Terran Identity: Damage and Supply

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

October 13 2012 18:47 GMT

First off, I want to thank FoxyMayhem here on TL for his continued support. It is because of him I will be able to make a Test map for these changes. His skills as an editor are also greatly appreciated. Also thanks to k10forgotten for helping me format this in a way that is not hurtful to look upon!

Here is the post on the beta forums and reddit respectively
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/6864316905?page=1#0
http://www.reddit.com/r/starcraft/comments/11fafh/terran_identity_damage_and_supply/

Arcturus Mengsk
Out of the many we shall forge an indivisible whole, capitulating only to a single throne. And from that throne... I shall watch over you.

IDENTITY
+ Show Spoiler +

Terrans have it rough. They are the unwanted and forgotten trash of Earth. Criminals, dissidents, undesirables. Here, among the ruins of empires and corpses of long-dead gods, Terrans grow crops, raise families, and feud with neighbors. There is no purity of form or essence here, only the wealth of blood and tears. Whether you are a General of the Dominion, or a Militia Commander, one thing is clear: this Sector is a dark and terrible place, and we are all in it together. Out of the many haphazard parts, comes an engine, a machine of war, made of bent plowshares, refitted motorbikes, and fueled by napalm and old grudges. Humans do not spawn in droves like the Zerg, and they cannot simply wade into battle like the Protoss. When the odds are stacked against the Terran, they cheat. Through sheer tenacity, ingenuity, and hard work, the Terrans have survived the The Great War, The Brood War, and the Second Great War. The message is clear: “We are here to stay, and if you got something to say, you can say it fifty yards out in a minefield.”

Identity and Mechanics
+ Show Spoiler +
Terrans are a race are a great machine made of interchangeable and focused parts. Each part is designed for a given set of tasks and in a pinch, can be used in ways not necessarily intended. Siege Tanks, Vikings were born out of necessity, and Vultures and Hellions units still bear resemblance to the civilian vehicles they were retrofitted from.

There are three core themes to a Terran combat unit:
- It has a near unprecedented ability to kill from a distance.
- It is intended to work in conjunction with a greater whole and fulfill a distinct role.
- It is reflects an effort to utilize and optimize every scrap. Waste is the deadliest of sins.
Mechanics and Tech
+ Show Spoiler +
Terran is special because it is comprised of three modular armies -- infantry, ground vehicles, and air vehicles -- that are brought to the field as the fight escalates. Each offering their own style. The rugged beauty of their modular design is that they give the terran commander the power to mix and match, bringing to bear different synergies for each strategy. Of the three races, Terran often has the most nuanced compositions. This is the heartbeat of Terran, the fundamental tension of choosing a pure composition of one modular army (stay with me Mr. Browder) for upgrade efficiency, or wielding their combined synergy.
1. Terran Infantry
  + Show Spoiler +
  Terran Infantry or Bio uses range and speed to outmaneuver and outgun their enemies. Many of these soldiers are expected to die in the process. That is fine: training these soldiers is cheap, and there are a multitude of gulags and prisons to draw upon. When playing Bio, one doesn't waste lives so much as spend them. Lives are cheap, equipment is expensive. Here, Blizzard's implementation is exceptional. Terran units feel cheap and useful for what they cost you. You can crank out an army of marines out of reactors, send Reapers to punish an unwary opponent, or lead Ultralisks on a merry chase with Marauders. Fighting against a good Terran infantry commander is like boxing with a hornet's nest: there is no running, there is no “fighting,” there is only the death of a hundred stings.
  - How has Bio Changed?
    + Show Spoiler [Brood War] +
    Terran Infantry was a problematic composition in BW due to their low starting values and their poor scaling.
    
    Unit Name Cost Supply HP/Shields Damage Range Tier
    BW Marine 50 1 40 6 4/5 1
    BW Firebat 50/25 1 50 4 (+4 vs Medium, +12 vs Small) 2 1.5
    BW Medic 50/25 1 60 - - 1.5
    BW Ghost 25/75 1 45 2 (+3 vs Medium, +8 vs Small) 7 3
    
    BW Zergling 25 0.5 35 5 0 1
    BW Hydra 75/25 1 80 5 (+3 vs Medium, +5 vs Large) 4/5 1.5
    BW Zealot 100 2 100/60 16 0 1
    BW Dragoon 125/50 2 100/80 10 (+5 vs Medium, +10 vs Large) 5/7 1.5
    
    The problem is pretty clear on paper. Terran units are strong with good positioning early on; however, the lack of durability made the composition terrible against any concentrated form of AOE damage such as Storms and Reavers. Additionally, speed Zealots and Dragoons could just straight up out last and out damage terran bio on a production basis. It doesn't help that the Dragoon out-ranged everything but the Ghost (a terrible tier 3 unit.) Pure Bio compositions existed on a timeline, for an infantry force to have scaled well into the late game, it required the support of Mechanized units on the ground or in the air.
    + Show Spoiler [Starcraft 2] +
    Starcraft 2 introduced several aspects to help make Bio a stronger presence in the mid and late game without making them too dominant early game. The results are mostly positive, and still preserve the gameplay and overall feel of Terran infantry.
    
    Unit Name Cost Supply HP/Shields Damage Range Tier
    WOL Marine 50 1 45+10 6 5 1
    WOL Marauder 100/25 2 125 10 (+10 vs Armored) 6 1.5
    WOL Reaper 50/50 1 50 4 (+4 vs Light) x2 4.5 1.5
    WOL Ghost 200/100 2 100 10 (+10 vs Light) 6 1.5
    
    WOL Zergling 25 0.5 35 5 0 1
    WOL Roach 75/25 2 145 16 4 1.5
    WOL Zealot 100 2 100/50 8 x2 0 1
    WOL Stalker 125/50 2 80/80 10 (+4 vs Armored) 6 1.5
    WOL Sentry 50/100 2 40/40 6 5 1.5
    
    The main changes are the addition of a more robust anti-armored unit (the Marauder), the removal of an AoE anti light unit (the Firebad) in favor of a ranged single target anti-light unit (the Reaper), and a more focused design of the Ghost, bringing it down to tier 1.5 (effective at Tier 2) and making it an anti-caster.
  - Marauder
    + Show Spoiler +
    The Marauder presents elegant design solution to the Starcraft 1 bio problem of melting to AOE, and their inability to take down heavy targets. These issues curtailed the entire composition of bio in TvP, but the Marauder helps carry bio viable into the late game. It can survive the initial burst of AOE, and does high damage to armored targets as well as buildings, opening up different kinds of harassment options. It also provides a means of Terran to stay away from their enemies (though I will argue that there are better ways to implement this but the effect is there.) The marauder has access stim and is a very “micro-able”, meaning good counter play is possible. Finally, it still is a small-ish unit and repeated exposure to aoe will still destroy them, so it’s not the answer to all of bio’s woes. This is good design; weaknesses give definition to a style are as interesting as strengths,. Despite the grief visited upon it, it is a well designed answer to the SC1 problem ...with the unfortunate addition of the unfun, antimicro concussive shell.
  - Ghost
    + Show Spoiler +
    A Tier 1.5 Ghost provides Bio with a caster that answers SOME of the threats to bio in the form of Snipe and EMP -- Storms don’t drop when the Templar is having an EMP seizure. The new Ghost is the elite terran infantry. Unlike the BroodWar Ghosth, the slightly increased supply cost of the SC2 ghost has allowed it to go toe to toe with its enemies, provided it gets the drop on them. It’s all about fighting dirty, and that is quintessential Terran.
2. Mechanized Units
  + Show Spoiler +
  Mechanized units, or Factory units, achieve the same goal of avoiding direct conflict through different means. Instead of sparing and fighting dirty, Mech armies assert dominance over territory. The opponent may have a hundred Zerglings and Hydralisks, but numbers don't matter when there is half a mile of mines and Tank fire waiting for the charge. Additionally, the machine of Factory units is a slower and more deliberate one. Timing attacks are executed on locations rather than enemies. It is about taking and the more critical ground. Old mech made “timings” by seiging the forth, then the third, and on until the they could put heat on the main base. These slow pushes provided tons of counterplay through mobility, and the chance to deploy units to break weak points in the line. This gameplay is the heartbeat of Mech, and the backbone of so many top-tier BW games.
  - Supply and Space Control in Mech Play
    + Show Spoiler +
    Since its release, Wings of Liberty has struggled with mech play, and there is one core reason: Supply.
    Let's look at the numbers.
    
    Unit Name Cost Supply HP/Shields Damage Range Tier
    BW Tank¹ 150/100 2 150 35² (+14 vs Medium, +35 vs L) 12 2.5
    BW Vulture 75 2 80 5 (+5 vs Medium, +15 vs S) 5 2
    BW Goliath [G] 100/50 2 125 12 5 2.5
    BW Goliath [A] 100/50 2 125 5 (+3 vs Medium, +5 vs L) x2 5+3 2.5
    BW Spider Mine - - 20 125² 1 2.5
    
    WOL Tank¹ 150/125 3 160 35² (+15 vs Armored) 13 2.5
    WOL Hellion 100 2 90 8² (+6/11 vs Light) 5 2
    WOL Thor [G] 300/200 6 400 30 x2 7 2.5
    WOL Thor [A] 300/200 6 400 6² (+6 vs Light) x4 10 2.5
    
    ¹ - Tanks in siege mode.
    ² - Area of Effect damage.
    
    The Wings of Liberty Tank does less damage (though smart fire makes its damage more consistent) and costs 50% more supply than its BW counterpart. This means that in BW 40 supply worth of tanks gave you twenty Tanks versus the 13 you can have in Wings of Liberty. The lack of a supply cheap means of map control like the Spider Mine also contributes to this problem. This means that Terran can hold ground less effectively with its core territory unit while Protoss and Zerg get more mobile armies through charge, Warp In, Blink, and Creep Speed. Meaning that when a tank line is broken, there are fewer tanks back home and no mines to slow down the enemy advance (which is faster in SC2). Perhaps the most problematic change is the Thor. The Thor's large numbers make it an intimidating unit to fight against, but all 6 supply has to be devoted to wherever the Thor is, meaning you get about 3 Goliaths worth of AA at a location, but you can't split it up. This high numbers/supply cost makes Thors a more all-in friendly unit at the cost of making it something you would make for a position-based macro based army.
  - The Old Warhound and why it was almost a perfect redesign of the Thor
    + Show Spoiler +
    Before the redesign of the Warhound and the inclusion of Haywire Missiles, the Warhound was introduced as a smaller, more mobile, Thor. To be clear, this is not the warhound played in the Beta. This older warhound was fantastic: its supply was somewhere between 2 and 4 rather than a 6 supply monstrosity; it targeted air; and had enough durability, speed, and damage to support Tanks and Hellbats on the ground. You could spread AA supply through your whole army, making mech a truly modular option, rather than a supplement to the other composition. When I saw the old warhound, I strongly considered switching to Terran to prepare for Heart of the Swarm. I would love to see the Warhound return as a reliable form of AA, restoring the modular nature of mech. Much superior to the mechanized marauder it was released as.
    
    The new mine may provide enough AA to allow mech to be its own modular Sub-army, however. We will have to see.
  - The Feel of the Thor
    + Show Spoiler +
    For the role it currently occupies, the Thor doesn't feel like a Terran unit. The Thor is an experimental weapon that costs tons of resources to bring to the battlefield. It is a ground battlecruiser, it wants to wreck things. Why should it be constrained to babysit tanks from mutalisks? Assigning it a babysitting AA role is wasteful. The fix will be discussed later.
3. Starport Units
  + Show Spoiler [Brood War] +
  Brood War Starport units had more complex and nuanced roles than the more specific roles of the Terran ground troops. They often combine firepower, range, increased durability, and mobility in exchange for higher costs. Air Terran shows up when the chips are down and the only recourse is to call in the air support. Starport units should feel like a cavalry that blares Vagner's “Flight of the Valkyries” (No pun intended). The Starcarft 2 Starport continues this proud tradition: the Wraith and Banshee excel at lightning attacks; Vikings are intended to hammer air targets from a long range, and descend upon supply lines when the opportunity presents itself; the Science Vessel and the Raven both have kits that can support multiple compositions by damaging mineral lines or discouraging direct engagements. Finally, the Battlecruiser sits atop the tech tree like some angry armored eagle, the contribution of the Terran's elite, the centerpiece of the great war machine, the banner of humanity.
  
  + Show Spoiler [Wings of Liberty] +
  I think out of all of the tech paths in SC2, WoL Starport units are both the most faithful and imaginative additions in terms of design and gameplay, even if the numbers aren't quite right. The Viking feels very terran. I know many people call it a gimmick, but the theme of converting a unit into another kind of unit is reflective of the ingenuity and sort of improvised identity of the race. A faster transformation would increase the micro potential and the smoothness of the unit. Or, even better, a transformation while moving. It’s not going anywhere very fast anyway, so forcing it to endure a self stun during the transformation seems like overkill. The Banshee is in the same spirit of the Wraith, and provides Terran with a real ground presence from the air before Fusion Core. This makes Air compositions very dangerous with good micro and support.
  
  Why I think the Raven is (in theory) even cooler than the Science Vessel
  + Show Spoiler +
  The Raven strikes me as a fantastic unit that supports all three modular army styles in SC2 Terran. It can provide buildings that block movement and harass, it creates safe zones that say “if you fight here you will lose,” and it has an ability that says “if you do not move your units in two seconds, they will die.” The unit has powerful tools to add to eliminate threats to Bio troops, bolster the zoning power of Mech, and mitigates damage to air forces. All of these abilities have counterplay. You can navigate around turrets, you can use tricks like hallucination or use non projectile attacks to soft counter Point Defense Drones. And you can split and run your units away from Seeker Missiles; however, each of these have costs in either apm, energy, or resources. If the Raven became the go to unit at Starport tech like the Science Vessel was, we would see more varied late game states in Terran match ups.

