Purify Is Going Backwards

On September 21 2012 10:08 aLt)nirvana wrote:
hi kcdc, I have done so.

Do note that Blizzard really does listen attentively in that forum, at least in the patch before this one. The carrier being brought back was them listening to incontrol + various pros and the oracle phase shield was actually a specific suggestion from grubby. It was really awesome to see Blizzard make the changes after listening to them and evaluating their suggestions.

(Just want to give the development team big props for that)

On September 21 2012 10:32 Grumbels wrote:
God forbid you can ever do a rush strategy against protoss. The mothership core is a unit that you almost get for free. Protoss has some issues with defending in pvp, but what is with people that think the expansion is supposed to stop all aggressive play?

On September 21 2012 10:36 Infernal_dream wrote:


Didn't realize 150/150 and worker build time was free. Didn't realize that my momma core ALWAYS had 100 energy to be defensive with. Oh wait, it doesn't. Quit being an idiot. This thing is trash and will not change pvp. I'll attack, be delayed 25 seconds just like if you dropped ff's with sentries. Except now there's no ff's. And it doesn't even attack at all once it's done. So i'll rape your base afterwards. Blizzard is doing terrible things with hots and it's going to trash very quickly.

On September 21 2012 10:35 DeCoup wrote:
Meh. If it can hold early pressure and also be sued offensively I don't mind that.

On September 21 2012 10:36 Infernal_dream wrote:


Didn't realize 150/150 and worker build time was free. Didn't realize that my momma core ALWAYS had 100 energy to be defensive with. Oh wait, it doesn't. Quit being an idiot. This thing is trash and will not change pvp. I'll attack, be delayed 25 seconds just like if you dropped ff's with sentries. Except now there's no ff's. And it doesn't even attack at all once it's done. So i'll rape your base afterwards. Blizzard is doing terrible things with hots and it's going to trash very quickly.

On September 21 2012 10:32 Grumbels wrote:
God forbid you can ever do a rush strategy against protoss. The mothership core is a unit that you almost get for free. Protoss has some issues with defending in pvp, but what is with people that think the expansion is supposed to stop all aggressive play?

On September 21 2012 11:11 Buchan wrote:
I just don't think Purify is ever going to work as intended. Because if you buff it too much it will shut down all aggressive strategies early game. It will always just be a buying time spell, people will just bait out purify and then wait or find other means of entry into the enemy base. It will always just be a time buying spell which does help Protoss early game but it's just not a fun to use or watch game mechanic.

Which is why I think they should just scrap purify and start coming up with a new defensive ability. Give the mothership core the ability to create destructible rocks in a specific area. That way it could block off ramps and chokes giving Protoss more time to build an army behind. Then change the name of the Mothership Core to Dustin Browder and bam, fixed.

On September 21 2012 11:13 SuperYo1000 wrote:



.....thats called force field we already have that :D

On September 21 2012 11:15 Buchan wrote:
You can't seriously believe I was being serious...

On September 21 2012 11:16 SuperYo1000 wrote:



you see that smile face after what I said? chill dude

On September 21 2012 11:19 Buchan wrote:
Alright so we've both successfully internet sarcasm trolled eachother. It's now even.

On September 21 2012 11:14 Jerubaal wrote:
Why don't they give it a 'Purifier mode' with a minimum energy cost that drains energy (like cloak) so that ducking in and forcing the Purifier click isn't as effective?

On September 21 2012 11:11 Buchan wrote:
I just don't think Purify is ever going to work as intended. Because if you buff it too much it will shut down all aggressive strategies early game. It will always just be a buying time spell, people will just bait out purify and then wait or find other means of entry into the enemy base. It will always just be a time buying spell which does help Protoss early game but it's just not a fun to use or watch game mechanic.

Which is why I think they should just scrap purify and start coming up with a new defensive ability. Give the mothership core the ability to create destructible rocks in a specific area. That way it could block off ramps and chokes giving Protoss more time to build an army behind. Then change the name of the Mothership Core to Dustin Browder and bam, fixed.

On September 21 2012 09:29 aLt)nirvana wrote:

2. Movement speed within base

The mofo core is incredibly slow. That is good. When its being "offensive". However, when used as a defense, good players know never to engage, they either wait out the purify charge or they "kite" by walking 1 square out of its range each time and avoid it completely. If its supposed to be a defensive unit at times, it needs to be able to defend more competently! Perhaps if its within a pylon radius it is "powered" by pylons and moves at a slightly faster speed, maybe that of the tempest? The concept would be similar to queens moving faster on creep and being able to provide that added defenders advantage. I don't see why we can't have this for protoss as well.

It would also introduce a few more dynamics in the game like the importance of pylon placement or chaining pylons in a row. This way it becomes unit people pay more attention to that could move "quicker" between your three bases for defending rather that it just staying in one position during the whole assault with people not bothering to move it cause it will never get there in time. Its "off-pylon" speed is good and should remain the same as it is now.

On September 21 2012 09:06 kcdc wrote:
Dayvie, Purify isn't working. It's good for attacking and bad at defense, which is the exact opposite of what it should be. I know you're gonna fix it. I've read your blogs, listened to your interviews, we've even played on ladder a few times in WoL. I know you've got this. But the last two balance changes have me a little nervous since they're going precisely backwards.

Your goal is for purify to be strong for defense, but not too strong for offense. When the beta began, you found that purify was weak for for defense because the attacker could just duck out of range and wait for purify to expire. Meanwhile, it was actually pretty decent for offense because bases don't run away.

