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On December 08 2012 18:48 Vindicare605 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 08 2012 11:20 SarcasmMonster wrote:
Since Blizz combined the mech & air upgrades, I don't think the Thor needs to be an exceptional anti-air unit. I'm with this guy. I think the HIP Cannons make the Thor a more useful anti-air unit vs larger enemies (if only slightly)due to the armor issue but I don't think they're meant to completely invalidate Vikings especially now that Vikings are so much more accessible with shared upgrades. At the end of the day too regardless of how effective 250cannons are, there's 2 points that can't really be argued against. 1. HIP is fucking cool. Seeing Thors walking around with giant cannons on their shoulders is AWESOME. 2. Thors lost their energy bar. Which means HTs can't feedback them anymore. That alone is a huge plus with the new system.
Vikings REALLY are a terrible concept, because they become pretty much useless the moment when all air opponents are dead. This is a fate they share with the Corruptor, except the Corruptor still has a moderately useful but annoying to use spell. Landing Vikings and using them as cannon fodder is a waste IMO unless you are on the brink of winning, since they cost a lot of gas to reproduce and if the Zerg/Protoss goes for a full size ground army (without Colossi) their usefulness is at an end.
Giving a "looks cool" as a reason for thinking the change is great is simply typical for this time. Its all about the looks and not the content. The change for HIP is nice, but the Thor is still terrible as AA when compared to the Goliath and its relationship with the Guardian. Since Blizzard has reduced the size of the Thor as well it seems they try to make it more like the Goliath, but its not enough. [I wonder if they reduced the size of the Odin in the campaign as well, hehe.]
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Just to make it clear:
vs an air unit with 1 starting armor (Medivac, Overseer, Viper, Broodlord, MSCore) and a 0/0 Thor
After 6 seconds:
New Attack will have fired 4 times (first attack is instant) with 24-1 damage => 92 damage
Old Attack will have fired 3 times with 4x(6-1) damage => 60 damage + splash
However Corruptor, Tempest, Carrier, Mothership, Battlecruiser have 2 or even 3 starting armor, making the new attack superior against those units (especiallys since they are quite big and don't stack as much as other units).
Damage would be 88 damage vs 48+splash against 2 armor and
84 damage vs 36+splash against 3 armor.
Also the new attack gets +2 per upgrade, which leaves 1 point of extra damage while the old attack gets only +1, which gets absorbed by getting armor upgrades.
Armored air units with 0 starting armor (Overlord, Viking, Voidray) could be targeted by both attacks. Since the new one fires faster it will kill small numbers more quickly, but against bigger numbers additional splash would be useful.
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I just tested various encounters with broodlords and thors with 2 or 3 BF-Hellbats the Thors are coming out ahead with HI while loosing with javelin. I mean HI is not the answer to all questions for mech, but it surely smoothes encouters in favor to the terran. HIR gives an option to not die that hard to certain things. Its not to counter things imho.
This is the small scale battle i tested: 4 BL vs 3 thors and 2 Hellbats. BL fokus fired the thors and vice versa, with full upgrades on both sides. With javelins 2 BL's remain, with HIR 2 Thors remain. I dont know how it fares and sclaes in bigger battles, but it doesnt look that useless to me.
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On December 08 2012 23:11 Knalldi wrote:
I just tested various encounters with broodlords and thors with 2 or 3 BF-Hellbats the Thors are coming out ahead with HI while loosing with javelin. I mean HI is not the answer to all questions for mech, but it surely smoothes encouters in favor to the terran. HIR gives an option to not die that hard to certain things. Its not to counter things imho.
This is the small scale battle i tested: 4 BL vs 3 thors and 2 Hellbats. BL fokus fired the thors and vice versa, with full upgrades on both sides. With javelins 2 BL's remain, with HIR 2 Thors remain. I dont know how it fares and sclaes in bigger battles, but it doesnt look that useless to me.
