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On November 30 2012 12:42 a176 wrote:
Why is everyone talking about this repositioning of SHs? What is so special about the respositioning of SHs? You set a target for the locusts, not the SH. It doesn't matter if you plant the SH here, then there, if the locusts are all going to the same target anyways.
Unless some of you are talking about the excitement of retreating your SHs when your enemy figures out how get by the wall of locusts.
Yeah... This is kind of how I see it too. The hots games I've watched, swarm hosts are uninteresting. There is no nail biting, gripping drama as swarm hosts spawn units from a distance, only to repeatedly unburrow and spawn units from a safe distance again. What I have seen is hosts being massed, getting into range, and then pooping out volleys of unmicroed (and largely unmicroable) slow moving locusts that do chip damage until the enemy does something to make the Zerg retreat en masse. Death ball mechanic: preserved.
Here's what lurkers had that swarm host doesn't: insane aoe damage. The kind that discourages armies from directly engaging, and encourages the "push" mechanism, offering an alternative method of combat to one shot death ball vs death ball battles which decide everything. Attacking into lurkers with lesser ranged units was usually suicidal, and so players would attack lurkers with siege units, spells or dragoons (sc1's immortal). However, the immobility of lurkers and mid level range of their attacks meant that they couldn't simply dominate like collossus, but had to "leapfrog" forward giving the enemy an opportunity to pick off unburrowed lurkers, then retreat before the burrowing animation could finish.
This isn't going to happen in sc2 with the swarm host the way it is. Blizzard has given the massive aoe role to a fast moving, very mobile melee unit (baneling), and the immobility to a ranged, non aoe chip damage unit. The shift in aoe to a mobile unit has resulted in less micro intensive, high stakes "pushes", less skirmishes, more attempts to simply obliterate the enemy army with a huge engagement. Meanwhile the swarm host has the mechanic the lurker once had to limit its offensive potential... But its offensive potential is shitty to begin with. It works well as an annoying siege unit - tbh, blizzard has done at least an ok job on this unit - but swarm hosts do not have the level of threat or dps necessary to push, bully and aggressively take position the way lurkers could. They have the lurkers burrow mechanic... but what for? If your siege unit is spawning attackers from outside tempest range what does it even matter if its burrowed or not? SHs create more pressure to have a death ball engagement, they do nothing to create the kind of lightning, micro intensive skirmishes lurkers created.
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Everything that the Swarm Hosts lack and the Lurkers did not is nothing that Zerg needed.
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I disagree. Micro-intensive is something Zerg lags behind in atm. They could also use a dose of exciting to watch, a situation not helped by the action happening a screen away with expendable, low micro units.
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Siege tank - takes time to siege - blocks units - doesn't move when sieged - makes things die
Swarm hose - takes time to burrow - blocks units - doesn't move when burrowed - makes things die
What's the difference?
Also as stated, Swarm host =/= lurker. So why compare them?
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I just posted the difference but I guess I'll restate it. Siege tanks do massive aoe damage with decent dps. They can be used to push slowly but powerfully forward or prevent an enemy from 1aing into your army. Swarm hosts do neither. They can chip away at an enemy army/defense or force him to come to you and... That's about it. They don't have the damage output to do anything else. If you're ok with swarm hosts doing only those things I just mentioned, that's fine, but this thread is about being honest about swarm hosts so i feel obligated to point out their inability to create truly exciting play.
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On November 28 2012 19:06 musai wrote:
I like your view on the Muta too, where's the mutating !?
OMG, is that really why it was called the mutalisk? (Insert Suddenly Clarity Clarence meme)
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United Kingdom14103 Posts
SH shouldn't be compared to BL or Lurkers in any way, the argument that Lurkers attack when burrows and SH attack when burrowed therefore they are the same unit is moronic.
As a T I have found that Swarmhosts require a of micro to play against, however in between volleys the zerg had to be so careful as I would slowly advance my hellbats and tanks.
I spoke to a Z after a game and he said he felt that he was pressurised to make it to viper before I reached critical mass of tanks because he believed i would stomp him once that happened, whereas I felt pressurised immensely on 3 bases as our siege lines moved back and forth while I attempted to deal with creep.
I'd have to say that SH are very interesting units and blizz has in fact got this one right.
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The swarm host, like all the HoTS units, is dull, and uninteresting.
People that cry about BW HD, we can't help but compare the first game to the sequel okay? You got brain washed into thinking that it is uncool to want things from the first game. Wake up. This game will never be as good as BW if it continues to make decisions like this. Swarm host over lurker? Really? This unit is a piece of shit.
Whatever. Played hots beta for 2 weeks before I got completely bored. Yaaaaaaawn.
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On November 28 2012 18:59 wankey wrote:
a) It takes away micro from the game yet again. You plop them down, and watch.
b) Projectiles are so slow that they are basically useless by themselves.
c) It requires at least 4-5 swarm hosts to be effective, meaning 12-15 food gone into swarm hosts.
a) and c) also apply on broodlords, kinda biased arguments here
They are a nice addition to the swarm, we will see many great games with them. (zerg can be everywhere !!)
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I agree with a lot of what's been said here. I'm still hoping that by LotV Blizzard get it all right design wise and slowly but surely balance the game out with patches too. Worst comes to worst, I'm sure some genius will make a BW mod with SC2 level graphics and macro built into it. Win, win.
