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So this is post I made on the b.net forums, mostly to blizzard directly, but I would like to see what my fellow TLer's think about the subject seeing as how those forums move about as fast as a molasses land slide chasing a snail.. on top of a turtle.
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/6794713364
Okay so its no secret the widow mines are too strong with current numbers, but thats fine, numbers are malleable. The purpose of this thread is too discuss how the widow mine should be nerfed to make it a balanced but still useful unit.
The cost and supply are fine I don't think that needs any touching.
The speed is also in a good place, still slower than stalkers and slow lings, they can get around the map just fine and can be taken out early enough before ling speed and obs with proper micro and positioning.
The Hit Points and Range are what I think need looking at, and if more balancing is needed, then burrow time. But if they're weaker and have less range the burrow time may be just fine.
Right now the widow mine is basically a hellion in terms of HP, it is very tanky, we have hellions for this role, the mine doesn't need to soak as much damage as it does now, considering the damage it deals. I propose a health reduction to 50 HP and see how that feels, I would not go any lower than 30.
The range right now is just 1 less than a Stalker and Banshee and 1 more than a roach. The range right now lets it take out units just a little too easily (as well as medivacs and warp prisms and any other harassing unit.) I think the range should be lowered to 4 or maybe 3, this would make the early game shenangins much easier to stop while still keep it powerful enough to control space and buffer your tank lines for those awesome BroodWar esque slow pushes.
So to summarize, Reduce the HP to 50 or 40 and reduce the range by 1 or 2, this makes microing against them not as unforgiving while still keeping them strong for controlling space and supporting your army.
Couple these changes with Blizzards proposed ideas to give the other races earlier detection and I think we have a balanced awesome widow mine! What do you guys think?
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Imo range is fine.
What I think is needed: like you said hit points. But also:
- Burrow time increased
- Reduced splash to 35
- Unable to detect cloaked units.
I think with these parameters altered it would be a good unit.
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Alternatively, let's not bombard the devs with balance issues and let them make the general design of the units work first.
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IMO:
-Reduce damage done to primary target (widow mines no longer sacrifice themselves therefore don't have to trade 1 for 1 with every 2 supply unit.)
-No longer targets air
All I would do for now.
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On October 12 2012 03:51 Ljas wrote:
Alternatively, let's not bombard the devs with balance issues and let them make the general design of the units work first.
What do you mean? Like they will change the mine again?
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On October 12 2012 03:56 Phoobie wrote:
IMO:
-Reduce damage done to primary target (widow mines no longer sacrifice themselves therefore don't have to trade 1 for 1 with every 2 supply unit.)
-No longer targets air
All I would do for now.
I think it needs to target air for the following reason(s):
1. An anti air unit on the factory smaller and more maneuverable than the thor has been an intention since HoTS was first announced. Unless they take out the Thor and maybe put the warhound back in as an AA unit I don't think they will make it not hit air.
2. With some earlier anti air Actually just making factories for the early game has become viable (which is so huge for mech) while still needing to make vikings later on if the opponent is committing to air.
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Ahaha funny joke by someone not in beta. I get it. Please stop trying to distract people from how the widow mine should be buffed so it's viable beyond the first 7 minutes of the game.
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On October 12 2012 03:51 Ljas wrote:
Alternatively, let's not bombard the devs with balance issues and let them make the general design of the units work first.
Lol how dare you suggest that we give blizz more than a week to give this new version of the unit its trial run.
At this point the beta shouldn't be about balance but about how well something works. Its the same with entomb, no one is really discussing the finer points of its balance but the fact that it is boring and requires no skill.
The discussion about the Widow mine should be focused on that too, is it a good unit? Does it require skill to use to its best and does it require skill to defend? Fuck balance, make the thing work right first.
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The fact that it sees cloaked/burrowed units (and prioritize them or so it seems) is puzzling me. it makes dealing with mines incredibly difficult. I mean, some will manage (protoss: obs folowwing a stalker, although bye bye to obs roaming the map), the pros will manage, but the others? Bronze-gold will be a clusterfuck of mines and ragequits. Zergs are gonna be pissed to no end to have to make like 3 hydras just for mines.
Is it really too simple to deal with mines if they cannot see cloaked units? It will still control space in the sense that the main army will be able to move around but small forces will have to be really careful.
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On October 12 2012 03:51 Grendel wrote:
Imo range is fine.
What I think is needed: like you said hit points. But also:
- Burrow time increased
- Reduced splash to 35
- Unable to detect cloaked units.
I think with these parameters altered it would be a good unit.
No range is not fine. The only unit from zerg that can attack the "mine" and not be killed is a broodlord, swarmhost and hydra with range upgrade.
You can't counter it with anything else no matter what the mine is going to kill zerg units no matter how hard you try. The mine should be able to be killed by ranged units like roaches when you have detection, but you can have detection and the mine will still hit a roach which is a change that needs to happen.
On October 12 2012 04:11 NATO wrote:
Ahaha funny joke by someone not in beta. I get it. Please stop trying to distract people from how the widow mine should be buffed so it's viable beyond the first 7 minutes of the game.
He's in beta, he plays terran and he uses the mine a ton. Learn to know what you are talking about?
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The range is to small, you can kill it easily before it gets the observer, and the time to rearm is too long.
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On October 12 2012 04:11 NATO wrote:
Ahaha funny joke by someone not in beta. I get it. Please stop trying to distract people from how the widow mine should be buffed so it's viable beyond the first 7 minutes of the game.