Was this with 3/3 for both? Also 4 BL are only 16 Supply, while 3 Thors and 2 Hellbats are 22 Supply, since they will likely meet in late game, full upgrades + using supply to compare is closer to a real game. Of course in a real game you don't have just BL vs just Thor+HBs 
From what i can tell Thor's new attack does 27 (24+6-3) every 2 seconds, so 9 attacks to kill or 16 seconds (first attack is instant). Javelins its 4*6 (6+3-3) for 24 damage every 3 seconds, so 10 attacks to kill or 27 seconds. Seems a big difference to me, 3 BL vs 2 Thor is equal supply, even with the Javelins hitting 2 BLs with every attack its takes 21 seconds for them to kill all 3 (5 attacks take 12 seconds and splash kills a BL, remaining 2 BL take 3 more attacks with splash hitting them so 9 more seconds) compared to 16 seconds to kill 2 BL, and then 10 more to kill the last BL for 26 seconds. Now how likely is it for Javelins to hit 2 BL with every attack for 21 seconds with micro + deaths creating space between the BLs.
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United Arab Emirates439 Posts
On December 08 2012 18:25 SirPinky wrote:Show nested quote +On December 08 2012 18:10 Sissors wrote:On December 08 2012 18:05 SirPinky wrote:On December 08 2012 17:04 Crawdad wrote:
This is so simple, I'm not sure why this thread is four pages long.
1) HIP has a shorter attack rate, and therefore has higher DPS.
2) HIP is not split into four separate attacks, and is therefore less affected by armor.
HIP does better against non-light units than EP, no questions asked. I'm so close to being done with this post b/c people like you. Please read the rest of the 4 pages before you comment. There is a reason for splash and its effectiveness. Please do not comment on this post unless you play Terran, are masters or higher and have the BETA. Thank you! Tbh you are pretty much the only one who cant see the obvious. Thors normal splash is very small, it only works against really clumped up units. I could give you an example how enormously better 3/3 thors with HIP would be against 3/3 carriers than thors with javs, but you would then only rage at me. (We are talking about way more than twice the dps, uncreative troll should take native resistances into account, and also upgrade scaling). Or glaringly obvious situations like you are walking around with a smallish mech army, bunch of hellbats, siege tanks, and 2-3 thors, and suddenly you find out your toss opponent managed to make some voids unscouted. Since we arent talking about 20 voids they wont clump up noticable, and AOE damage is fairly insignificant. But you are welcome to just stick to javs. And again, you are a perfect example of a person who obviously did not read the rest of the posts. I conceded units like BC and mid-size carrier armies are worse against HIP than Javelin missles. But, for the most part, this is not how Blizzard presents this weapon - better versus "mostly air" armies. It is no better versus units like BL or other mid-size (non-light) units - in fact worse because it doesn't splash clumped up corruptors/phoenix etc. At critical mass air (such as carriers) this weapon is useless. Sounds like myself and Availo are the only people that actually see this ability as useless. As GM I don't post many unfounded complaints unless it is blaringly obvious. I urge the next person to disprove me via replays. Thank you. Edit: And this has nothing to do with the Thor's strength - it is very strong in its current state (imo). This is just a statement "what the hell is this ability supposed to be used for." Thank you for the elimination of the energy component - I'm content with that....
There is no point in saying this ability is useless. I agree, the splash attack is going to be useful in the majority of situations. Namely, vs light units and against larger air armies because of splash (except perhaps large BC armies as it's very easy to keep them from clumping). You claim Blizzard presents this weapon as better against "mostly air" armies... where did they say that?
This is what DK said in the Thoughts on Balance post: "we felt that Factory units could use a more standard anti air attack. As such, we’ve given the Thor a new weapon that can be swapped with its anti-light, AoE weapon when it may be more useful for a particular situation."
And that's exactly what this attack does.
I have no idea how you can say it's going to be like the Strike Cannon and be useless. It isn't an upgrade and there are some situations where it is clearly better. Namely vs low numbers of units like Void Rays, Brood Lords, Tempests, Carriers, BC's. Nobody needs to upload a replay to support this, it's very simple math.
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Was this with 3/3 for both? Also 4 BL are only 16 Supply, while 3 Thors and 2 Hellbats are 22 Supply, since they will likely meet in late game, full upgrades + using supply to compare is closer to a real game. Of course in a real game you don't have just BL vs just Thor+HBs
I went for a ressource comparison there, but I guess supply comparison is better. But these unit testers and theorycrafting can only do so much. I think HIR have possibilities, and only extensive in game testing can prove them good or bad. Theorycrafting is not the way to prove or disprove anything imho.
