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Pulsar beam? Just a crappy attack against buildings that costs energy? kcdc pointed this out well but it has virtually no use, what are you going to kill with it really?
Pulsar Beam does suck, but thats a matter of number tweaking, not concept. If it did more like 40 dps, it could actually be quite useful and fun to use.
Time warp is even more terrible, it increases protoss reliability on chokes and forcefield.. Attacking into a protoss is already tricky with zerg given forcefield, now with timewarp you can't even retreat. Another anti-movement ability is too much for protoss, you get plays where you try to prod vs protoss, then they timewarp you, chase you, and FF you.. Making it too risky to play aggresive promotes passive/deathball play.
In what way does Time Warp increase Protoss reliability on Forcefields? You need forcefields less when you have Time Warp--you can actually catch enemies with slow zealots if they're time warped, and you can retreat fairly easily, etc. And since Oracles come out early and cost so much gas, Oracle builds are not gonna have many Sentries for FF. And there are actually pretty bad diminishing returns in trying to use them together: good forcefields will trap the enemy anyway so they cant move where they want. Who cares if they're slowed while not moving? Sure, slowing enemies makes it easier to land good ffs...but thats a crutch. Good players land good FF's in real time at normal speed anyway. Slowing down units is something you want to do when for whatever reason you cant just forcefield them. Basically, all this does is make it so the gas cost of Oracles doesnt outright cripple you since you cant really afford many FFs.
What Time Warp actually does is decrease Protoss reliability on Forcefield, by introducing another unit that offers Crowd Control functionality, but which doesn't mix that well with FF due to both cost and just the nature of the two abilities.
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Huge improvements! The oracle just became interesting.
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Gonna be fun to dodge storm when your bio is slowed Oo
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Gonna be fun to dodge storm when your bio is slowed Oo
The only way that will ever happen is if for some reason they make Time Warp long range, which I doubt they will. Assuming its fairly short range, any bioball will pretty much oneshot any Oracle trying to get close enough to Timewarp. Timewarp might help in small engagements, but probably not in big army fights (unless, as I said, they give it long range. but that would be so stupid I'm assuming they won't. If Timewarp is short range, like range 3 or something, then dropping it on a giant deathball will be suicide for the Oracle.)
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You can now use the oracle to kill rocks? It would mean that you can destroy the collapsible rocks in the hots map pool. Time warp seems cool but what if pulsar beem removed the targeted building from the opponents production. For example if you use the pulsar beem on the spawning pool the opponent wouldn't be able to make zerglings and stop eventual upgrades.
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United Kingdom14464 Posts
On October 25 2012 03:02 raf3776 wrote:
Well wouldnt time warp be adding to the death ball is my only issue
Seems like it would reduce it. Would force splitting of units, and in terms of the DPS battles that can often occur lategame it won't actually add to the Toss's power, but make getting into that position for Zerg more difficult. Hopefully.
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Really hope that time warp also works on workers. Very cool synergy with oracle being fast unit, it now has a pretty sweet escape mechanism.
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I'm sure they have the visual assets for Time Warp lying around. It was one of the spells that the Mothership had when it was first introduced years ago, and it still had the spell at the very start of the WoL beta before it got removed in one of the first patches.
I really like the Time Warp idea, although I kinda feel that maybe it would've been a good replacement for Force Field on the Sentry. I'm iffy about Pulsar Beam considering how ineffective the old Siphon spell was, but 20 dps seems like a lot. Doesn't a single Marauder do 20 dps against buildings?
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Should add a poll about what people think of the changes.
At first blush I think Pulsar sounds completely uninspired. I'm not one to bash ideas but it doesn't sounds interesting from a players perspective or from an esport watching fan's perspective. Who's going to get excited by watching a passive ability slowly damage buildings?!
The time warp sounds fundamentally flawed as well. It's an AWFUL idea to have abilities that discourage or deny micro. That's one of the reasons why people hate fungal and force field so vehemently! I'm not sure that I believe these are accurate changes and if so I'm equally dumbfounded and disappointed...