They see me trollin'... They hatin'...
I have 300+ games in the beta, with almost all of those being Terran and I have meched in the vast majority of the games. As a reasonably skilled player I am saying the mine is too strong period but I want it to be nerfed properly so as to not make it useless.
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On October 12 2012 04:14 ant-1 wrote:
The fact that it sees cloaked/burrowed units (and prioritize them or so it seems) is puzzling me. it makes dealing with mines incredibly difficult. I mean, some will manage (protoss: obs folowwing a stalker, although bye bye to obs roaming the map), the pros will manage, but the others? Bronze-gold will be a clusterfuck of mines and ragequits. Zergs are gonna be pissed to no end to have to make like 3 hydras just for mines.
Is it really too simple to deal with mines if they cannot see cloaked units? It will still control space in the sense that the main army will be able to move around but small forces will have to be really careful.
Well the obs does have 11 range, and if the mine gets a range reduction it will be even easier to deal with them but will still punish sloppy control. And yes Mech Terran has fairly poor detection early in the game and the mines are only a soft counter, derping DT's through front door was never really a good idea and only killed "greedy" terrans who skipped a single turret, but using DT's in warp prisms for example will still be strong, and think about it, you can drag the mine into the SCV lines with them, so there is still a lot of back and forth, its like the mine just straight up hard counters cloak units. Its just a soft counter to buy time.
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On October 12 2012 04:13 emythrel wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2012 03:51 Ljas wrote:
Alternatively, let's not bombard the devs with balance issues and let them make the general design of the units work first. Lol how dare you suggest that we give blizz more than a week to give this new version of the unit its trial run. At this point the beta shouldn't be about balance but about how well something works. Its the same with entomb, no one is really discussing the finer points of its balance but the fact that it is boring and requires no skill. The discussion about the Widow mine should be focused on that too, is it a good unit? Does it require skill to use to its best and does it require skill to defend? Fuck balance, make the thing work right first.
Yes I think it works pretty good, it rewards good positioning and punishes sloppy control, it can't be amoved, its a very methodical unit, much like the siege tank. And it takes a good amount of skill to clear the map of them and make sure they don't get into your base. They probably shouldn't be able to load into a medivac tbh... although it is hilarious when a 1 widow mine kills a medivac with 4 widow mines in it :D
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i like their high high hp so you cant just clear a minefield instantly and they either are vs runbys or stall long enough for the slow moving mech army to reposition. cost + supply + not being a "explode and gone" unit is also nice.
what needs to be changed:
- make them not hit air and not hit cloaked units. every harrass prevented by a super lowprice unit is just bad design (all harrass unit that are air or cloaked cost a LOT LOT LOT more than widow mines)
- make burrow time A LOT higher! they are supposed to be a DEFENSIVE structure, not an offensive one. right now they are used offensively and burrowed in sightvision of opponents or dropped in mineral lines and instaburrowed. thats a really bad thing.
with these changes i like the widow mine 
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On October 12 2012 03:51 Grendel wrote:
Imo range is fine.
What I think is needed: like you said hit points. But also:
- Burrow time increased
- Reduced splash to 35
- Unable to detect cloaked units.
I think with these parameters altered it would be a good unit.
I don't think it detects cloaked units. Do you mean it shoudn't be able to shoot at non-detected cloaked units?
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You guys really hate mech don't you? The mine really doesn't need a nerf at all, it was sensationalist people going "omg it's OP!" the first day it was out and that's all it was.
Right now, mech TvP is viable because of things like the ability to detect cloaked units.
The reason wings of liberty mech was bad wasn't necessarily because mech was bad, it was because of all the crazy things you had to do to get mech going which at high level play was basically impossible.
The widow mine currently has cut down a lot of those wings of liberty costs allowing you to play mech tvp.
Starport = 100 gas.
Raven = 100 minerals 200 gas, easily snipable
Armory = 100 gas, thor = 300 minerals, 200 gas, 6 supply
Siege mode = 100 gas
Vikings = 75 gas + starport etc
So, in wings of liberty if you want to be able to handle DT openings you need a raven, and you have to keep it alive. Which means you need a starport, which means you can't build as many factories. Or you need missile turrets, and you have to have them in the right position 100%, which is huge wastes of minerals in the early game.
With the current mine detection, you don't need to build a starport, no raven, all this gas can now go to factories, mines, tanks, hellions etc. which makes mech more viable. Imagine for every missile turret you would need for detection and that ebay, now you have 4-6 hellions more.
It's a huge deal. What about void ray all-ins and openings? Mines can now help against that because you no longer need the starport + viking + turret + ebay and/or a thor + armory. You're literally saving hundreds of vespene gas now that can go to MECH.
There's a reason why mech tvp is much more do-able with the most recent changes, and why it sucked shit before. If you've played enough beta now anyways, the mine is no where near imba, it's strong, just like swarm hosts, vipers, tempests, etc.
Let it play out, stop asking for nerfs when they're not needed after 4 days of play testing. The warhound was different - it was a poorly designed unit for Terran, let alone SC2.
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Well i find once you get in to the late game where its 200 vs 200 mines are pretty useless and take up important supply, but for the early-mid game the widow mine allows terran to defend and get some early map control while you get double armoury and 3 bases faster then you previously could. Wait a few more weeks before making these kind of conclusions.
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I honestly can't believe that after all the stuff protoss and zerg got in hots you people are still trying to make terran even more of a joke than it already is.
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Don't nerf it at all, just buff other units...
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EPT