So you started by buffing the range from 7 to 10, hoping that purify would be better for defense since it would get more shots off while the attacker pulled back. But this is supposed to be a PvP fix, and an extra shot or two on a retreating stalker isn't that big of a deal. Meanwhile, buffing the range made the core WAY better at attacking. At 10 range, it can pick off spines, queens and bunkers while mitigating return fire.

And now you've buffed its burst damage while reducing the defensive availability of the effect (shorter duration, higher energy cost). I'm guessing that this too was to make purify kill more units before they retreat. But defensively, that extra retreat damage comes at the cost of making purify less available and allowing the attacker to return sooner. And it naturally makes the core even stronger for attacks where you can plan for that huge DPS to be there right when you need it.

In Starcraft, the attacker chooses WHEN the battle happens. That means the attacker wants to be powerful in a short burst, while the defender wants to be equally ready at all times to prevent the attacker from forcing the fight at a moment of weakness. At 100 energy for purify, the mothership core has exactly zero defensive utility for the first 89 seconds after it spawns. That's a gigantic window where the defender would absolutely be better off if they hadn't built the core. And after that 25 second purify cast, there's another 153 second window where the core is again completely and utterly useless.

Does 89 seconds of weakness, 25 seconds of face-smashing awesomeness, and 153 seconds of weakness sound like a good defense? No, it sounds awful--the attacker just fights during one of the huge windows of weakness.

But it's AWESOME for an attack where you get to force the fight to happen during those 25 seconds.

What you need to do to make purify good for defense is make it so that it's always available to the defender. In order to discourage offensive use, you need to make it not too powerful in short bursts which an attacker will always manipulate to line up with the engagement. Simply put, reduce or remove the energy requirement, and nerf the attack itself.

And while you're at it, if you really don't want the mothership core to be used offensively, take the range back down to 7 and make purify only enabled when the mothership core is positioned within a power field. That way, its attack can be plenty powerful for defense, but super weak for offense since the attacker would have to slow push pylons into the enemy's base in order to make a mothership core rush deal any lasting damage.

Please fix this. Don't keep buffing its ability to pick off a retreating unit at 10 range--that just makes it insanely strong for an attack. Defense needs to be reliable and available. Offense needs to be powerful in short bursts. This critical concept needs to be reflected in purify's design.

PS: I'd appreciate it if someone with beta access could re-post this in the HOTS beta forums so that it has a snowball's chance in hell to actually be seen.

On September 21 2012 11:29 cozzE wrote:
I can't believe they've gone to such an extent to hide the BW-ness of their units. Like seriously, a biological battle hellion? What were they thinking? The exact same unit was made 12 years ago and it was called a firebat.

On September 21 2012 12:50 avilo wrote:
The thing is with longer duration it makes greedy protoss FEs way too good. Which is probably why they're changing it to have a shorter duration.

On September 21 2012 13:07 kcdc wrote:


The goal is for it to make expanding more stable in PvP, and to do that, you have to buff Protoss frontal defense enough to make TvP rushes irrelevant. On the flip side, Terran rushes are almost irrelevant in WoL, and the mothership core is slow, so Terran drop and harass openings will still be strong.

On September 21 2012 13:13 avilo wrote:


They don't want something that lets you just expo for free in any match-up. Terran rushes being almost irrelevant would be exactly one of the points -_-

And while you're at it, if you really don't want the mothership core to be used offensively, take the range back down to 7 and make purify only enabled when the mothership core is positioned within a power field. That way, its attack can be plenty powerful for defense, but super weak for offense since the attacker would have to slow push pylons into the enemy's base in order to make a mothership core rush deal any lasting damage.

On September 21 2012 09:06 kcdc wrote:
Dayvie, Purify isn't working. It's good for attacking and bad at defense, which is the exact opposite of what it should be. I know you're gonna fix it. I've read your blogs, listened to your interviews, we've even played on ladder a few times in WoL. I know you've got this. But the last two balance changes have me a little nervous since they're going precisely backwards.

Your goal is for purify to be strong for defense, but not too strong for offense. When the beta began, you found that purify was weak for for defense because the attacker could just duck out of range and wait for purify to expire. Meanwhile, it was actually pretty decent for offense because bases don't run away.

So you started by buffing the range from 7 to 10, hoping that purify would be better for defense since it would get more shots off while the attacker pulled back. But this is supposed to be a PvP fix, and an extra shot or two on a retreating stalker isn't that big of a deal. Meanwhile, buffing the range made the core WAY better at attacking. At 10 range, it can pick off spines, queens and bunkers while mitigating return fire.

And now you've buffed its burst damage while reducing the defensive availability of the effect (shorter duration, higher energy cost). I'm guessing that this too was to make purify kill more units before they retreat. But defensively, that extra retreat damage comes at the cost of making purify less available and allowing the attacker to return sooner. And it naturally makes the core even stronger for attacks where you can plan for that huge DPS to be there right when you need it.

In Starcraft, the attacker chooses WHEN the battle happens. That means the attacker wants to be powerful in a short burst, while the defender wants to be equally ready at all times to prevent the attacker from forcing the fight at a moment of weakness. At 100 energy for purify, the mothership core has exactly zero defensive utility for the first 89 seconds after it spawns. That's a gigantic window where the defender would absolutely be better off if they hadn't built the core. And after that 25 second purify cast, there's another 153 second window where the core is again completely and utterly useless.

