EPT[D] Terran Medic Speed Upgrade
| Forum Index > StarCraft 2 HotS |
|
IcED Bk
Canada245 Posts
| ||
|
Jellikit
Sweden258 Posts
| ||
|
Thieving Magpie
United States6752 Posts
On December 24 2012 02:43 IcED Bk wrote: Just curious to how the community feels about the speed upgrade. I have seen mixed views of the speed being too much of a buff. Some comments seen on HoTs was to change it to a energy cost? OR a longer cooldown. Others feel it was a long time coming to make it more powerful as a harass unit and a late game unit. No matter the ability (even if it is overpowered) what makes it interesting is the sense of choice. Siege Mode, Tank Mode? 50% Haste, -10/-20 Health? Snipe, EMP? etc... There either needs to be a trade-off or an either or moment. Even if it is obvious--we still need it. No one really thinks "when is it a good time to siege/unsiege" but yet we are able to say "that was a bad time to siege/unsiege" And it is the same for every ability, every unit option. Do I make a marine, or a maruader. Do I make a Thor, or a Siege Tank. Etc... Even if you choose option A 90% of the time and option B 10% of the time, being given the option is what makes choosing A feel good. 90% of the time you choose not to run pass the spine crawler with your hellions to save them for as long as possible. 10% of the time you run in and manage to kill 10-16 drones. That "sense" of choice is what makes any game fun. Why the diatribe? Because the current form of the speed boost does not give that sense of choice. When can you activate it? Anytime. What's the drawback to activating it? It's on cooldown. So if you activate it too early, you have a normal medivac. Compare it to say, Stim. Activating stim costs hitpoints. What does that mean? That means before medivac tech you can only ever stim your marines 1-2 times before the damage boost is not worth the health loss. Choosing *when* to stim becomes critical since it will cost you the fight. But, if you tech high enough, you can counteract the health loss with medivacs. Once you have healers, you can stim to your heart's delight! Except you can't because if you stim around too often your medivacs won't have energy for the big engagement and your army will die. 90% of the time you activate stim when the fight starts--but not always. Sometimes you want to stim a small force to snipe a drop, stim a few units to chase down a retreating force, etc...The choice is there and choosing wisely determines whether you win the fights or not. The speed boost has none of these. Yes, you can say that if you really need to drop troops you can use speed boost to get to a base faster at the cost of being able to retreat OR you could save the speed boost for your retreat only. But there's no actual drawback to casting it. As an example, corrupt on the corruptor is boring. It's not boring because a 20% damage boost is boring, it's boring because it is mindless. The fight starts, I better cast corrupt or I'm simply being inefficient. At no point is there a good reason not to corrupt when you can. Much like there is never a reason to choose not to use the speed boost when you can. But what if it had an energy cost? Suddenly you have a choice of "can I fight a bit longer OR run while I can?" What if it was an upgrade? Should I get a techlab for the speedboost or a reactor for 2x medivacs? It doesn't actually matter what the other option made available is--so long as it is there. Not as a nerf (if you feel that giving it a drawback means we buff the stats I'm cool with that too, I don't actually think it is overpowered nor do I think it is underpowered, I actually really like the numbers right now) but the more mindless we allow it to be the more boring it becomes. | ||
|
fighter2_40
United States420 Posts
| ||
|
avilo
United States4100 Posts
Basically agree with what thieving magpie said. There is literally no drawback to using speedboost. There's no choice, you just simply do it because it's the best thing to do and there's no drawback in terms of loss of energy, etc. There should be a conflict of some type, some decision the player makes when they use the ability. Do I want to sacrifice medivac energy to have higher success chance of the drop getting in? Or do I want to just fly it in and save the energy for pure healing? That makes sense imo. The other interesting part of making speed boost drain medivac energy is this further enhances lategame TvP drop play. Templar + cannon defense in lategame is very common vs Terran to use feedback to basically make it so Terran can never drop. Making the medivac speed boost drain energy gives Terran another way to purposefully drain medivac energy in lategame to also make their drops more successful in the lategame. (You can do the equivalent of the above by using ghost EMP on your own medivacs, but that's a bit unintuitive). | ||
|
benthekid
United States132 Posts
The buff was super smart by blizzard because there is a point in late game TvX where drops simply were not viable due to overlord spread/creep and mass observers not to mention static defense or an infestor or high templar that can gimp a drop. At least now you have a chance to get away and not lose your potential 1000+ resource investment. | ||
|
Pursuit_
United States1330 Posts
edit: I don't think it's OP at all though, it just makes Terran drops about as risk free as Protoss drops  | ||
|
XXXSmOke
United States1333 Posts
The buff is very strong as it should be. Drop Play is something that should be promoted not demoted. Drops create excitement and tension in the game, by spreading armies out and having multiple battles take place. | ||
|
ch4ppi
Germany802 Posts
