank
Spine Crawler
Lurker (the unit is actually there in HotS, just not enabled)
Spore Crawler
Thor
Viking
Void Ray
|
Thats quite some nerfs to Vikings and Phoenix. Especially with the Phoenix you should be careful not to nerf them to oblivion. They are already not used too much. Perhaps you can buff them in some other way to increase their usefulness, maybe make them beefier.
About the critical damage:
Remember, there are upgrades in the game. If you reduce their damage by 1 and they suddenly need more attacks to kill basic targets, thats all the more reason to research +1 weapons when you want to use them.
|
On August 07 2015 09:09 RoomOfMush wrote:
Thats quite some nerfs to Vikings and Phoenix. Especially with the Phoenix you should be careful not to nerf them to oblivion. They are already not used too much. Perhaps you can buff them in some other way to increase their usefulness, maybe make them beefier.
These changes alone could be concerning. However, please remember that it is a part of a bigger plan of making GtA stronger and AtA weaker. Still, air-to-air has unique capability to chaise their targets everywhere on the map. I doubt they will disappear completely unless we really nerf them (which we don't plan to).
For Vikings, the reduced range will make the game more micro intensive, but with the reduced damage point - high skill should be more rewarding. Some concern may be regarding Terran response to Collosi, but I hope to address that on the Collosi side - a topic which I would like to discuss next.
In case of Phoenix, its lift-kill-and-run tactic should not be affected much, hopefully. However, a longer, more persistent interaction against air (e.g. against mutalisks) is weakened.
On August 07 2015 09:09 RoomOfMush wrote:
About the critical damage:
Remember, there are upgrades in the game. If you reduce their damage by 1 and they suddenly need more attacks to kill basic targets, thats all the more reason to research +1 weapons when you want to use them.
You are right about that - I didn't pay much attention to it. I don't think however that +1 attack should be a prerequisite for efficient phoenix worker killing.
|
Protoss Deathball
After dealing with the more general game design issues, we would like to now focus on particular units. The first to "attack" are the key Protoss units that form what is known as "Protoss Deathball": the Colossus and Void Ray. These untis have high DPS. Colosi have a nice splash, Void Rays scale up very well. Both can stack well over each other and other ground units.
Colossus
This unit is complained about very often. Regarded as "boring", 1-A-victory with limited micro potential from either side (operator and receiver). We have seen many suggestions on how to change Colossus. Most revolve around adding new mechanic or activated abilities, e.g. the Hadronic Protection Field - activated 50% reduction shield over 5 seconds.
However, we believe that the Colossus can be made more interesting without really adding any new behavior into the unit. Instead, let us try to change what the unit is already doing.
The most interesting domain of Colossus is how it is doing damage. Currently attack works as follows (with bit simplicifaction)
- Draw an invisible line L forward from the Colossus.
- Pick any point X on that line in the attack range.
- Draw a perpendicular line M at that point.
- Damage is done alone line M, within small distance from X.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/eQ1t7n7.png)
This attack pattern has several properties:
- The actual attack is fast preventing the opponent reacting to it.
- Distance doesn't matter. Attack is as effective at range 3 as it is at range 9. Consequently, keeping the maximum distance against enemy is always the most optimal play.
- Getting a surround/concave around Colossi is not as effective as against other units. Some say that the attack pattern "nullifies" the concave.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/rTBcVJo.png)
Consequently Colossi are always held back in the army and the main ways to defeat them is to either simply overwhelm the ground defences and kill everying, or get a long-range anit-air and snipe the colossi.
We would like to propose a change: Collosi fires along the view direction line L, similarly to a Lurker. The attack always starts at a minimum distance (2 or 3) and moves at moderate speed till the maximum range. The idea is not new, similar concepts have been suggested before:
While similar, to the original Colossus, this actually changes the attack properties significantly:
- The attack is slow and the opponent has a change to react by moving units away from the beam path.
- The time for enemy raction scales with shot distance. An attack at range 3 cannot be avoided, but at range 9 shot can be avoided easily.
- Positioning Colossus close to enemy group gives the beam a chance to fry more targets in one shot. Sticking to maximum range renders Colossi quite ineffective.
- Consequently, long range attacks remain as safe as before, but their effectiveness is limited. A more aggressive Colossi placement can give higher rewards, but is also more risky - hopefully introducing an interesting interaction between both sides.
- Splitting an army and getting a surround/concave around Colossi, especially with a single row of units can diminish Colossi effectivenes. In contrary, when Colossi hits a ball of units, or better - flank into an already established battle, it can do a lot of damage.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/7fR9F3y.png)
If this works, we can then tweak the numbers for a better balance. For the moment, consider a case where effective DPS of a single beam is the same as before. However, only a unit in the center, between the beams, are hit by both of them.
And lastly: we believe it would look way cooler with the beams scorching earth parallel to each other, rather than crossing each other.
Void Ray
Back in the early days of WoL Void Rays seemed to be a unit with an interesting charge-up mechanic designed for killing high HP targets.
It soon ended up begin a gimmick: VRs would shoot at rocks or neutral/friendly units to get a charge, and afterwards unleash their full power at unsuspecting enemy - regardless if targetting heavy units or just a group of light units. In HotS they changed the unit, giving it a boring ability: "do more damage". No drawback, no situational behavior, just a straight stat increase.
Regardless of the above, VRs remain problematic due to their scalability. In few numbers they are rather weak and insignificant. But as their number grows, they become a killing machine that is hard to stop. One reasonable counter is a hard-counter in the form of anti-air AoE effects, but that is not always accessible. This problem has not been addressed at all, ever.
We would like to propose to step back to the interesting and unique WoL mechanic, with one important change: changing target resets the chargeup. This not only resolves the gimmicky use in WoL, but also addresses the scalability problem. Why? If you focus all VRs on a single target, it will die quickly resetting the charge. Targetting different enemies, however, is possible only when the VR count is low.
Consequently, these units remain useful in low numbers when doing a mission or their own or with a small support. However they would not be so effective when massing up or when used in a deathball.
Chargeup becomes an anti-massing mechanic, rather than only an incentive to focus on big targets (which didn't really work).
The basic VR shot would be generally weaker than current, while charged-up version noticeably stronger.
|
I did that Colossus change in my own mod. I personally think its a good change, perhaps not the best solution but definitely an improvement.
About the Void Ray: (I wrote that before in some thread)
The Void Ray seems to be an air unit that is designed as a ground unit. In SC all air units fall into a certain category. They are either fast moving but fragile harassment (Wraith, Scout (upgraded), Mutalisk, Banshee, Phoenix, Oracle) or anti-air support (Valkyrie, Corsair, Scourge, Devourer, Viking, Corrupter), a capital ship (BC, Carrier, Tempest, BL) or a Spellcaster (Science Vessel, Arbiter, Queen, Raven, Oracle, Viper).
The Void Ray however is slow, has the same single target attack against both ground and air and is cheap in terms of supply cost. It is basically a flying dragoon.
In my opinion the categories of air unis mentioned above make sense. Basic air units can be used for harassment, but since they die so quickly they are no good for actual army engagements. Capital ships can be used as a main army but they are very slow to build up and the enemy gets plenty of time to prepare (if we assume he scouts properly).
This is good because air units are so much more powerful then ground units because they can stack and move freely.
The fact that Void Rays dont fit makes them either overpowered or nerfed to oblivion.
|
On August 09 2015 22:42 RoomOfMush wrote:
About the Void Ray: (I wrote that before in some thread)
The Void Ray seems to be an air unit that is designed as a ground unit. In SC all air units fall into a certain category. They are either fast moving but fragile harassment (Wraith, Scout (upgraded), Mutalisk, Banshee, Phoenix, Oracle) or anti-air support (Valkyrie, Corsair, Scourge, Devourer, Viking, Corrupter), a capital ship (BC, Carrier, Tempest, BL) or a Spellcaster (Science Vessel, Arbiter, Queen, Raven, Oracle, Viper).
The Void Ray however is slow, has the same single target attack against both ground and air and is cheap in terms of supply cost. It is basically a flying dragoon.
In my opinion the categories of air unis mentioned above make sense. Basic air units can be used for harassment, but since they die so quickly they are no good for actual army engagements. Capital ships can be used as a main army but they are very slow to build up and the enemy gets plenty of time to prepare (if we assume he scouts properly).
This is good because air units are so much more powerful then ground units because they can stack and move freely.
The fact that Void Rays dont fit makes them either overpowered or nerfed to oblivion.
I remember that. You are probably referring to this:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/closed-threads/489939-a-protoss-redesign-proposal
Although the thread is now locked, there are useful points of yours.
However, I think that the core reason why Void Rays are so hard to balance is their scalability. Either they are too weak in low numbers or too strong in big numbers. That's why I am attacking this particular aspect and not redesigning the unit completely to fit a different role.
On August 09 2015 22:42 RoomOfMush wrote:
I did that Colossus change in my own mod. I personally think its a good change, perhaps not the best solution but definitely an improvement.
Yes, I remember that now. I should mention you too in the opening discussion post!
|
The scalability problem of Void Rays is a direct result of the problem I mentioned. They are designed (stat wise) like a core army unit. But because they are also flying they scale way better then any ground unit can.
What is their role? What is their purpose? In what situation do you build Void Rays?
Right now, it is for a core army unit. Powerful, beefy, scaling really well with numbers.
|
I agree with your reasoning that Void Ray is atypical among air. However, just because of that it is not necessarily a bad unit just yet. Instead, I am looking at particular problems and how it can be fixed. After identifying that scalability is problematic, I am looking a way to resolve just that, without changing the unit completely.
If that is proven impossible, we can of course look at more drastic changes.
|
Void Ray suggestion:
I was thinking about the role of VR and it seems that it supposed to be good against big, armored targets - Broodlords, Ultralisks, Carriers, BCs, Thors etc also including buildings. In reality instead of being surgical units snipeing key targets VR in HotS are all around main fighters as You both mentioned above. We should rework VR to make really important what they target and force Protoss players to be more precise with them.
Proposal:
- Make VR ability "Prismatic Alignment" be able to cast on unit instead of straight stim-like buff.
- PA increases VR damage against targeted unit with every second VR is attacking. In other words the longer VR is attacking the more dps it inflicts.
- PA is now channel-like ability. If protoss players will attack with VR with activated PA, other unit - it stops to work and cooldown starts. Also if targeted unit move out or range of VR - PA stops. If targeted unit dies it stops etc.