Does 89 seconds of weakness, 25 seconds of face-smashing awesomeness, and 153 seconds of weakness sound like a good defense? No, it sounds awful--the attacker just fights during one of the huge windows of weakness.

But it's AWESOME for an attack where you get to force the fight to happen during those 25 seconds.

What you need to do to make purify good for defense is make it so that it's always available to the defender. In order to discourage offensive use, you need to make it not too powerful in short bursts which an attacker will always manipulate to line up with the engagement. Simply put, reduce or remove the energy requirement, and nerf the attack itself.

And while you're at it, if you really don't want the mothership core to be used offensively, take the range back down to 7 and make purify only enabled when the mothership core is positioned within a power field. That way, its attack can be plenty powerful for defense, but super weak for offense since the attacker would have to slow push pylons into the enemy's base in order to make a mothership core rush deal any lasting damage.

Please fix this. Don't keep buffing its ability to pick off a retreating unit at 10 range--that just makes it insanely strong for an attack. Defense needs to be reliable and available. Offense needs to be powerful in short bursts. This critical concept needs to be reflected in purify's design.

PS: I'd appreciate it if someone with beta access could re-post this in the HOTS beta forums so that it has a snowball's chance in hell to actually be seen.

On September 21 2012 13:49 Crawdad wrote:
This wouldn't be a problem if it were still attached to the Nexus...

But, if you're trying to defend, wouldn't it be more productive to Energize a Sentry?

On September 21 2012 09:06 kcdc wrote:
And while you're at it, if you really don't want the mothership core to be used offensively, take the range back down to 7 and make purify only enabled when the mothership core is positioned within a power field. That way, its attack can be plenty powerful for defense, but super weak for offense since the attacker would have to slow push pylons into the enemy's base in order to make a mothership core rush deal any lasting damage.

On September 21 2012 15:49 DeathPengu wrote:


Power field might not be the best solution. Since you can just make a proxy pylon. In fact Protoss always need a proxy pylon while pushing.

On September 21 2012 16:26 Sirion wrote:
What I would like is reducing the MSC speed even further, but make Purify give a significant speed boost.

On September 21 2012 17:27 Stow.Wif wrote:



I like this idea. This can even be combined with the toggle idea.

On September 21 2012 10:08 aLt)nirvana wrote:
hi kcdc, I have done so.

Do note that Blizzard really does listen attentively in that forum, at least in the patch before this one. The carrier being brought back was them listening to incontrol + various pros and the oracle phase shield was actually a specific suggestion from grubby. It was really awesome to see Blizzard make the changes after listening to them and evaluating their suggestions.

(Just want to give the development team big props for that)

On September 21 2012 17:33 totalpigeon wrote:
Mothership core might make early TvP rushes irrelevant, but that surely also means tanks could finally get that damage buff without breaking the 1-1-1? Mothership core should be immune to tank fire anyway, tis a flying unit right?

On September 21 2012 16:14 SC2John wrote:
I think purify is perfectly fine in its current state. There has been some question as to its viability to actually defend, but I think, more and more, we're seeing it as a way to buy time rather than downright crush an early attack. In this way, it's not quite as good as, say, a void ray, but it works about the same in that a roach rush cannot continue even if the wall is down and there's only 1 sentry. It buys time for something like warp gate to finish, etc. In addition, we're seeing more of energize on sentries for more stalling time, making purify more of a "OH SHIT, I JUST NEED TO NOT DIE RIGHT NOW" ability. I think the idea of defending drops is also good. If you can position your MSC at your main while guarding your natural and 3rd, you'd have an easier time with drops, etc, in PvT.

As for offensive purposes...I've seen how ridiculous it is so far. There...might be ways to deal with this, but we'll have to see. I think it's too early to call MSC all-ins OP or unstoppable without more research. I feel like, aside from PvZ, the MSC is far too vulnerable to be allowed to float across the map.

All in all, I think it's a fair change so far. I like the idea of purify, I think the range will be a good benefit as well. I don't think it's a bad ability or idea, but it will definitely need some more tweaking.

On September 21 2012 12:40 ectonym wrote:
here's hoping for another patch within a week. i think OPs idea is good, and better stated here than i've heard elsewhere. dayvie, dustin, are you out there? HOTS is almost good, zerg is fine. t might be fine. fix the momma core and i think we're ready for release :p

On September 21 2012 19:22 FeyFey wrote:
They could increase the movement speed when in Purify

I agree with this, i think purify is heading in the wrong direction.

This is what i posted in the private HoTS beta forums before the latest two patches about my ideas on the mothership core.

I feel the mothership core can be tweaked into something more integral to our race and end up becoming kinda like what the queen is to zerg. It should be the first thing every protoss player wants to make when gets his cyber up.

1. Hotkey priority selection

The mofo core spell is kinda a one off thing. You use either purify once or energize once and then you're done with it for the next 5 minutes. Often times when selecting units in your base during a defense, the mofo core is usually parked at the entrance and gets caught in the selection and ends up delaying forcefields or makes the user have to TAB through his other spell casters to get to it.

Also, say I wanna do an attack but want to have the mofo core in my hotkey selection so i can recall my army should things go bad. I don't want it in another hotkey, nor do I want to have to press TAB first before i cast FFs every single time when selecting my main army group.

Basically I feel it should be moved to the last in terms of priority in spell casting units because of the relative infrequent usage of the spells.