On December 24 2012 03:09 Thieving Magpie wrote: No matter the ability (even if it is overpowered) what makes it interesting is the sense of choice. Siege Mode, Tank Mode? 50% Haste, -10/-20 Health? Snipe, EMP? etc... There either needs to be a trade-off or an either or moment. Even if it is obvious--we still need it. No one really thinks "when is it a good time to siege/unsiege" but yet we are able to say "that was a bad time to siege/unsiege" And it is the same for every ability, every unit option. Do I make a marine, or a maruader. Do I make a Thor, or a Siege Tank. Etc... Even if you choose option A 90% of the time and option B 10% of the time, being given the option is what makes choosing A feel good. 90% of the time you choose not to run pass the spine crawler with your hellions to save them for as long as possible. 10% of the time you run in and manage to kill 10-16 drones. That "sense" of choice is what makes any game fun. Why the diatribe? Because the current form of the speed boost does not give that sense of choice. When can you activate it? Anytime. What's the drawback to activating it? It's on cooldown. So if you activate it too early, you have a normal medivac. Compare it to say, Stim. Activating stim costs hitpoints. What does that mean? That means before medivac tech you can only ever stim your marines 1-2 times before the damage boost is not worth the health loss. Choosing *when* to stim becomes critical since it will cost you the fight. But, if you tech high enough, you can counteract the health loss with medivacs. Once you have healers, you can stim to your heart's delight! Except you can't because if you stim around too often your medivacs won't have energy for the big engagement and your army will die. 90% of the time you activate stim when the fight starts--but not always. Sometimes you want to stim a small force to snipe a drop, stim a few units to chase down a retreating force, etc...The choice is there and choosing wisely determines whether you win the fights or not. The speed boost has none of these. Yes, you can say that if you really need to drop troops you can use speed boost to get to a base faster at the cost of being able to retreat OR you could save the speed boost for your retreat only. But there's no actual drawback to casting it. As an example, corrupt on the corruptor is boring. It's not boring because a 20% damage boost is boring, it's boring because it is mindless. The fight starts, I better cast corrupt or I'm simply being inefficient. At no point is there a good reason not to corrupt when you can. Much like there is never a reason to choose not to use the speed boost when you can. But what if it had an energy cost? Suddenly you have a choice of "can I fight a bit longer OR run while I can?" What if it was an upgrade? Should I get a techlab for the speedboost or a reactor for 2x medivacs? It doesn't actually matter what the other option made available is--so long as it is there. Not as a nerf (if you feel that giving it a drawback means we buff the stats I'm cool with that too, I don't actually think it is overpowered nor do I think it is underpowered, I actually really like the numbers right now) but the more mindless we allow it to be the more boring it becomes. Brilliant post, not only concerns it the medivac, but also it is a good summary of how to design a units abilitiy | ||
|
Rainling
United States456 Posts
| ||
|
juicyjames
United States3815 Posts
On December 24 2012 03:48 Rainling wrote: Completely agree with Thieving Magpie, even Avilo agrees with giving speed boost an energy cost. It seems like a no-brainer to give a spell drawbacks so players aren't constantly casting it. An energy cost would make choosing to use speed boost much more of a tactical choice, because players have to choose between using energy for healing and using it for the speed boost. I really hope Blizzard plans on testing this. | ||
|
Zahir
United States947 Posts
On December 24 2012 03:57 juicyjames wrote: I really hope Blizzard plans on testing this. Agreed. It feels like this ability should've had an energy cost from the start, I'm surprised blizz chose to make it Cooldown in the first place. | ||
|
Sissors
1395 Posts
I think both solutions are fine: Either give it energy cost (also means you cannot use it when feedbacked or after large fights), or a much longer C/D timer. | ||
|
Zazzles
Slovakia153 Posts
| ||
|
Alex1Sun
494 Posts
On December 24 2012 03:09 Thieving Magpie wrote: No matter the ability (even if it is overpowered) what makes it interesting is the sense of choice. Siege Mode, Tank Mode? 50% Haste, -10/-20 Health? Snipe, EMP? etc... There either needs to be a trade-off or an either or moment. Even if it is obvious--we still need it. No one really thinks "when is it a good time to siege/unsiege" but yet we are able to say "that was a bad time to siege/unsiege" And it is the same for every ability, every unit option. Do I make a marine, or a maruader. Do I make a Thor, or a Siege Tank. Etc... Even if you choose option A 90% of the time and option B 10% of the time, being given the option is what makes choosing A feel good. 90% of the time you choose not to run pass the spine crawler with your hellions to save them for as long as possible. 10% of the time you run in and manage to kill 10-16 drones. That "sense" of choice is what makes any game fun. Why the diatribe? Because the current form of the speed boost does not give that sense of choice. When can you activate it? Anytime. What's the drawback to activating it? It's on cooldown. So if you activate it too early, you have a normal medivac. Compare it to say, Stim. Activating stim costs hitpoints. What does that mean? That means before medivac tech you can only ever stim your marines 1-2 times before the damage boost is not worth the health loss. Choosing *when* to stim becomes critical since it will cost you the fight. But, if you tech high enough, you can counteract the health loss with medivacs. Once you have healers, you can stim to your heart's delight! Except you can't because if you stim around too often your medivacs won't have energy for the big engagement and your army will die. 90% of the time you activate stim when the fight starts--but not always. Sometimes you want to stim a small force to snipe a drop, stim a few units to chase down a retreating force, etc...The choice is there and choosing wisely determines whether you win the fights or not. The speed boost has none of these. Yes, you can say that if you really need to drop troops you can use speed boost to get to a base faster at the cost of being able to retreat OR you could save the speed boost for your retreat only. But there's no actual drawback to casting it. As an example, corrupt on the corruptor is boring. It's not boring because a 20% damage boost is boring, it's boring because it is mindless. The fight starts, I better cast corrupt or I'm simply being inefficient. At no point is there a good reason not to corrupt when you can. Much like there is never a reason to choose not to use the speed boost when you can. But what if it had an energy cost? Suddenly you have a choice of "can I fight a bit longer OR run while I can?" What if it was an upgrade? Should I get a techlab for the speedboost or a reactor for 2x medivacs? It doesn't actually matter what the other option made available is--so long as it is there. Not as a nerf (if you feel that giving it a drawback means we buff the stats I'm cool with that too, I don't actually think it is overpowered nor do I think it is underpowered, I actually really like the numbers right now) but the more mindless we allow it to be the more boring it becomes. The choice is use it now or use it later. It has a cooldown. I however agree that a cooldown can be made longer to add more choice. | ||