- VR has 6 range by default. To help to snipe key units more range might be needed. That's why I suggest for PA to increase also range of VR by 2-3 for duration of PA.
- Cast Range = VR default range + 2-3 as mentioned above.
- Also if needed, "leash" range (not sure about the name?) might be also increased.
- **We might try to allow PA to also target structures but it'd probably be hard to balance
This changes would promote selecting individual Void Rays to cast Prismatic Alignment on key big units. There would be more decisons: do I want to select all my VR to kill 1 key unit very fast OR I want to use whole potential and target enemys units with VR in 1:1 ratio? Additionally You might aslo use PA against smaller units like Roach/Marauder/Hydra and still benefit to small extent.
Void Ray might become more specialized unit and hopefully replace Tempest as a unit designed to deal with broodlords/colossus/other massive units.
|
Colossus
... it is nearly ready.
However, I have a problem with selecting a different effect depending on a research. I know how to use Requirements with Abilities, but not Effects.
With the "Extended Thermal Lance" upgrade, a different effect - with different beam target offsets - should be used. Any ideas how to implement it?
Void Ray
I think your suggestion, egrimm, is quite similar except that it is an activated ability and gives an attack range buff.
I am not sure if that activation is really needed. Charging up on a small unit is not going really going to work, because it is going to die soon anyway and alignment will reset (as by yours and mine suggestion)
If you manually targeting big units for VRs, you are already microing it. I don't think you need a different button than A to do this thing.
In general, I would like to avoid the LotV trap of "activated ability on every unit!"
|
On August 12 2015 07:27 egrimm wrote:Void Ray suggestion: I was thinking about the role of VR and it seems that it supposed to be good against big, armored targets - Broodlords, Ultralisks, Carriers, BCs, Thors etc also including buildings. In reality instead of being surgical units snipeing key targets VR in HotS are all around main fighters as You both mentioned above. We should rework VR to make really important what they target and force Protoss players to be more precise with them. Proposal: - Make VR ability "Prismatic Alignment" be able to cast on unit instead of straight stim-like buff.
- PA increases VR damage against targeted unit with every second VR is attacking. In other words the longer VR is attacking the more dps it inflicts.
- PA is now channel-like ability. If protoss players will attack with VR with activated PA, other unit - it stops to work and cooldown starts. Also if targeted unit move out or range of VR - PA stops. If targeted unit dies it stops etc.
- VR has 6 range by default. To help to snipe key units more range might be needed. That's why I suggest for PA to increase also range of VR by 2-3 for duration of PA.
- Cast Range = VR default range + 2-3 as mentioned above.
- Also if needed, "leash" range (not sure about the name?) might be also increased.
- **We might try to allow PA to also target structures but it'd probably be hard to balance
This changes would promote selecting individual Void Rays to cast Prismatic Alignment on key big units. There would be more decisons: do I want to select all my VR to kill 1 key unit very fast OR I want to use whole potential and target enemys units with VR in 1:1 ratio? Additionally You might aslo use PA against smaller units like Roach/Marauder/Hydra and still benefit to small extent. Void Ray might become more specialized unit and hopefully replace Tempest as a unit designed to deal with broodlords/colossus/other massive units.
The problem with this is that it would become a hard counter. This ability would probably end up making the opponent simply not build big units because they would get sniped by hard counter Void Rays.
In the end neither big units nor Void Rays would be used because Void Rays would suck against anything else.
If you want a unit to be good it has to be universally useable. Not just useable in one specialized situation. At the same time it still has to have an obvious flaw that can be abused and not only if your opponent screws up.
|
On August 13 2015 00:27 BlackLilium wrote:
However, I have a problem with selecting a different effect depending on a research. I know how to use Requirements with Abilities, but not Effects.
With the "Extended Thermal Lance" upgrade, a different effect - with different beam target offsets - should be used. Any ideas how to implement it?
There's 'Player Requirement' validator type.
|
On August 13 2015 00:27 BlackLilium wrote:
Colossus
... it is nearly ready.
However, I have a problem with selecting a different effect depending on a research. I know how to use Requirements with Abilities, but not Effects.
With the "Extended Thermal Lance" upgrade, a different effect - with different beam target offsets - should be used. Any ideas how to implement it?
Void Ray
I think your suggestion, egrimm, is quite similar except that it is an activated ability and gives an attack range buff.
I am not sure if that activation is really needed. Charging up on a small unit is not going really going to work, because it is going to die soon anyway and alignment will reset (as by yours and mine suggestion)
If you manually targeting big units for VRs, you are already microing it. I don't think you need a different button than A to do this thing.
In general, I would like to avoid the LotV trap of "activated ability on every unit!"
Hmm, What I wanted to achieve is to somehow take over Tempest role by Void Ray to deal with BL/colossus but in more moderate way. Both units are supposed to be good against single targets however as we've seen in WoL VR weren't sufficient to deal with above-mentioned units which resulted in BL+infestor in PvZ and "War of Worlds" in PvP and then in HotS Tempest was introduced. However Tempest is too big, has too many hp and absurdly long range with little dps while also being really slow and clunky. The Void ray can be good replacement with proper tweaking.
I agree that yours idea and mine are quite similar actually. The difference is the range buff when ability is used which may be necessary if we want VR to battle sufficiently against key, big units. If that doesn't prove to be a problem and additional range isn't needed then I believe yours idea is more elegant and simple, as I am also not a big fan of "activated ability on every unit!"
|
On August 13 2015 02:41 egrimm wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2015 00:27 BlackLilium wrote:
Colossus
... it is nearly ready.
However, I have a problem with selecting a different effect depending on a research. I know how to use Requirements with Abilities, but not Effects.
With the "Extended Thermal Lance" upgrade, a different effect - with different beam target offsets - should be used. Any ideas how to implement it?
Void Ray
I think your suggestion, egrimm, is quite similar except that it is an activated ability and gives an attack range buff.
I am not sure if that activation is really needed. Charging up on a small unit is not going really going to work, because it is going to die soon anyway and alignment will reset (as by yours and mine suggestion)
If you manually targeting big units for VRs, you are already microing it. I don't think you need a different button than A to do this thing.
In general, I would like to avoid the LotV trap of "activated ability on every unit!" Hmm, What I wanted to achieve is to somehow take over Tempest role by Void Ray to deal with BL/colossus but in more moderate way. Both units are supposed to be good against single targets however as we've seen in WoL VR weren't sufficient to deal with above-mentioned units which resulted in BL+infestor in PvZ and "War of Worlds" in PvP and then in HotS Tempest was introduced. However Tempest is too big, has too many hp and absurdly long range with little dps while also being really slow and clunky. The Void ray can be good replacement with proper tweaking.
That may be true, but you would not make it any better by introducing a hard counter. Instead, make BL+Infestor less of a super overpowered composition and give the Void Ray a proper role (or remove it altogether).
|
On August 13 2015 01:30 PurpleStreak wrote:Show nested quote +On August 13 2015 00:27 BlackLilium wrote:
However, I have a problem with selecting a different effect depending on a research. I know how to use Requirements with Abilities, but not Effects.
With the "Extended Thermal Lance" upgrade, a different effect - with different beam target offsets - should be used. Any ideas how to implement it?
There's 'Player Requirement' validator type.
Yep, that did the trick. Thanks!
Experimental Branch Changes
Colossus:
- Beams now scorch the ground in the Colossus view direction, rather than perpendicularly (similar to Lurker attack)
- Beam scorches earth at distances 2 to 6, regardless of how far the target is
- Extended Thermal Lance increase the maximum scorching range to 9
- Beam impact movement speed reduced: 10/s -> 5/s
- Fire cooldown: 1.65s -> 2.2s
- Minimum fire range: 0 -> 2
Single target DPS is effectively reduced by 25%, but the beam has now a potential to hit much more targets if they are clumped one behind another. At the same time, at higher distances, the opponent has more chances to avoid the beam.
Ultimately, the Colossus may play quite differently than in HotS. Some serious testing will be required to conclude if they should be made stronger or weaker.
|
Experimental Branch Changes
Void Ray:
- Charge-up mechanic reintroduced, but resets every time target is changed.
- Base damage: 6+4 vs Armored -> 5+3 vs Armored
- Three charge levels: 5+3, 7+5, 9+7
- Charge increase after 1.8s (3 damage cycles)
- Current damage output is shown properly in the UI
Animation is somewhat wonky and could use some help with it
VRs vs Stalkers - stalkers are much better now that they are not armored. In a 1:2 scenario they beat VRs quite easily - even in great numbers and no micro/blink (e.g. 30VR vs 60 stalkers)
|
What is your thought about macro mechanics? Now that even blizzard has realized that they are bad you may want to copy their decision and cut them out.
The best solution I have yet read about the zerg larva problem is to make the inject larva ability a channeled ability that drains energy periodically and speeds up the larva generation at the hatchery. This would make you want to keep 1 queen per hatchery but additional queens can still be used for creep tumors and transfusion.
|
On August 17 2015 19:40 RoomOfMush wrote:
What is your thought about macro mechanics? Now that even blizzard has realized that they are bad you may want to copy their decision and cut them out.
The best solution I have yet read about the zerg larva problem is to make the inject larva ability a channeled ability that drains energy periodically and speeds up the larva generation at the hatchery. This would make you want to keep 1 queen per hatchery but additional queens can still be used for creep tumors and transfusion.
They are making it in LotV and it is an attempt to fix the problems they encountered, that is:
- Early game income is too fast (12 worker count) compared to army production speed and teching speed. (the macro parametrization I talked about in Strat Chat). By removing/tuning down macro mechanics, the overall income gain over time slows down.
- There are generally too many buttons to click in LotV and even pro are slipping off more and more often, and the game is stepping away from its strategy component.
- It was shown that Inject Larva is the dominant cause for Zerg win or loss, more than any clever army composition or movement.
However, these are - hopefully - not the problems in Starcraft Improved. Moreover, complete removal (case of Chronoboost) is a quick fix which is not necessairly good for the game. As Whitewing points out - it removes the choices and differences between builds of Protoss. The race becomes shallower without it.
I believe the macro mechanics need to be tuned in some way - not removed. Also, please remember, that Blizzard is experimenting. This is a rather big change and they may yet decide to undo it or change it further in different direction.
We may need another look into the Inject Larva. Maybe the channeled solution you propose would be the right one?
