Hey, since the HOTS beta started I have been working with pro players to upload cool strats, demonstrations of the new units and full games from their live streams. Some examples of these videos include:
HotS Balance Update #5 New Ability Demonstration
Rotterdam's Oracle Storm Drop
Destiny's Defending with Collapsible Rocks
Sheth and Destiny showing effectiveness of Blinding Cloud
Swarm Host + Spine Crawler Rush
Reaper's New Combat Awareness Ability (Vision Up Cliffs)
Awesome set of highlight vids. I never expected that Entomb having an aoe can actually adds some good tactics to its use by manipulating the worker pathing like that.
Some truly sick plays here, was literally beautiful to see. I really love this beta period, where everyone is hungry to try out new things, people aren't quite certain how to react and they do what their instinct tells them. I think eventually things will be figured out and the metagame will once again recess into a by-the-book play. Though everything minus the warhound looks great in HotS right now and I hope we will continue to see more exploration/exploitation of the new units/abilities/terrain.
The Blinding Cloud looks like the coolest mico ability imo. I think the range nerf was a tad too hasty by blizz, it's something like 1.5 now? I definitely think they should have given it a tiny bit more time to let people figure out how to deal with it to see if it was truly op...
Have any players toyed around with taking "Spawn locusts" off of autocast to set up neat traps (e.g. hold lurker). I don't even know if it's possible but from what I've seen it could be. Just imagine 2 flanks of swarm hosts, and when a terran player moves between them locusts just suddenly come out of nowhere and auto-surround. Would be so cool.
Hmmm, I never cared for the Reaper change, but now I dislike it even more after seeing TheStC's game. That Reaper did practically no damage to either the Nexus or the rocks. But ah well, I'm complaining....
Great post. Love to see the ingenuity of players already creating great games.
On September 15 2012 06:56 Yonnua wrote: Have any players toyed around with taking "Spawn locusts" off of autocast to set up neat traps (e.g. hold lurker). I don't even know if it's possible but from what I've seen it could be. Just imagine 2 flanks of swarm hosts, and when a terran player moves between them locusts just suddenly come out of nowhere and auto-surround. Would be so cool.
They will probably use that in a few months, just wait for other pros to switch to HotS Beta, and use new units to the full potential.
On September 15 2012 06:56 Yonnua wrote: Have any players toyed around with taking "Spawn locusts" off of autocast to set up neat traps (e.g. hold lurker). I don't even know if it's possible but from what I've seen it could be. Just imagine 2 flanks of swarm hosts, and when a terran player moves between them locusts just suddenly come out of nowhere and auto-surround. Would be so cool.
If nobody has used this tactic already, I will be supremely disappointed in the community, LOL. It's pretty clear. In fact, this is the easiest way to sync your Swarm Hosts, so it's useful outside of traps, too.
On September 15 2012 06:56 Yonnua wrote: Have any players toyed around with taking "Spawn locusts" off of autocast to set up neat traps (e.g. hold lurker). I don't even know if it's possible but from what I've seen it could be. Just imagine 2 flanks of swarm hosts, and when a terran player moves between them locusts just suddenly come out of nowhere and auto-surround. Would be so cool.
If nobody has used this tactic already, I will be supremely disappointed in the community, LOL. It's pretty clear. In fact, this is the easiest way to sync your Swarm Hosts, so it's useful outside of traps, too.
They haven't as far as I saw. Half of the Pro players don't even know that they can disable the Locusts autocast(or they know but just don't bother with it). They aren't even used correctly, half of the Swarm Hosts usually aren't doing anything because Pros burrow them somewhere and keep spawning Locusts at random location(and no, it isn't for defense, it is like, really really random, while forgetting about them). And when they need them, Locusts are on cooldown because they don't turn the autocast off.
On September 16 2012 19:43 Ramiz1989 wrote: They haven't as far as I saw. Half of the Pro players don't even know that they can disable the Locusts autocast(or they know but just don't bother with it). They aren't even used correctly, half of the Swarm Hosts usually aren't doing anything because Pros burrow them somewhere and keep spawning Locusts at random location(and no, it isn't for defense, it is like, really really random, while forgetting about them). And when they need them, Locusts are on cooldown because they don't turn the autocast off.
Typical.
Same problem with the Widow mine. IMO, Blizz should get rid of autocast entirely, to alleviate confusion (and promote micro).
On September 15 2012 06:56 Yonnua wrote: Have any players toyed around with taking "Spawn locusts" off of autocast to set up neat traps (e.g. hold lurker). I don't even know if it's possible but from what I've seen it could be. Just imagine 2 flanks of swarm hosts, and when a terran player moves between them locusts just suddenly come out of nowhere and auto-surround. Would be so cool.
yes, i hope that someone uses that, i think it would be so good vs terran
Watched all the videos and enjoyed them a lot, ty for organising these fun things all in one place! I'm zerg, so obviously pretty excited as a whole lot is about to change very soon. I feel zerg is really getting a lot of options. Bring on HOTS!
I'm pretty sure they can see up cliffs in the bunker. Also, I love all the new strategies coming out, for the most part they seem like they are making the game a lot more interesting. I haven't seen much viper usage as of late, however. I heard someone (can't remember who) saying that it was because they are classified as armored units, so vikings kill them ridiculously fast. They are already squishy enough besides that. I don't really see that effecting much else (cuz voids aren't going to be fighting them lol), so maybe that could be a potential upcoming change?