2. Movement speed within base

The mofo core is incredibly slow. That is good. When its being "offensive". However, when used as a defense, good players know never to engage, they either wait out the purify charge or they "kite" by walking 1 square out of its range each time and avoid it completely. If its supposed to be a defensive unit at times, it needs to be able to defend more competently! Perhaps if its within a pylon radius it is "powered" by pylons and moves at a slightly faster speed, maybe that of the tempest? The concept would be similar to queens moving faster on creep and being able to provide that added defenders advantage. I don't see why we can't have this for protoss as well.

It would also introduce a few more dynamics in the game like the importance of pylon placement or chaining pylons in a row. This way it becomes unit people pay more attention to that could move "quicker" between your three bases for defending rather that it just staying in one position during the whole assault with people not bothering to move it cause it will never get there in time. Its "off-pylon" speed is good and should remain the same as it is now.

3. Mothership morphing speed

This is a tricky one. I do not like that you cannot chorno the build time and as a result the loss of it is much more severe compared to WoL. If you mofo ship dies, gl for the next 5 mins. And at the same time starting with full energy makes it almost OP so perhaps a better balance between the energy and morphing time could be reached.

Maybe during the transition into the mofo ship, a tripod extends itself out of its !@# and plants itself to the ground, effectively making it a building during the transition. There is also proper animation so it looks more realistic with it slowly increasing in size during the morph, and will give opponents an idea when the mofo ship is about to pop out based on the animation. Right now its like whoa where did that come from! Surprise! It was in my pocket all along! And this also means since its a building during that period it gets added armor and that way it can be chronoed too, making logical sense.

I'd like to see what happens if it can only cast purify when within a pylons range.

On September 21 2012 23:30 stard1n wrote:


I think this idea is brilliant.

On September 21 2012 23:39 LOLItsRyann wrote:


I don't understand this, are you implying Protoss' go aggressive without placing pylons down almost next to the enemy base? Because proxy pylons would make the M Core exactly the same.

On September 22 2012 00:28 Grumbels wrote:

Yeah, the community says on one hand: "Blizzard don't tell us how to play the game!" and at the same time it's "make sure we can't use the MsC aggressively!". Which then leads to all sorts of complicated ideas to limit it.

On September 21 2012 23:39 LOLItsRyann wrote:


I don't understand this, are you implying Protoss' go aggressive without placing pylons down almost next to the enemy base? Because proxy pylons would make the M Core exactly the same.

On September 22 2012 00:28 Grumbels wrote:

Yeah, the community says on one hand: "Blizzard don't tell us how to play the game!" and at the same time it's "make sure we can't use the MsC aggressively!". Which then leads to all sorts of complicated ideas to limit it.

On September 21 2012 23:30 stard1n wrote:


I think this idea is brilliant.

On September 21 2012 23:00 wcr.4fun wrote:


are you high? The game is terrible and boring right now. They need to get their act together or a lot of people will not be buying the game.

On September 22 2012 02:23 Ramiz1989 wrote:

The game is decent, and definitely in better spot that WoL is right now. It still changes every week, and we still didn't see any normal strategies from the pros since they won't make strategies when the game is changing so much.

And with the last 2 patch, I've seen about ~5 Terran players that constantly whines how they won't spend 40 or 60$ on expansion because they will play the same Terran they played in WoL(because they already perfectly understand what will be with the metagame 1 year from today). Even if Beta is about to finish, we would see balance changes in the later patches of HOTS, and Beta just started, it will be out for next 4+ months, they are trying a tons of things, like I said, it will get changed a lot, if they don't like it(nor the community and pros), they will change it, the same way they removed the Warhound, buffed Mines and Battle Hellions and brought back the Carriers. And I've seen a lot more players satisfied with the current Hots than those that aren't.

On September 22 2012 02:23 Ramiz1989 wrote:

The game is decent, and definitely in better spot that WoL is right now. It still changes every week, and we still didn't see any normal strategies from the pros since they won't make strategies when the game is changing so much.

And with the last 2 patch, I've seen about ~5 Terran players that constantly whines how they won't spend 40 or 60$ on expansion because they will play the same Terran they played in WoL(because they already perfectly understand what will be with the metagame 1 year from today). Even if Beta is about to finish, we would see balance changes in the later patches of HOTS, and Beta just started, it will be out for next 4+ months, they are trying a tons of things, like I said, it will get changed a lot, if they don't like it(nor the community and pros), they will change it, the same way they removed the Warhound, buffed Mines and Battle Hellions and brought back the Carriers. And I've seen a lot more players satisfied with the current Hots than those that aren't.

On September 22 2012 00:59 Vindicare605 wrote:
Purify worked great when the Mothership Core was attached to a Nexus.

I really don't understand why they felt they NEEDED to allow it to move. It made a lot more sense from a design standpoint as a structure than a unit.

On September 22 2012 04:31 Blacklizard wrote:
The MSC could be responsible for big metagame shifts. Maybe super greedy expands won't be able to be so greedy, and that may be fine. If that happens, it could make up for Protoss's poor early game scouting, which is reliant on a ton of inferrances.

Personally I really love the Mothership Core. It gives Protoss everything it needed early game. Right now, the MSC definitely helps in defense. It also gives options for poking/recall. It gives the ability to see and/or hit incoming 10 minute bio drops at one more location. And it gives options for harassment. I think of it as a really slow flying reaper... pretty decent at killing a handful of marines, lings, or workers but without support it goes down fast.

Sure, it is worrying that 4 gates would be stronger against Terran. But honestly, 4 gates were pretty God awful against Terran in the past. 2 repaired bunkers were just about enough? Maybe now it will require 4 bunkers because 2 will go down. Still very defendable if Terran doesn't play super greedy.

