EPTAll of the intricate micro involved with using a unit like the vulture is completely gone from this game and if you would ask Blizzard how that's defensible they'd just shrug and point to sales figures.
Why the Warhound should NOT be balanced - Page 33
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Grumbels
Netherlands7032 Posts
All of the intricate micro involved with using a unit like the vulture is completely gone from this game and if you would ask Blizzard how that's defensible they'd just shrug and point to sales figures. | ||
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NicolBolas
United States1388 Posts
On September 18 2012 10:15 Honeybadger wrote: I will counter this entire argument with one statement: Vultures were considered to be a shitty unit, too. Vultures weren't built around binary mechanics. They could lay Spider Mines, which are highly dangerous, and shoot stuff. They had potential. Potential that Entomb lacks. Also, let's not forget that the people who claimed that Vultures were weak were looking at the game from a non-professional perspective. Or at least, not from a modern perspective. We know a hell of a lot more now about what makes for a strong unit than we did then. Vultures are dangerous because people have the APM and micro ability to make them dangerous. Speaking of which, if SC1's engine didn't have that little bug in it that allowed moving shot to work, Vultures wouldn't be nearly as dangerous as they currently are. On September 18 2012 10:54 Grumbels wrote: I wish Blizzard had bothered with adding more subtlety to unit control. Yet they patch out every possible 'unintended' feature of the game, such as various micro tricks. They could have given vikings micro where you can avoid projectiles by switching forms, they could have added moving shot to hellions, they could have let the void ray do the phasing trick to increase dps, they could have kept the old carrier micro. All uses for stacking units with patrol micro are removed. Yet all of it is either not in the game or removed when discovered. It's honestly quite irresponsible for them to remove potential depth this way. I don't think all of the 'bugs' were good for the game, but they could have at least given them more of a chance. All of the intricate micro involved with using a unit like the vulture is completely gone from this game and if you would ask Blizzard how that's defensible they'd just shrug and point to sales figures. No, bugs are always bad for the game. The question is whether you remove them or legitimize them by making them an explicit feature. Blizzard choose the former rather than the latter. | ||
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Advantageous
China1350 Posts
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Grumbels
Netherlands7032 Posts
On September 18 2012 11:19 NicolBolas wrote: Vultures weren't built around binary mechanics. They could lay Spider Mines, which are highly dangerous, and shoot stuff. They had potential. Potential that Entomb lacks. Also, let's not forget that the people who claimed that Vultures were weak were looking at the game from a non-professional perspective. Or at least, not from a modern perspective. We know a hell of a lot more now about what makes for a strong unit than we did then. Vultures are dangerous because people have the APM and micro ability to make them dangerous. Speaking of which, if SC1's engine didn't have that little bug in it that allowed moving shot to work, Vultures wouldn't be nearly as dangerous as they currently are. No, bugs are always bad for the game. The question is whether you remove them or legitimize them by making them an explicit feature. Blizzard choose the former rather than the latter. I don't understand how you can call bugs bad for the game by definition, yet praise how the vulture required skill because of a bug in the engine in the same post. Doesn't the cognitive dissonance hurt your brain? | ||
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jinzo123
27 Posts
On September 16 2012 09:09 convention wrote: Which 3 would that be? The only two I can really think of are zealots and collosi, and honestly, collosi still require some micro if you actually want to win a fight. Zealots I will agree with, but you still need to make good decisions with zealots, e.g. when to pull back and when to engage. With charge, once you engage, you are going to lose many of those zealots. Stalkers, sentries, DTs, and HT all require lots of micro. Immortals also require a lot of micro as they are terrible against light units. VRs are mostly used as a harass/all-in unit, and in those cases they do require plenty of micro. Phoenix are one of the most micro intensive units in the game. Carriers? I suppose that can be your third a-move only unit? archons/zealots/colosus and immortals dont require micro unless terran go tank wich is very rare or in PVP to focus colosi | ||
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NicolBolas
United States1388 Posts