SUGGESTIONS
+ Show Spoiler +

Because unit design in SC2 is very consistent with the identity of Terran these suggestions are not nearly as radical as my previous proposals, with the exception of Change Set #2.

Bio
Polishing infantry to a shine.
- A Micro-Encouraging Marauder
  + Show Spoiler [Concussive Shell] +
  - Projected Effects
    Engaging Marauders, especially in small unit battles, currently turns your targeted units into Hydralisk, allowing no escape. It forces an engagement without choice. It’s binary: either your army will survive, or it completely dies. It creates a hard snowball for the terran, turning a small advantage into a large one without counter. With this change, the Marauder would be better equipped to bring the fight to targets with high armor such as well upgraded protoss armies, improving the marine’s effectiveness against them as well.
- A more versatile Snipe that doesn't break the game.
  + Show Spoiler [Snipe] +
  - Projected Effects
    This one is pretty straight forward: Terrans can once again effectively use Ghosts to kill not casters. QXC used pre patch snipe to kill banelings during pushes and kill marines in early micro battles, TLO used them to snipe the SCV building a bunker for his crazy early push. This change (as proposed by QXC) would return that diversity of play without taking away from the Ghost's core role as a support unit that eliminates small, high profile threats. Further, the original balance change is preserved: Terran can't efficiently spam snipe all Zerg's Tier 3 units.
Mechanical
Making the mechanical army modular.
- A Siege tank With More Utility and Counterplay
  + Show Spoiler +
  - Siege Tanks can now overkill targets.
  - Reduced Supply to 2 from 3.
  - Projected Changes
    This would allow Terran to field a larger number of Siege Tanks in the late game and increase mech's defender’s advantage. Additionally, allowing tanks to waste shots permits more counterplay that is currently limited by smart fire. It also increases the value of spreading tanks out, creating the battle lines BroodWar fans love so much. This is not about making the game harder for its ownsake, the same idea is actually going on right now in the HotS beta with the Widow Mine. They are pushing a unique unit's power while giving the races means of countering it. This change would hopefully produce a similar dynamic.
    
    On turtling
    Yes, this would allow Terran to turtle a bit harder in that they could cover more ground, however, there is a wealth of counters to this playstyle. Warp Prisms can Zealot bomb tank lines, Blink Stalkers can cover the distance, Colossi can hit from 9 range, Immortals have Hardened Shield, Tempests will hammer tank lines from 15 range, Swarm Hosts can waste shots and push the line, Vipers can pull or Blind Tanks, Infestors can deploy Infested Terran in the line's blind spots, Burrow roaches can close and ambush, Ultralisks can charge. Each race now has a ton of ways to exploit weak spots in a tank line. It is time to return tanks to that meaty core unit feel again.
- An AA Warhound
  + Show Spoiler +
  - Projected Effect
    This new unit provides a supply-cheap means for Mech to defend itself from AA. It still is vulnerable to armored air units like the Carrier, tempest and Broodlords, but with good target firing on clumps of units, the Jotun can come through for the composition, without obsoleting the Viking. It also allows the player to have wider coverage AA, further encouraging the battle line effect, rather than a deathball effect. Instead of committing 18 supply to 3 thors covering a small area, you can commit 12 supply to 6 of the more mobile Jotun to protect your tank lines. More degrees of success, improved esports design.
- A Tier 3 Thor
  + Show Spoiler +
  - Projected Effect
    The Thor was supposed to break siege lines, and a slight increase to speed and health would help the unit fulfill that role. With the Jotun in place, the Thor has no need for an AA attack, and can focus on being a land-based spear-head unit. The armor increase allows the Thor to shrug off lighter blows. It is a Juggernaut and the enemy is the wall. If it does fall in battle, the Terrans are loathe to waste such a costly unit. The Immortality Protocol can restore the hulk to fighting form, creating miniature objectives over the course of a battle, and creates a powerful Point of Interest for spectators. These changes give the Thor a focused identity: High-Tech Siege-Breaker Assault Unit. Rather than the deathball-forming AA babysitter it currently is.
Starport
- A Cooler Raven
  + Show Spoiler +
  - Projected Effects
    Ravens should be the foil to the Infestor, where the Infestor provides a burst of high damage short lived units, The Raven should lay down a wall of low damage, high durability buildings. Bringing the cost in line makes sense and provides for cool Raven plays like making walls mid battlefield. Currently the Raven has 2 techlab upgrades and 2 engineering bay upgrades needed for their turrets to be effective. The Science Vessel had three total, so combining two of the raven upgrades make the transition to Ravens smoother and move viable, especially in the early mid-game.
- A More Microable Viking
  + Show Spoiler +
  - Projected Effects
    Anyone else remember TLO’s 1 base Viking harass against Idra in the WoL Beta? That was awesome. Today, Vikings’ ground form is used as a last resort rather than the raiding option Blizzard intended it to be. This is because the Viking effectively stuns itself during the transformation to and from air. If it were allowed to move, we could see dives on tank lines, or swoops into and away from Mineral lines. Movement is key in an esport, and the Viking’s identity is that of a mobile raider.

As a note: Terran’s design with relation to its identity is the by far the tightest of the three races. The only deviation from that identity is the Thor, which really just feels like it is in the wrong Tier, not the wrong race. The rest of my suggested changes seek to pronounce the identity of a playstyle or a unit, and bring more variety and counterplay to the game.[/quote]

Update: 11/25/2012
The Concussive Shell change didn't work well at all and has been removed. The main issue is that it made fights even faster and less readable than WoL. We are currently testing out Juggernaut Plating (+2 Armor) and are much happier with the results.
1. It isn't anti mirco. You can actually disengage from Bio armies without using Forcefield or Speedlings unless they choose to stim.
2. It makes Marauders more micro friendly. You have to work to kite with them. Positioning Marauder walls vs Lings and Zealots is a more rewarded skill set. Pulling back Marauders being healed by Medivacs is rewarded due to their high HP efficiency.
3. It makes fights last longer.
4. Its simple , intuitive, and it is consistent with the unit's theme and image.

Raven is going to get a bit of a rework. No 25 energy turrets. We are going to make the Sci Vessel super jealous.

Battle Cruisers have a new ability that allows them to work with mech based armies as a command unit. The ability costs and constantly consumes energy, making BCs a bit more reasonable vs Feedback.

We are currently testing Tech Reactors as a Fusion Core upgrade as a means of answering Terran reinforcement issues. The gameplay is ok, and seeing lots of tech intensive units late game is awesome, but it isn't really a decision and feels more like a reward for completing the tech tree rather than a real research.

Decendos

Germany1338 Posts

October 13 2012 19:05 GMT

might i ask why you still work with damage to compare units instead of much more accurate DPS? a unit with 50 damage but 50 sec cooldown has 1 DPS, the same unit with 20 damage and 1 sec cooldown 20 DPS. obviously the second units is way stronger so plz work with DPS since damage comparisons dont say anything.

other than that: great work like your other threads :-)

Morton

United States152 Posts

October 13 2012 19:11 GMT

awesome to see the custom map!, it seems really promising in that blizzard is at least taking some of your suggestions to heart.

However, the siege tank concept is not the way to go about it in my opinion. Introducing overkill (and therefore the ai) is not only something that the design team is almost NEVER going to do, but in my opinion a backwards way of fixing the siege tank.

something else needs to be done to fix the tank, other than reverting back to outdated ai or ui.

topsecret221

United States108 Posts

October 13 2012 19:14 GMT

I would have waited another year for WoL to have the dynamic that you suggest in this series. Seriously, love it.

Incomplet

United Kingdom1419 Posts

October 13 2012 19:16 GMT

-A More Microable Viking

-Added Ragnarok Engine Upgrade 50/50 60 seconds. Requires Armory. Allows Vikings to Move While Transforming.

Projected Effects: Anyone else remember TLO’s 1 base Viking harass against Idra in the WoL Beta? That was awesome. Today, Vikings’ ground form is used as a last resort rather than the raiding option Blizzard intended it to be. This is because the Viking effectively stuns itself during the transformation to and from air. If it were allowed to move, we could see dives on tank lines, or swoops into and away from Mineral lines. Movement is key in an esport, and the Viking’s identity is that of a mobile raider.

SIIIIIICK!!!! Vouch for this...this would be fricking awesome!!!

topsecret221

United States108 Posts

October 13 2012 19:21 GMT

Another thing that made Brood War so fantastic was that every map was huge. Not covered in bases, like Tal'Darim, just big with a variety of exploitable points and terrain features. What might this do to SC2, if these were implemented?

Do we have en ETA on the release of the custom map? I'm dying to try out these changes (also, will the custom map include HotS units in their improved form?)

PrsdntKmacho

United States19 Posts

October 13 2012 19:47 GMT

Marauders Cost 100/25 not 125/25

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

October 13 2012 19:55 GMT

Oops, that was a typo >.>

Edit: Where did I say that a marauder cost 100/25? I am not able to see it.

BadgKat

United States156 Posts

October 13 2012 20:02 GMT

I want to play the game you design. It sounds more fun.

A.Alm

Sweden509 Posts

October 13 2012 20:03 GMT

#10

ItWhoSpeaks > Blizzard

Love the viking idea!

captainwaffles

United States1050 Posts

October 13 2012 20:09 GMT

#11

I've been asking for a 2 supply tank since the WoL beta, no doubt a 2 supply tank with smart fire would be broken as shit but blizzard has said multiple times they're not going to change how the AI works in the game... which is pretty sad Tbh.

Other than that, great post, do you have any plans to follow these posts up or anything?

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

October 13 2012 20:12 GMT

#12

It is interesting, it is the most embattled of my posts on reddit. It receives roughly as many downvotes as upvotes. I am curious as to why that is.

SigmaoctanusIV

United States3313 Posts

October 13 2012 20:20 GMT

#13

2 supply tank is to much some of the suggestions are good but some are just ridiculous, Interested to see some of these implemented and looked at.

Zombo Joe

Canada850 Posts

October 13 2012 20:32 GMT

#14

I really like all this except the Marauder change.

Concussive shell is fine imo, especially since it only affects 1 target, Zerg and Protoss have much more anti-micro abilities like Force Field and Fungal Growth which invalidate micro in entire armies.

Trozz

Canada3454 Posts

October 13 2012 20:34 GMT

#15

I love all of these.
I hope someone makes this map.
I want to play it.

whiskypriest

68 Posts

October 13 2012 20:42 GMT

#16

These ideas are all really great!

SolidMoose

United States1240 Posts

October 13 2012 20:49 GMT

#17

Pretty good ideas, although I'd have to disagree with the marauder. Concussive shell is just too important for picking off faster moving protoss armies and infestors. I'd also rather see raven auto turrets buffed in damage/health instead of less energy.

Garmer

1286 Posts

October 13 2012 21:02 GMT

#18

i like your SC2, if only you was in charge instead of dustin or david...

ledarsi

United States475 Posts

October 13 2012 21:14 GMT

#19

I nominate ItWhoSpeaks as lead designer of Starcraft. Not even joking- these three posts on how the game should have been made hit absolutely every point of interest. Blizzard, make it so. Fix your game.

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

October 13 2012 21:14 GMT

#20

On Turrets: a 25 energy turret would be pretty damn scary. I think letting the Turret scale with Ship Weapons would probably be a better fix.

On Marauder's Concussive shell: A slow is useful, but is not fun, especially on an auto attack. It may not cost energy, but it still shuts down micro in the early game, much like force field. This is why I would love to see it changed to some other helpful effect. As for chasing down targets, Stim does more of that work than Concussive Shell. Infestors aren't terribly fast, nor are High Templar.

jackdavis486

United States19 Posts

October 13 2012 21:16 GMT

#21

On October 14 2012 04:16 Incomplet wrote:

Show nested quote +

SIIIIIICK!!!! Vouch for this...this would be fricking awesome!!!

Agreed. ^
I think you have really nailed the heart of what it means to be a Terran unit. I commend you for an excellent write up (though some of the data could have been presented in a clearer way), and I would like to see these changes in action. I would at the very least like to see them tested.

Von

United States363 Posts

October 13 2012 21:49 GMT

#22

On October 14 2012 05:02 BadgKat wrote:
I want to play the game you design. It sounds more fun.

This.

Word.

ItWhoSpeaks really 'gets it', understands the game at a high level, analysis is spot on on all three write-ups.

Good work man. Much luck getting any or all of this to sink in at Blizz HQ.

Von

United States363 Posts

October 13 2012 21:53 GMT

#23

On October 14 2012 06:14 ledarsi wrote:
I nominate ItWhoSpeaks as lead designer of Starcraft. Not even joking- these three posts on how the game should have been made hit absolutely every point of interest. Blizzard, make it so. Fix your game.

This too lol.

mlspmatt

Canada404 Posts

October 13 2012 22:14 GMT

#24

Blizzard should hire you. Great Post

Tankz123

Denmark228 Posts

October 13 2012 22:20 GMT

#25

Again, please, compare the DPS, not the damage itself.

it doesnt matter if you say "holy crap ,zerglings do exact same damage!" - when one of them attack twice as fast.

Aveng3r

United States2411 Posts

October 13 2012 23:21 GMT

#26

a lot of these ideas are awesome. i especially like the one with the thor repairing itself (i understood that correctly, right?)

LOLItsRyann

England551 Posts

October 13 2012 23:43 GMT

#27

On October 14 2012 04:16 Incomplet wrote:

Show nested quote +

SIIIIIICK!!!! Vouch for this...this would be fricking awesome!!!

I was just about to say this!

A simple small change like this, is what could make things interesting, because right now, the time for Vikings to decelerate, stop, and transform, is hurting them a lot.

All in all, I'm really impressed by your threads, you've realy put a lot of thought into them and the community reflects it, especially with the test map! I really hope some of your ideas come into play, there are some good and some less good choices imo but well thought out ideas are always appreciated.

I really like the snipe change too, it keeps snipe being a cool one shot spell for smaller units, but nerfs what needed nerfing without changing any other aspect of the ghost.