However, what I do like about current injections is that they come in waves. You get nothing for 40 seconds, and then you get a burst of larva. You need to make a periodic decission on how to use them - something that is emphasized even further in SCI.
It is a rythm that both defender and the attacker have to account for. It is also something unique for the Zerg. Removing it may make the Zerg shallower in that aspect. Reducing it to produce only 2 larva is also a step with not-so-good direction. If that was the direction, I would prefer the Inject to still give 4 larva, but last 80s and cost twice as much energy. Or 3 larva and 60s. Keep the burst rythm, just a bit slower.
|
I played a couple of games as Protoss vs AI to check the changes. Some quick thoughts:
- I LOVE stalkers with reduced dmg point! They feel really nice to micro and move around. My only concern is if they are not too strong in early game, especially against Terran.
- New economy seems good, obviously needs more playtesting. One thing I noticed is that I was a bit mineral starved when taking my natural. Gas started to bank to level of 300-400 whereas minerals where low. Was it me macroing badly or it is expected in HMH model?
- With chronoboost access moved to Cybercore You gather a lot of energy (basically 100/100) before CC finishes and You can use that energy. That doesn't feel good and may lead to some early game issues like difficult early rushes from Protoss. Maybe Nexus should start with 0 energy or only after building CC start gathering energy? Maybe upgrade to nexus like Orbital Command which would give access to energy?
- Reworked Colossus seems nice and interesting. It is hard to say if it is balanced or if changes actually makes playing against colossus more pleasant Need to play against good Terran players to try it out or even in unit tester for bio vs colo interaction only.
Also Is it possible to add map with SCI mod version with implemented changes form experimental branch?
|
Thank you for this valuable feedback egrimm!
- I agree that Protoss gets a bit of buff early game with Stalkers, but also is a bit weaker due to lack of MSC. In the end, I think it may be hard to compare. Finally, I don't think SCI Protoss against Terran is stronger than LotV Protoss, is it?
- Mineral income starts to sink below Standard with about 12+ workers. Each worker in 9-16 counts like a half of it actually. You might actually consider cutting a few workers for an earlier expansion. Cutting workers in HMH is less punishing than in Standard (which, in turn, may promote more early game aggression)
- I agree, there is a power spike the moment Cybernetics finishes. A non-proxy non-warpgate rushes may become a thing. I think that is one of the things we should test!
- Colossus may need balancing - probably a damage nerf. However, I hope that with the change we now have a wider window in which Colossus is neither overpowered nor nerfed into oblivion.
SCI mod (all branches) are published as extension mods. You can use them with any map.
The reason there is "SCI - Coda" is for the loading screen only. It is a chance for new players to get a hint on what is going on.
--
If there are no further comments specific to recent Colossus and Void Ray changes I will be closing this topic soon.
I think, more than anything this mod now needs some proper testing!
|
The Colossus and Void Ray changes have been pushed to Stable branch
General Balancing
There are still several units that we want to look at in the future. The scope of the changes to come however is significantly smaller than those that we have already made. Before proceeding we would like to ensure that the current setup is more-or-less balanced.
It is time to play some games, tune some numbers and talk about everything related...
Also, I would like to take this opportunity and ask if you like the current discussion format?
While things are organized - there are not actually many people saying anything. If you don't like where it is going or have other concerns - please share!
I had a pleasure to have a few fights against egrimm. My current concern is:
- Mieral-to-gas ratio favors gas a bit. On one hand, a 1-gas Protoss becomes more viable, on another - archons become effectively cheaper and a good gas sink. Zealot+Archon is a bit more effective as Colossi do not deal with them so well.
- Gateway production may actually be too fast. This, coupled with the slight buffs can make Protoss dominant in the very early game. Will have to play a couple more games to verify...
|
Protoss Early game
There might be slight imbalance in early game in favour of Protoss which is a combination of:
- 0 point damage on stalker - easier to micro
- +10 shields on zealots
- decreased build time on gateway units
- a lot of spare chrono boost after Cyber Core finishes which may be used for boosting production of gateway units.
What should be probably done is reduce the amount of energy available on nexus just after CC has been completed. Right now energy pool approaches 100/100 which is 4 CB = 4 * 10 sec = 40sec reduction which translates into 1 additional gateway unit (4 instead of 3) assuming constant gateway production.
Not sure about specific implementation but it would be good if nexus had 25-50/100 energy when Cyber Core finishes.
Also as BlackLilium said the mineral/gas ratio is disturbed a bit in favour of gas. So some tweaks should be made in gas gathering time.
Toner thoughts/suggestions:
- Force field casting range seems a bit too low as sentries are trying to pass through friendly stalkers and most of the Time they are blocked and cannot cast spell on time. Also sentries have to go in front of army which means they are focused fire almost instantly. I think that casting range should be increased to attack range of stalker: 5->6
- more later
|
Experimental Branch Changes
- Gas harvesting time increased by 10%. Workers 1 and 2 have their mining speed reduced by a small percentage. However, the third one is less efficient by about 30%. Total gas mining speed is at around -10% with 3 workers.
- Zealot build time / warpin cooldown: 28s -> 32s
- Stalker build time / warpin cooldown: 32s -> 36s
I do not know how to address the build-up of Chronoboost energy before the Cybernetics Core is available.
Ideally, you should be able to cast zero or one Chronoboost after CC is ready, not 4 of them. Otherwise, CC becomes too much of a power spike.
Options I see:
- Nexus should have no energy at all when the game starts, and it gets enabled only when Cybernetics Core is built.
But what should happen if CC is later destroyed?
- Add a new reserach at CC for Nexus to be able to have energy, or upgrade a Nexus with something that would have energy. That's the Starbow way. We want to avoid this for the sake of similarity to original Starcraft.
- Reduce Nexus energy speed or increase Chronoboost cost. But that will be a nerf!
- Reduce maximum Nexus energy down to 50. Consequnelty, Protoss will have to use the ability more regularly or be punished. Getting the first Cybernetics Core would enable only 2 chronoboosts instead of 4. The downside is that the cost of photon overcharge would have to be reduced to 50 as well.
Force Field got a substantial nerf because of the casting range and it is intended. You can still use it effectively to separate your army from your opponent, e.g. when fighting in melee or trying to retreat. However, it is much harder to separate the opponent army in half.
Still, a range of 5 makes Sentries viable against Roaches. Zerg must remain alert not get his roaches trapped in force-field, but it is much easier to avoid such trap.
With Zealot and Stalker buffs, the FF needs a nerf. At the same time, I believe, the guardian shield is a bit more practical and easier to use.
|
On August 21 2015 03:46 BlackLilium wrote:Experimental Branch Changes- Gas harvesting time increased by 10%. Workers 1 and 2 have their mining speed reduced by a small percentage. However, the third one is less efficient by about 30%. Total gas mining speed is at around -10% with 3 workers.
- Zealot build time / warpin cooldown: 28s -> 32s
- Stalker build time / warpin cooldown: 32s -> 36s
I do not know how to address the build-up of Chronoboost energy before the Cybernetics Core is available. Ideally, you should be able to cast zero or one Chronoboost after CC is ready, not 4 of them. Otherwise, CC becomes too much of a power spike. Options I see: - Nexus should have no energy at all when the game starts, and it gets enabled only when Cybernetics Core is built.
But what should happen if CC is later destroyed?
- Add a new reserach at CC for Nexus to be able to have energy, or upgrade a Nexus with something that would have energy. That's the Starbow way. We want to avoid this for the sake of similarity to original Starcraft.
- Reduce Nexus energy speed or increase Chronoboost cost. But that will be a nerf!
- Reduce maximum Nexus energy down to 50. Consequnelty, Protoss will have to use the ability more regularly or be punished. Getting the first Cybernetics Core would enable only 2 chronoboosts instead of 4. The downside is that the cost of photon overcharge would have to be reduced to 50 as well.
All changes look good imho.
What comes to chrono boost proposals it is hard to choose as all of them have pros and cons. I am more of a fan of first and second ideas as they do not change universal mechanics like speed of energy regenaration or the max energy on buildings. I always liked starbow idea as it is similar to Terran's CC -> OC upgrade and also Gateway -> Warpgate transformation for Protoss. However that solution quite heavily differs from original sc2 which SCI tries to avoid. 1st idea, maybe not that elegant as 2nd, seems nice and simple. I think that even if CC would be destroyed, nexus should be able to cast chrono boost and PO (not sure if it works like that currently).
Force Field got a substantial nerf because of the casting range and it is intended. You can still use it effectively to separate your army from your opponent, e.g. when fighting in melee or trying to retreat. However, it is much harder to separate the opponent army in half.
Still, a range of 5 makes Sentries viable against Roaches. Zerg must remain alert not get his roaches trapped in force-field, but it is much easier to avoid such trap.
With Zealot and Stalker buffs, the FF needs a nerf. At the same time, I believe, the guardian shield is a bit more practical and easier to use.
I agree about the nerf to FF. Against zerg range reduction is fine as roaches have attack range of only 3 and zerglings are melee. However against stalkers or marine/marauders which have 5-6 range sentries are auto focused by AI as they go in front of stalkers trying to cast FF. My short experience is that sentry dies trying to cast FF or just after casting which for really gas heavy unit is quite bad as they should be reusable.
Maybe I just need more practice but right now it is really hard to keep sentries alive especially against Terran that's why I suggested the increase in casting range by 1. It is still less than in sc2 (9 vs 6) and sentry has to be in front rank to cast FF BUT it is not gonna be focused fired automatically by AI however still it would allow for opponent to grab some units and focus sentry manually with a A-click on the unit.
Anyway that's just my feelings, it is hard to say if I'm right after all especially that change is rather minor
About Guardian shield:
I like it that it is casted on ground, works nicely I was thinking that maybe changing the radius to be smaller and energy cost decreased to 50 could be even more interesting as you could use spell a bit more frequently and also not always whole your army will be able to fit in 'the bubble' which would lead to some additional decisions, maybe?
Recall:
The MsC was removed and Photon overcharge moved to nexus. Time Warp wasn't a good ability so I'm not gonna miss it but Recall might actually be added to Nexus after upgrade on Cybernetics Core or Twilight Council or Fleet Beacon depending on how fast access to recall we want to give to Protoss (early/mid/late game).