On September 18 2012 11:46 Grumbels wrote: I don't understand how you can call bugs bad for the game by definition, yet praise how the vulture required skill because of a bug in the engine in the same post. Doesn't the cognitive dissonance hurt your brain? That's not cognitive dissonance. The thing you missed was that I did not praise how Vultures gained skill from a bug. I simply stated the truth: the bug made Vultures more skillful. Whether the ends (skillful Vulture) justify the means (random bug) is for you to decide; I made no statement claiming that it was a good thing or not. | ||
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usethis2
2164 Posts
On September 13 2012 20:53 Garmer wrote: a thing that really frightens me, is that in two years of development of HOTS, they can't come up with something better than the warhound It seems like it, isn't it? But what would you add to the Factory that are interesting but not gimicky/overpowered? As much as I agree with many others, simply "Leave Terran as it is and make tanks stronger," "Just give mines to Hellions," "Buff Ravens and Thors," etc. WON'T HAPPEN. Blizzard is a corporation of which No. 1 priority is to generate profit for its share holders. Not adding something new for Terran races -> All reviews/magazines make comments about it -> Mass public see it as a rip-off and not worth paying money. And they would be right. You don't need an expansion to buff tanks or ravens. If Blizzard published an expansion with just buffed existing units for each race, they will be criticized to death. Most importantly, the expansion won't sell. Look at Street Fighter 4 and its "expansions." All those silly/overlapping tricks, painfully differentiated by number of frames, and ridiculous/hedious new charecters. But Capcom wants to make money and they can't simply publish expansions with existing units with more balanced stats. They have to add something new, no matter how "not new" that might be. So it is an inevitable reality that Blizzard will have to add something "new" for Terrans. Tweaking existing units in WoL will not cut it. And Blizzard has never really been good at innovation. They are usually very good at borrowing and perfecting someone else's innovations, though. I don't have good answers for what to add for Terran myself. | ||
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Grumbels
Netherlands7032 Posts
On September 18 2012 12:35 NicolBolas wrote: That's not cognitive dissonance. The thing you missed was that I did not praise how Vultures gained skill from a bug. I simply stated the truth: the bug made Vultures more skillful. Whether the ends (skillful Vulture) justify the means (random bug) is for you to decide; I made no statement claiming that it was a good thing or not. "Bug creates skillful unit, which is good" equals praising the effect of a bug, when you also said that bugs are by definition bad. Not to be pedantic, of course. It's that I've read posts by you before where you're constantly upset about how having bugs as features was a terrible thing for Brood War and I disagree, becausenobody should care whether existing good gameplay was intended or unintended by the designers. | ||
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JuiceBoxHero
117 Posts
Edited so I could add a suggestion for a new unit for terran (since everyone seems to be arguing about that). Maybe a terran bio unit that does some splash damage? Or has a spell that does actual damage, unlike emp from ghosts. Just a random idea. | ||
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Snake.69
Canada140 Posts
 In high numbers vs low numbers vultures still destroyed dragoons cuz of surround+spidermines.As it is, Warhound takes the place of the marauder pretty much.. other than for sneaky stim building sniping... Like i said, maybe make a mech unit that is good single target anti air and decent single target vs ground .. Good vs light, so so vs armored, single target. The siege tank should be the anti armored. You know what, I want that unit to have a researchable ability at fusion core. It gives them a aoe shield against air ( or broodlords/carriers attacks) for a certain amount of range, I want a unit that can be really good to drop right under broodlords, focus target them, and run. Imagine, drop PDD for anti corruptors, drop the super goliath under broodlords, kill them. THis way, you could go pure mech and somewhat fight against anything in the game with really good micro and speed. Obviously zerg could move the broodlords back out of the shield range, or have something like hydras or zerglings defending. But maybe this way zerg couldnt just go broodlord corrutors against mech.. Or if they did the meching player could do something against it with sick micro. | ||
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NicolBolas
United States1388 Posts
