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Lately I've come to notice I like orbital command much more as a extra feature compared to chrono boost. Both in power level as in from a design point.
Let me first compare the 2 on a power level.
The core part of this is their economic bonus as everyone will agree this is the major use of both abilities early on.
The OC takes 35 seconds to build and gives MULES which will give 270 minerals during their 90s stay. Energy generates at slightly more then 1/ sec if you calucate this all a OC will give slightly more then 3 minerals per second or about 200 minerals a minute. This is about 3.3 scv's which as the OC takes about 2 scv build times to make is a big plus (1.3 scv roughly ahead of normally building scvs). Hence we see everyone making a OC ASAP when the rax finishes. The cost of 150 is also less then that of 3.3 scv's so OC is always superior to making a scv if you got the money, this also leaves me puzzled why people often make scv's first instead of a OC at their expo.
Chrono boost boosts productionrate by 50% for 20 seconds. The new production time will thus be 66.6% of the original one. During one chronoboost one can produce 1,76 probes
while normally that is 1,17. Effectively thus a chronoboost leads to +0.588 probe per chronoboost. 2 chronoboosts thus lead to about 1.18 probe ahead of 'normal' building which about equals the OC in mineral income. Given the fact protoss usually used 2 chrono's by the time terran makes their OC this seems about fair, toss can use additional chrono's on production and even come out a bit ahead in 'scv/probe' count while terran can't get more then 1 OC early...
However you hit a ceiling very quickly. Saturation drastically reduces the effectiveness of extra probes while MULES suffer no pathing uses. Thus chrono boosts on economy hardly become effective after the first 4 without an expansion as you hit saturation effects after 22 probes (16 minerals + 6 on gas).
Saturation exactly is the point which makes the OC imo much better then the chrono boost:
- OC's are build INSTEAD of scv's so they LOWER the speed at which a terran base gets saturated -> terrans can expo slower
- chrono boost QUICKENS the production of probes -> protoss need to expo faster
As a result protoss needs a 2nd, 3rd and 4th way faster then terran as to keep their mining efficiency. This effect gets even worse as terran can balance out the mineral use over bases by using MULES at their newest bases so both deplete at nearly the same time. Games that go late thus give terran's a tremendous advantage in the expansion game.
Added to this is the fact that terran bases that are depleted can fly to new bases while nexi at depleted bases are nearly useless. Also terran has effectively a bigger supply cap as they easily have 10 scv's worth in OC's while toss actually have the probes taking supply.
Offcourse this is just the economic boosting part which is not the whole story, both abilities have other uses.
Terran have increase supply and scan, increase supply is basically a worse eco boost then MULE which should only be used in cases when you forgot to build a depot in time. Scan however is a very valuable tool for needed detection and scouting.
Toss can use chronoboost on 'military' buildings as well giving them a boost. Going from 100% to 66% isn't a huge difference though on building units as unit build speed can easily be addressed by building more of the production building unlike with probes (extra nexi is much harder). For 'key' structures you don't easily make more off as the robo bay and the forge chronoboost is decent, it still seems to be a bit weakish/irrelevant lategame.
The biggest problem I have with chronoboost just boils down to this I guess, lategame it's hardly relevant anymore as even with 100% perfect usage of it the boost in unit production is quite small. Small boosts in probe production can lead to big difference's in economy as any RTS player will know, small boosts in 'military' production don't do so much however. Money and not build speed is the limiting factor for military units afterall.
A extra use to nexus energy would be the perfect solution to this issue I think.
OC have lategame scans/MULES and queens have heal or creep colony as 'energy' outlet but toss has almost no such thing as boosting all the warpgates or anything like that tends to do little in a money tight game.
The extra function would only have to be usefull lategame though not too offset early strategies too much, it shouldn;t be too strong either merely by a output for those 100 energy nexi many toss have lategame.
Options I've seen from others or just think are good include:
- An area of effect shield regeneration. It would cost 75 energy for example and restore shields of protoss units in a area (that of EMP or storm) for 50 over 5 seconds for example. It would give you a slight combat boost lategame while being useless early on.
- Changing the mothership in that it would cost partially energy to make or too maintain. For example reduce it costs and let it cost 90 energy as well, it would be a far more cost effective unit then but hard to 'rush' out as you would need alot of energy on the nexus that makes it.