I suggest Recall having small radius (FF like) and cost of 75 energy. That way You could recall only small portion of army instead of that massive Recalls of Deathballs from HotS. That may promote more skirmishes across the map.
|
On August 21 2015 05:37 egrimm wrote:Show nested quote +On August 21 2015 03:46 BlackLilium wrote:
Force Field got a substantial nerf because of the casting range and it is intended. You can still use it effectively to separate your army from your opponent, e.g. when fighting in melee or trying to retreat. However, it is much harder to separate the opponent army in half.
Still, a range of 5 makes Sentries viable against Roaches. Zerg must remain alert not get his roaches trapped in force-field, but it is much easier to avoid such trap.
With Zealot and Stalker buffs, the FF needs a nerf. At the same time, I believe, the guardian shield is a bit more practical and easier to use. I agree about the nerf to FF. Against zerg range reduction is fine as roaches have attack range of only 3 and zerglings are melee. However against stalkers or marine/marauders which have 5-6 range sentries are auto focused by AI as they go in front of stalkers trying to cast FF. My short experience is that sentry dies trying to cast FF or just after casting which for really gas heavy unit is quite bad as they should be reusable. Maybe I just need more practice but right now it is really hard to keep sentries alive especially against Terran that's why I suggested the increase in casting range by 1. It is still less than in sc2 (9 vs 6) and sentry has to be in front rank to cast FF BUT it is not gonna be focused fired automatically by AI however still it would allow for opponent to grab some units and focus sentry manually with a A-click on the unit. Anyway that's just my feelings, it is hard to say if I'm right after all especially that change is rather minor
I think it depends what you want to do with forcefields.
If you want to cast on enemy units, you will have to bring that sentry on the front and it will be hard to survive.
However, you can still cast FFs right in front of your own army, e.g. to block of melee or prepare for retreat.
Forcie fields become more situational spell, rather than good for all must-have ability.
On August 21 2015 05:37 egrimm wrote:
Recall:
The MsC was removed and Photon overcharge moved to nexus. Time Warp wasn't a good ability so I'm not gonna miss it but Recall might actually be added to Nexus after upgrade on Cybernetics Core or Twilight Council or Fleet Beacon depending on how fast access to recall we want to give to Protoss (early/mid/late game).
I suggest Recall having small radius (FF like) and cost of 75 energy. That way You could recall only small portion of army instead of that massive Recalls of Deathballs from HotS. That may promote more skirmishes across the map.
Both Time Warp and Mass Recall are available in the Mothership itself. You are not going to see these spells early game, but at later stages, when you go 4+ bases - why not?
In addition, Motherships can be massed, allowing - for example - Protoss to have not 1 but 2 armies with recall. I don't expect huge numbers of Motherships though, simply because of the price.
|
Are you still working on this?
|
Still playtesting, but given less feedback - probably due to major swings in LotV itself - I spend a bit less time now than before.
I am thinking that AA capability of Immortal should be removed. It does not really add much as the unit is slow anyway.
|
I go in the "SC Improved" chat channel every time I log on, but I've never seen anyone in there.
|
|
|
I fully agree that having a separate rank for arcade games and mods would bring a lot to the custom-mapping community! Thank you for giving the pointer to this petition
|
Experimental Branch Changes
- Chronoboost cost: 25 -> 50
- MULE cost: 50 -> 100
- Spawn Larvae cost: 25 -> 35
- Spawn Larvae duration: 40 -> 60
It is an overall nerf to all macro mechanics. I believe it is a good compromise between HotS and a completely removal of macro mechanics. This way - they are less impactful, but still present.. My hope is that these will still give the best players to show their skill and gain an edge, while at the same time being less punishing at lower league levels for someone being sloppy in this area. There are always other domains where skill can be shown!
The reason I don't want to completely remove macro mechanics is that their usage diversifies build orders. To you put more chrono on upgrades or units? To you delay your Orbital to get other stuff fast?
For the Zerg, the nerf is not as strong, which aligns what was suggested in LotV. To clarify:
- In LotV it was tested a complete removal of macro mechanics for Protoss and Terran (thus nerf by 100%), while Zerg was nerfed by 50%.
- The change I propose here, Protoss and Terran are nerfed by 50%, while Zerg is by 33%.
Last, but not least - it also solves the power spike problem with the Cybernetics Core we were facing
How do you feel about these?
|
I personally dont like it. I just dislike the macro mechanics in general.
Perhaps how about this:
MULE: Drops a regular SCV (no mineral costs, but costs supply) instead of a MULE. This is helpful, but definitely not overpowered.
Chrono: I actually like what blizzard did. It still gives access to strategic usage, is less powerful but easier to use.
Larva: I would really like a channeled ability that increases the larva spawn rate by 20% (or so) as long as the queen keeps channeling. The ability costs energy over time so that at some point the queen will run out and stop. This would remove the burst in production that leads to super fast tech switches (which are hard to counter and impossible to scout) it would remove the constant APM sink but it would still give a nice benefit. It would also encourage more macro hatcheries and thus more structures being build by zerg => more "active" macro.
|
Keep in mind that previous changes to SCI macro mechanics are still in effect. In particular, in case of Spawn Larvae, it is still on autocast, but cannot be casted on a hatchery having more than 3 larvae. The rhythm of sudden larva count increase is unique to Zerg and I believe it should remain. At the same time, sudden tech switches are limited to 7 larvae per Hatchery which already encourages more macro hatcheries, as well as spending those extra larvae as soon as they pop (mimicing similar requirement when not queueing units in other races' production facilities)
If you think it is still a concern, we could - for example - revert the Spawn Larvae costs, but make them spawn 3 larvae instead of 4, effectively capping their count to 6 per hatchery.
Blizzard removed energy cost on Chronoboost. In the SCI setting this removes energy tension between it and Photon Overcharge - which is also casted from the Nexus. For balance reasons, Blizzard also removed energy cost from MULE, removing energy tension against supply drops and scan.
I would prefer to avoid the removal of this tension, as it removes active decision making.
|
Has anything interesting happened lately? Were you able to test your mod?
|
Testing? Yes.
Something interesting? Not really.
I think I will remove the AA from Immortal, push it to Master branch and then continue with further itching tweaks on the list...
|
Is the stalker really not "armored" and the immortal really shooting air? What comp could possibly stop a death ball of Stalker/Immortal? That would trade efficiently against every last in game composition.
|
How are you doing in terms of numbers of test players? I am really curious to hear how many people show interest in mods like these.
|
On October 09 2015 02:42 CannonsNCarriers wrote:
Is the stalker really not "armored" and the immortal really shooting air? What comp could possibly stop a death ball of Stalker/Immortal? That would trade efficiently against every last in game composition.
First of all, Stalker/Immortal does not scale well in numbers due to bulkyness of the units. How many Stalkers can you squeeze in a given region - compare that to, say:
- marines
- roach/hydra
- stalker+colossus+void ray (those are bigger units, but can overlap very well)
Immortal is going to lose its AA very soon. I acknowledge that it was a bad decission which has to be reverted.
As such, Stalker-Immortal shouldn't be hard to outdps - at least on paper. Ultimately, with the changes new compositions and responses have to be found - something that games will answer better than theorycrafting. And - if given combination is proven to be too strong - we will adjust.
|
On October 10 2015 05:37 RoomOfMush wrote:
How are you doing in terms of numbers of test players? I am really curious to hear how many people show interest in mods like these.
Not very well. Only few of us are there
|
On October 11 2015 17:04 BlackLilium wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2015 05:37 RoomOfMush wrote:
How are you doing in terms of numbers of test players? I am really curious to hear how many people show interest in mods like these. Not very well. Only few of us are there
Thats a bummer. Is it consistent though? I wonder how TheDwf is doing.
I am still thinking all the people who want a custom mod should come together. There is just too few players out there for all the mods.
|
On October 11 2015 19:54 RoomOfMush wrote:
I am still thinking all the people who want a custom mod should come together. There is just too few players out there for all the mods.
I think a better advertisement, or maybe even a platform for custom SC2 games would help.
But that is kind of a job I have no idea how to do successfully...
|
This seems interesting. I should check this out when I have the chance, and try out the changes. So until then, I don't want to be too quick to judge on the changes. Also, I have read a few of the pages so far, but planning to read them.
So until I can try this out, I still want to comment on ome of the Blanace Changes, and probably question some of the intended design choices (Note, I only focus on the Protoss since that's the race I genearlly play).
1) Why are you guys introducing the Charging mechanic on the Void Ray? Unless you guys intend to make a Void Ray not part of any main army, the Charge mechanic is counter-intuitive to having more units assisting the Void Ray, making Void Ray worster the army grows.
2) You wrote:
We are looking for ways to make a Warpgate a choice rather than a must-have, at least in the early-to-mid stages of the game.
I purpose a different alternative for the issue for 'Morphing into Warpgate', and 'Photon Overcharge'. You remove the research require to acquire them from the Cybernatic Core, and make 'Morphing into Warpgate' tied to the Nexus energy (it no longer cost extra minerals).
This way, you now force Protoss player to diverge their build into 2 main focus, early warpgate power or faster tech expansion, while Photo Overcharge just becomes a last ditch defense. Say, something like Chrono= 50 energy, Warpgate=75 energy, PO=100 energy. (While I'm at it, increase Nexus starting energy to 25 and maximum to 200) Just a suggestion.
3) Why is the Stalker getting their armor tagged removed? I am for making the Gateway units better, but I more into having a more diverse gateway composition during the early game and would perfer seeing Zealots being also a more viable choice. And I'm not ignoring the +10 shield to Zealot. I just don't personally like the direction since in-battle, Zealots are great against most early game units already.
4) I would comment about the Immortal, but I see above that you are already changing that so I have no important comment. So I'll just ask, what was the reason why you gave the Immortal the ability to attack Air? (I'm not really against giving Protoss better anti-air from the ground)
5) I actually have a radical balance change for most of the Massive units and was still wondering if you guys were still in the stage of wiling to make such a change.
I would comment more, like the MSC(I would actually like to see the MSC stay though admit it's role needs to change), and but I sort of need to test out the mod.
|
Thank you for your comments Clear World. Let me answer it in the sequence.
- "Why are you guys introducing the Charging mechanic on the Void Ray? Unless you guys intend to make a Void Ray not part of any main army, the Charge mechanic is counter-intuitive to having more units assisting the Void Ray, making Void Ray worster the army grows."
Let me answer this one in steps.
- Why chaniging VR at all?