A late 4 gate against Zerg seems pretty weak to me. I'd be more worried about the 2 base 8 gate timing + MSC. Except that swarmhosts counter practically any number of gateway units, so it doesn't appear to be a problem there either.

Really, I think the mothership core is doing fine. The lastest buff hasn't been tested a ton, but it's probably close to being fine. I think the good far outweighs the bad. More options early game make for more interesting games. Offensively and defensively.

On September 22 2012 05:11 kcdc wrote:
It occurrs to me that what the MSC purify really helps are 2-base 7-gates since these already line up at the time that a MSC would get across the map. And 7-gate all-ins are already quite strong against both Terran and Zerg. Throw in a 50/50 unit that deals ~40 DPS and can't be hit by roaches or lings, and you've got a pretty scary all-in.

On September 21 2012 13:13 avilo wrote:


They don't want something that lets you just expo for free in any match-up. Terran rushes being almost irrelevant would be exactly one of the points -_-

On September 24 2012 06:57 wcr.4fun wrote:


I don't see how zerg doesn't get a free expo in every match up. This point goes for other races in certain match ups as well. So it's just another poor excuse by blizzard imo...

On September 24 2012 07:44 kcdc wrote:
Yeah, they've expressly stated that they believe the MsC is too easy to retreat from and wait out. They buffed the range to address this problem, and they presumably buffed the DPS for the same reason. The balance changes on purify were to buff the MsC's defense, not to nerf it. They'll eventually get purify where they want it defensively, and Avilo will be sad that TvP rushes will suck even harder than they do in WoL. But Protoss players will rejoice that PvP won't suck quite as badly.

On September 24 2012 07:54 kcdc wrote:
The end goal is to have it good at defense and bad at offense. Assuming they're competent, they'll eventually get it there. Actually, I've even told them how to do it, so they don't even need to be competent--they just need to be literate.

On September 22 2012 05:11 kcdc wrote:


It occurrs to me that what the MSC purify really helps are 2-base 7-gates since these already line up at the time that a MSC would get across the map. And 7-gate all-ins are already quite strong against both Terran and Zerg. Throw in a 50/50 unit that deals ~40 DPS and can't be hit by roaches or lings, and you've got a pretty scary all-in.

On September 21 2012 09:06 kcdc wrote:
Dayvie, Purify isn't working. It's good for attacking and bad at defense, which is the exact opposite of what it should be. I know you're gonna fix it. I've read your blogs, listened to your interviews, we've even played on ladder a few times in WoL. I know you've got this. But the last two balance changes have me a little nervous since they're going precisely backwards.

Your goal is for purify to be strong for defense, but not too strong for offense. When the beta began, you found that purify was weak for for defense because the attacker could just duck out of range and wait for purify to expire. Meanwhile, it was actually pretty decent for offense because bases don't run away.

So you started by buffing the range from 7 to 10, hoping that purify would be better for defense since it would get more shots off while the attacker pulled back. But this is supposed to be a PvP fix, and an extra shot or two on a retreating stalker isn't that big of a deal. Meanwhile, buffing the range made the core WAY better at attacking. At 10 range, it can pick off spines, queens and bunkers while mitigating return fire.

And now you've buffed its burst damage while reducing the defensive availability of the effect (shorter duration, higher energy cost). I'm guessing that this too was to make purify kill more units before they retreat. But defensively, that extra retreat damage comes at the cost of making purify less available and allowing the attacker to return sooner. And it naturally makes the core even stronger for attacks where you can plan for that huge DPS to be there right when you need it.

In Starcraft, the attacker chooses WHEN the battle happens. That means the attacker wants to be powerful in a short burst, while the defender wants to be equally ready at all times to prevent the attacker from forcing the fight at a moment of weakness. At 100 energy for purify, the mothership core has exactly zero defensive utility for the first 89 seconds after it spawns. That's a gigantic window where the defender would absolutely be better off if they hadn't built the core. And after that 25 second purify cast, there's another 153 second window where the core is again completely and utterly useless.

Does 89 seconds of weakness, 25 seconds of face-smashing awesomeness, and 153 seconds of weakness sound like a good defense? No, it sounds awful--the attacker just fights during one of the huge windows of weakness.

But it's AWESOME for an attack where you get to force the fight to happen during those 25 seconds.

What you need to do to make purify good for defense is make it so that it's always available to the defender. In order to discourage offensive use, you need to make it not too powerful in short bursts which an attacker will always manipulate to line up with the engagement. Simply put, reduce or remove the energy requirement, and nerf the attack itself.

And while you're at it, if you really don't want the mothership core to be used offensively, take the range back down to 7 and make purify only enabled when the mothership core is positioned within a power field. That way, its attack can be plenty powerful for defense, but super weak for offense since the attacker would have to slow push pylons into the enemy's base in order to make a mothership core rush deal any lasting damage.

Please fix this. Don't keep buffing its ability to pick off a retreating unit at 10 range--that just makes it insanely strong for an attack. Defense needs to be reliable and available. Offense needs to be powerful in short bursts. This critical concept needs to be reflected in purify's design.

PS: I'd appreciate it if someone with beta access could re-post this in the HOTS beta forums so that it has a snowball's chance in hell to actually be seen.