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On December 08 2012 21:56 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On December 08 2012 18:48 Vindicare605 wrote:On December 08 2012 11:20 SarcasmMonster wrote:
Since Blizz combined the mech & air upgrades, I don't think the Thor needs to be an exceptional anti-air unit. I'm with this guy. I think the HIP Cannons make the Thor a more useful anti-air unit vs larger enemies (if only slightly)due to the armor issue but I don't think they're meant to completely invalidate Vikings especially now that Vikings are so much more accessible with shared upgrades. At the end of the day too regardless of how effective 250cannons are, there's 2 points that can't really be argued against. 1. HIP is fucking cool. Seeing Thors walking around with giant cannons on their shoulders is AWESOME. 2. Thors lost their energy bar. Which means HTs can't feedback them anymore. That alone is a huge plus with the new system. Vikings REALLY are a terrible concept, because they become pretty much useless the moment when all air opponents are dead. This is a fate they share with the Corruptor, except the Corruptor still has a moderately useful but annoying to use spell. Landing Vikings and using them as cannon fodder is a waste IMO unless you are on the brink of winning, since they cost a lot of gas to reproduce and if the Zerg/Protoss goes for a full size ground army (without Colossi) their usefulness is at an end. Giving a "looks cool" as a reason for thinking the change is great is simply typical for this time. Its all about the looks and not the content. The change for HIP is nice, but the Thor is still terrible as AA when compared to the Goliath and its relationship with the Guardian. Since Blizzard has reduced the size of the Thor as well it seems they try to make it more like the Goliath, but its not enough. [I wonder if they reduced the size of the Odin in the campaign as well, hehe.]
Vikings are a lot better now then before anyway. On equal UPs they actually kill Roaches for supply.
I like the new Thor attack. Now you can build more then just Vikings for anti air. The only thing that i worry about is mass Thors, one of the ugliest compositions in the game IMO.
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On December 08 2012 23:58 Knalldi wrote:Show nested quote +Was this with 3/3 for both? Also 4 BL are only 16 Supply, while 3 Thors and 2 Hellbats are 22 Supply, since they will likely meet in late game, full upgrades + using supply to compare is closer to a real game. Of course in a real game you don't have just BL vs just Thor+HBs
I went for a ressource comparison there, but I guess supply comparison is better. But these unit testers and theorycrafting can only do so much. I think HIR have possibilities, and only extensive in game testing can prove them good or bad. Theorycrafting is not the way to prove or disprove anything imho.
I agree, unit testers + theorycrafting only help give an idea. Things can be amazing in theory but micro or even just getting to a certain mix of units without dying are almost impossible to properly test/theorycraft outside actual games.
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On December 08 2012 22:29 Cruncher93 wrote:
Just to make it clear:
vs an air unit with 1 starting armor (Medivac, Overseer, Viper, Broodlord, MSCore) and a 0/0 Thor
After 6 seconds:
New Attack will have fired 4 times (first attack is instant) with 24-1 damage => 92 damage
Old Attack will have fired 3 times with 4x(6-1) damage => 60 damage + splash
However Corruptor, Tempest, Carrier, Mothership, Battlecruiser have 2 or even 3 starting armor, making the new attack superior against those units (especiallys since they are quite big and don't stack as much as other units).
Damage would be 88 damage vs 48+splash against 2 armor and
84 damage vs 36+splash against 3 armor.
Also the new attack gets +2 per upgrade, which leaves 1 point of extra damage while the old attack gets only +1, which gets absorbed by getting armor upgrades.
Armored air units with 0 starting armor (Overlord, Viking, Voidray) could be targeted by both attacks. Since the new one fires faster it will kill small numbers more quickly, but against bigger numbers additional splash would be useful.