Void Ray is decent against all kind of threats, akin to a core unit. As it was pointed by RoomOfMush - it is a bad design and no other air unit has this property. The reason for that is that air units can stack up, which - in the case of VR - can become a mobile deathball which is hard to deal with. In the pursuit of better air micro we also introduced dynamic air separation which allows even more stacking of units, making VR potentially even stronger. The only real counter to such scenario is mobile AA with splash - a combination which is hard to find. LotV are introducing more splash AA, (e.g. the new Viper ability) but that is a hardcountery solution to the problem.
However, we don't want to completely change the roles of the units. Void Ray should stay similar to what was before. That is why I believe the solution is to reduce the scalability to Void Ray.
- Why changing charging ability?
In WoL uninterruptable charging lead to gimmicky use where you fired on rocks or even your own units to charge up and then unleash the power on unsuspecting enemy. It also allowed VR to deal with mass small units efficiently. HotS introduced a simple and uninteresting buff button of "do moar damage" kind.
- So finally: why interruptible charging?
- It stick close to the original idea of WoL - something most players should be familiar with.
- Charging up reduces scalability: having a second VR targetting the same unit will not reduce TTK by 50%. This is most apparent against small and medium units.
- Interruption prevents VRs from being effective against a mass of small units (e.g. marines, zerglings)
- By manually assigning beefy targets for your VRs you have a chance to increase your effective DPS. As such it promotes ability-less kind of micro.
Ultimately, I hope to see a few VRs in small armies, or even lone VR harassment, but not a mass of units that add up to a Protoss deathball.
Regarding the charging being unintuitive - yes, it may be a bit surprising. Fortunately the necessary animation is already there to provide visual feedback. We also changd the code a bit so that the increased damage output is actually visible in the stats when you click on the unit - something that was absent even in WoL. Now, what are the consequences of such mechanic and how to use VR efficiently - that is something players will have to figure out on their own - we shouldn't force upon players the one true and only way of playing the game Maybe there will be other uses that we simply don't see now.
- "I purpose a different alternative for the issue for 'Morphing into Warpgate', and 'Photon Overcharge'. You remove the research require to acquire them from the Cybernatic Core, and make 'Morphing into Warpgate' tied to the Nexus energy (it no longer cost extra minerals). [...]"
The divergence between fast Warpgate and fast Tech/Expansion is already happening due to mineral pressure. It also gives a substantion defender's advantage during 4-gate scenario (the aggressor has 400 less minerals).
I fear your solution would introduce less difference between those two paths. On the other hand, it could be an interesting tool to increase the energy tension on the Nexus.
Still, at this point I would prefer to stick to the present solution and revisit yours only if the current is proven to be broken beyond repair.
Otherwise we will end up circling around the same design problems over and over and never moving forward.
- "Why is the Stalker getting their armor tagged removed? I am for making the Gateway units better, but I more into having a more diverse gateway composition during the early game and would prefer seeing Zealots being also a more viable choice. And I'm not ignoring the +10 shield to Zealot. I just don't personally like the direction since in-battle, Zealots are great against most early game units already."
I am a bit confused here. You initially ask about Stalker change and finish that Zealots are great against early game units already. Or did you mean to say that Stalkers are great against most early game units already?
Let's start with Zealots: In low numbers, Zealots are pretty weak, especially in PvT since they can be microed to death. Only when forciefields comes to play things change. But we significantly reduced the FF cast range and it is now hard to put them behind enemy marines. FF is now more a tool to separate yourself from the enemy, rather than splitting enemy ball in half. But when you split yourself - zealots become completely useless. This applies to other ranged early game units, such as Roaches and Stalkers.
With the Stalker removal of Armored flag: we were looking for a way to buff the unit without altering its actual hard stats much. We decided on reducing the damage point promoting its mobility, and removing "Armored" flag - aligning to the concept of a light/mobile Stalker. The removal of the flag allows the unit to be a bit more versatile and harder to hardcounter (we don't like hardcounters in general). Most prominently, it helps Stalkers when facing Marauders. In LotV, Marauder got its damage output nerfed, here we change the Stalker instead.
If you meant to comment that it is Stalkers which are already good early game - the armor flag does not change early game much. It is actually affecting it less than if a Stalker was changed stat-wise.
Damage point is much more influential in small battles.
Now that I am thinking about it... Maybe we could reduce Stalker damage output, but increase the bonus it gets from the upgrades?
- "So I'll just ask, what was the reason why you gave the Immortal the ability to attack Air? (I'm not really against giving Protoss better anti-air from the ground)"
You answered it yourself We are trying to promote ground-to-air and nerf air-to-air. Zerg got Hydra supply cost reduced (effectively to 1.5), Terran got simpler Thor AA with wider splash and higher range, and Protoss - in order to avoid another Stalker buff - we tried adding AA to Immortal. Having such high anti-armor damage hitting air from a healthy unit is not good though. We may need to find another solution.
We also removed high-regen on Mutalisks (something that not everyone is happy about), which was severely reducing the viability of ground-based AA.
- "I actually have a radical balance change for most of the Massive units and was still wondering if you guys were still in the stage of wiling to make such a change."
You mean: a general change of what "Massive" flag does, or a set of individual changes to big units?
Do voice your ideas. I will add that to the TODO list and we can have a look at the right time. I just want to keep some order in the discussion and avoid discussing everything at the same time.
I am looking forward to your MSC idea as well. If you check my initial posts, I was hoping to keep MSCs in-game. I still like the idea of having chronoboost on it instead of Nexus, but massing MSC early game was actually gamebreaking due to lack of proper AA response. However I am open to other, completely different ideas for MSC.
|
So I tried about 3 games so far, and 1 unit tester, and finally read all 11 pages. Don't know everything, but have a better grash of it all, compare to yesterday.
1) I agree with RoomofMush's point. I understand your reasoning and purpose and have nothing against it. My problem with the mechanic is, "What purpose is the Void Ray supposed to serve now?" It's current design doesnt really lean itself to be useful much else other than a high DPS unit, but the charge mechanic makes it bad for rather large battles.
In a few games testing with my friend, I found it constantly having to recharge annoying and it kept failing to take out the vikings or the battlecrusier before the vikings took them out.
Base on just testing on Unit tester (based on supply):
1 Void Ray loses to: 2 Vikings, 1 Battlecrusier, 2 Phoenxis, 1 Carrier.
1 Void Ray barely beats 2 corruptors. (ended with less than 25 health out of the 10 tries)
1 Void Ray beats 2 Mutalisk (base on your current numbers to Hots version, I say you made the Void Ray better against Non-armor units and worst against armor units)
This only gets worst for the VR when army size increases over the course of a game. The VR and their target needs to surive for like 3-5 seconds, which is asking a lot when more units are fighting at once. Let's also not forget the fact, focus firing is better than spreading out single target damage.
Now, if the main purpose of the VR was to be like a harassment tool, or to be use outside of army clashing, than I would see the Charging mechanic as a good method to gate the VR outside of battles. But you're not going that direction.
I'm not trying to hate on the idea and I like your intend, but this does not stop the enemy from making large death balls themselves. This in turn means, the VR either fights in large groups battles, making their mirco pointless since too many units are dying, or die due to being overwhelmed from numbers. So do you balance for the assumption of being able to get fully charge or not, because in one case, it can be too strong, but another, too weak.
Personally, if I was allowed to make any balance changes I deem fit, the VR would be the only unit I remove from the game, due to:
* Protoss has like 3 more units compared to the Zerg and Terran race
* VR provide the least amount different gameplay or stragetic value compared to Protoss other Air units
** VR are slow, average range, basically a single target channel attack, and has like zero form of mirco on them without major addtions.
** Almost any balance issue can be sloved by changing Tempests (a lot of changes) to fill the VR role if they are removed.
2) I raise this alternative of Nexus and Warpgate because:
* I feel weird having Nexus that has energy, but unable to do anything with it until I make a Cybernetic Core.
* What is your intended purpose of PhotoOvercharge? Is it supposed to be an important form of defense or like a last restort form of defense. Because of its closer to the latter, making people have to reseach an ability that they shouldn't be using often seem like poor design.
* I just find it weird how you have to research Warpgate at Cybernetic Core, and then still have to pay extra minerals to warp the actual gateway to a warpgate. So, I attempted to simplfied the step. Cut out the research and change the minerals to energy (and the energy would now act as the delaying tactic).
** This is attempting to follow the Transporting Overlord change in LotV beta. Allowing a few Warpgate to appear at a time instead all at once, but stopping the 4/7/8gate timing all-in as energy doesn't generate fast enough,
* This remove both upgrades from the Cybernatic Core and requirement of CyberCore, something I just see as nothing more but delaying tactics.
That's just my thought on that matter, though, seeing your reply, I doubt we'll ever come back to this. I don't see your current form as broken, but simply, a few unnecessary requirements/steps.
3) Let me try to clarify. I want diversity for the Protoss early game. I want to see Zealot be use as well, instead of Stalker heavy usage.
The armor tag removal. This affects way more than just marauders. The Siege tank and immortal also now rather meh against the Stalker, or possibly pointless when considering blink play. But really, I think Stalkers make a horrible core units, only being used because there is no other option.
The Stalker can't trade efficently against any of the units (i.e, zealots, marine, marauder, zergling, roaches, hydralisk). Because of this, Player's have to play a defensive-poke style with Stalkers, preventing enemies from getting off too many hits or abe to kill a single Stalker with good blink play. To me and I know someone else already brought this up. The Stalker seems best suited for being an anti-harass/air unit and harass unit themselves. Their high movement and blink is best suited for that role, though not exclusive to that 1 role.
I bring up the Zealot, claiming they are actual great "IN-BATTLE" against other units, not that they're actually good early units. With zero mirco, they trade between evenly to cost-efficent against Marines, Marauders, Zerglings, Roaches, Hydralisk, and would destory Stalkers. But because of mirco, kiting, clumping up, cliffs, or walls, The Zealot is almost useless.
That's why I suggest you move Charge to be at the Cybernetic Core. You allow Zealots to actualy reach their target. You do this, and the Zealot's early game will shine, covering a lot of Protoss early game issues but not all. With another bright side of being, Charge doesn't make Zealot's oppressive power of all-in better since actual in-battle stats doesn't increase (*cough, like the shield increase). Also, base on the range reduction to ForceFields, I fail to make it useful for Zealots without having my sentry be killed.