On September 24 2012 09:42 kcdc wrote:
Black lizard, you're right that the new units might make 2 base all ins weaker. Still, if Z takes a quick third, they narrowly defend a 7 gate all in with hatch tech units in WoL. It's hard to imagine swarm hosts coming out in time and in large enough numbers to defend the timing at 8:30. Maybe Z will open lower income with faster tech to defend P's 2 base timings, but if the MsC is strong enough offensively to force Z into tech openings, that strikes me as a problem on its own. Why not just make it less useful for those attacks?

On September 25 2012 01:11 Thrasymachus725 wrote:
In theory, yeah. In practice, the core has been used as far less offensive than before since the patch, owing in part to the fact that you can simply run away from it and wait it out, even if it is in your base, it is better for it to blast your pylons than your army.

On September 25 2012 01:50 kcdc wrote:


I'm still not in the beta, but it's hard to imagine that Protoss players wouldn't use the option of 50 seconds of an offensive super-cannon for 2-base timings against Z and T. Even if the attacks aren't overpowered, you still have an issue where purify is better for offense than it is for defense. If it sucks for offense, that just means it will suck more for defense. However the stats are tuned, there unit cannot meet its design goals so long as it's better at offense than at defense.

At 100 energy for purify, the mothership core has exactly zero defensive utility for the first 89 seconds after it spawns. That's a gigantic window where the defender would absolutely be better off if they hadn't built the core.

On September 25 2012 03:57 Treehead wrote:


I'm not in the beta either, but I have a hard time imagining that you can "sneak" a mothership core which doesn't start production until after a core is done across the map to a Terran's base. Kinda requires a Terran player not to be looking for it (or not building marines), doesn't it? Protoss doesn't have many early units at all to support it along its path. Think moving Siege Tanks only worse (because if you trigger the MC's attack before it reaches the base, it gets there and... waits...).

For Z, they always have 3 queens anyway, and 3 Queens can kill a MC in about 10 seconds - unless they trigger the attack, which the queens can micro away from, and overlords to grant vision of the approaching MC.

I'm perfectly willing to concede that super-mode for 25 seconds for 100 energy is not what is needed, but I have a hard time believing that the Mothership Core will see offensive usage for very long once players know how to combat it. For me, if they meant it to be a defensive unit, they've done an awful job. I'll use it as a macro/offensive support unit by using recalls and energize - but you're definitely right when you say that Purify is awful.

Noted. Thank you guys for the thread. We are seeing a lot of aggresion with the unit which was not the intent with the current balance. I feel like we should have anticipated this problem.=)

We'll look at it.

On September 25 2012 11:03 kcdc wrote:
In this thread Browder said the following on the MsC:



It kind of pisses me off that a herp derp "Mothership core is too strong cuz it's hard to win with 1/1/1 now!" thread got a response while my thread which had actual analysis got ignored. He's also right that they should have anticipated this problem.

It annoys me that my thread got ignored, but at least they're now aware that it's a problem. We'll see what they do about it. The fact that this offensive use issue caught them by surprise makes me skeptical that they understand how the game works. Can someone with beta access please bump my explanation? It can be found here:

http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/6606432986

On September 25 2012 05:23 kcdc wrote:

Against a gasless FE, building 3 stalkers allows you to easily keep Terran in his base until 7 minutes or so when he finishes concussive shells. And if you're going for a big warpgate timing, you auto-win if you catch Terran out on the map right before your timing. Maybe Terran's opening will change, but as is, you should be able to get the MsC to his bunkers no problem.

Against Zerg's gasless 3 base opening, Z has nothing that moves off creep and shoots up until 10 minutes. Z should be able to scout it coming and they can build extra queens to kill it, but they also have to worry about your main army. 7 gates and will be a stronger due to MsC support. I've also heard complaints about the MsC making phoenix harass stronger since it can kill queens quickly and pick off spores from 10 range. 50/50 to take out Z's AA at their third sounds like a great trade for P.

On September 25 2012 04:16 ZealotSensei wrote:


Wrong. With one sentry, the core gives 4 FF by using energize. That means that if you IMMIDIATLY use a FF after a sentry spawns and then energize, you will have at least 5 FF's ... At least... You will probably have 6 FF's by the time a attack comes... With only one sentry.. Two sentry's and you will have around 8!!! FFs when the attack hit... I dare say thats pretty fricking good as a defensive ability...

On September 25 2012 11:03 kcdc wrote:
It kind of pisses me off that a herp derp "Mothership core is too strong cuz it's hard to win with 1/1/1 now!" thread got a response while my thread which had actual analysis got ignored.

On September 25 2012 18:37 Adonminus wrote:
I was playing PvZ the other day, rallied mothership core to enemy base, killed 3 queens 5 drones at 5 minutes. Pretty overpowered in offense.

In my opinion I think Purify should do splash damage or very fast attack speed with bonus vs light. This way, the mothership core will be the best defense in the early game against the basic units like zealot/marine/zergling. Right now in PvZ if he runs with tons of zerglings, the mothership core shooting its kinda slow attack and overkilling lings with 45 damage just isn't effective and the zerglings still do damage. With the changes I proposed, purify will no longer be effective against queens, buildings or higher tech units making it more an early game defense spell and nullifying the offensive part of it.

On September 25 2012 18:37 Adonminus wrote:
I was playing PvZ the other day, rallied mothership core to enemy base, killed 3 queens 5 drones at 5 minutes. Pretty overpowered in offense.