Wow, first shot is instant? nice
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On December 08 2012 21:56 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On December 08 2012 18:48 Vindicare605 wrote:On December 08 2012 11:20 SarcasmMonster wrote:
Since Blizz combined the mech & air upgrades, I don't think the Thor needs to be an exceptional anti-air unit. I'm with this guy. I think the HIP Cannons make the Thor a more useful anti-air unit vs larger enemies (if only slightly)due to the armor issue but I don't think they're meant to completely invalidate Vikings especially now that Vikings are so much more accessible with shared upgrades. At the end of the day too regardless of how effective 250cannons are, there's 2 points that can't really be argued against. 1. HIP is fucking cool. Seeing Thors walking around with giant cannons on their shoulders is AWESOME. 2. Thors lost their energy bar. Which means HTs can't feedback them anymore. That alone is a huge plus with the new system. Vikings REALLY are a terrible concept, because they become pretty much useless the moment when all air opponents are dead. This is a fate they share with the Corruptor, except the Corruptor still has a moderately useful but annoying to use spell. Landing Vikings and using them as cannon fodder is a waste IMO unless you are on the brink of winning, since they cost a lot of gas to reproduce and if the Zerg/Protoss goes for a full size ground army (without Colossi) their usefulness is at an end. Giving a "looks cool" as a reason for thinking the change is great is simply typical for this time. Its all about the looks and not the content. The change for HIP is nice, but the Thor is still terrible as AA when compared to the Goliath and its relationship with the Guardian. Since Blizzard has reduced the size of the Thor as well it seems they try to make it more like the Goliath, but its not enough. [I wonder if they reduced the size of the Odin in the campaign as well, hehe.]
Vikings on the ground are pretty good if you can avoid anti armored ground damage. But they could actually tank if they would lose their armored status on the ground. But due to their air unit like hp on the ground they really get destroyed by anything that does + to armored. But without the armored flag, they would be really good against Immortals, because they are perfect at bringing down Immortal shields.
At the end it is perfect to go and harass with them, if they are no longer needed. But thats often way to much micro for a terran.
At the end the best composition against Air is the Thors and a few Vikings. They work so well together at bringing down air Units in a giant area.
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On December 09 2012 00:41 FeyFey wrote:Show nested quote +On December 08 2012 21:56 Rabiator wrote:On December 08 2012 18:48 Vindicare605 wrote:On December 08 2012 11:20 SarcasmMonster wrote:
Since Blizz combined the mech & air upgrades, I don't think the Thor needs to be an exceptional anti-air unit. I'm with this guy. I think the HIP Cannons make the Thor a more useful anti-air unit vs larger enemies (if only slightly)due to the armor issue but I don't think they're meant to completely invalidate Vikings especially now that Vikings are so much more accessible with shared upgrades. At the end of the day too regardless of how effective 250cannons are, there's 2 points that can't really be argued against. 1. HIP is fucking cool. Seeing Thors walking around with giant cannons on their shoulders is AWESOME. 2. Thors lost their energy bar. Which means HTs can't feedback them anymore. That alone is a huge plus with the new system. Vikings REALLY are a terrible concept, because they become pretty much useless the moment when all air opponents are dead. This is a fate they share with the Corruptor, except the Corruptor still has a moderately useful but annoying to use spell. Landing Vikings and using them as cannon fodder is a waste IMO unless you are on the brink of winning, since they cost a lot of gas to reproduce and if the Zerg/Protoss goes for a full size ground army (without Colossi) their usefulness is at an end. Giving a "looks cool" as a reason for thinking the change is great is simply typical for this time. Its all about the looks and not the content. The change for HIP is nice, but the Thor is still terrible as AA when compared to the Goliath and its relationship with the Guardian. Since Blizzard has reduced the size of the Thor as well it seems they try to make it more like the Goliath, but its not enough. [I wonder if they reduced the size of the Odin in the campaign as well, hehe.] Vikings on the ground are pretty good if you can avoid anti armored ground damage. But they could actually tank if they would lose their armored status on the ground. But due to their air unit like hp on the ground they really get destroyed by anything that does + to armored. But without the armored flag, they would be really good against Immortals, because they are perfect at bringing down Immortal shields. At the end it is perfect to go and harass with them, if they are no longer needed. But thats often way to much micro for a terran. At the end the best composition against Air is the Thors and a few Vikings. They work so well together at bringing down air Units in a giant area.
I really thing that is what Blizzard is going for, to give players the ability to build several types of units to counter air units, rather than just build viking/Corruptor/stalker-blob. By giving the Thor passable(maybe not with the current stats, but with a slight buff), a terran is not hurt by getting them. Since vikings upgrade on the same tree, they can get a few vikings and back them up with thors/marines. Fewer viking blobs are great for the game.
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On December 08 2012 23:49 Habitus wrote:Show nested quote +On December 08 2012 23:11 Knalldi wrote:
I just tested various encounters with broodlords and thors with 2 or 3 BF-Hellbats the Thors are coming out ahead with HI while loosing with javelin. I mean HI is not the answer to all questions for mech, but it surely smoothes encouters in favor to the terran. HIR gives an option to not die that hard to certain things. Its not to counter things imho.