4) So why not choose the Stalker for this anti-air role? Though, I make this suggestion with assumption of nerfs to the Stalker in other areas.
5) I don't really want to go into details because it would require massive amount of changes, so the general. Increase Massive unit's supply, reduce their cost and maybe their build time, and remove the armor type from the massive units. It would require a ton of balance changes, so doing this now would be rather time consuming so... so I second guess my own idea.
Lastly, about the MSC, I'm not in the same realm as you. Unlike a lot of people, I don't personally see an issue with being a 'Hero' unit. I think the concept could work. It just can't be an unit that the Protoss really depends on nor a unit useful in battle, but rather a unit that just provides another option.
|
First of all I would like to thank you for taking your time reading and testing stuff as well as writing this highly constructive feedback!
Void Rays
I think this requires a separate discussion. I am adding this to the TODO list.
Maybe directing VR towards harassment/outside-of-army unit is the way to go indeed. I agree that as a capital-target sniping tool Tempests seems as a better candidate.
Nexus energy
The fact that you have an energy that cannot be used on the Nexus is a side-effect of a combination:
- We want to delay access to chronoboost
- We don't want an upgrade on the Nexus
- Giving energy to the Nexus only when Cybernetics is available becomes a problem when the said Cybernetics gets destroyed at a later stage of the game.
We could add some additional ability without a tech, but I would prefer avoiding adding completely new abilities.
Photon Overcharge Role
You bring a valid point about a research of an ability that should be avoided in the first place. Let us revisit that - adding to the TODO list.
Warpgate research
"This remove both upgrades from the Cybernatic Core and requirement of CyberCore, something I just see as nothing more but delaying tactics."
Nearly all research is about delaying. Extended thermal lance is a must-have tech if you go Colossus, and all it does is delay and soak resources. Same goes for Storm if teching Templar (and not going immediate Archon), zergling speed, stim, etc...
As such I don't think it is a bad thing.
The current change significantly increase the cost of obtaining warpgate, and at the same time removes the build-time penality for not having it. As such we hope to see games when Protoss chooses to research it at much later stage (after nat or even 3-rd taken) and reduce the annoying search of those pesky hidden pylons in the early game.
Your approach actually seepds up the time when warpgate is possible at a mild cost of not using chronoboost. I fear this may push the Protoss game way into the 1-base all-in area.
Zealots
Those are really hard units to balance. In one scenario they are useless, in another are very good and hard to deal with.
Zealot speed and charge is problematic on the receiver's side, because once the Zealot "glues" to your unit, it is hard to "unglue". We already have Terrans complaining about charge late game, and not without a reason.
I fear moving charge to Cybernetics would make it too easy and too early accessible.
I am adding Zealot to the TODO list in order to expand this topic later on, but I don't see any good solutions at the moment.
Stalker as an AA
Stalker has the same type of attack versus ground as versus air. As such se shouldn't diversify its damage output. AA units need to stay mobile or have a very nice range. Finding a good buff/nerf combination to strengthen AA and weaken other areas may be challenging.
|
I'm glad you like my feedback. I'll try to keep this dicussion more focused only on the early game of the Protoss for now, considering that the Void Ray more or less just depend on what role you want it to serve. And I know you already talk at lenght on Gateway units earlier, though, I really want to add my input as well since I do have more suggestions and I'm not sure if you're final with your thoughts.
Personally, I don't see why we shouldn't attempt to make the lesser used Gateway units scale better as the game progresses, so it's not just all Stalkers production for most of the game.
Nexus / Warping In / Timing Attacks
I read that you want their to be energy tension, but realistically, there is no energy tension. The better a player is, that person is more likly to lean away from considering using PhotoOvercharge. There is no offensive or aggressive usage with that ability (unless you count proxy nexus). Just a pure defensive use, unlike Scan which can be use offensivily.
I know where you guys are coming from, wanting to delay these All-in pushes. Though I wonder why not much thoughts were put in actually targting the actual act of warping-in. I think you breifly mentioned it but it sort of just never got brought up again.
I know Warpgate issues don't just consist of timing attacks. I know people find them hard to balance for the late game as well, when Protoss can instantly reinforced right during a big battle, which is a huge factor to the Snowball that eventually leads to the All-In situations. And a slight swap in Gateway and Warpgate build times doesn't really affect this. If it's an all-in situation, Warpgate is still better in both the defensive and offensive side. Warpgate is frontloaded in production +no travel time while Gateway is backloaded. You would have to survive around 5-6 rounds of warp-in before Gateway production rate would bring net gains over Warpgate production rate.
Let alone, the whole, 'warp-gate negate defender's advantage'.
No devs' solution to this? As in, warp-in duration being changed. Or something else?
Gateway Units - Zealot
Not to sound like I'm nitpicking, but citing a late game issue and while giving a +10 extra shield seems to also make the late game issue worst. Part of the issue of the 'glue' issue is that a person doesn't feel like they can fight head on, and I make this assumption because this issue doesn't seem to arise for the Zergling who is far better at sticking to targets than Zealots.
You say the Zealot is a hard unit to balance, but keeping Zealot's unable to actually reach their enemy will only enforce this binary balance. Now, this doesn't mean that Charge has to stay at its strenght. For example, I like your change to Charge already, and if Charge itself is too strong early on, there is a lot of room to nerf Charge. (i.e, like cooldown, or duration)
Actually, I know someone already did a bunch of test and posted the result with the Zealot with 60 shield, and if you look at the resources lost for both side, you will see that the Zealot side is clearly winning the resource battle by landslides. I don't think that wouldn't be idea balance for you.
Second, I have done a lot of tests with the Zealot in combat with other units. The Zealot are not really stronger against any early game unit. Charge doesn't really affect this. Assumign roughly equal supply, somewhere close to equal research, and zero mirco. Zealots:
- Break even in terms of cost against: Marines, Zerglings, Roaches.
- Can beat: Marauder, Stalker, Hydralisk (assuming Hydralisk don't have meat shields)
With Mirco, the result shifts away from Zealots The biggest balance issue I foresee would actually be Zerg combating Zealots, since Charge Zealots are no better in battle against regular Zealots (sadly, MSC doesn't exist in this mod), and Terran have widow mines, hellbat, medivac, and can wall in.
Third, melee units can't attack over walls, cliffs, suffers more in tight spaces, and naturally scales worst as the game progresses. As units clump up, the surface area to attack becomes worst, let alone the amount of splash damage that gets added. In other words, Zealots get worst as the game progresses, compounded by the fact they aren't even that good to begin with.
And to my final rebuttal, that's the point of moving Charge to Cybernetic Core. It's supposed to be fast & easy to access. Ideally, it's supposed to come out the same period when Marine and Zergling upgrade hits. The issue with keeping Charge at Twilight Coucil is that it competes with Blink, and Blink is really the better ability, and Stalkers with their range, able to attack air, and mobility are way better for the mid to late game. Meaning, Charge tends to come out very late in the game.
Finally, I'm still trying to figure out how to code it so you can use Zealot's Charge at targeted locations and ally units, while still maintainning the auto-cast against enemy units. Versitlity would definity help the Zealot. :p
Gateway Units - Stalker
Actually, why can't you split the ground and air attack? It's not flawed designed by any means and doesn't require any more knowledge compared to changing the Stalker's damage output.
Gateway Units - Sentry
Forcefield
I actually don't find your change to Forcefield good. It's makes the usablity of it worst, making it more just for defensive use, while still keeping most of the 'oftened-disliked' situations at roughly the same power. Would it be possible to do a different change, more following what Edyworth suggested quiet a few times before in other threads: Reduce Forcefield duration to 5 seconds from 15.
This would weaken more of its unliked features (endless walls that opponent's can't pass), while still making it somewhat useful by trapping enemies for a short period.
Guardian Shield
I say, you should amp this ability up to eleven. You should make it Reduce ALL incoming damage by 50% when in the bubble. That was not a typo.
This change plus your current change, this ability would become a siege breaking tool, or a final defense bubbe. Too many spine crawlers, Guardian Shield. Too many Siege Tanks, Guardian Shield. Too many Carriers, Guardian Shield. Basically a Dark Swarm, but for Protoss.
Of course, nerfs will have to come along, Like, reduce the bubble radius to 3.25, reduce the duration to 6 seconds, increase energy cost to 125, and require research at the Twilight Council. ... Maybe I'm going too far with this, but a change like this would definity allow the Sentry to serve a purpose in the late game.
Hallunication
I know someone suggested this already, reduce the cost to 75 energy. Hallunication could fill Guardian Shield current role. Absorbing damage, though now this include melee units & with the added benefit of still able to scout with hallunication. It's just so much more useful than current Guardian Shield.
---------------------------------------------------------
Well, those are my suggestions and thoughts on how to improve the Gateway units and make them useful. The Zealots could use a late game upgrade if their late game is really bad. Though if i was to go through with a Stalker ground attack damage nerf, the immortal would become more important to being a very well-rounded ground unit.
|
Experimental Branch Changes
- Immortal cannot shoot air again (tooltip may be wrong about it)
- Halluciation cost: 100 -> 75
- Forcefield duration: 15s -> 8s (Edyworth suggestion)
I feel that nerf to 5s forcefield may be too much, but reduced it to 8 from 15.
"while still keeping most of the 'oftened-disliked' situations at roughly the same power"
What exactly is the "often-disliked" situation? My understanding was that biggest problem is the splitting of enemy army, trapping half of your forces on the wrong side. This is now much harder to pull off.
Note, I am ignoring further discussion about Zealots and Stalkers at the moment. We will get to that topic in due time... It is a bigger design change.
|
Merging of Balance and Economy components
A rather technical change:
A new Experimental version of Starcraft Improved has been published, merging changes coming from Balance and Economy parts. The reason for that is that certain abilities and units affect both aspects, but can be reliably edited only in one file.
Hopefully I didn't break anything horribly by doing it so.
I had to perform the merging manually using XML files. The newly released merging tools failed me
In the next few days (probably just tomorrow) I will make a general pass over all changes made; make sure nothing is missed or invalid, and publish all changes to Stable and Master branches (finally!).
Afterwards I hope to resume working over the TODO list.
|
A few things I noticed while playing 2 more games of this mod:
Animation:
- The Immortal performs 1 attack animation, that deals damage, than another rapid attack right afterwards that does nothing. So animation error.