In my opinion I think Purify should do splash damage or very fast attack speed with bonus vs light. This way, the mothership core will be the best defense in the early game against the basic units like zealot/marine/zergling. Right now in PvZ if he runs with tons of zerglings, the mothership core shooting its kinda slow attack and overkilling lings with 45 damage just isn't effective and the zerglings still do damage. With the changes I proposed, purify will no longer be effective against queens, buildings or higher tech units making it more an early game defense spell and nullifying the offensive part of it.

On September 21 2012 10:26 rpgalon wrote:
they should just go back with it being immobile, make the movement speed 0, and give to it an ability that has a cooldown or requires low energy, that allows the MC to teleport to any protoss building (maybe exclude pylons since it could be used for cheese).

On September 26 2012 02:36 Plansix wrote:
If the purify ability made it so the core could not move, would that solve some of the issues? Then the core could do everything it currently does, but is locked in once it goes into turret mode. Even if it was used for agression, the opponent could just back away.

On September 26 2012 02:43 archon256 wrote:

This would make it worse at defending too, since the opponent could choose to attack somewhere else while the core is stationary (or just wait for Purify to end as currently). You could buff the range to compensate, but then the core would become a siege weapon (doesn't matter if its stationary if it's attacking defensive structures).

On September 21 2012 09:30 wcr.4fun wrote:
Don't bother reasoning with logic. We've got a battle hellion who's biological now.

On September 26 2012 03:08 EnE wrote:



Yeah thats like the most retarded thing imaginable

On September 26 2012 03:02 kcdc wrote:
Yep, spend 50/50, scoot core over to airspace near natural (think Cloud Kingdom), 1-shot workers from 10 range. What does Terran do about that with their only available AA having 5 range? Do they just stop mining until the core runs out of energy?

On September 25 2012 23:23 Treehead wrote:


If your mothership core arrived at 5 minutes, that means that either you managed to build it ridiculously early, you're playing on a ridiculous map, or that your opponent didn't scout you and went blind three-bases while you rushed him.

It takes at least 20 seconds to get 100 minerals for your initial pylon, and a further 30 to get 150 minerals (i.e. realistically, you probably won't start a gate before 1 minute). From there, it's a further 1:50 until your core is up (no earlier than 2:50). If you're playing on Steppes of War, it takes about 40 seconds for a probe to reach the Nat from your main Nexus. A probe is nearly exactly 6 times slower than a probe - meaning it'll take you 4 minutes (that's right - FOUR MINUTES) to get from your Nexus to your opponent's nat.

All things told, it is impossible to get a Mothership Core to your opponent's natural - even on Steppes of War - earlier than 7 minutes unless you do something really crazy. You claim you got it there in five. Either there's something I'm missing, you proxied a Nexus (lol), or your story seems unlikely. Either way, there's definitely a ton of missing information in this story you've posted of getting a MC to your opponent's base at 5 minutes.

Edit: If you watch the Day9 daily about Mothership Core tricks, he mentions that his Mothership Core arrives at zerg's base at around 8 or 9 minutes to support a 4-gate. What's he doing differently that makes him 3 or 4 minutes behind you?

On September 26 2012 05:05 Adonminus wrote:

I was playing on close air on that 4 player ice map. Fractured Glacier. Spawned in 11 oclock and he was 2 oclock, it's a very short distance.

On September 26 2012 05:49 meadbert wrote:
I would rather see Purify use energy over time like a Ghost or Banshee used to cloak.
Then you could simultaneously make it weaker.

The result would be a unit that is very strong for defense, but much weaker for offense.

Noted. Thanks for the thread. We are looking at this ability.

On September 26 2012 06:31 kcdc wrote:


Woo-hoo! Well, we've done our part to help. Let's see what they come up with.

On September 26 2012 06:33 IPA wrote:


I take all credit for bumping.

On September 28 2012 14:09 Treehead wrote:
The Mothership Core is, was and will be undoubtedly my favorite new addition to the protoss arsenal. It was created to be a potent unit for economy, for early-game defense, and for use in recalling slow pushes once they are overextended. Currently, it is doing 2 of 3 jobs pretty adequately. The main problems are surrounding it’s attack, which I would like to talk a little about, and then propose a solution to these problems.

Problem: The Mothership Core is currently being used offensively. This is not what was intended for the unit.

The current version of the Mothership Core can be very useful for attacking early. The main challenge of doing so is getting it across the board into an attacking position safely, but this is sometimes a moot point because there tends to be so much space along the sides of the map.

Its range 10 allows it to avoid difficulty with every early Terran Anti-Air when positioned over open space. They can snipe Turrets before the turret can fight back, and 1-shot 0 armor marines from range 10. This means that when positioned over opened space near an expansion, the MC can effectively stop mining until Vikings. Once Vikings are available, they do quite well in taking it down, though it takes several Vikings to take down a MC without losing anything (and once you’ve lose something, the MC has traded effectively).

Against Zerg, as Day9 has pointed out in one of his dailies, the early game use of the MC along with a 4-gate seems very difficult to stop – at a time when the only response zerg has to the MC is Queens (which it outranges and generally trades quite well against). Spore crawlers get the same treatment as turrets – they get killed out of range to be effective as anti-air.

In PvP, the ability to use a MC effectively does a couple things. First, it makes the ramp much less of an advantage (since you can’t deny vision with a flying unit around). This can be a big issue playing against blink builds (whose only issue in engaging is vision) which were previously spending 225/175 on one observer to provide a much more fragile form of vision (40 health vs. the 250 of the MC). This provides blink/obs builds the ability to ignore the obs and get 175/125 more to spend on units (detection aside, this makes blink pushes without detection much harder to stop, and executing blink rushes against DTs semi-autoloss… because PvP needed to be more about build order wins, right?). And then, of course, I’m sure there will be a 4-gate recall build on that winter map with the incredibly close air distances (maybe that map won’t make it, or something – pure speculation).