Tppz!

Germany1449 Posts

October 13 2012 23:59 GMT

#28

On October 14 2012 06:14 ItWhoSpeaks wrote:
On Turrets: a 25 energy turret would be pretty damn scary. I think letting the Turret scale with Ship Weapons would probably be a better fix.

Why would it be scary? Infested Terrans are way more powerful and dont take up as much place to spawn. Turrets right now are pretty bad. And I would scale them with Vehicle Upgrades since its less a flying unit then a vehicle.

Other than that: Awesome post! I dont agree too much on the tank thing but its very thoughtout and pretty scary how good all your suggestions/reviews are. keep going!

Fen1kz

Russian Federation216 Posts

October 14 2012 00:04 GMT

#29

^ this

seriously, it is a first guy who suggested remove strike cannons in his balance thread
and he doesnt want to add +5 sec to bunker..

lpunatic

235 Posts

October 14 2012 00:16 GMT

#30

I feel like Blizzard have a bit of a "sunk costs" mentality with regard to game balance - they've said that it's very close to 50/50/50 in all matchups, and I feel like they want to preserve some of this with regard to WOL units (though it also seems that they're more open to experimenting with HOTS units, which is good).

I think some of the ideas here are interesting, though. I would really like to see a slower mech style more common in lategame TvP; I think if it existed it might even help to bring out the strengths of bio play in the same scenario.

Buchan

Canada184 Posts

October 14 2012 00:33 GMT

#31

Please hire this guy as the lead multiplayer designer Blizzard. Let Dustin "platinum" Browder design single player.

sona

Canada52 Posts

October 14 2012 00:33 GMT

#32

A group of people should make their own beta to test all these out.

Zombo Joe

Canada850 Posts

October 14 2012 00:47 GMT

#33

On October 14 2012 09:33 Buchan wrote:
Please hire this guy as the lead multiplayer designer Blizzard. Let Dustin "platinum" Browder design single player.

That would be a compliment.

rysecake

United States2632 Posts

October 14 2012 01:06 GMT

#34

great points. put this up on the blizzard forum though, i don't think they reply to tl

BadAssJ

United States136 Posts

October 14 2012 01:22 GMT

#35

really random arcturus video

LockeTazeline

2390 Posts

October 14 2012 01:59 GMT

#36

These are such good suggestions, especially the moving viking. That would be so sick to watch as a spectator.

All in all, a great series. I hope Blizzard listens.

SigmaoctanusIV

United States3313 Posts

October 14 2012 02:55 GMT

#37

On October 14 2012 08:59 Tppz! wrote:

Show nested quote +

Turrets are scary because they last for 3 minutes being able to much down double would be damn scary they would need duration and damage decrease to work.

YyapSsap

New Zealand1511 Posts

October 14 2012 03:20 GMT

#38

On October 14 2012 10:59 LockeTazeline wrote:
These are such good suggestions, especially the moving viking. That would be so sick to watch as a spectator.

All in all, a great series. I hope Blizzard listens.

SC2 needs... MOVING SHOT!!!

Cant believe they took it out. LIke you glide in, fire your missiles/attacks off while gliding back. That made wraith micro so beautiful to watch.

And to the OP. Excellent as usual! Seriously, the game would be SO much more interesting with those changes. One more thing to add to the raven is how HSMs work. They are far too binary (either lots of explosions including the death of the ravens) or nothing. They should implement something like a damage over time, or deal damage after a timer HSM spell where both gives some sort of control to the opposing player to mitigate damage. Direct damage dealing abilities (especially AOE) should be avoided at all costs due to the binary nature of them.

ZigguratOfUr

Iraq16955 Posts

October 14 2012 03:38 GMT

#39

I entirely agree with a majority of the proposed changes. However, the proposed raven change seems a bit too strong to me. A 25 energy auto-turret would be absurdly strong. Lone raven harass would be extremely destructive, as a mineral line would be shredded by 8 turrets queue-dropped. This is not even comparable to the infested terran considering a turret can last 3 min (or 4 if upgraded), and has 125 health, and has a similar level of mobility to the infested terran.

Evangelist

1246 Posts

October 14 2012 03:56 GMT

#40

Concussive Shell enables early game Terran micro. It doesn't shut it down. Without Conc Shell, bio would be completely unable to contend with anything. I wish people would get this right.

I also find it faintly amusing (but entirely predictable) that there's a chorus of "LET HIM DESIGN THE GAME BLIZZARD" ongoing. You realize that in the grand scheme of things, these changes are incredibly minor iterations based off the designs already implemented in the game? Blizzard already did the hard work - the OP is just making a few extremely minor changes based off his own ideas, though his hit rate is a little higher than most.

About the only vaguely original idea here is the idea of vikings being able to dive bomb things which while cool isn't really game changing so long as vikings only do 12 damage a second or so for the supply and minerals they cost.

YyapSsap

New Zealand1511 Posts

October 14 2012 04:03 GMT

#41

On October 14 2012 12:38 BrokenMirage wrote:
I entirely agree with a majority of the proposed changes. However, the proposed raven change seems a bit too strong to me. A 25 energy auto-turret would be absurdly strong. Lone raven harass would be extremely destructive, as a mineral line would be shredded by 8 turrets queue-dropped. This is not even comparable to the infested terran considering a turret can last 3 min (or 4 if upgraded), and has 125 health, and has a similar level of mobility to the infested terran.

Ravens are 200gas. They are also slow and vulnerable. Plus I dont think anyone would waste 200 energy when it could cast HSMs off during the big engagement.

Turrets are very weak (unless you upgrade everything on them just to make them ok) unless in big big numbers. People dont realise how useless they are and especially as the game enters the mid/late game.

YyapSsap

New Zealand1511 Posts

October 14 2012 04:12 GMT

#42

On October 14 2012 12:56 Evangelist wrote:
Concussive Shell enables early game Terran micro. It doesn't shut it down. Without Conc Shell, bio would be completely unable to contend with anything. I wish people would get this right.

It enables early game micro? What micro? One thing for sure is that it shuts down micro for the other two races. What it does is make you commit. Theres NO running away or fighting away from it. This is almost as bad as chain fungals. You cant kite due to the effective movement speed being reduced.

And bio unable to contend? Ive seen numerous PvTs without conc shell and the Ts doing fine without them from early to late game. Plus wasn't it that concussive shells makes it worse during mid/late game engagements due to the slowed zealots being overtaken by the ones not being effected and i.e. the marauders changing targets?

On a side note, it seems like you're getting offended by other posters cheering the OP. Quite strange indeed.

NiteWatch

Indonesia58 Posts

October 14 2012 06:01 GMT

#43

In a few threads you have made much better ideas than blizzards design team combined. Good job!!

Hattori_Hanzo

Singapore1229 Posts

October 14 2012 06:26 GMT

#44

On October 14 2012 13:03 YyapSsap wrote:

Show nested quote +

Yes, the HSM should be foil to the infestor's FG. Either a raven fires their payload or an infestor stops them in their tracks.

YyapSsap

New Zealand1511 Posts

October 14 2012 08:46 GMT

#45

On October 14 2012 15:26 Hattori_Hanzo wrote:

Show nested quote +

Yes, the HSM should be foil to the infestor's FG. Either a raven fires their payload or an infestor stops them in their tracks.

Or gets taken out on its way to the lone expansion without doing anything productive? Ravens are... well quite coin flippy in there current form. Either big big explosions, or nothing.

Kaleidos

Italy172 Posts

October 14 2012 08:56 GMT

#46

With the AA to Warhound, widow mines are supposed to lose their AA, right? The AA right now seems to be shutting down almost any form of harass, which is not good for the gameplay.
Personally i think that the old (the one time use) widow mine, with the activate/deactivate mechanic, was funnier to use and had a higher skill ceiling.
Maybe removing the AA would even allow to reduce its supply to 1, tweaking the numbers accordingly.

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

October 14 2012 10:01 GMT

#47

Ground only Widow Mine would be pretty essential with an AA Warhound/Jotun unit.

zlefin

United States7689 Posts

October 14 2012 10:22 GMT

#48

if you're going to try to adderss balance issues, you NEED to understand the units thoroughly. While i like some of your ideas, your refusal to consider the huge relevance of attack speed, and attack speed changes from bw.
Also, your information on firebat, while at a decent basic level, neglects the much more complicated details on firebat damage. do you remember how many attacks it woudl take a firebat to kill a dragoon?

Big J

Austria16289 Posts

October 14 2012 10:28 GMT

#49

On October 14 2012 17:46 YyapSsap wrote:

Show nested quote +

Or gets taken out on its way to the lone expansion without doing anything productive? Ravens are... well quite coin flippy in there current form. Either big big explosions, or nothing.

so are harassing Infestors. People lose them quite commonly before they do any damage. The getting taken out part of ravens is quite OK, but autoturrets are simply not good for harass, nor for a lot else.

guN-viCe

United States687 Posts

October 14 2012 12:08 GMT

#50

IMO these ideas are pretty decent, but Blizzard is unlikely to change.

YyapSsap

New Zealand1511 Posts

October 14 2012 12:14 GMT

#51

On October 14 2012 19:28 Big J wrote:

Show nested quote +

Atleast you can burrow move them and sneak them into the expansions. Plus are you seriously comparing infestors to ravens?

FeyFey

Germany10114 Posts

October 14 2012 12:58 GMT

#52

Sigh I loved Terran because they evaporated enemy armies within a few seconds if they were in position. But it worked the other way round as well.

The issue for the AutoTurrets are the missing attack upgrades. Infested Terrans would be crap lategame if they wouldn't get upgrades. And with 25 energy you would create an environment where people would go for a Raven AutoTurret push, before they become useless because they deal no damage against +3 armor. They also work like a universal PDD. Units priorize them, you absorb multiple siege tank shots with them when pushing and they occupy 0/0 lings for a year. Which would make a Raven even stronger for early game aggression, something where a Terran already is pretty strong and forced alot of balance changes, because the other races like to sit out till Blizzard steps in.

Exogenesis93

Australia8 Posts

October 14 2012 13:05 GMT

#53

This is absolutely brilliant. I'm a master terran player myself and LOVE your ideas. Especially the tier 3 thor for breaking siege lines, and the revised Warhound "Jotun". I hate how they nerfed the ghosts snipe, so you couldn't even one shot banelings let alone use it effectively against non-caster bio. You should seriously be the lead designer behind starcraft 2 as it is in need of an overhaul at the moment imho, for the good of both gameplay and spectating in esports.

Alex1Sun

494 Posts

October 14 2012 13:19 GMT

#54

Awesome post as usual. I fully support it!

Big J

Austria16289 Posts

October 14 2012 13:21 GMT

#55

On October 14 2012 21:14 YyapSsap wrote:

Show nested quote +

Atleast you can burrow move them and sneak them into the expansions. Plus are you seriously comparing infestors to ravens?

No, I'm saying that "getting taken out on its way to the lone expansion" is something that happens to basically any harass unit quite often and is part of the deal when you want to harass. Infestors can burrow, DTs are cloaked, banshees can fly and can cloak, Medivacs fly, Ravens fly. All of them have some abilities that make catching them a bit harder than just a simple ground unit.

Ravens right now are not a great unit. They have their use against air play and are an interesting support tool, but for harassing they miss the expandability that a standard unit you get many of has and also an ability that is really made for harassing. Autoturrets are not, they are a tool that gives you a little more area control and even that they don't do well.

Millet

Sweden143 Posts

October 14 2012 15:24 GMT

#56

Agreed, ravens are kind of a hit or miss unit with the HSM. Id like to see the range of hsm to be at least he range of feedback and fungal growth in order for ravens to compete with the other spellcasters. The turrets are ok, but no where near the infestors harrass capabilities. Perhaps blizzard could alter the "neosteel frame" upgrade on he ebay to also upgrade the static weaponry of terran (ie PF, turrets and auto-turrets damage output). I picked neosteel frame because it's never upgraded anyway.

Acually, including static weapon upgrade in the neosteel frame makes sense: lighter hull leaves more space for weapons, more space for weapons means more damage. A cost of 150/150 resources would make sense for this upgrade.

Mataza

Germany5364 Posts

October 14 2012 15:36 GMT

#57

Let me chime in on autoturrets.

Right now turrets are downright awful. When was the last time you saw someone getting a raven and plant turrets? Ravens are got for PDD and HSM.
Issues I see with turrets:
Space inefficient.
Durable my ass.
Can be outmicro´d in 2 clicks A.K.A. can only harass buildings.

Let me elaborate a little. Turrets are space inefficient, as every single turret takes 1 building spot. 4 turrets are the size of a bunker. How many beachballs(Infested Terrans) would fit in the space of a bunker? A lot more than 4. This issue goes further. Because of huge footstamp, you can only put a turret where you could place a building. You cannot put a turret into a mineral line, only around it. You can lob beachballs into gaps in the enemy army, into the smallest of crevasses you can fit 1 or 2. You can hardly place 3 turrets into a busy battle except smack in the middle, and if you do that, the enemy can just retreat and your own turrets block and hinder you from chasing.
Turrets might last forever and have 150 hp. They might last 3 minutes and deal ok with unupped zerglings, queens and workers but they don´t even dent spines, cannons, roaches, marauders and zealots. Against those units you can´t put them down since they are not actually durable healthwise, only timewise. It´s more like one really fat marauder(with +25 hp).
Against fast units like lings and hellions you can´t prevent a runby. Against workers you might even fail to kill a single one. The placing range is short, you can only plant them where no worker is at that very moment. Hell, the best way is to fly over the line and try to trap them with a wall of turrets. So without workers, you can kill buildings. Only that turrets hit like an unupped marine each. Also every defense structure counters turret harass, either by threatening the raven or killing the turrets. The harass potential is simply not worth the energy.