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Do not know if anyone thought of it yet. But i think it would work on expansion under constructions. Wouldn't that mean if zerg take a early third with out any anti air or creep spread it will keep on getting denied. Doesn't this shut down early third hatch completely????. sounds awesome if it works like that changing zvp allot!.
I also believe that they stated that the Oracle change they are testing out is going to almost always denies zerg an early third so it must be this one ^^
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Yea, I'm going to withhold judgement until we know the full details and feel for how things actually interact with other units. I like the direction they're going with the Oracle though.
Non-Committal harass that is micro/positioning based. Possible offensive synergy. i.e. Attack the front, Pulsar Beam a tech lab down or something like that.
And support role ability that will add to Protoss's capability to defend without NEEDING! force field. The 50% slow to me sounds like Zealot/Stalker/Oracle could be a sick early-game defensive combination, making Stargate a viable opener. Especially with Purify. Depending on the cost and duration of Time Warp.
Also, I like that Blizzard is exploring abilities that would benefit from multiple Oracles acting upon the same location. Entomb felt very "I only ever want one Oracle" and I feel that's boring.
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The time warp sounds fundamentally flawed as well. It's an AWFUL idea to have abilities that discourage or deny micro. That's one of the reasons why people hate fungal and force field so vehemently! I'm not sure that I believe these are accurate changes and if so I'm equally dumbfounded and disappointed...
Time Warp isn't like Fungal, which immobilizes, or FF which outright stops movement. Its a slow, so people can still micro under it, its just reduced. Hasn't changing Fungal to a slow been exactly what everyone is asking for, because it "allows for countermicro"?
Not all Crowd Control is inherently bad for gameplay.
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One thing that would be interesting is if Time Warp also slowed other things, like:
1.) Rate at which structures build. Cast it on a key structure while its building to delay it for a bit.
2.) Rate at which units build and upgrades research
3.) Rate at which creep spreads
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Time Warp seems pretty cool. I think it should slow down mining rate to make it a useful harassing tool. And if it speeds up timed units lifespan imagine using it on a clump of MULES. I like the idea since it can be used in so many ways, i.e. using it to slow hellions so you can kill them and escape with your probes. They should limit its range so that the oracale is able to be sniped easily if used in a big confrontation however.
As for Pulsar Beam I think the general idea is good, but it needs some more flavor I think. The suggestion above about stopping production/research is a good one, giving it more of a tactical component. If they do this they should make Revelation reveal what buildings are researching/producing to give the abilities some synergy.
I don't think just doubling its DPS to 40 or whatever is a good idea. It was the one of the main reason Void Ray speed got removed as it was too effective at burning down buildings all over the map late game before the enemy could react. It wouldn't be very interesting from a player or spectator perspective either.
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Yeah I think Pulsar needs at least one of the following changes:
-Higher damage output
-Prevent repair / natural regen
-AOE effect on multiple buildings, possibly with a cap (3 building perhaps)
-Have some kind of "lightning shield" around the effected building, hurting any repairing worker or bypassing enemy unit.
-Able to cast while moving, possibly with a movement reduction while casting.
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I actually like the new oracle spells, but I feel like Pulsar Beam could use an extra bit of utility.
I think Pulsar beam would be perfect if it not only did 20 DPS to buildings, but also applies a debuff for 15 seconds that slows production by a %, something like 25%. This way a good/fast player can quickly hit enemy buildings and get out, or even kill a key structure later on in the game when the gas investment is not that intensive relative to the overall gas investment of the Protoss army.
Good job on this on Blizzard! <3
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I don't think Time Warp should be something that would be aimed at workers. All that ends up giving us is an un-killable entomb-like spell.
Time Warp on an opponent's army seems really really cool though.
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Oh wow, that time warp ability seems like an alternative to force fields. Maybe you could have an oracle / gateway army with no sentries. I like it.
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Pulsar Beam seems pretty useless, what is it actually going to achieve? When are you going to kill something with this ? 0.o
Time Warp in mineral line seems more useful.
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Wow those changes seem to be pretty interesting 
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EPT