This is the small scale battle i tested: 4 BL vs 3 thors and 2 Hellbats. BL fokus fired the thors and vice versa, with full upgrades on both sides. With javelins 2 BL's remain, with HIR 2 Thors remain. I dont know how it fares and sclaes in bigger battles, but it doesnt look that useless to me. Was this with 3/3 for both? Also 4 BL are only 16 Supply, while 3 Thors and 2 Hellbats are 22 Supply, since they will likely meet in late game, full upgrades + using supply to compare is closer to a real game. Of course in a real game you don't have just BL vs just Thor+HBs From what i can tell Thor's new attack does 27 (24+6-3) every 2 seconds, so 9 attacks to kill or 16 seconds (first attack is instant). Javelins its 4*6 (6+3-3) for 24 damage every 3 seconds, so 10 attacks to kill or 27 seconds. Seems a big difference to me, 3 BL vs 2 Thor is equal supply, even with the Javelins hitting 2 BLs with every attack its takes 21 seconds for them to kill all 3 (5 attacks take 12 seconds and splash kills a BL, remaining 2 BL take 3 more attacks with splash hitting them so 9 more seconds) compared to 16 seconds to kill 2 BL, and then 10 more to kill the last BL for 26 seconds. Now how likely is it for Javelins to hit 2 BL with every attack for 21 seconds with micro + deaths creating space between the BLs.
Just realised i forgot to include the BLs base 1 Armor, so its actually 26 every 2 seconds, so still 9 attacks/16 seconds for HIP, while its 4*5 with Javelins for 20 per 3 seconds or 12 attacks/33 seconds to kill now.
3 BL vs 2 Thor the Javelins become 6 attacks/15 seconds for splash, then 3 attacks/9 seconds for remaining 2 for 24 seconds totals. So 2 second reduction in TTK with Javelins compared to HIP if every Javelin attack hits 2 BL.
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The point is that there is no more energy on the thor with a useless ability. terran still has vikings and with the combined upgrades, the thor transformation is now an option. i'm not sure how it will play out, but it definitely makes mech a little more viable in TvP because feedback doesn't counter thors anymore. Blizzard just wanted to make the cannons on their back cool again, and I think it's a great cover up for 250 mm cannons.
i also realized that a 3/3 mech army can be supplemented by 3/3 grounded vikings
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Assuming equal upgrades, if you're fighting a unit with base armor, HIP essentially doubles your single-target DPS. Doubling your DPS is definitely going to be useful in some situations.
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When I play I find that hellbats kill broodlings super fast while thors with HIP kill the actual BLs. Very effectively at that
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I like the idea of HIP, but I think it may need a buff, because even the units it is best against tend to come in big clumps that make Javelin missiles better regardless. Raising the damage to 30 or so would give it a much more clear place. I think it should also be able to target Colossi who are out of the range of the Thor's ground attack.
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High Impact should do 2x25 damage just like their ground attack and maybe they could throw grenades on the ground that do 8 damage in aoe or something.
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I think the point of HIP is to prevent you from insta dieing to a few Air Units before you tech to Vikings. This is nice since a Meching Terran has to really watch where they allocate gas.
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Even if this ability turns out to be situational. Can you really compain?
Pro
-Strike cannons where worse
-Energy is gone
-Additional single target damage
-looks cool
Cons
...
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On December 10 2012 14:08 awesomoecalypse wrote:
I like the idea of HIP, but I think it may need a buff, because even the units it is best against tend to come in big clumps that make Javelin missiles better regardless. Raising the damage to 30 or so would give it a much more clear place. I think it should also be able to target Colossi who are out of the range of the Thor's ground attack.
It's fine I think. It's a noticeable buff against big armored targets like broodlords and carriers. It still doesn't make the thor good against armored air but it shouldn't be as otherwise the thor would just a be a stupid 'good against anything' unit which is not what you should want for a boring slow unit as it is.
The thor should just be a mech unit that is mostly made for countering light air while still being decent against other stuff which is exactly what it is now. Buffing it more could lead to heavy thor compositions which is quite possible even worse thane the mass broodlord style we see in WoL now..
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EPT