There´s an achievement for killing ~15 workers with turrets in 1 game. After a single raid, the enemy will be aware of the possibility and a. put 1-2 turrets/cannons/spines/spores behind every mineral line b. pull the workers quicker next time.
Overall they can´t
-be placed during battle
-harass workers
-defend positions
They are good
-harassing buildings, if you got the time
They´re only other use is to write your name on the map with them.

k1ruaa

17 Posts

October 14 2012 16:05 GMT

#58

Dude, I really like your ideas. I hope blizzard will consider introduce some changes you suggested.

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

October 14 2012 20:28 GMT

#59

Thought: What if HSM speed up as time went on, making it effectively guaranteed damage to its primary target while giving ample time for the opponent to split and mitigate damage?

Akamu

United States309 Posts

October 14 2012 20:42 GMT

#60

Interesting post. I like a lot of the ideas you brought to the table. Especially the warhound/thor concept. Hopefully blizz at leasts takes a glance at this.

rembrant

62 Posts

October 14 2012 20:45 GMT

#61

On October 14 2012 13:12 YyapSsap wrote:

Show nested quote +

Lol, I guess anything that alters micro is considered "shutting down micro" now, I bet if fungal was made a slow ppl would still cry just as much. Conc enables micro as it let's marauders kite units or chase them down, in case you were wondering. Microing away from conc isn't that hard u just can't do it super early game, just get blink or charge or a warp prism.

zlefin

United States7689 Posts

October 14 2012 20:54 GMT

#62

please correct firebat damage on the original post, what you have isn't really accurate. If you don't want to put something accurate for firebat damage, at least give indication of the unmentioned details.

xTrim

472 Posts

October 14 2012 21:33 GMT

#63

Brilliant... Just brilliant... I loved it.. too bad this is not gonna change anything, but i really enjoyed the read

Kyrao

United States161 Posts

October 14 2012 21:43 GMT

#64

I really like these ideas, except for the overkill siege tank one, that seems like a step backward. I really hope Blizzard sees this and takes it seriously. I've always disliked the play style of the Thor... it really does seem out of place as it currently is.

Crawdad

614 Posts

October 14 2012 23:01 GMT

#65

I have to admit that this is my least favorite of the three.

A lot of the changes just seem unnecessary. The Marauder change, the Viking upgrade, the Raven change... How did these take priority over the Reaper or Battlecruiser? The Marauder and Viking are fine as they are. I agree that the Raven needs an update to see more use, and that it has way too many upgrades, but reducing Auto Turret cost to 25? This doesn't solve the problem with Ravens, it just makes it better at doing what it already did. I also agree 100% with changing the Thor's utility, because it seems ridiculous to have such an intimidating unit be used as AA support, but I don't think you fixed it in the right way. I would rather see Strike Cannons updated, so that there is actually a way to deal with Immortals, as well as protracted tank wars.

YyapSsap

New Zealand1511 Posts

October 14 2012 23:41 GMT

#66

On October 15 2012 05:28 ItWhoSpeaks wrote:
Thought: What if HSM speed up as time went on, making it effectively guaranteed damage to its primary target while giving ample time for the opponent to split and mitigate damage?

I think its a good idea. Or you take it one step further and say the bomb latches on the primary target (it will always hit the target since it will speed up as time gets longer), and then a timer starts like the original widow mine concept. This way it allows the opponent to split/run away or pick out that particular unit and avoid scenarios like when the deathballs clash where the HSMs would just evaporate half the opposing army.

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

October 15 2012 03:20 GMT

#67

On October 15 2012 08:01 Crawdad wrote:
I have to admit that this is my least favorite of the three.

A lot of the changes just seem unnecessary. The Marauder change, the Viking upgrade, the Raven change... How did these take priority over the Reaper or Battlecruiser? The Marauder and Viking are fine as they are. I agree that the Raven needs an update to see more use, and that it has way too many upgrades, but reducing Auto Turret cost to 25? This doesn't solve the problem with Ravens, it just makes it better at doing what it already did. I also agree 100% with changing the Thor's utility, because it seems ridiculous to have such an intimidating unit be used as AA support, but I don't think you fixed it in the right way. I would rather see Strike Cannons updated, so that there is actually a way to deal with Immortals, as well as protracted tank wars.

I think the best way to deal with Immortals is to make Immortals less of a hard counter and boost the overall power of tanks rather than updating Strike Cannons. But I may be alone on that. I agree that a 25 energy turret is probably not a good change given that it doesn't answer late game Raven issues but makes them even stronger in all ins. When the custom map is done, we will test other tweaks to the turret.

As for Battlecruisers, we will see how much help they really need.

zlefin

United States7689 Posts

October 15 2012 08:15 GMT

#68

ItWhoSpeaks, stop dodging my questions.
If you want to balance the game you need to understand it, and repeatedly dodging the very relevant issue of attack speed will make all your mathcrafting worthless, and will heavily degrade the quality of any design.
Your stats for firebats remain inaccurately presented; and since you refuse to answer my question, i have to assume you don't even remember how firebats attack works. Your range on dragoons is incorrect; and your analysis of how they fare vs terran bio is questionable, attack speed factored in the results are fairly close, and it requires dragoon kiting to be truly favourable to protoss.
Your way of displaying the bw damage stats also would imply results that are incorrect with how the actual game works due to the armor interaction.
Dodging these is not acceptable if you want to balance the game.

HOTcarl

United States102 Posts

October 15 2012 08:57 GMT

#69

My god GREAT thread! Brilliant dynamic suggestions. blizzard definitly needs to take a look at this. Especially love the viking/thor/tank/jotunwarhound suggestions. The ghost snipe seems a bit obvious and I cant believe blizzard hasnt already made that change... Awesome thread man. Hope it leads to some changes

LazerMaze

Australia6 Posts

October 15 2012 11:09 GMT

#70

I really have to object to this whole idea of designing the races based upon what they should "feel" and what their "identity" should be. When thousands of dollars and careers are on the line, BALANCE and not FEEL/IDENTITY must be the priority here. The two don't always correlate and these changes only conformed to one of those ideas.

If the goal is to completely change how the three races should play out then you should structure your propositions in terms of general goals and directions for the game, and not throwing in a bunch of numerical changes and praying it all balances out in the end. The latter needs to be backed up with a proven problem on why there is an unequal opportunity for one race to win as oppose to the other and a ton of simulations to show that your proposed change won't heap a havoc of unintended consequences on the other matchups.

Yes it would be nice if the three races could conform to your desired "identities", but that's not an excuse to impose a ton of "balance" changes just to suit your demands. In fact it seems like everyone's too blinded by their hate for blizzard to see these proposed "changes" for what they actually are: a whole heap of radical, game breaking proposals just because some player wanted terran to "feel more like his/her version of terran" completely irrespective of any consequences on actual gameplay

moQbara

Romania76 Posts

October 15 2012 12:07 GMT

#71

You cannot make suggestions about a balance change without taking into account the effects this has on each matchup and, at the same time, without assessing what changes should be made to the other races in order to compensate.

Yes, I love flying space bombs which teleport in a black-hole-type of effect and at the same time control my favourite music player to select the proper soundtrack for each situation. This idea could have lots of followers also. Doesn't mean it's applicable for Starcraft 2 tho.

Velr

Switzerland10668 Posts

October 15 2012 12:44 GMT

#72

Your analysis of SC/BW Bio vs P seems to be wrong?

IIRC Marine/Medic/(Firebat) with Upgrades shredded Zealot/Dragon with ease... But then AE came in to play and a single Reaver or Psistorm totally screwed Bio.

Now when looking at SC2, what has really happened?
Medics went out and the Medivac came on a way higher Techtree for much higher individual cost --> Marines therefore couldn't stand toe to toe with Zealots/Stalkers, let alone Zeal/Stalker/Sentry --> Marauder was introduced to fix this --> Marauder "destroyed" Terran-Bio's identity by having a million HP and therefore removing Bios weakness.

Solution:
Bring Medics back.
New Marauder: 1 Supply, 45 HP, 8/16 DMG, same range as the Marine, costs ~60/25.

+buff Tanks.

Treehead

999 Posts

October 15 2012 15:33 GMT

#73

I don't like the OP's changes.

As I said in the tank thread:

On October 03 2012 05:53 Treehead wrote:

In WoL, mech is quite supply inefficient, but not because of the tank. Consider this:

At 300/250/6 (and lower tech) 2 siege tanks do:
23.4 - 33.4 dps to primary target plus a radius of splash
320 health

Another supply efficient unit of a similar role (the Colossus) costs 300/200/6 and does:
18.2 dps (line of splash)
350 health (can be attacked by air)

Do these not seem similar? Not that I'm a meching expert, but it seems to me that the trouble I've always had with mech isn't that Siege tanks don't deal a ton of damage for their cost and supply, but that the stuff you have to put in front of them in WoL (hellions/marines) are so supply inefficient and fragile. This should be solved (hopefully) by the battle hellion.

Regarding air, if you accept that against ground armies mech is efficient, and against sky armies Vikings are efficient, I fail to see why mech/medevacs/vikings isn't a good strat, especially if medivacs are able to be used on BHs. It doesn't have the mobility of bio - but neither does it have its fragility.

...

They're different units. Colossi have issues with Vikings too, where tanks don't. Tanks tend to be worse against zealots, while Colossi deal fairly well with them.

My numbers are meant to illustrate that I don't see that reducing supply costs for the tank to allow for 50% additional tanks to occupy the same supply would have a positive affect on the game. I think the 3-supply tank compares reasonably, and the 2-supply tank (from a purely supply standpoint) seems like it would allow for an awful large number of tanks for the same supply (3 per colossi instead of 2).

Maybe it would be good - but I haven't really seen any reason to think that that's the case.

In addition, I dislike the idea that Marauders would get an (albeit microed) ability to negate up to 2 armor upgrades - as armor upgrades (and sentries) seem to be the only thing that hold early marines in check long enough to get splash damage. Bio has plenty of dps early on - why not replace concussive with something which is defensive in nature, maybe a damage/range upgrade while in bunkers or a (heaven forfend) an activated ability which requires them to do something other than auto-attack? Or a mode which increases their range/damage but lowers their speed (and cannot be used in conjunction with stim).

The thor changes seem quite vicious to Protoss as well. The removal of energy (since you removed strike cannons) was something Blizzard did midway through WoL, and the result was actually quite scary. We didn't get a chance to flush it out - but again, I'm not seeing anything stated in the OP that says we should. You seem to say they're redundant with BCs - in which case, just take them out. Don't make them more resilient, take away one counter (feedback) while hurting another (zealot damage past 3 base armor) - AND give them a come-back-from-the-dead ability.

On October 15 2012 21:44 Velr wrote:
Your analysis of SC/BW Bio vs P seems to be wrong?

IIRC Marine/Medic/(Firebat) with Upgrades shredded Zealot/Dragon with ease... But then AE came in to play and a single Reaver or Psistorm totally screwed Bio.

Now when looking at SC2, what has really happened?
Medics went out and the Medivac came on a way higher Techtree for much higher individual cost --> Marines therefore couldn't stand toe to toe with Zealots/Stalkers, let alone Zeal/Stalker/Sentry --> Marauder was introduced to fix this --> Marauder "destroyed" Terran-Bio's identity by having a million HP and therefore removing Bios weakness.

Solution:
Bring Medics back.
New Marauder: 1 Supply, 45 HP, 8/16 DMG, same range as the Marine, costs ~60/25.

+buff Tanks.

Your new marauder makes all infantry cripplingly weak against all forms of splash damage (esp tanks/colossi) - was this your intent?

Glorfindel21

France51 Posts

October 15 2012 16:39 GMT

#74

I think than most people trying to respond to the OP don't get what he meant.
He did not want to adress numbers per se, it was all about identity, or to say, philosophy of the races. That means the principles that the races supposed to correspond to (don't know if my english is understandable enough :p).

In fact, it's obvious that every and each of the possibilities that he mentionned are going to produce chaos in the balance. But what matters is not the following : how should we modify ideas to fit the numbers ? In fact it should be : how we modify numbers to fit the ideas ? Problem is : numbers have been fixed, so now there is no turning point to idea whitout having to redesign every single number.
But, nevertheless, it's how it works : it could be done, it's juste a matter of people not wanting to drop numbers on things, which is stupid. In fact, they consider the balance of the moment as being the sacred heart of the game, which is, as i said, a wrong way to think about it.

When you say (as I read it) : yes but if turrets cost 25 energy, those and this and those should be modified and this would be broken ?

NO, you don't even know how it would look, since you can't predict how this unit would fit in the new game's design, neither the metagame it would introduce.

Big J

Austria16289 Posts

October 15 2012 16:58 GMT

#75

On October 16 2012 01:39 Glorfindel21 wrote:
I think than most people trying to respond to the OP don't get what he meant.
He did not want to adress numbers per se, it was all about identity, or to say, philosophy of the races. That means the principles that the races supposed to correspond to (don't know if my english is understandable enough :p).

In fact, it's obvious that every and each of the possibilities that he mentionned are going to produce chaos in the balance. But what matters is not the following : how should we modify ideas to fit the numbers ? In fact it should be : how we modify numbers to fit the ideas ? Problem is : numbers have been fixed, so now there is no turning point to idea whitout having to redesign every single number.
But, nevertheless, it's how it works : it could be done, it's juste a matter of people not wanting to drop numbers on things, which is stupid. In fact, they consider the balance of the moment as being the sacred heart of the game, which is, as i said, a wrong way to think about it.

When you say (as I read it) : yes but if turrets cost 25 energy, those and this and those should be modified and this would be broken ?

NO, you don't even know how it would look, since you can't predict how this unit would fit in the new game's design, neither the metagame it would introduce.

They are not going to make a new game. What you are saying is they shouldn't tweak it, they should remake it, which they won't for obvious reasons.

k10forgotten

Brazil260 Posts

October 15 2012 17:24 GMT

#76

On October 16 2012 00:33 Treehead wrote:
I don't like the OP's changes.

As I said in the tank thread:

Show nested quote +

Your new marauder makes all infantry cripplingly weak against all forms of splash damage (esp tanks/colossi) - was this your intent?