|
IcED Bk
Canada245 Posts
. | ||
|
dynwar7
1983 Posts
| ||
|
Sambobly
Australia241 Posts
| ||
|
ktimekiller
United States690 Posts
| ||
|
LonelyClock
Canada29 Posts
| ||
|
SolidMoose
United States1240 Posts
| ||
|
aksfjh
United States4853 Posts
About the only things I would consider if a nerf HAD to be done would be a toggle between heal and speed OR speed boost doesn't allow energy regeneration. I feel an actual energy cost would put too many drops in a "can't escape" situation due to healing energy drain or reactive feedback. | ||
|
OyvN
Norway15 Posts
| ||
|
Zahir
United States947 Posts
| ||
|
FeyFey
Germany10114 Posts
Even if some people think this ability isn't complex enough. They could have reverted their speed nerf from earlier days, to make Medivacs stronger again. But chosen an ability to reward active control. I think it is a good way of doing it. (makes dropping in multiple locations a bit harder, which was the cause for the speed nerf in the first place) The cooldown will probably end up that way, so that you decide if you use it to rush in or to retreat. Energy based restriction would just transfer the decision from when to use, to do I need the energy in the near future. Imo cooldown is the better way to do it. Energy based would probably turn into dash dash dash and do damage and get out safely and then turtle mode until the energy is back. | ||
|
zergrushkekeke
Australia241 Posts
It's a bit sad how poor zerg drops are compared to the other races, it makes me think that is why they are not seen often, and when they are seen it's only for doom drops. The overlord is bad because it is slower 0.586 or 1.88 vs 2.5, and because it has no offensive synergy with dropping units somewhere. Protoss can warp in, Terran can heal and now vrroooom around the place. I want overlords that are somehow viable for harassment in the same time window hellion drops are, but it will always cost too much and come out too late as it stands. | ||
|
SolidHaze
Canada44 Posts
| ||
|
avilo
United States4100 Posts
| ||
|
Glowinglight
United States76 Posts
On December 27 2012 11:57 FeyFey wrote: Made it cooldown for testing purpose most likely. They were probably scared about this ability being unused as Medivacs run dry if you play aggressive. . Maybe make it delay energy regeneration then? | ||
|
Empirimancer
Canada1024 Posts
| ||
|
Belha
Italy2850 Posts
| ||
|
bLo0d
58 Posts
| ||
Plexa
Aotearoa39261 Posts
| ||
|
a176
Canada6688 Posts
| ||
|
mudkipkilla
31 Posts
On December 27 2012 13:03 avilo wrote: I take back all I said. If they are going to make Terrans play essentially wings of liberty vs P/Z + new units, then leave medivac speed boost how it is. At this point, Terran has nothing, so they need all they can get -_- As it is, I think that I agree with the fact that boost should have a drawback, but Terran needs buffs in other ways. I would really like a way to strengthen a "hybrid" mech/bio composition other than tank/marine. Currently, the HOTS Terran changes effect Mech more, but mech is weak, Bio/mech suffers from bad upgrade scaling leaving MMM bio as still the clear choice in most matchups. Back to the point, I think it would make for a more exciting game if the Medivac was tweaked more. Its exciting to play and watch a game where there are many active abilities, especially when those active abilities have drawbacks or tradeoffs. | ||
|
Yoshi Kirishima
United States10324 Posts
also it feels that bio doom drops are very strong against mech players (though that's largely also just because the hots maps have huge airspace making it very hard to turret your bases to stop the drops, even if you have 50 or more for your main and nat) | ||
|
Project_R
3 Posts
So, I hope people aren't blindly looking at this as if it's a simple buff because it's not. It's a useful ability in the late game, but the cost increase is a nerf during the mid game when the upgrade isn't there yet, unless Terrans are going to start rushing to fusion core. Just thought I would point that out. | ||
|
aksfjh
United States4853 Posts
On December 27 2012 18:22 Project_R wrote: If you all think about it actually... this upgrade is a nerf to medivacs mid game and a buff to medivacs late game because the medivac now costs 150/150 throughout the game. The upgrade doesn't come into affect until you upgrade it AND that upgrade requires the fusion core. So, I hope people aren't blindly looking at this as if it's a simple buff because it's not. It's a useful ability in the late game, but the cost increase is a nerf during the mid game when the upgrade isn't there yet, unless Terrans are going to start rushing to fusion core. Just thought I would point that out. The medivac is still 100/100. It's the reactor upgrade that costs 150/150. | ||
|
mnc dover
United States93 Posts
-cost 25 mana to cast -slow the Medivac down during cooldown Option 1 is easy to understand (spend mana get spell) but does become useless if playing overly aggressive or being on the receiving end of mass AoE spells for healing. Option 2 would keep the spell the way it is now (useable whenever) except that during the cooldown period the Medivac would move at half its normal speed (visually shown by sparks emitting from the engines). There's a big drawback to consider and doesn't cost mana. Sure you got into their base, but good luck escaping if an army shows up and surprises you. | ||
|
jumai
Canada115 Posts
On December 27 2012 10:06 OyvN wrote: soooo what is the drawback of blink? Um... stalkers themselves, lol. | ||
|
dangthatsright
1158 Posts
On December 27 2012 10:06 OyvN wrote: soooo what is the drawback of blink? aggressive blinks can, if misjudged, lose you the game easily but not doing them when they would be good can come back to bite you later, especially when counting on a blink push doing enough damage / winning the game | ||
|
Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On December 29 2012 02:53 dangthatsright wrote: aggressive blinks can, if misjudged, lose you the game easily but not doing them when they would be good can come back to bite you later, especially when counting on a blink push doing enough damage / winning the game Blinking doesnt cost half your shield or whatever to do it and "positioning correctly" is part of your playing skill and not a drawback. ---- Personally I would have liked to have a better "speed up" to help with drop harrassment: INSTANT DROP. Having the ability to unload everything at once would actually be more specific to using the Medivac as a dropship while a turbo boost can also be used as a regular escape method to get away in a battle. Smart placement - even for Medivacs - is an important skill and giving players an "easy way out" is a bad thing IMO. | ||