On September 18 2012 12:44 Grumbels wrote: "Bug creates skillful unit, which is good" equals praising the effect of a bug, when you also said that bugs are by definition bad. Not to be pedantic, of course. It's that I've read posts by you before where you're constantly upset about how having bugs as features was a terrible thing for Brood War and I disagree, becausenobody should care whether existing good gameplay was intended or unintended by the designers. Allow me to share one of my favorite TV show quotes: "If you do the right thing, for the wrong reasons, the work becomes impure, corrupted, and ultimately self-destructive." It's rather like logic. Consider: All fish live in the sea. Sharks live in the sea. Therefore, sharks are fish. The conclusion is right, but the reasoning is not (the fact that fish live in the sea does not prohibit the possibility of non-fish living in the sea, thus sharks are not necessarily fish just because they live in the sea). Could you trust someone's reasoning if that's how they got to the right answer? Of course not. He got the right answer by luck; if you apply that reasoning to something else, then you get bad information. Yes, a bug can have good effects. But that doesn't change the fact that it's still a bug. Thus, you as a game designer need to look at that bug and figure out how to harness the positive aspects that the bug creates while also getting rid of the bug itself. Using the above logical fallacy example, you fix the logic (by adding additional premises), but you do so in such a way that the conclusion remains the same. Thus, you're no longer relying on fallacious logic. StarCraft is not special in this regard. Street Fighter 2 is a perfect example of this. They took what was originally a bug (namely, combos/move canceling) and turned it into a feature. They didn't leave it alone; they made changes to how it worked (in some cases, playing around with recovery times so that some combos didn't work anymore). They adapted it and their design to work together. They even added systems into the game to teach players how to use the "bug". Or, to put it another way, it stops being a bug when it's in your instruction manual. I'm not against serendipity; if you find something cool by accident, that's great. But by the time it gets to the shipping product, I as the player shouldn't see it as an accident. I should see it as your intended game design. | ||
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Grumbels
Netherlands7032 Posts
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Sapphire.lux
Romania2620 Posts
On September 18 2012 12:41 usethis2 wrote: It seems like it, isn't it? But what would you add to the Factory that are interesting but not gimicky/overpowered? As much as I agree with many others, simply "Leave Terran as it is and make tanks stronger," "Just give mines to Hellions," "Buff Ravens and Thors," etc. WON'T HAPPEN. Blizzard is a corporation of which No. 1 priority is to generate profit for its share holders. Not adding something new for Terran races -> All reviews/magazines make comments about it -> Mass public see it as a rip-off and not worth paying money. And they would be right. You don't need an expansion to buff tanks or ravens. If Blizzard published an expansion with just buffed existing units for each race, they will be criticized to death. Most importantly, the expansion won't sell. Look at Street Fighter 4 and its "expansions." All those silly/overlapping tricks, painfully differentiated by number of frames, and ridiculous/hedious new charecters. But Capcom wants to make money and they can't simply publish expansions with existing units with more balanced stats. They have to add something new, no matter how "not new" that might be. So it is an inevitable reality that Blizzard will have to add something "new" for Terrans. Tweaking existing units in WoL will not cut it. And Blizzard has never really been good at innovation. They are usually very good at borrowing and perfecting someone else's innovations, though. I don't have good answers for what to add for Terran myself. Then God help us when LOTV (the next expansion) comes out. | ||
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NicolBolas
United States1388 Posts
On September 18 2012 19:15 Grumbels wrote: I don't agree. Glitches are discovered by the playerbase and belong to them, while features belong to the designers. For any game I prefer the former. Utilizing various bugs is often one of the most fun experiences, discovering the logic of what makes them work and how they came to be, what applications there are etc. I recognize that some people like that sense of getting one over on the game, of taking ownership of it, of creating some magical effect that could only be arrived at through weeks upon weeks of playtime. However, I refer you to my "right things, wrong reasons," argument: every such bug has the potential to utterly destroy game balance and gameplay. The best example I have of this is Team Fortress Classic and Bunny Hopping. That bug utterly destroyed TFC for me; it transformed the whole thing into a completely different kind of game, a game I didn't want to play anymore. It ruined class balance, turned medics into dedicated flag runners, and generally ran roughshod with the experience of the game. I know some people liked the game that way. But I was not one of them. Game designers are ultimately responsible for the quality of gameplay within their games, not players. If players discover a bug, the onus is on game designers to evaluate it and decide if they want that gameplay in their games. On September 18 2012 19:15 Grumbels wrote: I mean, the term bug is misleading. Mutalisk micro in BW is certainly