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On November 30 2012 16:35 Morphs wrote:Show nested quote +On November 28 2012 19:06 musai wrote:
I like your view on the Muta too, where's the mutating !? OMG, is that really why it was called the mutalisk? (Insert Suddenly Clarity Clarence meme)
In BW the Muta's mutated into Guardians so maybe that's where the name came from? Possible.
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It's to late in the game for them to change anything Blizzard even said at BWC that they are happy where the HOTS units are, So get used to it and hope that someone who is far better at the game finds a cool use for them other then just Burrowed Broodlords. I agree and feel the same way about Protoss, I am sure Terran players feel the same way about their race. We all want our races to change and work better.
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Ya they are ok units. IF you use em like siege tanks it can be effective but I wouldn't use them once a Toss has some AoE out or Terran tanks can hit your stuff.
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Russian Federation51 Posts
I think a lot of people will find Swarm host usefull. It's very nice positional unit. Dont see any issues about it. It matches any army composition well
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On November 30 2012 22:38 boniest wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2012 16:35 Morphs wrote:On November 28 2012 19:06 musai wrote:
I like your view on the Muta too, where's the mutating !? OMG, is that really why it was called the mutalisk? (Insert Suddenly Clarity Clarence meme) In BW the Muta's mutated into Guardians so maybe that's where the name came from? Possible.
But they didn't mutate into anything in the original SC though right? So I don't think so
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United States7483 Posts
On December 01 2012 00:56 JDub wrote:Show nested quote +On November 30 2012 22:38 boniest wrote:On November 30 2012 16:35 Morphs wrote:On November 28 2012 19:06 musai wrote:
I like your view on the Muta too, where's the mutating !? OMG, is that really why it was called the mutalisk? (Insert Suddenly Clarity Clarence meme) In BW the Muta's mutated into Guardians so maybe that's where the name came from? Possible. But they didn't mutate into anything in the original SC though right? So I don't think so
Yes they did, Guardians were in Vanilla SC, from the mutalisk. The new zerg BW units were the Devourer (another option for the muta to change into!) and the Lurker.
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On December 01 2012 01:08 Whitewing wrote:Show nested quote +On December 01 2012 00:56 JDub wrote:On November 30 2012 22:38 boniest wrote:On November 30 2012 16:35 Morphs wrote:On November 28 2012 19:06 musai wrote:
I like your view on the Muta too, where's the mutating !? OMG, is that really why it was called the mutalisk? (Insert Suddenly Clarity Clarence meme) In BW the Muta's mutated into Guardians so maybe that's where the name came from? Possible. But they didn't mutate into anything in the original SC though right? So I don't think so Yes they did, Guardians were in Vanilla SC, from the mutalisk. The new zerg BW units were the Devourer (another option for the muta to change into!) and the Lurker.
Yeah wow I'm an idiot, thanks. You are correct
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On November 30 2012 21:00 Targe wrote:
SH shouldn't be compared to BL or Lurkers in any way, the argument that Lurkers attack when burrows and SH attack when burrowed therefore they are the same unit is moronic.
As a T I have found that Swarmhosts require a of micro to play against, however in between volleys the zerg had to be so careful as I would slowly advance my hellbats and tanks.
I spoke to a Z after a game and he said he felt that he was pressurised to make it to viper before I reached critical mass of tanks because he believed i would stomp him once that happened, whereas I felt pressurised immensely on 3 bases as our siege lines moved back and forth while I attempted to deal with creep.
I'd have to say that SH are very interesting units and blizz has in fact got this one right.
Interesting post, I'd love to be proven wrong on swarmhosts. Siege lines moving back and forward sounds exactly like what I'm hoping hots will become. Could you provide a replay?
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On November 30 2012 21:53 Mutaahh wrote:Show nested quote +On November 28 2012 18:59 wankey wrote:
a) It takes away micro from the game yet again. You plop them down, and watch.
b) Projectiles are so slow that they are basically useless by themselves.
c) It requires at least 4-5 swarm hosts to be effective, meaning 12-15 food gone into swarm hosts.
a) and c) also apply on broodlords, kinda biased arguments here They are a nice addition to the swarm, we will see many great games with them. (zerg can be everywhere !!)
So if a) and c) also apply to the Broodlord then maybe that unit is a terrible concept as well? I would certainly say so because of the stupid "free unit bullshit". Why didnt they keep the Guardian instead like they kept the BC and Carrier?
I wonder who is biased here ...
Oh and please explain to me why a unit which spawns "free units" which cost no resources (not even food) and which screen the unit spawning them from enemy fire by blocking their path is a good idea. Think hard and think how "fair and balanced" this is since it is only one race which has these free unit spawners ...
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I think the problems with SH in their current shape is that there is no positional advantage to be gained. It doesn't matter if the swarm hosts are spread out, or if they are more/less forward. The thing you do is take all your swarm hosts, put them in a random spot close to your opponents base and rally in the locust.
Because of this there is no positioning, leapfrogging or anything, which takes away all the strategy a unit like the lurker, or siege tank do have. Swarmhost just become a new amove deathball unit like this.
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EPT