|
dangthatsright
1158 Posts
| ||
|
tehemperorer
United States2183 Posts
| ||
|
Clawfinger
Canada221 Posts
| ||
|
Fragile51
Netherlands15767 Posts
| ||
|
Plansix
United States60190 Posts
| ||
EsportsJohn
United States4883 Posts
It takes a true protoss player to understand this comment lol. | ||
|
myRZeth
Germany1047 Posts
also i m having the feeling that it killed colossus openings because of the blinknerf (colossus/blinkstalker) and because of the even more increased mobility of terran | ||
|
Fig
United States1324 Posts
So true hahaha! Plus the fact that you have to pay 150/150 for the blink upgrade. And as of the latest patch, it takes a very long time for that payment to become worth anything. By the way, no one is arguing to make the speed boost weaker. You could make the boost cost as little energy as necessary to make it just as useful as it is right now. It would just make more sense to use energy for it because the Medivac already has an energy bar! This would make the ability more intuitive for both sides. And then you could also have a trade off between healing and boosting, adding more of a tactical aspect to it. | ||
|
NuclearStar
United Kingdom57 Posts
Where is the tradeoff of using all your HT energy on storms, and then morphing it into a powerful archon, creating an archon costs nothing if you have 2 HT sitting around. I think the cooldown might need to be doubled though, people do use it to get to the drop location faster, when I think it should really be used to get out of a drop location instead. If it had a longer cooldown, then people would only use it to evacuate, which is really what medivacs main purpose should be. | ||
|
Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On December 29 2012 04:55 SC2John wrote: It takes a true protoss player to understand this comment lol. Well this is one of the big design flaws at the heart of SC2 ... the units are balanced with Blink and Forcefield as a requirement, but you cant really do that when people are at different levels of skill and thus low level Protoss will be screwed up more than those who have learned to use these abilities well at the top level. Sadly at top level they (like Forcefield) can become TOO GOOD to the point of being OP. Because Blizzard wanted the game to be "flashy" they came up with the Blink mechanism and had to nerf the unit itself to make up for that mobility ... sadly they didnt do the same for Zerg. In addition the ability to Blink kinda negate positional play directly, because they can go "offroad" and blink across places where no other unit can go. Killing strategic choice through unit abilities or spells is a bad idea in general. | ||
|
FancYCaT
45 Posts
| ||
|
aksfjh
United States4853 Posts
On December 29 2012 05:20 Fig wrote: So true hahaha! Plus the fact that you have to pay 150/150 for the blink upgrade. And as of the latest patch, it takes a very long time for that payment to become worth anything. By the way, no one is arguing to make the speed boost weaker. You could make the boost cost as little energy as necessary to make it just as useful as it is right now. It would just make more sense to use energy for it because the Medivac already has an energy bar! This would make the ability more intuitive for both sides. And then you could also have a trade off between healing and boosting, adding more of a tactical aspect to it. What's more intuitive than "click this button for a boost of speed"? You know what's not intuitive? Clicking the button and being told you don't have enough energy. It's like people either want all their vT to be free wins or for there not to be any T left in this expansion... | ||
|
Bakku
United States9 Posts
| ||
|
InvincibleRice
United States38 Posts
| ||
|
musai
Canada552 Posts
On December 29 2012 07:57 aksfjh wrote:What's more intuitive than "click this button for a boost of speed"? You know what's not intuitive? Clicking the button and being told you don't have enough energy. It's like people either want all their vT to be free wins or for there not to be any T left in this expansion... lol yea, I think the speed boost is fine, I remember seeing baby in the hots showmatch in blizzard cup try to be too cute with medivac speed boosts, he probably used it on cooldown as he moved across the map, it really hurt his macro (think he ballooned to 1k+ a couple times), but maybe he wasn't trying too hard | ||
|
Tamburlaine
Canada288 Posts
On December 29 2012 05:24 NuclearStar wrote: Where is the tradeoff of using all your HT energy on storms, and then morphing it into a powerful archon, creating an archon costs nothing if you have 2 HT sitting around. Um. The cost of a storm is 1.5 feedbacks. The cost of an archon is two high templar. | ||
|
Sadist
United States7215 Posts
that should be the biggest issue out of everything in the damn game lol. | ||
|
phfantunes
Brazil170 Posts
I don't even see it as being all that necessary. In BW, Scourge were the perfect counter to drops and they still had their place. With the new Medivac heal, once you do manage to unload, drops are so ridiculously strong that I'm not really sure the Medivac being uncatchable for 8 sec and pretty much garanteed to be able to drop is a good thing. Lastly, imo drops are supposed to be just the icing on the cake, an extra option of gameplay, a tactic to allow superior players to strain their opponent's multitasking or even a way for someone behind to claw back into the game. With these changes (speed + uber heal), I'm afraid that Terran might be forced even more to do damage in the early/midgame to be on par in the lategame. Protoss and Zerg drops didn't receive any buffs, whereas Terran - the race that was, in general, already pressed in WoL to be the agressor - did, further reinforcing this (bad) aspect of the race and thus being balanced around it. | ||
|
HumpingHydra
Canada97 Posts
The WarpGate is a good example of poorly implemented risk/reward. I think it should be redesigned. It might be a little late for this though. Meh, something like toss units are warped in with no shield, but with immediately recharging shields with temporary (re)generation boost, in addition to reworking toss ground to be not so freakin' weak. That way, Warping in can be highly rewarding due to the nature of reinforcement nearly anywhere, but if caught warping in carelessly, the toss player can lose all his forces. This also means that players must weigh the benefits of having normal gateways vs warp gate. Normal gateways produce units with full shield, but take longer (balance tweaked). Very Very late into SC2 to do a major redesign though. | ||