unintended, but it's a direct result of how the game engine functions. Crashing is also a "direct result of how the game engine functions". A bug is a bug, even if it has some positive consequences. On September 18 2012 19:15 Grumbels wrote: It's not that Blizzard should deliberately introduce bugs to the game (how does that even work?), but at the very least they can leave those alone that aren't really problematic and can add depth to the game. Deliberate introduction is exactly what you're asking for. Blizzard did not remove anything from SC2. Remember: SC2 does not run on the SC1 engine or codebase. If it has any SC1 code, it would only be in the most peripheral edges of the codebase, nothing that would be responsible for unit locomotion and AI. In order for them to replicate SC1's behavior, they would have to deliberately introduce those bugs into the SC2's codebase. | ||
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Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
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NicolBolas
United States1388 Posts
On September 19 2012 02:25 Rabiator wrote: Macroing boost mechanics, production speed boost mechanics, Um, the macro mechanics were things the community asked for. The community talked long and often about how MBS, rally-mine, and so forth would make macro easier. So Blizzard added features that make macro harder to compensate. You have to go back to your base to drop MULEs. You have to go back to your base to Chrono Boost. And so forth. You can't just sit in the field and select a bunch of buildings and press hotkeys all day while microing. You have to regularly return to base to do stuff. If you fall behind on these and your opponent doesn't, that's a testiment to his macro skill and your lack thereof. And you lose because of it. | ||
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Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On September 19 2012 11:09 NicolBolas wrote: Um, the macro mechanics were things the community asked for. The community talked long and often about how MBS, rally-mine, and so forth would make macro easier. So Blizzard added features that make macro harder to compensate. You have to go back to your base to drop MULEs. You have to go back to your base to Chrono Boost. And so forth. You can't just sit in the field and select a bunch of buildings and press hotkeys all day while microing. You have to regularly return to base to do stuff. If you fall behind on these and your opponent doesn't, that's a testiment to his macro skill and your lack thereof. And you lose because of it. MBS and rally-mine arent the problem, but having a burst production (Warp Gate and massed Zerg larvae thanks to injecting) and a burst economy boost (MULE) are a problem, because you make the game MUCH faster in its economic turn-through and production. This has an impact on the way we play and throwing away units just because the players can reproduce them quickly enough and have the resources to do it will have a serious impact on balancing. Why do you think mech is so problematic? Because the important units cant be speed-reproduced with a reactor addon but rather require a tech lab for a single-file production. Another problem also is the discrepancy between the mass-producion type, because Terrans can only mass-produce their basic units which doesnt give them a lot of choice, Protoss have a wider variety of choice in their speed-production but can only do it with a limited selection of their units, but Zerg can basically do whatever they please once the late game comes. This shifts the balance during the game and makes it very very hard for a Terran in a late game to do anything against Zerg once they have a sufficient economy and stack of larvae. Even if "the community asked for it" that doesnt mean it is the right decision (and I doubt they asked for Warp Gate and this kind of stacking of larvae and a reactor and MULE). "The community" usually is a stupid and selfish bunch which only thinks about having more for themselves but not about the implications for balancing the game. Thus it should never be listened to without filtering it heavily and weighing the consequences. A faster game with battles involving a larger part of everyones army will make those battles "do or die" and that is a bad thing, because it doesnt allow for corrections to your own mistakes in time. There are no maps anymore with gold minerals simply because of the MULE. The balance had to be adjusted for tiny maps like Steppes of War and now you basically need all of your Siege Tanks to fight in an engagement and are vulnerable to run-bys on larger maps. The speed of the game is too fast and the tight unit movement has been instrumental in making a deathball possible and in getting AoE attacks nerfed. | ||
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Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