I propose an AOE upgrade, rather than an armor reducing upgrade. Bio doesn't have any means to do AOE damage, and it can be adjusted to make it balanced. I'd even name it Frag Shells, instead of Concussive Shells.

Treehead

999 Posts

October 15 2012 17:33 GMT

#77

In the broadest possible sense, we all want the same thing for SC2 - a game which rewards skill and has three different but equally viable races.

In a less broad sense, we may agree on general principles, but be unsure as to whether or not the implementation of said principles results in a "good" game. This is where the specifics come in.

For example, let's say something we agree would be good in flavor is something silly - for example, zealots with wings - an air superiority melee unit! Let's pretend we all like this conceptually. How does our sky zealot fare against a Viking? If a sky zealot can't take a Viking 1v1, then it will never be good against Vikings (since if it can't take a Viking 1v1, in an XvX situation, the vikings can act the same as they could in 1v1 - or they could focus fire, which works better). If a sky zealot can take a Viking 1v1, it must have high enough health to endure the Viking's attacks or high enough damage to lay on the hurt after it closes distance. Then, you add marines into the mix, and suddenly our flying zealot is either something which is so tanky that is really only useful as a tank - or it's so damage-heavy that it plays more like a scourge than it does like a zealot. Or maybe then you need to make flying sentries to support your flying zealots and at that point you begin to wonder - do we really want this after all?

My point (in case it wasn't clear) is that all concepts which lead us to our broad goal (of making a good game which rewards skill and has three distinct but viable races) seem good without specifics. Often times, though, once we start seeing any specifics, we realize that any specifics make the underlying concepts hard to actually implement. Without specifics, all concepts aimed at good goals are good - but how do you know there exists an implementation that won't absolutely wreck the game? It comes through specifics and testing.

As much as I'd love the ideas being presented in this series if I knew they were tested and implemented in a way that led to a more dynamic an interesting game than what SC2 currently is, I don't see many reasons why I ought to believe that the game the OP is presenting is any better than the HotS being played in the beta.

Without specifics, everyone ought to like what the OP is going for. But also, without specifics, it's impossible to tell whether or not the OP's concepts are bad.

Treehead

999 Posts

October 15 2012 17:40 GMT

#78

On October 16 2012 02:24 k10forgotten wrote:

Show nested quote +

On October 16 2012 00:33 Treehead wrote:
I don't like the OP's changes.

As I said in the tank thread:

Your new marauder makes all infantry cripplingly weak against all forms of splash damage (esp tanks/colossi) - was this your intent?

I actually like this. You could make it an AOE effect which telegraphs its intended area before it lands (and prevent the Marauder from attacking for an appropriate length of time) - to create Marauder AE vs. blink wars, where fast players could prevent a set or two of their stalkers from being AE-ed, but it'd be far too action intensive to save them all (where in large engagements, the difference between button +click-click-click-click, and select+button+click/select+button+click/etc. is large enough to lose you some units). Early game with a few marauders, this would do nothing away from choke points. Late game, it might be huge. That might also require the Marauder to cost more gas, though, or for the AE to be very expensive.

Like I said above, this might be a good concept - if they came up with specifics that felt reasonable.

Jermstuddog

United States2231 Posts

October 15 2012 18:06 GMT

#79

This whole thread misses the biggest factor of the Terran army that was lost going from BW to SC2: squishiness.

In BW, Terran didn't have a single unit that would be considered "tank" by any means. Look at the unit stat comparisons real quick to see:

Marauders have 125hp compared to the Firebats 50hp, Marines 45/55 vs 40, Siege Tanks 160 vs 150, Hellions 90 vs Vultures 80, Medivacs 150 vs Medics 60, Thors 400 vs Goliaths 125.

This is a little discussed topic, but the facts are fairly evident: Terran got an across-the-board HP buff while the other races remain roughly the same or worse.

Part of this intricate "parts of the greater machine" theory that made Terran so interesting in BW was that all their units sucked and were barely useable, but combined, the whole was far greater than the parts.

In SC2, Terran largely retains this interdependence between the various units, but some of those units got upwards of a 30% hp bonus.

What I want for Terran is to see their health go down, and not in the spiteful "terran is OP" sort of way, but just from the viewership perspective, I am rarely impressed with SC2 Terran play compared to BW.

What once was a beautiful orchestra of interworking parts has been reduced to a stim-and-attack race.

Terrans biggest problem is their units got better, unlike the other races.

zlefin

United States7689 Posts

October 15 2012 18:39 GMT

#80

actually Jerm, several units from other races did receive buffs in SC2; what's a buff depends in part on what you use a baseline, but for some of them it's very clear they were buffed.
The only truly nerfed units was the zergling, because their stats would be obscenely good with better pathing and unit selection in sc2.

Glorfindel21

France51 Posts

October 15 2012 18:49 GMT

#81

For example, let's say something we agree would be good in flavor is something silly - for example, zealots with wings - an air superiority melee unit! Let's pretend we all like this conceptually. How does our sky zealot fare against a Viking? If a sky zealot can't take a Viking 1v1, then it will never be good against Vikings (since if it can't take a Viking 1v1, in an XvX situation, the vikings can act the same as they could in 1v1 - or they could focus fire, which works better). If a sky zealot can take a Viking 1v1, it must have high enough health to endure the Viking's attacks or high enough damage to lay on the hurt after it closes distance. Then, you add marines into the mix, and suddenly our flying zealot is either something which is so tanky that is really only useful as a tank - or it's so damage-heavy that it plays more like a scourge than it does like a zealot. Or maybe then you need to make flying sentries to support your flying zealots and at that point you begin to wonder - do we really want this after all?

I stoped reading after first sentence. Because you get the way wrong. I will use the same example.
If you decide to add wings to a zealot, you do not do so for the sake of adding wings to the zealot, you do it because you have a purpose in doing so. Oracle process is the same : people think they can add whatever spell they want. Wrong ! The unit has a purpose, and must serve this purpose. So the first sentence should not be : we want to add wings to our zealot. It should be : what do we want our zealot to be AS A UNIT, and not, dont get me wrong, what do we want our zealot do. In fact, if you begin with the latter, you are already one step under, that is, you design a unit with no clear direction, that can't allow you to discriminate anything that could be add to it.
So, you will never want your zealot to fly, unless you have decided (what blizzard did), taking it all from the start (what different kind of evironment our units should be able to move into ? Say : ground, air, and secret dimension !), that some units are going to be able to fly. But, if you do so, the next step is : ok, now that i have flying units, what kind of role could they have ?

I'am fully aware that this is pure theory and that often ideas come BEFORE theory. Though the OP made it clear that he had IDEAS and that's from those ideas that he derived the units, because it's precisely how it's supposed to work !

Without specifics, all concepts aimed at good goals are good - but how do you know there exists an implementation that won't absolutely wreck the game? It comes through specifics and testing.

Actually, no. The concept are bad, if, and only if, they can't fit the identity. Wheter it's possible or not to implement them does not affect the concept, which is only, and I insist, only consistent compared to another concept. What you say is that numbers can show than there is impossible contradiction than make the implementation impossible. I don't see how since you can't (sorry, it's also my case ^^) foresee what will happen with testing, since you must consider one implementation at a time, which is precisely not to do (and explains why blizzard needs a beta with all units running at the same time).

As much as I'd love the ideas being presented in this series if I knew they were tested and implemented in a way that led to a more dynamic an interesting game than what SC2 currently is, I don't see many reasons why I ought to believe that the game the OP is presenting is any better than the HotS being played in the beta.

Well, you can't. It's up to you to decide if HotS' units philosophy is better than the one of the OP. It's concept against concept, not numbers vs concept (you can't compare wha'ts not homogeneous).

Without specifics, everyone ought to like what the OP is going for. But also, without specifics, it's impossible to tell whether or not the OP's concepts are bad.

Like i said, concept can't be bad in this regard.

Jermstuddog

United States2231 Posts

October 15 2012 18:51 GMT

#82

On October 16 2012 03:39 zlefin wrote:
actually Jerm, several units from other races did receive buffs in SC2; what's a buff depends in part on what you use a baseline, but for some of them it's very clear they were buffed.
The only truly nerfed units was the zergling, because their stats would be obscenely good with better pathing and unit selection in sc2.

And the Zealot, and the Stalker. Hydras didn't lose any HP, but had their gas cost doubled.

I'm not even trying to talk about odd comparisons like Reaver vs Colossus or things like that, and maybe that would disqualify the Thor complaint, but my point still stands just fine.

The Marauder has over 2x as much HP as the Firebat did and is generally considered far more useful with it's 6 range, double damage vs armored, and concussive shells.

The Marine got a FREE 5 hp and an unheard of +10 hp upgrade, giving a fully upgraded Marine a 37% increase in health when compared to it's BW counterpart.

The Medivac is a bit more of a stretch considering the costs are more inline with that of a dropship than a medic, but it's a dropship that can heal 2x as fast as medics used to in BW, at longer range, and the damn thing flies... oh yeah... it's a fucking dropship too.

These 3 units had their utility massively scaled up, and that is why mech isn't used in SC2.

I've pointed it out plenty of times before, and I will continue to do so because 99% of the people here don't get it.

Nobody WANTED to use mech in BW, at least not when you're learning to play the game.

You started out trying to make Marines and Firebats work, but they were just too fucking weak. Zealots would 3-shot marines, Dragoons were faster, had longer range, and had huge HP, bio just wasn't useable.

Terrans were forced to use mech in TvT and TvP. Anything outside of a handful of marines in the early game was basically suicide.

Even in TvZ, Bio was essentially on a clock. M&Ms were good in the early game due to their mobility, generalist nature, and speed, but as higher-tier units hit the field, Marines QUICKLY lost their usefulness.

The biggest problem with mech in SC2 is that Marines (and Marauders, and Medivacs, but mostly Marines) are so damn good.

Treehead

999 Posts

October 15 2012 18:52 GMT

#83

On October 16 2012 03:06 Jermstuddog wrote:
Part of this intricate "parts of the greater machine" theory that made Terran so interesting in BW was that all their units sucked and were barely useable, but combined, the whole was far greater than the parts.

In SC2, Terran largely retains this interdependence between the various units, but some of those units got upwards of a 30% hp bonus.

What I want for Terran is to see their health go down, and not in the spiteful "terran is OP" sort of way, but just from the viewership perspective, I am rarely impressed with SC2 Terran play compared to BW.

What once was a beautiful orchestra of interworking parts has been reduced to a stim-and-attack race.

Terrans biggest problem is their units got better, unlike the other races.

Maybe I haven't been watching the "stim-and-attack" TvZ games that you have, but the games I've been watching are largely based around interplay between a bunch of different units. Colossi and HTs both only have one unit designed to be able to deal with them, and the micro involved with those units often differentiates a win from a loss. In TvZ, from what I've spectated (by no means an expert here), it felt like the same kinda deal - broodlords without Vikings, or Infestors without ghosts or banelings without tanks, etc. feels very fragile.

Am I missing something that you're saying?

Jermstuddog

United States2231 Posts

October 15 2012 18:59 GMT

#84

On October 16 2012 03:52 Treehead wrote:

Show nested quote +

So, the games you're watching DON'T involve Terran throwing away massive amounts of bio all game long?

I guess I'd like to see these games, because, the games I'm watching show that TvT has been stuck on Marine/Tank for 2 years, TvP revolves around trading away bio units for at least the first half of every game (with the core army never changing from MMM to anything else), and TvZ, being the only MU where mech appears even remotely viable, still has 50-80% of the army supply being made up by marines in at least 1/2 the pro games I see.

Maybe a little bit more than stim happens, but the Terran race is not nearly the work of art it once was.

Zorgaz

Sweden2951 Posts

October 15 2012 19:08 GMT

#85

Really like alot of the ideas, alot of them are things that I've theorized about, and I'm sure a good portion of TL has aswell.

The big 3 things i would like to see is.

1: A mech AA, the mines don't cut it. If they widow mines stayed how they are but lost their AA attack they would be easier toe balance.

2: Because mech then would have a more reliable and less clunky AA unit the Thor could lose it's AA attack, get moved up a tier and become stronger against ground.

3: Ghosts Snipe becomes 45(25 to massive), this would be so much more fun! Opening 1 rax ghost TvT was so awesome, the nerf against t3 Zerg was defiantly needed but it could have been done so much more smoothly.

Best of luck to you sir in getting your ideas through to blizzard.

zlefin

United States7689 Posts

October 15 2012 19:14 GMT

#86

Jerm, you're wrong. zealot wasn't nerfed, and stalker is a bit of a remake, and has some significant advantages/disadvantages vs the dragoon.
mutalisks received a modest buff.
You've forgotten about the effects of the shield change to protoss I suspect.
I ain't disagreeing about marines being pretty strong now; but you don't seem to have all the figures right; and those figures matter a lot, which is why I keep insisting the original poster demonstrate he understands how firebats actually work.

Treehead

999 Posts

October 15 2012 19:25 GMT

#87

I stoped reading after first sentence.

That's weird because you seemed to guess very well at what the rest of the post said. Hyperbole is never useful in communicating constructive criticism - which I assume is what you're trying to do.

If you decide to add wings to a zealot, you do not do so for the sake of adding wings to the zealot, you do it because you have a purpose in doing so. Oracle process is the same : people think they can add whatever spell they want. Wrong ! The unit has a purpose, and must serve this purpose. So the first sentence should not be : we want to add wings to our zealot. It should be : what do we want our zealot to be AS A UNIT, and not, dont get me wrong, what do we want our zealot do. In fact, if you begin with the latter, you are already one step under, that is, you design a unit with no clear direction, that can't allow you to discriminate anything that could be add to it.
So, you will never want your zealot to fly, unless you have decided (what blizzard did), taking it all from the start (what different kind of evironment our units should be able to move into ? Say : ground, air, and secret dimension !), that some units are going to be able to fly. But, if you do so, the next step is : ok, now that i have flying units, what kind of role could they have ?