|
MateShade
Australia736 Posts
| ||
|
aksfjh
United States4853 Posts
On December 29 2012 11:04 phfantunes wrote: I don't have HotS beta, but as a spectator, from watching streams, I'm not impressed at all with the ability. It doesn't seem to impact gameplay that much and Thieving Magpie hit the spot, imo, on why it's a bad ability because it doesn't promote much choice. I don't even see it as being all that necessary. In BW, Scourge were the perfect counter to drops and they still had their place. With the new Medivac heal, once you do manage to unload, drops are so ridiculously strong that I'm not really sure the Medivac being uncatchable for 8 sec and pretty much garanteed to be able to drop is a good thing. Lastly, imo drops are supposed to be just the icing on the cake, an extra option of gameplay, a tactic to allow superior players to strain their opponent's multitasking or even a way for someone behind to claw back into the game. With these changes (speed + uber heal), I'm afraid that Terran might be forced even more to do damage in the early/midgame to be on par in the lategame. Protoss and Zerg drops didn't receive any buffs, whereas Terran - the race that was, in general, already pressed in WoL to be the agressor - did, further reinforcing this (bad) aspect of the race and thus being balanced around it. It's not like we're given the choice between being the aggressor and not. The way the game is already coming about, Terran NEEDS this ability or there may be no options left. | ||
|
DuaneDibly
Australia30 Posts
| ||
|
Sadist
United States7215 Posts
On December 29 2012 16:37 DuaneDibly wrote: Yeah i like the ability costing energy, make it a baseline ability but make speed boost cost about 75 energy, needs to be some sort of trade off for using it. wheres the tradeoff for warpgate/blink? | ||
|
Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
He MUST BE joking, because no one in their right mind would consider an energy cost of 75 a reasonable price for a short boost. If you could "turboboost" anywhere on the map with that in about 5 seconds it might be reasonable, but such an ability would be a tad overpowered ... just a teeenie weenie bit. | ||
|
Cloudshade
91 Posts
| ||
|
Cloudshade
91 Posts
On December 29 2012 16:56 Rabiator wrote: He MUST BE joking, because no one in their right mind would consider an energy cost of 75 a reasonable price for a short boost. If you could "turboboost" anywhere on the map with that in about 5 seconds it might be reasonable, but such an ability would be a tad overpowered ... just a teeenie weenie bit. I don't know if he's joking or if he's retarded or completely biased...but 75 energy is way too much lol | ||
|
NaldoR
Singapore2198 Posts
On December 24 2012 04:23 Zahir wrote: Agreed. It feels like this ability should've had an energy cost from the start, I'm surprised blizz chose to make it Cooldown in the first place. It should be a cooldown with energy cost. This is to avoid them boosting to prevent feedback | ||
|
Loccstana
United States833 Posts
On December 29 2012 17:16 Hopelessnoob wrote: It should be a cooldown with energy cost. This is to avoid them boosting to prevent feedback Sure but only after changing the high templar and infestor to have cooldowns on their spells as well. | ||
|
Hetz
196 Posts
| ||
|
Wekslie
1 Post
Sure but only after changing the high templar and infestor to have cooldowns on their spells as well. +1 for this guy. I don't understand why everyone wants to put a cooldown on it, when most spells don't have a cooldown | ||
|
Zorgaz
Sweden2951 Posts
| ||
|
Evangelist
1246 Posts
Medivacs needed a buff. Protoss don't need a buff, they already got their buff ages ago since Warp Prisms survive about twice as long and are far faster. Zerg definitely don't need a mobility buff. | ||
|
shid0x
Korea (South)5014 Posts
It feels like fresh air for a Terran. | ||
|
Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On December 29 2012 17:16 Cloudshade wrote: I don't know if he's joking or if he's retarded or completely biased...but 75 energy is way too much lol "Joking" is the most polite way to describe it ... so I went for that one. | ||
|
Anomi
Sweden149 Posts
| ||
|
Bagi
Germany6799 Posts
As much as I would love them to fix mech, instead they keep nerfing it and overall don't seem to have a clue how to make it viable. So instead terrans will mass bio even more and abuse the medivac to win games against P/Z opponents who now have much more choices in viable units. If you want terran to keep winning games and make them a viable race, the OP medivac seems like a necessary evil. Now that I think of it, medivacs feel like the crutch that infestors are to zerg in WOL right now. They have 3 months to fix this, but I have to admit I don't have very high hopes. | ||
|
Stingart
122 Posts
On December 30 2012 01:58 Bagi wrote: The speed boost is absolutely overpowered, and so is the upgraded healing. Problem is, everything else terran gets this expansion is gimmicky and/or borderline viable. Boosting around in medivacs is the only thing that makes me go "holy shit, this is really awesome". As much as I would love them to fix mech, instead they keep nerfing it and overall don't seem to have a clue how to make it viable. So instead terrans will mass bio even more and abuse the medivac to win games against P/Z opponents who now have much more choices in viable units. If you want terran to keep winning games and make them a viable race, the OP medivac seems like a necessary evil. Now that I think of it, medivacs feel like the crutch that infestors are to zerg in WOL right now. They have 3 months to fix this, but I have to admit I don't have very high hopes. The healing boost is not overpowered because of the fact that you need a fusion core and a techlab starport to get it. It is a much needed lategame upgrade for bio. | ||
|
Thieving Magpie
United States6752 Posts