- (my favorite) Make chronoboosts stackable. Let 2 chronoboosts have double the effect so 2 chronoboosts would make a building function 100 + 2* 50 = 200% thus making build time 50% instead of 66% of the original. It would be ineffective to stack them early on in the game as it would waste chronoboosts slightly (2 separate ones would be more effective then 1 single) but you would get a better use for lategame saved energy.
A couple nexi on 100 energy could boost out a carrier or 2 from a single stargate really quick then, now all you can do is get that carrier at 66% of the original time.
It could make tech switches and army changes a bit more doable later on and make carries a bit better perhaps, without buffing toss early on reallly. The double boost could help against some cheese though, like doubleboosting a stalker against fast reaper for example.
I wonder if some people agree a slight addition would make the chrono boost more interesting instead of the somewhat dull mechanic compared to OC's and queens that in my opinion it is now.
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chrono boost can counter-act build/resource time nerfs to a certain extent as it boosts the unit's/ research's build time and can allow u to reach full saturation much faster than normal.
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I really like the chrono stack idea. I don't think a new ability needs to be added but I agree that their macro mechanic is very weak late game (making an extra production facility or two basically does the same thing, and you aren't THAT starved for cash).
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make chrono affect buliding build time.
And the big problem is that so many strategies are reliant on P being able to chrono units or upgrades faster. IMO this is an issue
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Chrono boost accelerates upgrades. This is a really powerful ability that might not have a direct comparison to MULE but nonetheless is still very good for Protoss.
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I dunno. The ability to speed up crucial upgrades or big units like immortal or collossi seem pretty major even late game.
I think CB is very powerful as it is.
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Chrono boosting an important unit or upgrade is amazing.
As a result protoss needs a 2nd, 3rd and 4th way faster then terran as to keep their mining efficiency. This effect gets even worse as terran can balance out the mineral use over bases by using MULES at their newest bases so both deplete at nearly the same time. Games that go late thus give terran's a tremendous advantage in the expansion game.
the races aren't all supposed to be played the same
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@ Boarding,
chrono affecting building build time could speed up some tech builds etc by too much in my opinion. Assuming you keep the 50% boost it could give you like 20 seconds faster immortals or air. Just in general boosting the gateway would be a really strong boost already, I dont think this is a good idea. It would in fact ONLY boost early protoss and still leave the 'problem' of lategame use for nexus energy.
@ machinus
This use is alright but the only upgrades I tend to be getting lategame are forge upgrades and unless I have 2 forge's that is only a use for 1 boost which doesn't do that much. It is the main source I use my lategame boosts on but it just feels tedious and fairly irrelevant to be honest. Especially given the fact toss upgrades are not that great anyway and going from 140 secs to 93 doesn't feel that gamechanging (if you can perfectly chronoboost).
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The chronoboost stack idea is cool and might lead to interesting strategies. For example, tech to starport as fast as possible off 1 base, then use all saved chrono boosts (energy should be close to 200 at that point?) to crank out a void ray in a matter of seconds. Another interesting use could be to FE, timing it so that a fleet beacon and 2 starports are up around the same time both nexus reach 200 energy, then dump all chrono on the starports to pump out 2 carriers super fast. With the way you did the math, 200 energy would net you 8 chrono boost, which would make the building function at "100 + 400%" = "500%", making build time 20% of what it is normally. Since carriers take 120 seconds to finish, and chronoboost lasts 20 seconds, you would be able to pop out 2 carriers only 40 seconds after the fleet beacon finishes (assuming you have the proper saved resources).
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Give Nexus Argus Link (Energy Recharge)
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On April 07 2010 10:04 Boardin wrote:
make chrono affect buliding build time.
This would break the crap out of pvp so bad and proxy gates would rule all, as well as proxy gates becoming way to strong in pvt and pvz.
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Chrono Boosting already adds such a ridiculous strategical depth to the Protoss race in the form of timing (something that will be of utmost importance not too far in the future) that I don't even see how you can compare it to OC, let alone feel that it needs an upgrade. Allowing Chrono to stack would cause all manner of problems, not the least that it would be more powerful early on than later anyway.