I'am fully aware that this is pure theory and that often ideas come BEFORE theory. Though the OP made it clear that he had IDEAS and that's from those ideas that he derived the units, because it's precisely how it's supposed to work !

If your whole point can be consolidated to my rewording "lets say we decide a good concept is to add wings to the zealot" as "lets say our predetermined good concepts lead us to design a flying zealot as the perfect addition to the protoss army - and we planned it that way from the start", then I think you missed my point.

If you meant something else, then please, work on your proofreading. I don't mean to be a grammar nazi, but it's almost impossible for me to glean any meaningful criticism from what you wrote.

I know I don't know what would happen in testing, but I do know something about the phoenix and why it has trouble being used with any logevity in any matchup. Hence, the flying zealot example (PS - I didn't mean all zealots should be able to fly - I meant that the concept of the new unit would be "like a zealot, but flying") - which takes all of the phoenixes problems and amplifies them. You seemed to miss that.

Add to that the fact that there are plenty of examples in SC2 of things people don't consider to be good design, that fit the race conceptually just fine. The Colossus (or if you'd prefer - a Reaver which does the micro for you), the roach, the marauder, all fit conceptually. Unless by conceptually you mean after looking at stats - in which case, I guess I think of stats as the specifics.

Well, you can't. It's up to you to decide if HotS' units philosophy is better than the one of the OP. It's concept against concept, not numbers vs concept (you can't compare wha'ts not homogeneous).

This assumes that there is not an absolute "good" or "bad" that we can agree on. I think that's a bit pessimistic, don't you? And I'm not saying "let's compare numbers to concept" - I'm saying "let's compare numbers to numbers". Because in comparing "concepts" we can often say things which are disingenuous, misleading or just flat out wrong. For instance, did you know part of the Colossus' concept was as a raiding unit?

Treehead

999 Posts

October 15 2012 19:33 GMT

#88

On October 16 2012 03:59 Jermstuddog wrote:

Show nested quote +

The games I'm waching of every matchup involve a lot of play using roach/ling/hydra or gateway units or terran bio for most of the game.

I don't see a problem with that. But like I said, I'm no TvZ expert. I thought it was pretty fun to watch though. When I watched Stephano vs. Taeja on Ohana (was it Dreamhack?) - I was completely entertained. There was a lot of bio, yes. But I never felt like Taeja was just "stimming and attacking".

Jermstuddog

United States2231 Posts

October 15 2012 19:37 GMT

#89

On October 16 2012 04:14 zlefin wrote:
Jerm, you're wrong. zealot wasn't nerfed, and stalker is a bit of a remake, and has some significant advantages/disadvantages vs the dragoon.
mutalisks received a modest buff.
You've forgotten about the effects of the shield change to protoss I suspect.
I ain't disagreeing about marines being pretty strong now; but you don't seem to have all the figures right; and those figures matter a lot, which is why I keep insisting the original poster demonstrate he understands how firebats actually work.

WHAT IN THE HELL? YOU THINK MUTAS GOT BUFFED?!?! PLEASE EXPLAIN.

As far as the Zealot argument, however you want to slice it, they got a -10 shield nerf, charge can generally be considered worse than leg enhancements. The best argument I can see for your idea of Zealots getting nerfed would be Siege Tanks, which went from taking 4 shots to kill a Zealot to 5. Pretty much every other unit interaction is far worse for the Zealot, most notably their exchange with Marines, where they used to be one of many reasons for why Marines were not useable in the MU (again, Marines used to get 3-shot by Zealots, just like Zerglings).

You can use your Shield argument for how much better Archons got, at least Archons have the notable interaction with Marauders, but I wouldn't go so far as to claim they got better compared to BW Archons.

Now back to your Stalker argument, sure... blink offers it some new utility, and I would even go so far as to argue that is the single reason why the Stalker can't be any better than it currently is, but the Stalker doesn't exactly inspire the same feelings the Dragoon did. I would go so far as to argue that the Stalker suffers from being TOO MUCH of a generalist unit. It's good for harass, fighting, defense, it's got good speed, decent hp, but it's not really great at any of those things. The Dragoon at least had raw strength behind it.

Anyway, I have my figures right, thanks for not assuming wrong.

I'd really like to see how you consider the Mutalisk to have received ANY sort of buff coming to SC2 where DPS inflation, splash damage, and lack of moving-shot have made them all but worthless.

Jermstuddog

United States2231 Posts

October 15 2012 19:44 GMT

#90

On October 16 2012 04:33 Treehead wrote:

Show nested quote +

On October 16 2012 03:59 Jermstuddog wrote:

On October 16 2012 03:52 Treehead wrote:

http://blip.tv/day9tv/day-9-daily-1-flash-vs-hero-3515432

Go back and look at some of the old day9 games involving Terran. All 3 MU.

Day9 does a great job of explaining what's going on and why the various small maneuvers are beautiful and important.

Specifically related to MY argument, you can see the evolution of the Terran army throughout the MU. A few marines to start out. Then add some medics. Soon a few Siege Tanks pop out, maybe a firebat or two, finally add some dropships and Science Vessels, eventually replacing the M&M army with Vultures and Goliaths if the game ever gets that far.

TvX just had a lot more depth in BW than it does in SC2.

renaissanceMAN

United States1840 Posts

October 15 2012 19:52 GMT

#91

i hope to god that one of the dev's reads this.

zlefin

United States7689 Posts

October 15 2012 20:11 GMT

#92

Jerm, if you use marines as a baseline, mutalisks got a 13% attack speed increase.

i ask you jerm, how many attacks does it take a firebat to kill a dragoon?
that's a nice stat to know, and since you claim to know your stats so well, i'd like you to demonstrate, just as i've asked of the OP.

Jermstuddog

United States2231 Posts

October 15 2012 21:10 GMT

#93

On October 16 2012 05:11 zlefin wrote:
Jerm, if you use marines as a baseline, mutalisks got a 13% attack speed increase.

i ask you jerm, how many attacks does it take a firebat to kill a dragoon?
that's a nice stat to know, and since you claim to know your stats so well, i'd like you to demonstrate, just as i've asked of the OP.

Firebats have a funky attack, I remember their rules were all jacked up, but quickly off the top of my head, they would do 4 damage to armored targets, but Dragoons had 1 armor, I remember something about Firebats ignoring armor value, but I'm going to ignore that and say it should be ~3 damage a shot x 33 = 100 to get through the hull. They would deal the full 16 damage to the shield though, so that's like 5 shots. You're in the range of ~38 shots to kill a dragoon.

Mataza

Germany5364 Posts

October 16 2012 00:47 GMT

#94

On October 16 2012 03:06 Jermstuddog wrote:
This whole thread misses the biggest factor of the Terran army that was lost going from BW to SC2: squishiness.

In BW, Terran didn't have a single unit that would be considered "tank" by any means. Look at the unit stat comparisons real quick to see:

Marauders have 125hp compared to the Firebats 50hp, Marines 45/55 vs 40, Siege Tanks 160 vs 150, Hellions 90 vs Vultures 80, Medivacs 150 vs Medics 60, Thors 400 vs Goliaths 125.

This is a little discussed topic, but the facts are fairly evident: Terran got an across-the-board HP buff while the other races remain roughly the same or worse.

Part of this intricate "parts of the greater machine" theory that made Terran so interesting in BW was that all their units sucked and were barely useable, but combined, the whole was far greater than the parts.

In SC2, Terran largely retains this interdependence between the various units, but some of those units got upwards of a 30% hp bonus.

What I want for Terran is to see their health go down, and not in the spiteful "terran is OP" sort of way, but just from the viewership perspective, I am rarely impressed with SC2 Terran play compared to BW.

What once was a beautiful orchestra of interworking parts has been reduced to a stim-and-attack race.

Terrans biggest problem is their units got better, unlike the other races.

Quoted for truth.
I totally forgot the squishyness part of terran. Never was really into terran back in bw. It seems odd now that hydralisks had higher or equal hp to every ground unit except tanks and goliaths.
The only real high hp they had were air units. It has become a lot less tricky to make terran work :/

EntDreamin

New Zealand45 Posts

October 16 2012 01:00 GMT

#95

The title of this should be Terran Identity: Position, Macro, and Micro

zlefin

United States7689 Posts

October 16 2012 14:14 GMT

#96

it's actually going to be ~23 shots.
a firebat attack has 3 hits, the number of which hit varies based on positioning and the size of the target; and as with many splash weapons there's a 50% and 25% damage zone.
Against large targets the firebat will usually get in all 3 hits in the 100% zone.
Firebats don't ignore armor, but armor is subtracted before the % adjustment for weapon type vs target size is calculated;
so each hit part does 1.75, for a total of 5.25 per attack.
this also menas oddly enough, that 2 firebats attacking 1 dragoon, if neither side micros, is actually a pretty close battle.
This is why OP's way of displaying the stats is simply bad, it messes up the armor interaction with size frmo sc1, and fails to denote firebats actual damage.

On another note, zealots got a 5% attack sped increase in sc2, again if using marines as a baseline; so while they lost 10 shields, they did gain that. and the change in shield interaction rules means they aren't hurt as badly by anything doing explosive damage, which would be most analogous to the anti-armor damage in sc2; so zealots weren't nerfed, they're about the same. while charge may nto be quite as good as zealot speed boost, improvements in pathing rules do maek it much easier for melee to saturate on an opponent and avoids single file syndrome.

While I agree wtih many of your conclusions and unit quality assessments, you don't know the figures and underlying math of the game nearly as well as you think you do. Understanding all these details is a real help in trying to balance the game and in mathematically modeelling the underlying behavior.

EllisA

United States6 Posts

October 16 2012 15:22 GMT

#97

This is a beautiful write up op!

As a toss I'm hesitant to suggest any buffs to terran. Historically (I've played since release) terran has been the best race. I would, however, feel ok if terran had a slightly more terrifying siege tank. I'm thinking of this for the late game of course, as I think the tank works well in 1/1/1 rushes.

Jermstuddog

United States2231 Posts

October 16 2012 16:11 GMT

#98

On October 16 2012 23:14 zlefin wrote:
it's actually going to be ~23 shots.
a firebat attack has 3 hits, the number of which hit varies based on positioning and the size of the target; and as with many splash weapons there's a 50% and 25% damage zone.
Against large targets the firebat will usually get in all 3 hits in the 100% zone.
Firebats don't ignore armor, but armor is subtracted before the % adjustment for weapon type vs target size is calculated;
so each hit part does 1.75, for a total of 5.25 per attack.
this also menas oddly enough, that 2 firebats attacking 1 dragoon, if neither side micros, is actually a pretty close battle.
This is why OP's way of displaying the stats is simply bad, it messes up the armor interaction with size frmo sc1, and fails to denote firebats actual damage.

On another note, zealots got a 5% attack sped increase in sc2, again if using marines as a baseline; so while they lost 10 shields, they did gain that. and the change in shield interaction rules means they aren't hurt as badly by anything doing explosive damage, which would be most analogous to the anti-armor damage in sc2; so zealots weren't nerfed, they're about the same. while charge may nto be quite as good as zealot speed boost, improvements in pathing rules do maek it much easier for melee to saturate on an opponent and avoids single file syndrome.

While I agree wtih many of your conclusions and unit quality assessments, you don't know the figures and underlying math of the game nearly as well as you think you do. Understanding all these details is a real help in trying to balance the game and in mathematically modeelling the underlying behavior.

So, this is why the firebat is a bad unit to test one's knowledge of unit interactions. The same firebat can hit a unit for anywhere from 1 to 33 damage depending on position and upgrades. Referring to a unit that was niche in a game I haven't played in years is asking for far too much murkiness.

I looked the stuff up last night when I got home just to check. I should have told you how stupid of a question that is rather than bothering to play your game.

You are getting too caught up in the underlying numbers and not watching the fucking game in front of you.

You make a case for mutalisks doing more dps relative to marines in SC2, well that's nice, why do marines shit all over mutas in SC2 when they used to be fairly even in BW? Zealots do 5% more damage? Great! Why don't they slaughter marines like they used to?

The problem with your argument is that you're talking about shit that doesn't matter. Marines and bio in general got MASSIVE buffs in SC2. We're not taking 5 or 15%, we're talking 30-100%. Firebats were never as good as you're trying to make them out to be, this is supported by high-level BW play for over 10 years. They were used, and had a critical role, but they were niche.

Terran infantry in SC2 is far better than Terran infantry in BW, which already had its place.

OP is talking about supply and damage. Those aren't defining features of BW Terran IMO. Terran was defined by range, positioning, and low HP. Or if you want specific units: Tanks, Spider Mines, and in TvZ, Marines.

Garmer

1286 Posts

October 16 2012 16:22 GMT

#99

On October 14 2012 12:20 YyapSsap wrote:

Show nested quote +

no, SC2 need overpowered things, everything here, feel so underwhelming...

XenoX101

Australia729 Posts

October 16 2012 16:38 GMT

#100

The main problem with all these comparisons between BW and SC2 is that they're running on different engines, we saw how you couldn't achieve BW balance in SC2 with the SC2BW mod. Things like bad unit pathing, grid movement, unit glitches and the aforementioned different way that splash damage interacted means you can't really compare stats number to number like the OP has done. I think its clear that the OP needed to put some numbers in for people to get a clear idea of what was intended, something for people to say 'thats too high' or 'that's too low' rather than 'that could be anything', but he needed to justify these numbers against SC2 numbers not BW numbers.

zlefin

United States7689 Posts

October 16 2012 17:10 GMT

#101

ok jerm, you just don't get it, its' far harder to competently balance a game when you don't understand how the underlying game works. your poor attitude merely demonstrates needless belligerence; and the damage dones't vary frmo 1 to 33 on a firebat, you're just a noob who can't accept that you don't know the game nearly as well as you think you do. i shan't bother arguing with you anymore, since i've proven you don't know the game that well in detail, and you can't track the arguments properly.
OP - pay more attention to attack speed and how all units actually work; understanding how all these things, as well as all the things other mention interact is vital to making a good design.