Okay, I'm a bit tired of these types of comments. Blink is not a straight up upgrade tactically, but a necessary upgrade to give back the tactical advantage the Stalker used to have during the early stages of the game. Pre-Metabolic Boost and Pre-Conc Shell stalker pokes and stalker patrols keeps watchtowers and map presence to a minimum. It outranges everything and outruns everything. Then, once Zerg gets speed or Terran gets Stim/Conc, the stalker loses the advantage it had and becomes a sub-par ranged unit. Forcefields becomes the main form of field presence that Protoss has preventing both frontal assaults and threatening siege breaks. We enter the midgame and blink becomes available. Once blink is researched, Stalkers once again gain back the advantage they previously had. It cost both minerals and gas to get as well as needs the research time to get. But more importantly, it's an ability to return the Stalker back to its initial position during the early game of a mobile field harasser. More importantly, it's an ability that specifically allows stalkers to fight against the upgrades that previously crippled it. Speed, Conc, Stime, etc... go from being direct counters to Stalkers into soft counters at best. (assuming good Stalker control) The medivac speed upgrade does not give it the ability to do anything different. It only improves drop play whether it is getting to a drop location faster or whether it is escaping faster. It's not like the boost now allows drop play to be possible or the boost allows you to circumvent defenses previously effective versus drop play. Nor does it allow the medivac to do cool shit. It's a cooldown spell much like corrupt. I don't think it's an OP spell, if they buffed it I'd be even fine with it. I just want a better, more flexible implementation of the spell. For example, imagine if it costs energy to boost, but didn't have a cooldown. Sure, boosting it around a lot would make it seem unstoppable--but you won't be able to heal your marines. But suddenly mech drops become something actually interesting. Doing thor harass akin to reaver strikes and being able to escape due to constant speed boosting? Hellion drops having a different flavor compared to bio drops since bio drops needs the energy to heal units you can be more liberal with your energy uses when doing hellion drops, you can use it to "counter" feedback defenses, allow your army to be more mobile as you use fast medivacs to actually ferry your troops around the map since it will be faster than walking so long as you micro. The point is not about nerfing it, I don't think it's too powerful at all. The point is that it would be more interesting if it was flexible and provided choice. Right now its really only useful for drops. That's it. Because its a cooldown you really can only afford to use it at "the right time" and the only time that is present is when you're doing drops. But what if we made it more powerful while giving it a drawback? Suddenly we can start using the ability to more aggressively, more often, and there will suddenly be a big difference between people who knows how to manage their medivacs versus those who simply spam the cooldown/burn the energy. But it doesn't even have to cost energy! The cooldown could be longer, but give it something other than a speedboost (someone suggested instant unload similar to the bunker dropping the entire squad out at once instead of one at a time) to increase DPS upon arrival. Suddenly there is a tactical choice between using the boost early (DPS) or for using the boost later (escaping) You could double the speed boost increase but force a full stop as the engine is taxed too much, in which case you need to accelerate again. You could simply improve the current speedboost to give more incentive to use it early so that when people use it to escape it is a choice they make. Like, imagine if the speedboost also gave a temporary armor boost? That way people don't simply turn it on when dropping/retreating but also during engagements when they notice stalkers focus firing the medivacs. There's a lot of ways to buff/change/nerf the ability until it gets exciting. The point should not be about nerfing/buffing it but the point should be to find a way to make it allow for interesting play. | ||
|
Hider
Denmark9366 Posts
From a design pov we want to see as much mutltiasking as possible and players with great mechanics should be rewarded. The current version of the speed medi rewards fast players. GIving it a cooldown will just make games more boring unfrotunately. | ||
|
Sadist
United States7215 Posts
On December 30 2012 02:28 Thieving Magpie wrote: Okay, I'm a bit tired of these types of comments. Blink is not a straight up upgrade tactically, but a necessary upgrade to give back the tactical advantage the Stalker used to have during the early stages of the game. Pre-Metabolic Boost and Pre-Conc Shell stalker pokes and stalker patrols keeps watchtowers and map presence to a minimum. It outranges everything and outruns everything. Then, once Zerg gets speed or Terran gets Stim/Conc, the stalker loses the advantage it had and becomes a sub-par ranged unit. Forcefields becomes the main form of field presence that Protoss has preventing both frontal assaults and threatening siege breaks. We enter the midgame and blink becomes available. Once blink is researched, Stalkers once again gain back the advantage they previously had. It cost both minerals and gas to get as well as needs the research time to get. But more importantly, it's an ability to return the Stalker back to its initial position during the early game of a mobile field harasser. More importantly, it's an ability that specifically allows stalkers to fight against the upgrades that previously crippled it. Speed, Conc, Stime, etc... go from being direct counters to Stalkers into soft counters at best. (assuming good Stalker control) The medivac speed upgrade does not give it the ability to do anything different. It only improves drop play whether it is getting to a drop location faster or whether it is escaping faster. It's not like the boost now allows drop play to be possible or the boost allows you to circumvent defenses previously effective versus drop play. Nor does it allow the medivac to do cool shit. It's a cooldown spell much like corrupt. I don't think it's an OP spell, if they buffed it I'd be even fine with it. I just want a better, more flexible implementation of the spell. For example, imagine if it costs energy to boost, but didn't have a cooldown. Sure, boosting it around a lot would make it seem unstoppable--but you won't be able to heal your marines. But suddenly mech drops become something actually interesting. Doing thor harass akin to reaver strikes and being able to escape due to constant speed boosting? Hellion drops having a different flavor compared to bio drops since bio drops needs the energy to heal units you can be more liberal with your energy uses when doing hellion drops, you can use it to "counter" feedback