- The new Colossus attack animation is really unproductive. Why did you make it start at 3 range for any attack? It visually has no reason to be starting at 3 range if the target is like 8 range away. I assume you're doing this for 'mirco' potential, but this literally makes the Colossus bad against any moving target and also ruins any good 'mirco' potential for the Colossus itself when it already consist of so little. The Colossus attack animation is pretty long, so you really can't move the Colossus in the middle of an attack if you hope to deal damage, also meaning, you can't even move if the opponent is moving back. I suggest you make it so that the Colossus can at least hit its target the majority of the time, while the AoE can be dodged.
- To add on the Colossus's attack animation. When attacking an Ultralisk or Thor, the damage occurred only once, dealing 15 instead of 30.
Balance concern:
- Viking beats every Protoss air unit in the game now that Phoenix attack period went up.
|
Thanks for the feedback!
- Immortal: this may be caused by the Immortal having 2 guns, where one is a dummy allowing the unit to keep the turret aim at the opponent while moving. This is a walkaround to an engine deficiency.
- Colossus is intended to be bad against single targets. A good micro is not necessairly something you do during the attack animation, but before the attack. Colossus excels (or at least: should excel) when hitting at flank towards already established front. It also promotes moving Colossus closer to the battle, rather than shooting at its maximum range. This exposes the colossus more to ground forces (higher risk), but allows the unit to fry more targets in one shot (higher reward).
It will require some practice from the Colossus user though in order to use it efficiently!
We could speed up the attack animation, but that will decrease a chance for the opponent to dodge the shot. We could also simply buff the damage output if that is necessary.
- If a single unit is hit by two beams, it should do double damage. This however happens only towards the units which are in between the beams. If, in that scenario, thor is hit only once - that will require fixing!
|
All changes are now moved to the Master Branch. If you search for a mod "SC Improved" without any suffix (Stable/Experimental) - that will be the Master in the state that it is now. The Master changes infrequently so it will stay like this for some time.
I also rewrote all the changes, without splitting between Economy/Micro/Balance because those interact and sometimes it is unclear in which section it should fall.
Let us now take an item from the TODO list... I will skip the Hellion vs Melee for a bit later, as it is a minor thing (I think). So:
Tank as a space-controlling unit
It's intended role is a slow, area-denial unit. Unfortunately, it can't really hold on its own. On the other hand, the unit is slow and would be good to be able to leave it in a key position to - at least - slow the enemy a bit.
In LotV they add aditional mobility by allowing a tank to be loaded into a medivac while it is sieged. In my opinion this just leads to a gimmicky play. Fun, but gimmicky. It does not help the tank to be an area-of-denial unit in any way. It just helps an annoying harassment a bit.
So what could we do?
During the course of this thread I have seen some suggestions already:
On July 08 2015 16:20 RoomOfMush wrote:
I would also recommend giving each race some strong positional units that can hold the ground, like Siege Tanks, Lurkers, Reavers from BW. These units can be positioned at an expansion to defend it cost efficiently against much larger forces of enemies. At the same time these units are not imbalanced because they need to be set up to be used.
On July 04 2015 16:35 RoomOfMush wrote:
1) Buff the damage
2) Buff the splash
3) Make the Weapon Cooldown longer
4) Make the Siege / Unsiege time longer
On July 06 2015 02:22 xPrimuSx wrote:
I also wanted to throw out a random suggestion when it comes to damage modifiers, all the ones in the game are X +Y, but what about X -Y? Having a unit that deals bonus damage to everything but a certain type of unit allows for a bit more flexibility in constructing matchups. I know we are tabling the discussion on Siege Tanks for right now, but I think that is a unit that would benefit from this as you can make it deal more damage to everything but light (for instance) to have its damage be high against everything, without having it absolutely murder light units.
On July 14 2015 09:15 LastWish wrote:
* Siege Tank Siege Mode
- buff single target damage to +20(the splash remains the same)
- also I like the reduced supply cost you mentioned
Also, Clear Word mentions that:
On October 13 2015 06:13 Clear World wrote:
The armor tag removal [of Stalker]. This affects way more than just marauders. The Siege tank and immortal also now rather meh against the Stalker, or possibly pointless when considering blink play.
Combining all those comments of yours leads me to the following suggestion
- In old WoL patch 1.1.0 in 2010 Siege Tanks were nerfed. Damage was reduced from 50 down to 35 + 15 vs Armored. Let us revisit it as: Damage = 50 -15 vs Light.
This would make Siege Tanks a threat to a wider array of units, not only those which are armored (Stalker (after our change), Archon, Ghost, Baneling). However, popular light units such as zerglings, marines, zealots would remain intact.
- Maybe buff the damage further a bit? 60 perhaps?
- Reduce speed: 2.25 -> 2 and/or increase sieging time 4s -> 5s. This makes the tank a bit harder to use, encouraging more the leapfrogging tactic rather than siege/unsiege everything.
- Reduce supply cost 6 -> 5 (effectively 3 -> 2.5)
- Reintroduce Siege Tank upgrade that was removed in HotS beta balance update #1 (January 2013). The extra firepower should not be available too early.
However, if you disagree or have a different idea for a Tank - share your thoughts!
We will also need to change the Immortal a bit to be less hard-countery against Tanks. I would love to see Tanks viable in TvP...
|
More damage to Archon Ghost Baneling. and...... ?
Many nerfs to mobility, and not much buff. That's a joke!
If you nerf mobility why not just go flat 50? Or even 50+10?
|
The proper way to balance Siege Tanks is to increase the cost efficiency while at the same time give the opponent much stronger tools at breaking down a turtling mech player over time. Note that the strong tools of the opponent must be something that the mech player has to counter by reacting to it.
He shouldn't be able to counter it by preventing it from happening in the first place. For instance Ravens/Vikings/mass turret-line, often prevents any type of army trading/aggression against a mech player. Instead it should be possible to attack into a location and the mech player should be able to reacquire that location by repositioning his siege tanks.
In order for that dynamic to work, the mech player must be on multiple bases. When on 2-3 bases, defensive mech is always gonna be lame though and your best bet is to make harass play strong for both players in order to incentivze aggression.
Increasing siege time, is not a good idea as it doesn't solve the "I can't break my opponent" turtle issue on 2-3 bases, but just makes any type of aggressive mech play worse + is a significant nerf to the repositioning part of meching.
So these are a couple of changes you could do:
- Buff the damage of the siege tank
- Buff overlord drops
- Get rid of Vikings as an anti-drop unit
- Give protoss more tools as well to slowly break mech
- Make a mech player takes bases a ton faster while minimizing the snowball effect. That can be accomplished by implementing a LOTV economy with a higher income rate.
- DH economy is pointless with 400 supply cap (higher supply cap accomplishes the same advantage as DH). Relative to LOTV economy it only serves to delay the time until a meching terran needs to defend 4 bases at once.
|
I like to say, my comment appereantly is being used for something that I'm not advocating for at all. I don't even like that my comment is being mentioned in tangent with these suggestions.
I mean, I actually like the ability of Medivac being able to pick up Siege Tank while in Siege Mode (I don't understand why it wasn't like that to begin with), though dropping them back in Siege Mode is something I'm against. Though, calling it gimmicky seems wrong. What exactly about dropping Tanks already in Siege Mode gimmicky? What about the fact that they can harass, poke, & make lead froging quicker gimmicky?
But to my actual feedback:
[*I thought this mod was more about 'improving' units & SC over attempting to rework them into 'roles' that a person wants. So how forcing Siege Tanks more into a 'positional' unit make the gameplay better? Don't just consider the genearl usage, but also consider the extreme cases (i.e, what if a player is to Mass Siege Tanks? Would that bring fun gameplay for both the player and opponent).
- Tanks are already predominantly used in TvT & TvZ, and they are affective in their general role in those match-ups. So what's with these changes. Why are you changing them?
- Considering that Siege Tanks are underperforming in TvP, why not just consider other possible ventures to improve the Siege Tank and Mech as a whole in that match-up, without making it oppessive in the other match-up (oppessive in being the opponent feeling like they lack an option to deal with Siege Tank).
- Wasn't part of the leap-froging possible when the Terran was able to 'protect' the Siege Tank when they were unsiegeing and repositioning themselves. Isn't the lack of properly able to protect the Siege Tank a problem as well.
- If you do intend to make them fill the role of area-denial unit, what options do your opponent have to deal with the Siege Tank. You have to consider ways for your opponent to deal with the Siege Tank as well.
|
Hider, I have a feeling that you misunderstood the supply in SCI. We didn't increase the supply cap. Yes, the number is now 400 but all supply costs and contributions are doubled as well. This was to remove the 0.5 supply issue and not a way to change the effective number of units and workers on the battlefield. As such DH/HMH economy is relevant.
The primary tool of handing a turtling player is map control. DH already penalizes turtling as we have seen in the showmatches. HMH is even a bit stronger at it. Tank player needs to keep expanding and defending its assets in order to say even. Tank players also have to think about their own harassment (yay, action!), to keep the expanding player in check.
I hope to encourage terrans to spread their tanks more, putting them in the key positions before fights happen.
If that is achieved, each single spot of the fortification should be a bit weaker and easier to push into.
Even if the fight does not end up cost-efficient for the attacker, he probably has more bases to compensate for that.
What I would like to avoid - on the other hand - is spamming tanks in one spot, moving them in bulk and then deploying them in bulk. That's why I am considering increasing their raw power and reduce their speed. If you end up being caught in transit, you should be in a really, really bad situation.
If you think the proposed changes are too big of a nerf for offensive play - do you think that keeping original speed but keeping the siege time increased would be a good compromise, achieving both goals at the same time (offensive play vs more throught when and where you siege up)?
Tanks are already predominantly used in TvT & TvZ, and they are affective in their general role in those match-ups. So what's with these changes. Why are you changing them?
It is an important question. Reasons are two-fold:
- Correct me if I am wrong, but the amount of tank play in TvZ is much lower than in the past. Tanks are nonexistent in TvP. We would like to make them appear more, even if the dominant terran strategy is not mech (e.g. bio with few defensive tanks)
- Secondly, tanks naturally promote more positional play with clear fronts - something that Starcraft II could benefit from.
Some tool to break boring TvT tank stalemate will be required - I agree with your concern in that aspect.
Ultimately, I want to stress it: I don't want to make a tank outright better. I am looking for a buff/nerf combination that would make tanks better fit their role: as a relevant space controlling unit. Space controlling - it means: you deploy a few at a spot and you are done - the opponent no longer can push it with a small force.