SCRK

Netherlands17 Posts

October 16 2012 17:11 GMT

#102

I like every change except for the siege tank change. Your version of the unit will have 20 tanks attacking 1 zergling, after which the real swarm begins, where your tanks are useless for a couple of moments. Focus firing will be harder to do for lower leagues too, because focussing a pack of banelings with your tanks will most likely mean that pack of 10 will die, but a lot of your siege tank shots are wasted on dead units, so the other units will overrun you. You say it allows for more tanks to be build, but those tanks would just be useless because they would attack units that are already dead (for a split-second, units that are dead for a longer time of course wouldn't be targeted).

In conclusion, this will make the tank better at the pro level, but this is a giant nerf to the lower levels of play where the amount of micro needed is not (yet) present. The rest of the changes are pretty good, though, and I think they'll make Terran more fun to play.

Jermstuddog

United States2231 Posts

October 16 2012 18:45 GMT

#103

On October 17 2012 02:10 zlefin wrote:
ok jerm, you just don't get it, its' far harder to competently balance a game when you don't understand how the underlying game works. your poor attitude merely demonstrates needless belligerence; and the damage dones't vary frmo 1 to 33 on a firebat, you're just a noob who can't accept that you don't know the game nearly as well as you think you do. i shan't bother arguing with you anymore, since i've proven you don't know the game that well in detail, and you can't track the arguments properly.
OP - pay more attention to attack speed and how all units actually work; understanding how all these things, as well as all the things other mention interact is vital to making a good design.

If my cussing offends you, too bad. Welcome to the fucking internet, bitch.

You can act all haughty if you want, but the point is YOU aren't seeing the forest through the trees. Just tell me how a 5% DPS increase for the Zealots is even relevant when they clearly perform less well, especially when considering the Marine, the unit you're using to justify this very same DPS increase. Same goes for the muta.

Prove the relevance of your numbers, then you will actually have a point. Until then, you're just rambling.

Jollygoody

Sweden6 Posts

October 16 2012 19:12 GMT

#104

Absolutely brilliant. I only hope Blizzard will consider this post. Especially would love to see the Thor reworked in that way and the moving viking transformation is a smart solution to an underused mechanic.

Velr

Switzerland10668 Posts

October 16 2012 19:27 GMT

#105

While his numbers are (probably) wrong, his points are right.

Killcycle

United States170 Posts

October 17 2012 04:49 GMT

#106

ItWhoSpeaks, these three threads have really been about the best whole sets of balance changes I've seen. Your reasoning is solid, you give meaningful insight for each change, and really make it shine from a game design standpoint. I especially like how your changes, while sometimes drastic, try to stay relatively close to our current build; you shuffle some things around, but really there are only one or two new units. This, if nothing else, is probably the best way to have Blizzard listen, and to get players interested in this.

Now, it all sounds great in theory, but I bet Sc2 sounded just as good on paper before release. For that (probably obvious) reason, I'm really interested in seeing the custom map with these changes.

My other concern with a custom map like this is that it ignores the principle of unit testing. It's hard to discern the effects of each unit when you have so many changes in one place. While this will eventually yield results given enough games, I think it may be in the best interest of the map to include a pre-match GUI set-up allowing the toggling of specific units, between two states - "Original" (as they are now), and "Modified". Maybe not even in the published map, but the one that you and your testers use.

This will let you play with individual units and get a real-game feel for what each unit contributes or doesn't, relative to other units. Perhaps this is just the way I'd go about it, being a (prospective) programmer; just a suggestion.

Either way, this is awesome thought food. Well done.

Edit: Will that custom map be available for us non-beta players, or will it be strictly available on HOTS beta?

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

October 17 2012 08:37 GMT

#107

On October 17 2012 13:49 Killcycle wrote:
ItWhoSpeaks, these three threads have really been about the best whole sets of balance changes I've seen. Your reasoning is solid, you give meaningful insight for each change, and really make it shine from a game design standpoint. I especially like how your changes, while sometimes drastic, try to stay relatively close to our current build; you shuffle some things around, but really there are only one or two new units. This, if nothing else, is probably the best way to have Blizzard listen, and to get players interested in this.

Now, it all sounds great in theory, but I bet Sc2 sounded just as good on paper before release. For that (probably obvious) reason, I'm really interested in seeing the custom map with these changes.

My other concern with a custom map like this is that it ignores the principle of unit testing. It's hard to discern the effects of each unit when you have so many changes in one place. While this will eventually yield results given enough games, I think it may be in the best interest of the map to include a pre-match GUI set-up allowing the toggling of specific units, between two states - "Original" (as they are now), and "Modified". Maybe not even in the published map, but the one that you and your testers use.

This will let you play with individual units and get a real-game feel for what each unit contributes or doesn't, relative to other units. Perhaps this is just the way I'd go about it, being a (prospective) programmer; just a suggestion.

Either way, this is awesome thought food. Well done.

Edit: Will that custom map be available for us non-beta players, or will it be strictly available on HOTS beta?

1. It is important to build on the foundations of SC2 rather than throwing everything away to chase a past that will not return. Our focus as a community should be forward. This is what I (and I hope the community) fight(s) for.
2.It does sound good in theory, but that is only theory, the One Voice PTR will be essential in separating good ideas from bad. And I am sure that I produced both.
3.There will be two maps for the One Voice project. The first will be a PTR map on Ohanna (unless anyone has other suggestions for maps that encourage low tier unit play.) with some of the changes (Toss swaps, Zerg Swap and new Fungal, and rebooted Terran Mech.) There will be HotS units unless otherwise stated by Blizzard, since we are not seeking to Copy the HotS experience. I feel ok about this. The second will be a dev map unit tester where you can turn on and off the various (each change set is a toggle) unit changes and test dynamics between WoL and One Voice. This hopefully will provide the best of both worlds without making it hard for people to get involved in. Thanks for the input!

4. The custom map will be available to all WoL players.

Velr

Switzerland10668 Posts

October 17 2012 09:37 GMT

#108

The problem is. The foundations and general design of Wol are flawed. Therefore they should be corrected now, they actually could have tried this with Hots and try it again with Lotv... Yet, they don't.

To get into detail of your points... You write:

The Marauder presents elegant design solution to the Starcraft 1 bio problem of melting to AOE

+ Shield Upgrade for Marines

It's not an "elegant solution" it's the contrary---> "Bio is melting to AE, let's give them a fat meatball that survives AE and a general HP upgrade... Hurrdurr derp."
It is not a well tought out answer to SC1's "problem", it's the answer a 5 year old would give you (my units are dieing fast, what should we do: WE MAKE EM STRONGER!!!)...

Your suggestion:

OUT: Anti-micro 50% slow.
IN: It now provides a static -1 armor reduction to targets for 3 seconds, for a max stack of -2 (this debuff cannot make armor go into the negatives).

Did you for a second think what this would do to the Lategame? This is basically a "free" +2 upgrade advantage for Terran. You would in essence have 5-3 Marines/Marauders.

Your Siegetanksuggestion basically makes him the SC/BW tank.. So much about going forward ^^.

Your new Warhound: 140 HP.. May i ask WHY does everything so much HP? You don't like AE, i get it but your basically trying to patch it out.
And why does it need Splashdamage? Your purpose is nothing diffrent than a Gholiat with more HP and Splashdamage (which it does not need).

Your Thor changes... ROFL.. Yeah, even more HP, even more Armor and decent Speed (you really have a theme going here). I also think that it was weak to Zergligns was a shame and has to be immediatly adressed or what exactly is the extra armor supposed to do, for sure nothing against Mech..... Why this should help against the Deathball is also beyond me, you now got a better Thor, so why wouldn't you build just more Thors because it's.. stronger and faster and reanimates itself?

I have another solution for you: Let's give PF's an upgrade so they can walk, that'll break siegelines! Which Siegelines btw? Nearly everytime i see a Siegeline i see a Thor/Tank or Marauder army just walking over it...

Your Raven change:
Yeah, if this game needs one thing it's more Forcefields... Forcefields that shoot and mess with targeting AI!!!!
Want a good change? Give it (or the Ghost) Irradiate.

I kinda like your Viking change.

I seriously have 0 Idea why you get praised for your suggestions... The only ones that seem decent to me are the Viking and Snipe changes.

Ramiz1989

12124 Posts

October 17 2012 11:01 GMT

#109

@Velr

Don't want to quote whole text, but If you don't understand why the Siege Tank change would be a lot better than what we have currently, and that comment "so much about going forward", maybe you shouldn't comment on it?

Velr

Switzerland10668 Posts

October 17 2012 11:06 GMT

#110

No, i like the change. But it's not going "forward", it's making the Siegetank more alike to BW again. I just found it fun in context to this:

Overkill is imho extremly important for Tanks an supplycosts in SC2 are near generally to high, a 2 supply siegetank would propably need a nerf to their non-sieged dmg tho (this one is stronger than it was in SC/BW)... Else a really big siegetank army could probably just "drive" to victory.

Ramiz1989

12124 Posts

October 17 2012 11:46 GMT

#111

On October 17 2012 20:06 Velr wrote:
No, i like the change. But it's not going "forward", it's making the Siegetank more alike to BW again. I just found it fun in context to this:

Show nested quote +

I agree, but when we talk about going "forward", I think it is about better gameplay, and not wanting every single iconic SC BW unit back, Tanks are already here, they just need a little tweaking. And overkill is extremely important, it was the whole point of Siege Tank Lines, and why they were so strong, but also double-edged units with their splash. Lowering their damage and disabling overkill just made Siege Tank into ordinary units. They don't have the counters as they did but they don't deal as much damage as they did for the same reason, so in the end positioning and flanks don't really matter.

I am ok with them being 3 supply, they could be 2, but it is not that important change like other two are.

HOTcarl

United States102 Posts

October 18 2012 10:41 GMT

#112

Brilliant post. Probably the best thread I've seen on sc2 concepts and balance. Blizzard seriously needs to take a look at this.

ItWhoSpeaks > Blizzard

keep us updated!

LexKaiba

Ireland23 Posts

October 18 2012 12:30 GMT

#113

looking forward to trying out the new maps!!! keep us posted.

CutieBK

Sweden227 Posts

October 18 2012 12:43 GMT

#114

This thread is pretty damn awesome! Really liking the format and general direction of ideas

The Viking change would be huge - I've always loved the unit and wished there were more ways to integrate it in early game and massable strategies!

fouquet

Canada29 Posts

October 19 2012 01:00 GMT

#115

Let me start by saying i love your Protoss changes and your barracks changes they hit the mark so well and i love everything about them. i like the general idea of your factory changes and came up with similar, slightly more extreme changes before i saw this thread. here are my suggested changes for the factory and the viking.

Change Package #1

Terran Factory:

-Widow Mine Seeder:
+ Show Spoiler +

removed unstable payload. Burrow time 2 seconds. When burrowed it seeds a medium area radius 2 (diameter or 4) with 6 burrowed mini widow mines. Mines have a 2 range activation range and each one deals 60 damage to a single target with a small 15 damage splash. Mines are re seeded 10 seconds after detonation. Mines hit air and ground. Mines deactivate when seeder un burrows.

With this change the widow mine retains its purpose of passive area denial but has more counter play
with a much smaller individual mine activation range it punishes units that dont have detection but is countered by most forms of detection. In all its a technical buff to the widow mine's damage at the cost of utility/range (360 single target damage if all mines are activated)

-The Thor:
+ Show Spoiler +

Anti Air attack removed.
Basic attack modified to 80+20 to armored (+5/+5 per upgrade) x1 (2.68 second attack cool down)
the thor's basic attack has a cool up time of 1 second before firing to prevent hit and run abuse or silly thorship drop micro from being too strong (still effective but the thor has to be on the ground for 1 second to fire)
Strike Cannon Ability Replaced with Haywire Missile Strike (still requires research) targeted ability
16 max range 10 min range. Fire a very slow (only slightly faster than seeker missile) missile at an area dealing 120+80 to mechanical in 3 AoE. 30 second cool down
Thor Energy Removed

THOR IS HERE. The Thor's current role is an awkward anti light air/anti tough ground unit/sort of meat shield that doesn't shine in any of these roles. It is nonviable in TvP due to being countered by high templars (feedback) and its uses in TvZ are to counter mutaballs (and then they get magicboxed)

with these changes the Thor is completely pushed into the anti tough unit role by slowing its attack and heavily increasing it's damage. It also furthur adds to it's innate weakness against swarms of lighter units. It also now has a secondary role as a siege breaker (a role blizzard has shown an interest in with the original warhound) due to its new ability Haywire missile strike. This ability has the limitation of 10 minimum range from the thor but has a whopping 16 range max. it also has an anti mechanical damage bonus and can easily be dodged by mobile units. It primary function would be to kill siege tank lines and to soften defensive emplacements. I think this will not only be an effective ability but one that is fun to watch from a spectator standpoint as it's counter play is micro due to its slow missile speed so landing a great haywire strike will be very rewarding. (it can 1 shot tanks)

fun fact
new thor can 1 shot marauders with full upgardes but cant 1 shot a roach (roaches are still a counter to the thor)

-the Warhound:
+ Show Spoiler +

looks like the a mix between the old warhound and viking ground mode with dual missile racks instead of auto cannons
this new warhound has 150 hp 1 armor and is classified as armored mechanical
ground attack: 5 range 3x4 damage (no bonus) (+1 damage per upgrade) no AoE
air attack: 5 range 4x4 damage (+3 to light) (+1/ per upgrade) smaller AoE than the Thor
1.4 seconds/attack for both attacks

the warhound is now a ground Valkyrie from brood war. It attacks by launching 4 mini rockets at a target and is specialized against light air units. It's attack is not very strong against ground and non light air targets due to armor being 4x effective but it also inversely gains a large attack bonus from upgrades, making this unit able to take advantage of upgrade advantages in the early/mid game.