defenses, allow your army to be more mobile as you use fast medivacs to actually ferry your troops around the map since it will be faster than walking so long as you micro. The point is not about nerfing it, I don't think it's too powerful at all. The point is that it would be more interesting if it was flexible and provided choice. Right now its really only useful for drops. That's it. Because its a cooldown you really can only afford to use it at "the right time" and the only time that is present is when you're doing drops. But what if we made it more powerful while giving it a drawback? Suddenly we can start using the ability to more aggressively, more often, and there will suddenly be a big difference between people who knows how to manage their medivacs versus those who simply spam the cooldown/burn the energy. But it doesn't even have to cost energy! The cooldown could be longer, but give it something other than a speedboost (someone suggested instant unload similar to the bunker dropping the entire squad out at once instead of one at a time) to increase DPS upon arrival. Suddenly there is a tactical choice between using the boost early (DPS) or for using the boost later (escaping) You could double the speed boost increase but force a full stop as the engine is taxed too much, in which case you need to accelerate again. You could simply improve the current speedboost to give more incentive to use it early so that when people use it to escape it is a choice they make. Like, imagine if the speedboost also gave a temporary armor boost? That way people don't simply turn it on when dropping/retreating but also during engagements when they notice stalkers focus firing the medivacs. There's a lot of ways to buff/change/nerf the ability until it gets exciting. The point should not be about nerfing/buffing it but the point should be to find a way to make it allow for interesting play. This same argument can be applied to stalkers and blink. And you didnt address warpgate at all. Now with the speedboost medivacs are no longer instantly owned by blink stalkers and can actually get away from engagements. Do you see what I did there? Stop trying to rape everything terran without seeing that your argument is flawed and the same thing could be said about other units in the game. | ||
|
Anomi
Sweden149 Posts
On December 30 2012 03:43 Sadist wrote: This same argument can be applied to stalkers and blink. And you didnt address warpgate at all. Now with the speedboost medivacs are no longer instantly owned by blink stalkers and can actually get away from engagements. Do you see what I did there? Stop trying to rape everything terran without seeing that your argument is flawed and the same thing could be said about other units in the game. to be honest the only thing you can see is someone made random comeback without saying anything at all . . Maybe u should try to say how the same thing can be said by stalkers and why warp gate is important to mention. It’s pretty clear from your post that you are ether too lazy or unable to adress the points he brought up in his post and believe somehow that you counterd his arguments by being funny with words. Next time u should read the psot carefully if u dont want to sound like an idot since he acctuallay says "The point is not about nerfing it, I don't think it's too powerful at all. The point is that it would be more interesting if it was flexible and provided choice." If this isn’t clear enough he isn’t talking about removing the ability but adding something to make it more interesting. | ||
|
Thieving Magpie
United States6752 Posts
On December 30 2012 03:43 Sadist wrote: This same argument can be applied to stalkers and blink. And you didnt address warpgate at all. Now with the speedboost medivacs are no longer instantly owned by blink stalkers and can actually get away from engagements. Do you see what I did there? Stop trying to rape everything terran without seeing that your argument is flawed and the same thing could be said about other units in the game. Blink *is* something different. Stalkers can now circumvent terrain. The drawback is that if they circumvent terrain at the wrong time, they can't run away because of the cooldown. The fact that they can do other things is what makes blink interesting. While it is possible to use blink get past cliffs, walls, gaps, etc... you can also use it out in the open to snipe/retreat, you can also use it to improve unit retention during engagements, etc... Medivac with a speed boost merely is the medivac doing what it already does, but faster. Blink actually changes the whole dynamic of how the unit is. The goal is not to find a nerf, nor is it to find a buff--the goal is to have an ability that actually changes how the unit is played. Warp Gate, for example, speeds up unit production and allows for dynamic unit placement. It has the huge drawback of you having to actually fix your screen at the location of production every time you use it. It's not like Terran or Zerg where they can tap a hotkey, makes some units and go on their merry way. And it's not like BW macro where you go back to the same location over and over to re-click the same buildings over and over. You literally have to move your screen to different parts of the map depending on what is needed, why it's needed, and when it is needed. The unit production system is literally changed both thematically, mechanically, and physically. The execution of unit production changes, the whole concept of unit production changes. Do you know why metabolic boost gives a flat speed upgrade and not a temporary speed upgrade? Because needing to push a button to run faster is not the most exciting ability in the world. Sure stim is used for the 50% run speed all the time--but do you think people would praise it so much if it didn't come with a 50% attack speed increase as well? If what you want is more power then sure, buff the ever living crap out of the speed boost upgrade--but give it something else other than moving faster. I made multiple suggestions that ranged from nerfing it to buffing it, increasing its speed, giving it additional properties, giving it drawbacks, everything. I don't actually care whether or not its too strong or too weak. I care if it is boring or not. If buffing it makes it less boring--then buff it. If nerfing it makes it less boring, then nerf it. It is already a highly mobile unit. Making mobiler does not make it more dynamic. Blink gives stalkers a completely new way to play, speed boost does not. Blink allows stalkers to actually go face to face with units that are supposed to kill it and through blink micro overcome the odds. Speed boost allows a drop harass unit to... drop harass more? Does Terran as a race need a buff to make the matchups more even--sure. But we're not here to talk about the metagame, we're here to talk about a unit ability. One that is on the right track, but needs just a little bit more tweaking to make it actually interesting. | ||