As you can see offensive MC usage, if you can get away with it poses problems in all matchups. Maybe given sufficiently astute play by your opponent you can’t, but that remains to be seen.

How did this happen? Pre-beta, the MC was a unit attached to a building. It didn’t move and therefore you couldn’t attack with it unless you proxied a Nexus (which is a bit much). So why is it being used so much and so offensively now? It’s mobility has changed, so that it can participate in fights in which it didn’t used to be able to participate.

Problem: The Mothership Core has issues with defending. Because its attack is available for only a short window of time – and the cost of using it is a recall or an energize (both of which are ridiculously better in terms of having more units with which to defend later).

One energize on a Nexus is generally 90 seconds of build time over the next three minutes. That’s a little more than 5 probes, (or about 150-200 resources per minute – not to mention about 225-300 resources if you’re able to harvest at the 30-40 rate as probes emerge). If you get your MC around 4 minutes, your first 100 energy will come at about 5:30. You don’t get 100 energy again until 8:30. By 10 minutes, if you used your first Energize on probes, you’re both mining optimally (somehow, haven’t tweak build order stuff yet, but just in theory) and you’re both still making probes, you’re a solid 450-600 resources ahead. That’s a lot of money – It’s a full Colossus or almost two Immortals.

Ok, we’ve established that Energize is good. Recall is good, too (at least worth the cost of the units you save with it, isn’t it?).

Hey, wait a minute, wasn’t I talking about Purify? Here’s the point I’m coming to about Purify. If you need Energy for Purify, you’re not getting one of these other effects – and for what? If you’re not way behind in army size, your opponent will turn tail and run once Purify hits the field – and during that time you get a few marines, maybe a couple marauders, a stalker or two (perhaps none if they have blink), perhaps more than one roach. See how bad that is at defense? Because you can’t force your enemy to stay (with a lot of FFs – and no Medivacs or burrow - or bad positioning on your opponent’s part) once he’s begun attacking. You get nice bursts of dps – but you can’t keep them around for it, so it just goes unused. And if it is high enough that you can cream an army hard enough to make using the ability worth it, what happens when you get it to the front lines and it can be used offensively? (Hint: scroll up a little bit.)

The point is that energy for an attacking mode is great for offense – but not that good for defense, especially if its duration is low.

My solution
There is undoubtedly more than one, but here’s what I’ve decided I like best. The reason it’s become so good offensively is because it’s mobile. The reason it’s so poor at defense is because its attack is so temporary. So what happens if we make the attack passive, and make the movement the part that’s tied to energy use. This has several effects.

1. We can provide the MC with bursts of mobility during defense. Short bursts of attack may be horrible for defending, but short bursts of mobility are great for it. Why else does everyone and their mother get blink near the beginning of a game if they suspect mutas or drop play?

2. The MC is always available for defending. Maybe it’s not a 45 damage/10 range super-cannon, but who’s going to be able to use it as that anyway – if everytime you turn it on an enemy can just decide to engage again 20 seconds later without the super-cannon available?

3. We can limit how much the MC is able to use its mobility by limiting the availability of its movement speed (through energy cost), and thereby eliminate the possibility of getting it across the map for a rush. If it takes the MC five minutes to get across the field on a map like Steppes of War – who cares if its good during the attack? On this note, you can make it worse during the attack, since its passive attack can have effectiveness of something like a photon cannon, rather than requiring a more potent attack due to its limited availability. Oh, and also, for all you zergies, they could also make it take long enough to get across the field for you to be able to have more anti-air available than hydras, or give it a short enough range to be susceptible to spores. This makes it much more defendable in a “rush” (if such thing is still allowed to occur).

4. This may have a slight “Energy tax” at the beginning of the game, in order to get it into defensive position once it emerges from the Nexus.

Example of Concept
Mothership Core
Cost: 50 minerals, 50 gas, 0 supply, 30 build time
Defense: 150 health, 100 shields, 1 armor
Sight: 14
Ground/Air Attack: 20
Cooldown: 1
Range: 7
Speed: 0

Abilities: Recall (as before), Energize (Range extended to 20 due to restricted mobility) and...
Psionic Thrust
Cost: 50 Energy
Description: Psionic Energy propels the motor-less core forward, granting it a movement speed of 1.0 for 10 seconds.

On September 29 2012 01:37 Treehead wrote:
Just wrote a blog on how what I believe is the best way to change purify.

http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?topic_id=372113



Basically, the idea is that, since it has a passive move speed and a temporary attack, we swap the two to give it a temporary move speed (costing energy) and a permanent attack. If you like it, would someone be so kind as to forward it to the bnet forums?

On September 29 2012 03:31 TheBloodyDwarf wrote:
Wtf. I have tryed several times to attack with mc. It takes 3-4mins to get get from yourbase to his! So you have to send mc out so early that its so easy to scout. You CANT attack with mc.

On September 29 2012 01:37 Treehead wrote:
If you like it, would someone be so kind as to forward it to the bnet forums?

On September 29 2012 03:58 IPA wrote:


I posted your idea (and credited you) on the b.net forums within kcdc's "Purify is going backwards" thread.

On September 26 2012 06:40 SarcasmMonster wrote:
To be honest, I don't see any possible changes to the Mothership core that won't be controversial.