Fully upgraded a warhound deals 40 damage before armor to light air targets
added a 150/150 upgrade to factory tech lab: Cerberus Booster +3 range to warhound air attack

This concludes the factory changes. Here are all the factory unit's and their new roles:

Hellion/Battle Hellion: mobile anti light ground harassment and AoE

Widow Mine Seeder: Passive air and ground area denial + detection forcing

Siege Tank: long range AoE anti armor bombardment at cost of immobility.

Warhound: mobile anti light air AoE very weak against higher armor values

Thor: Slow moving siege breaker and single target ground unit eliminator. Weak against multiple targets.

Now the factory has a well rounded arsenal of options. I would even argue that the battle hellion could be removed with these changes (the warhound can block for siege tanks in its stead)

Change Package #2

-the Viking:
Changed tag from armored to light (both air and ground mode)
Visuals modified to reflect light status (less beefy looking especially in ground mode)

now countered by:
+ Show Spoiler +

Pheonix
new Warhound
new anti light Stalker (match up unchanged)

unchanged against:
+ Show Spoiler +

zerg
capital ships
tempest

stronger against:
+ Show Spoiler +

other vikings (makes viking wars less binary due to the unit not being its own counter)
new anti air immortal (takes half damage)
void rays

I feel like the viking sound have been a light unit from the start and that there are too many “armored” units in the game as it is. It also is a big buff the the usability of the phoenix in PvT and should promote more interesting air dominance wars in TvT. This change doesn't change much in the TvZ matchup

in addition to your viking change (which is awesome)

+ Show Spoiler +

Ground mode attack modified to 6x2 and cool down reduced to .83

this small change makes the ground viking gain +2 dmg per upgrade but also reduces its effectiveness vs armor. To compensate it fires slightly faster resulting in a slight net dps boost. Will also make the viking better at killing workers in ground mode making it a better harasser. And also no longer activates the immortal's hardened shield.

let me know what you think :D

ledarsi

United States475 Posts

October 19 2012 05:07 GMT

#116

On the whole, your post is great. However the Viking being light is a bad idea. It doesn't need to take extra damage to be countered by the warhound you propose. Same for stalkers with +light. It also does change its effectiveness vs zerg, as banelings would obliterate light-type vikings. Furthermore, hellions and reapers would counter landed vikings very hard, which is bad.

A much better way to change the Viking would be to let it move while lifting and landing, increase its ground movement speed, and give it moving shot on the ground. Could also give the landed viking cliff jump, as it already has this function, just in a really awkward non-fluid way that isn't fun to micro.

fouquet

Canada29 Posts

October 19 2012 21:43 GMT

#117

On October 19 2012 14:07 ledarsi wrote:
On the whole, your post is great. However the Viking being light is a bad idea. It doesn't need to take extra damage to be countered by the warhound you propose. Same for stalkers with +light. It also does change its effectiveness vs zerg, as banelings would obliterate light-type vikings. Furthermore, hellions and reapers would counter landed vikings very hard, which is bad.

A much better way to change the Viking would be to let it move while lifting and landing, increase its ground movement speed, and give it moving shot on the ground. Could also give the landed viking cliff jump, as it already has this function, just in a really awkward non-fluid way that isn't fun to micro.

i guess the other option would be to make ground form viking non light or armored. i really think air vikings should have the light tag as it opens more more interesting air battles and dynamic air counters (instead of vikings counter vikings, pheonix are useless ect.) it is less about focing the AA warhound to be relavant and more about making pheonix relevant and keeping ItWhoSpeaks, anti light stalker as a mobile counter to vikings.

i really like the lift move thing.

Goobahfish

Australia71 Posts

October 20 2012 01:01 GMT

#118

So the 1-33 statistic is actually technically correct I believe.

A firebat has a base damage of 8. (In the same way a zealot does). With +3 damage upgrades this is 11. It can hit up to 3 targets. Ergo: 33 damage. Likewise vs an Ultralisk... it does like 1 damage.

1-33.

Missing DPS does significantly 'colour' comparisons.

Goobahfish

Australia71 Posts

October 20 2012 01:08 GMT

#119

Re: Vikings being light.

The following changes:
Protoss:
Stronger vs Stalkers, Immortals, Void Rays
Weaker vs Phoenix
Terran:
Stronger vs Viking, Tank, Marauder
Weaker vs Reaper, Hellion
Zerg:
Stronger vs Infestor
Weaker vs Baneling

I can't really see a problem with any of that. Banelings/Reapers/Hellions can't hit air so who cares. Vikings counter Voids better but suffer against Phoenixes and they are more durable in a lot of circumstances on the ground.

Ultimately it doesn't really change too much except using stalkers to protect collossi which would then give Phoenixes more play vs terran I guess.

Fencar

United States2694 Posts

October 20 2012 01:40 GMT

#120

On October 20 2012 10:08 Goobahfish wrote:
Re: Vikings being light.

The following changes:
Protoss:
Stronger vs Stalkers, Immortals, Void Rays
Weaker vs Phoenix
Terran:
Stronger vs Viking, Tank, Marauder
Weaker vs Reaper, Hellion
Zerg:
Stronger vs Infestor
Weaker vs Baneling

I can't really see a problem with any of that. Banelings/Reapers/Hellions can't hit air so who cares. Vikings counter Voids better but suffer against Phoenixes and they are more durable in a lot of circumstances on the ground.

Ultimately it doesn't really change too much except using stalkers to protect collossi which would then give Phoenixes more play vs terran I guess.

I see a problem with Vikings being light as Sky Terran will not be viable unless Ravens are buffed heavily to account for this, as there will be a reliance on turrets (auto and missile) to defend against enemy Air, which does not allow mobility and allows the Terran to get picked apart by a mass expanding Protoss with Tempests to snipe high tech units and hit your economy in the meantime.

fouquet

Canada29 Posts

October 20 2012 04:06 GMT

#121

On October 20 2012 10:40 Fencar wrote:

I see a problem with Vikings being light as Sky Terran will not be viable unless Ravens are buffed heavily to account for this, as there will be a reliance on turrets (auto and missile) to defend against enemy Air, which does not allow mobility and allows the Terran to get picked apart by a mass expanding Protoss with Tempests to snipe high tech units and hit your economy in the meantime.

it only really changes things vs protoss and the new warhound i suggested would make the air fights more dynamic (defend your long range vikings with warhounds against pheonixs. it doesnt change how they play against tempest or carrier at all it just buff the pheonix which itself is a light unit and makes vikings counter void rays harder

vikings still outrange pheonix's by a large margin this would simply reward a protoss player who can get a few pheonix up close to a terrans unprotected vikings. instead of being completely useless (the current setup)

MasterCynical

505 Posts

October 20 2012 07:01 GMT

#122

"replace the Thor with a Goliath wearing a Warhound suit"

Best idea ever. The thor is just too big and ugly, very annoying to micro. They cut into each other when they clump up. Even David Kim agrees, just check out his MLG interview. "thors actually suffer from an art issue"

TheRealPaciFist

United States1049 Posts

October 20 2012 10:04 GMT

#123

Thoughts/points of assent

1) I also wondered why they changed the idea of the old warhound, which seemed super reasonable, and a good replacement for the thor

2) I would love to see Vikings be able to transform while moving. I'm imagining the kind of animation that would require and it seems too cool. I don't know that it needs to be an upgrade, but I guess it's easier to balance that way

3) Removing concussive shells might be a great idea, but the suggested replacement seems kinda boring, and early game TvP might need balancing. Also, love the Snipe change

4) The mech changes look awesome, though smarter players than I would need to comment on how they might play out

5) Raven change is subtle but awesome

Such a good post =D

benzcity07

United States79 Posts

October 20 2012 17:44 GMT

#124

Would really really love to see what ItWhoSpeaks could do with a full design team. As in the words of sundance, it seems like the dude just gets it. Gabe Newell PLEASE hire this man!

Jasiwel

United States146 Posts

October 23 2012 17:19 GMT

#125

Great write-up. I find myself agreeing with all of those, though I feel the Marauder should have a different upgrade besides the one suggested. I'm so glad that you mentioned how atrocious Concussion Shell is to gameplay. It makes PvT stale and utter hell for Protoss in the early game, not to mention combine with Stim makes the efficiency of Terran M/M/M (or any combo with it) ridiculous throughout an entire game.

neggro

United States591 Posts

October 23 2012 17:47 GMT

#126

Great write up!

Luminous16

Canada8 Posts

October 30 2012 16:44 GMT

#127

Love all the options except two:

Turret cost for ravens
Viking upgrade

Mass raven with marine support (a build rarely built but can be powerful and unstoppable if its not prepared for) can wreck a zerg since mutas die to seeker missles too easy, along with corrupters who lose to viking support. Its extremely hard to pull off. But if the terran gets it, zerg struggles as hydras melt, and nothing can touch marines since turrets block movement too well against all zerg units except lings which die too easily in such a case. Therefore I would say no to decreasing turret cost.

As for vikings moving, i cant picture it. I keep trying it seems weird.

The rest of the changes are good just one concern: thors are difficult to kill in WOL for zerg. Of course HOTS could change this (haven't played it yet) but how would you propose zerg kill these 'super thors' as lings just got drastically less effective?

InoyouS2

1005 Posts

October 30 2012 19:32 GMT

#128

The Thor should DEFINITELY be a tier 3 unit like the Battlecruiser, at the moment it is a gimped anti-air unit that is the only unit that can synergise at all with mech.

Doominator10

United States515 Posts

November 24 2012 22:41 GMT

#129

Search One Voice In the Custom Games Lobby (not the arcade). One Voice PTR CloudKingdom and Ohana are now up. GOGO COMMUNITY !

StateofReverie

United States633 Posts

November 24 2012 23:08 GMT

#130

Viking harassment on zerg bases as an added pressure to a drop and/or a timing push is very underused. Vikings shred drones pretty quickly and a viking will beat a queen 1 on 1 too

-deLete-

France8 Posts

November 25 2012 21:18 GMT

#131

ItWhoSpeaks work for Blizzard please, your ideas are amazing

cresse

United States59 Posts

November 25 2012 23:19 GMT

#132

Huh. Your ideas are definitely a breath of fresh air. I like your subtle changes to the raven too - it has the capability of being versatile, just isn't quite there yet. I would also be curious in either reducing the build size of the turret so more could be placed, or make them work like Infested Terrans and have them more spammable, or even make it so they could build on top of units (but not unbuildable tiles and other buildings). As is, it's rather tedious and difficult to lay down so many in an effective way with the game fighting against you - it doesn't feel "fun" to lay down autoturrets right now.

Overall I'll be paying attention, seems like some fun ideas you're introducing.

Xahhk

Canada540 Posts

November 25 2012 23:48 GMT

#133

improved Vikings would overlap with banshees. It would be horrible. A terran player could just go straight for vikings and be perfect against Collossus right off the bat while being able to fulfill the banshee's role.

thirtyapm

521 Posts

November 26 2012 00:28 GMT

#134

i disagree with concussive shell...

but the viking change is brilliant!

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

November 26 2012 03:06 GMT

#135

Just a friendly update on what is going on with Terran.
The Concussive Shell change didn't work well at all and has been removed. The main issue is that it made fights even faster and less readable than WoL. We are currently testing out Juggernaut Plating (+2 Armor) and are much happier with the results.
1. It isn't anti mirco. You can actually disengage from Bio armies without using Forcefield or Speedlings unless they choose to stim.
2. It makes Marauders more micro friendly. You have to work to kite with them. Positioning Marauder walls vs Lings and Zealots is a more rewarded skill set. Pulling back Marauders being healed by Medivacs is rewarded due to their high HP efficiency.
3. It makes fights last longer.
4. Its simple , intuitive, and it is consistent with the unit's theme and image.

Raven is going to get a bit of a rework. No 25 energy turrets. We are going to make the Sci Vessel super jealous.

Battle Cruisers have a new ability that allows them to work with mech based armies as a command unit. The ability costs and constantly consumes energy, making BCs a bit more reasonable vs Feedback.

We are currently testing Tech Reactors as a Fusion Core upgrade as a means of answering Terran reinforcement issues. The gameplay is ok, and seeing lots of tech intensive units late game is awesome, but it isn't really a decision and feels more like a reward for completing the tech tree rather than a real research.

CrazyF1r3f0x

United States2120 Posts

November 26 2012 05:32 GMT

#136

Excellent post, I love how you marry the lore and the game mechanics so well.

mDuo13

United States307 Posts

November 27 2012 00:15 GMT

#137

I am super excited to see Immortality Protocol for Thors in multiplayer. It just sounds like a hell of a blast, both as a player and as a spectator.

I also just want to see the animation for a Viking transforming as it lands. I can only imagine it dive-bombing, tumbling, transforming, and then coming upright, guns at the ready.

syroz

France249 Posts

November 27 2012 01:11 GMT

#138

How can we find your "one voice" map in europe serveur?

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

November 27 2012 01:23 GMT

#139

On November 27 2012 10:11 syroz wrote:
How can we find your "one voice" map in europe serveur?

It isn't up just yet

Don't worry, it will come!

syroz

France249 Posts

November 27 2012 02:10 GMT

#140

On November 27 2012 10:23 ItWhoSpeaks wrote:

Show nested quote +

It isn't up just yet

Don't worry, it will come!

Nice. Keep the good work, can't wait to try it.

topsecret221

United States108 Posts

November 27 2012 03:41 GMT

#141

On November 27 2012 09:15 mDuo13 wrote:
I also just want to see the animation for a Viking transforming as it lands. I can only imagine it dive-bombing, tumbling, transforming, and then coming upright, guns at the ready.

Now if only there was a 3-D animator among us in the community...

ItWhoSpeaks

United States362 Posts

December 04 2012 07:55 GMT

#142

Or a designer >.>

Normal

Please or register to reply.

Terran Identity: Damage and Supply

Completed

Ongoing

Upcoming