Clear World, I mention you in the context of Tank-Stalker interaction. It is not an argument for or against anything else. As such I am somewhat puzzled that you dislike that I mentioned it.
------
Let me iterate over this:
- Buff the damage of the siege tank
- Buff overlord drops
- Get rid of Vikings as an anti-drop unit
- Give protoss more tools as well to slowly break mech
- Make a mech player takes bases a ton faster while minimizing the snowball effect. That can be accomplished by implementing a LOTV economy with a higher income rate.
- Damage of the siege tank: that is already suggested. BrokenSegment suggests it could be even more? or?
- Overlord drops: I think the LotV is a good change that we could implement. However, I am not sure if it would matter in a late-game when you might want to use overlords en-mass. More armor to dropable overlords?
- Vikings: they got a range nerf already, but ultimately remain as an AA unit. I don't see a way to make vikings remain AA and not be an anti-drop unit. Any ideas that won't make Viking complete trash?
- I don't think armor is a problem for Protoss at the moment... or?
- We shouldn't make people do stuff. They want to turtle on 3 bases? That should remain viable. But that comes at a price, coming from HMH economy already.
----
Let me iterate over this as well: (added more bullets to better refer to each statement)
- I thought this mod was more about 'improving' units & SC over attempting to rework them into 'roles' that a person wants.
- So how forcing Siege Tanks more into a 'positional' unit make the gameplay better? Don't just consider the genearl usage, but also consider the extreme cases (i.e, what if a player is to Mass Siege Tanks? Would that bring fun gameplay for both the player and opponent).
- Tanks are already predominantly used in TvT & TvZ, and they are affective in their general role in those match-ups. So what's with these changes. Why are you changing them?
- Considering that Siege Tanks are underperforming in TvP, why not just consider other possible ventures to improve the Siege Tank and Mech as a whole in that match-up, without making it oppessive in the other match-up (oppessive in being the opponent feeling like they lack an option to deal with Siege Tank).
- Wasn't part of the leap-froging possible when the Terran was able to 'protect' the Siege Tank when they were unsiegeing and repositioning themselves. Isn't the lack of properly able to protect the Siege Tank a problem as well.
- If you do intend to make them fill the role of area-denial unit, what options do your opponent have to deal with the Siege Tank. You have to consider ways for your opponent to deal with the Siege Tank as well.
- 'improving'.... that may include working on a unit to better fit their intended (or unintended) roles. Ultimately, we want more options and variety in games. We want to avoid completely new units and abilities if possible - everything should remain more-or-less familiar to an average Starcraft II player. Sure, SCI requires some learning to get better, but not relearning everything from scratch.
'improving' does not necessarily mean just 'minor changes'.
- With more area to cover it should allow a player to establish a stable front. A long front with possibility for a medium-sized battle anywhere on its length - I think that is a fun and desired scenario.
Talking about extreme cases: Mass Siege Tank cluster deployed at a single spot will be hard to take down - no doubt - but at the same time such player forgoes the rest of the map, allowing a mass expansion strategy. Having that mass Siege Tank cluster reposition itself (for both attack and defense) becomes harder and more risky with the movement/deploy nerf.
- (answered earlier in this post)
- I don't really understand your sentence here. You protect a tank that is sieging/unsieging by other units (tanks which remain sieged, or other type of units). That was and is true in all versions of Starcraft. The question is - is it necessary to do so at the moment?
- Ways of dealing with tanks depend on their numbers. We currently have direct counters, such as Immortals, Graviton Beam, Abduct, Yamato, Ravens... Combined-arms situation is harder to theorycraft though. However, the biggest weakness - which we try to strengthen further a bit - is their lack of mobility.
|
Hider, I have a feeling that you misunderstood the supply in SCI. We didn't increase the supply cap. Yes, the number is now 400 but all supply costs and contributions are doubled as well. This was to remove the 0.5 supply issue and not a way to change the effective number of units and workers on the battlefield. As such DH/HMH economy is relevant.
What is the 0.5 supply issue?
What I would like to avoid - on the other hand - is spamming tanks in one spot, moving them in bulk and then deploying them in bulk. That's why I am considering increasing their raw power and reduce their speed.
You do this by making it neccasary to defend several locations at once by giving the opponents strong enough offensive tools. By just increasing siege-time you make them much more immobile and thus make it much harder to retake previously lost positions. If you look at BW, the effective siege/unsiege time is quite a bit faster than in Sc2 due to units being spread out so much when engaging.
And BW late game mech was a lot about losing one location on the map --> retaking that position by repositioning the Siege Tanks --> Then the opponent attacks another location.
That's the fun part about mech imo, where you are rewarded for repositioning the siege tanks actively and not just having them stand still in the same location throughout the entire game.
Overlord drops: I think the LotV is a good change that we could implement. However, I am not sure if it would matter in a late-game when you might want to use overlords en-mass. More armor to dropable overlords?
I think there are various types of solutions here. Armor is one. Speed is another. IMO the Thor and VIking should also swap roles so the Thor is more comparable to the Goliath in that its better vs armored air units. That change per definition make it harder for terran mech to defend vs dropplay.
We shouldn't make people do stuff. They want to turtle on 3 bases? That should remain viable. But that comes at a price, coming from HMH economy already.
Game-design is about incentiving players to do that makes the playing experience fun. If lame playstyles are roughly as strong as more interesting playstyle, you failed as a game-designer.
Diversity for the sake of diversity should not be a goal. What should be a goal is diversity between interesting playstyles.
|
On October 27 2015 19:59 Hider wrote:
What is the 0.5 supply issue?
The fact that there are units with 0.5 supply, but it is not shown in UI. Moreover, doubling the values overall allows us to effectively give 0.5 / 1.5 / 2.5 etc... supply values to other units that may benefit from it. We did that for a Hydralisk already.
You do this by making it neccasary to defend several locations at once by giving the opponents strong enough offensive tools. By just increasing siege-time you make them much more immobile and thus make it much harder to retake previously lost positions. If you look at BW, the effective siege/unsiege time is quite a bit faster than in Sc2 due to units being spread out so much when engaging.
And BW late game mech was a lot about losing one location on the map --> retaking that position by repositioning the Siege Tanks --> Then the opponent attacks another location.
That's the fun part about mech imo, where you are rewarded for repositioning the siege tanks actively and not just having them stand still in the same location throughout the entire game.
OK, I see your point there. However, if we just keep current tank mobility and give damage buff, are you not worried that tanks may simply become too strong?
As you suggest, we may want to look on other units to allow breaking the siege lines instead... I don't think Protoss has too mcuh problem with that due to Immortals, but Zerg and Terran may require some help.
On October 27 2015 19:59 Hider wrote:Show nested quote +Overlord drops: I think the LotV is a good change that we could implement. However, I am not sure if it would matter in a late-game when you might want to use overlords en-mass. More armor to dropable overlords? I think there are various types of solutions here. Armor is one. Speed is another. IMO the Thor and VIking should also swap roles so the Thor is more comparable to the Goliath in that its better vs armored air units. That change per definition make it harder for terran mech to defend vs dropplay.
Due to immobility of mech, isn't it already a bit difficult to fight against drop play? I mean - harassment-focused drop play?
So, you suggest Vikings should work more like BW Valkyries? Hm... that is an interesting idea.
We already changed Thor AA, but we could tweak it a bit more to focus more on slower, armored units.
On October 27 2015 19:59 Hider wrote:Show nested quote +We shouldn't make people do stuff. They want to turtle on 3 bases? That should remain viable. But that comes at a price, coming from HMH economy already. Game-design is about incentiving players to do that makes the playing experience fun. If lame playstyles are roughly as strong as more interesting playstyle, you failed as a game-designer. Diversity for the sake of diversity should not be a goal. What should be a goal is diversity between interesting playstyles.
I agree with you. The question is - how much incentive there is. If it is too low, lame playstyles will make the game boring. If there is too much, it effectively forces players on certain routes and crosses others. In my opinion LotV economy falls into that second category a bit too much. I can understand however others may have a different opinion on it. It is hard to measure it.
|
OK, I see your point there. However, if we just keep current tank mobility and give damage buff, are you not worried that tanks may simply become too strong?
As you suggest, we may want to look on other units to allow breaking the siege lines instead... I don't think Protoss has too mcuh problem with that due to Immortals, but Zerg and Terran may require some help.
Well I think we have to take into account how well Vikings synegize with Siege Tanks. With Thors + Tanks instead, the overall mobility of the mech army is lower. But even then, I still think - as i said - that mech on 2-3 bases won't be that exciting. Brood War mech was awesome in late game, but pretty meh'ish until then.
Another thing you can do is to only add a marginal default buff to siege tanks, and give it a late-game upgrade that's first relevant once terran is on 4 +bases (e.g. it could require fusion core).
In my opinion LotV economy falls into that second category a bit too much. I
I don't think it makes sense to add DH becasue LOTV makes immobile playstyles unviable. For balance purposes, you simply compensate the immobile units by buffing them.
The only valid argument for DH is the snowball-effect where losing a base in LOTV hurts a ton more. When I look at LOTV atm. the game bores me because its so often one battle into GG since there is no comeback potential.
Hence my suggestion is to actually increase the mining rate of workers + make it easer to rebuild expansions. Imagien if a player lost 30 supply + 1 base and wasn't completely dead but actually had a chance of making a comeback! I think that would make for a much better playing experience.
Due to immobility of mech, isn't it already a bit difficult to fight against drop play? I mean - harassment-focused drop play?
The issue - in Sc2 - is that its hard to counter it after it has happened. but - as mech - you have the the tools to prevent it from occuring in the first place.
And that type of way to balance immobile vs mobile creates very passive and black/white gameplay. In BW late game, the mobile race could always force something on the map (or at least almost always -a few Flash games where that wasn't so easy).
Instead, a terran would have 30-35 Siege Tanks spread out all over the map. So if we assume that he lost 7-8 Siege tanks in one location, he could reposition his army and retake the lost location.
But that type of dynamic is only possible if (a) the income rate is high, (b) Siege Tanks are stronger and (c) Siege Tanks are 2 supply.
On the other hand, if you lose 7-8 Siege Tanks in LOTV, that's typically 50% of your army. Afterwards you are typically gonna lose a base as well. That means you have no army strenght to retake the lost location and you have no income to rebuild your army --> Snowball into GG.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/a0w97JP.png)