1. Blizzard adds the Warhound to the game and balances it against other units. 2. Blizzard adds the Goliath to the game and balances it against other units. 3. At the beginning of each game you decide if you want to use the Warhound or the Goliath. 4. Rinse and repeat for every unit except the three basic ones ... Zealot, Marine, Zergling. This would give a very wide variety of units - theoretically - but only a limited number of options each game AND you would make BW fetishists happy while giving the option to add in a bit of new stuff. You could screw up by not getting anti-air units against someone who plays with heavy air, but war isnt fair anyways and a certain degree of strategy has to be included into the game again after it got removed in favor of mass production and bigger battles. This option would also make it possible to have tournaments with a required set of units like "BW" or "SC2-HotS" and thus we would have a wider variety in the games we could watch as eSport. As I said above the production speed and economy boosts are a really terrible idea, because units are usually balanced in a fight, but that is only one side of the medal and thus the production speed and economy for all three races should be similar to keep that part of the balance from affecting the game. | ||
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NicolBolas
United States1388 Posts
On September 19 2012 14:39 Rabiator wrote: MBS and rally-mine arent the problem, but having a burst production (Warp Gate and massed Zerg larvae thanks to injecting) and a burst economy boost (MULE) are a problem, because you make the game MUCH faster in its economic turn-through and production. This has an impact on the way we play and throwing away units just because the players can reproduce them quickly enough and have the resources to do it will have a serious impact on balancing. Why do you think mech is so problematic? Because the important units cant be speed-reproduced with a reactor addon but rather require a tech lab for a single-file production. Mech is problematic for two reasons: it was substantially nerfed in SC2, and Protoss have Immortals, which is a giant "fuck you" to Mech. It's not problematic because of reactors-vs-tech-labs. On September 19 2012 14:39 Rabiator wrote: Another problem also is the discrepancy between the mass-producion type, because Terrans can only mass-produce their basic units which doesnt give them a lot of choice, Protoss have a wider variety of choice in their speed-production but can only do it with a limited selection of their units, but Zerg can basically do whatever they please once the late game comes. This shifts the balance during the game and makes it very very hard for a Terran in a late game to do anything against Zerg once they have a sufficient economy and stack of larvae. You're mis-identifying the source of the problem. In SC1, a maxed, fully-upgraded Terran Mech army was, cost-for-cost, stronger than a maxed, fully-upgraded Protoss army. But, the Protoss could rebuild their army faster; their primary production building cost only minerals, so they can have more of them than the much more expensive Factory. This allowed the Protoss a chance against the Terrans by taking more bases and being more mobile. After an engagement, the Terran army may have lost 2/3rds of what the Protoss did, but by the time they unsiege (and recover units in Stasis) and advance on the Protoss bases, the Protoss will be near max and able to potentially defend. The problem with SC2 is that a maxed, fully-upgraded Terran Mech army is cost-for-cost about equal to a maxed, fully-upgraded Protoss army. In a death-ball on Mech clash, both players will lose about the same amount of stuff. That's bad, because the Protoss can remax much easier. Not because of the macro mechanics (though they do help) but mainly for the same reasons as SC1: their primary production building only costs minerals. They can max-out, then build lots of WGs. So the death-ball attacks, both lose most of their armies, and the Protoss re-maxes first. Protoss wins. Similarly, the Reactor/Tech Lab issue is pointing the finger in the wrong direction. A Reactor isn't a production speed increase; a Barracks+Reactor is no different than two Barracks. The only difference is cost (and that the latter can't become two Barracks+Tech Lab). Barracks+Reactor costs 200/50, while two Barracks cost 300/0. That's 2 extra Marines. When you look at Factories, the cost is more substantial. Factories cost 150/100, so Factory+Reactor costs 200/150, while two Factories+Tech Labs is 400/300. That's a whole Siege Tank of difference. Which is why you don't get to build Siege Tanks from Factory+Reactors. Each race should have its own production advantages for different sets of units. That's good race differentiation. The problem is that the Terran units are not balanced correctly for their production. Mech units that require Tech Labs are underbalanced for the added cost of their production buildings (which affects production speed, but only indirectly). They're too cost-ineffective for what you have to do to get them. On September 19 2012 14:39 Rabiator wrote: There are no maps anymore with gold minerals simply because of the MULE. That makes no sense, as MULEs mine from gold minerals the same amount they mine from regular ones. | ||
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Seigifried
United States60 Posts
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