|
c0sm0naut
United States1229 Posts
On December 30 2012 03:43 Sadist wrote: This same argument can be applied to stalkers and blink. And you didnt address warpgate at all. Now with the speedboost medivacs are no longer instantly owned by blink stalkers and can actually get away from engagements. Do you see what I did there? Stop trying to rape everything terran without seeing that your argument is flawed and the same thing could be said about other units in the game. guess which race over 2/3rds of this player base doesn't play? they will be "raped" and the argument isn't "flawed" to the majority of players. to the majority of players, the new medivacs are annoying and powerful, and require a lot more conscious thought to deal with, which is kind of why i "know" they will be nerfed as you say. once you give a year or two of easy games vs T to the other races they are going to cry endlessly about having to position units intelligently and defend drops. before this change, protoss only had to defend one build from terran. assuming you 9pylon scout, there is no other build that is viable. that build is a 1rax fe > 10 minute stim, 2 medivacs and + 1 attack push. it always hits at the same time every game, and every other pressure build is not truly viable if your opponent just played standard(look at the success rates of 1 base all ins in tvp recently) now they have, the possibility of this drop. the possibiliity of some kind of drop + speedy get away before they have enough dps to burst down the medivac. perhaps the biggest thing now however, is that protoss can no longer get an extreme lead by having collosus ready for this medivac push. now with the speed boost it is always possible to counter drop. this means that crushing a medivac drop with collosus stalker, and then warping in nothing but stalkers with blink and winning 90% of your games in a counter attack will not happen anymore because of the threat of a counter drop. against zerg, before this change there was a lot of variance in the matchup but ultimately pretty much the same compositions, however against mutalisk play, even if you notice where they are you still cant counter drop. with overlords everywhere, they wills top harassing to come clean it up. with the new speed boost, zergs have to actually be using their mutalisks to defend drops and will have to leran to watch/use the minimap. they can counter drop you so fast that I think this change's biggest effect is that zergs can no longer drone nonstop while making mutas/infestors. if these drops come in and unload, even if yo uhave 20 mutalisks, if you didn't premake lings for banelings you'll probably lose a lot of shit unnecessarily, etc. i play as random, i'm just letting you know you should start practicing builds that dont center around the medivac, beause it will be nerfed strongly before this game is released. if it isn't, koreans are going to rebreak the game for terran again | ||
|
Sadist
United States7215 Posts
On December 30 2012 04:57 Anomi wrote: to be honest the only thing you can see is someone made random comeback without saying anything at all . . Maybe u should try to say how the same thing can be said by stalkers and why warp gate is important to mention. It’s pretty clear from your post that you are ether too lazy or unable to adress the points he brought up in his post and believe somehow that you counterd his arguments by being funny with words. Next time u should read the psot carefully if u dont want to sound like an idot since he acctuallay says "The point is not about nerfing it, I don't think it's too powerful at all. The point is that it would be more interesting if it was flexible and provided choice." If this isn’t clear enough he isn’t talking about removing the ability but adding something to make it more interesting. Get over yourself. How come we don't do the same thing to warpgate and blink? Add a drawback to medivac speed boost when you add a drawback to those abilities. Then I woulnd't have an issue with it. Im sick of people being hypocritical as terran receives nerfbat after nerfbat. | ||
|
Thieving Magpie
United States6752 Posts
On December 30 2012 05:07 Sadist wrote: Get over yourself. How come we don't do the same thing to warpgate and blink? Add a drawback to medivac speed boost when you add a drawback to those abilities. Then I woulnd't have an issue with it. Im sick of people being hypocritical as terran receives nerfbat after nerfbat. Let me quote myself to just show you what I literally said. There's a lot of ways to buff/change/nerf the ability until it gets exciting. The point should not be about nerfing/buffing it but the point should be to find a way to make it allow for interesting play. | ||
|
RaXCitY
United States37 Posts
| ||
|
Loccstana
United States833 Posts
Protoss and Zerg both received a new spellcaster for HOTS so why not give one to terran as well. Possible Spells: -Restoration: for 75 energy remove any harmful effects (snare/stun/slow/dot) in a 2 radius and render units immune to these effects for the next 5 seconds (opposite of fungal lol) -Emergency Flares: For 25 energy drop a flare, giving 10 range vision of the position there for 25 seconds -Triage Center: For 100 energy, create a small healing station that slowly heals all units in a 2 radius at 2 hp/sec. Lasts 90 seconds. | ||
|
Zahir
United States947 Posts
On December 30 2012 09:21 Loccstana wrote: I have an idea: Why dont we turn the medivac into another spellcaster for terran? Protoss and Zerg both received a new spellcaster for HOTS so why not give one to terran as well. Possible Spells: -Restoration: for 75 energy remove any harmful effects (snare/stun/slow/dot) in a 2 radius and render units immune to these effects for the next 5 seconds (opposite of fungal lol) -Emergency Flares: For 25 energy drop a flare, giving 10 range vision of the position there for 25 seconds -Triage Center: For 100 energy, create a small healing station that slowly heals all units in a 2 radius at 2 hp/sec. Lasts 90 seconds. That would be retardedly fun and broken. They should implement zany spells on medivacs posthaste. | ||
|
MateShade
Australia736 Posts
| ||
|
Cloudshade
91 Posts
| ||
|
TheSwagger
United States92 Posts
| ||
| ||