Furthermore, I don't see how mining out one base faster (and specific mineral patches faster than others), and having full saturation later than the other player are good things. It's not ideal to mine out your most secure and important base before the others, which is why Terran players will not usually MULE at their main post-expansion.
As for late game, I still don't see what the problem is. Protoss already has warp gates that allow them to macro up an army faster than ever. Having nearly constant boosts on your robo bays (or forges for upgrades - you're going to want 2 forges anyway) only makes it that much easier.
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Yeah I gotta agree that chrono boost has alot of depth to it and doesn't need any changes to it. Early game I don't think anyone disagrees that the ability can turn tides and affect strategies. Lategame I agree that dropping 5 mules and continuing production even when all your scv's were killed is insanely good, but I wouldn't call chrono boost bad in lategame. I'd rather say that most players haven't gotten used to it enough to use it lategame. They'll just add gateways or robo bays instead. Even lategame (with maybe 3 nexi?) chrono boost can give a great advantage I'm sure, it's just harder to measure its effect than the mule's.
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i dont think its possible to balance chrono-stack tbh. simply giving the nexus more abilities to match queen/OC would be nice. dont know why blizz felt that shield regen just had to go
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the only upgrade i whould like to see is this thread locked for being a strait foward answer, nothing needs to be changed. you may notice that only protoss players seem to suport the idea.
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Chronoboost is fine the way it is. If you're finding difficult ways to use it lategame, it's because you aren't playing at maximum efficiency. Chronoboosting reduces the number of gateways/other production required to produce at a certain rate. That's minerals you could be saving. Chronoboost also really speeds up upgrades which are so important in lategame. The reason people have 100 energy on their nexuses lategame is simple - it takes a lot of apm. Good protosses will be the ones to find uses for it.
If you change it to be any better protoss will become imbalanced. Chrono'd zealots from a proxy gate are already somewhat broken.
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I sorta feel like in certain situations chronoboost is completely outshined by OC. I first came to this idea after watching TheLittleOne vs Nazgul @ metalopolis during the TL SC2B invite. Basically it got to a point in the late game where both players killed off a large portion of each other's workers after mining out 3 or 4 bases (I think it was TLO with 3 vs nazgul with 3 and a half). TLO had about 10(?) SCVs left and Nazgul like 15ish. They both took the high yield expansions and had their whole army there protecting it. It looked like Nazgul was ahead when suddenly TLO called down like 6 MULEs at once and quickly got a HUGE economic lead and made being able to build a probe a few seconds faster look like complete garbage. After a few minutes completely crushed nazgul.
Now I'm not saying that this clearly means OC is completely better than CB or anything, but I think it's definitely something to think about in terms of late-game low-econ balance. Maybe it's just a situation a protoss should never get into just like how Zerg in SC1 always had to be an expansion up on the opponent or something, but it's definitely something that I think really gives Terran a new advantage completely different from anything seen in BW.
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United States47024 Posts
On April 07 2010 09:50 Markwerf wrote:
As a result protoss needs a 2nd, 3rd and 4th way faster then terran as to keep their mining efficiency. This effect gets even worse as terran can balance out the mineral use over bases by using MULES at their newest bases so both deplete at nearly the same time. Games that go late thus give terran's a tremendous advantage in the expansion game.
Added to this is the fact that terran bases that are depleted can fly to new bases while nexi at depleted bases are nearly useless. Also terran has effectively a bigger supply cap as they easily have 10 scv's worth in OC's while toss actually have the probes taking supply.
I would argue that this is intentional. Blizzard probably liked the dynamic in Starcraft 1 PvT where Protoss has to stay ahead on bases to match the Terran's army. Likely, this was Blizzard's attempt in part to preserve that dynamic.
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Hyrule19215 Posts
Regen shield? Seriously? That would make Immortals too godly. EMP wouldn't counter them anymore, and it would make Marauders more annoyingly required. Also, with 2 or 3 Nexi full with energy, you can chrono all your gates and replenish plenty fast. It's really annoying, actually. Not to mention Drop Supplies becomes literally useless.
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there is a whole thread of people tring to find uses for drop supplies beyond the "oh ____" moments.
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EPT
