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On January 10 2013 06:29 The_Darkness wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 05:49 Cartacea wrote:
What if Medivacs could transport sieged tanks?
Maybe adding a small delay before they can fire when dropped off. It would encourage making medivacs when meching, which synergize well with hellbats. I actually really like this idea. Players with really good micro probably could exploit it in interesting ways. Perhaps in siege mode a tank should take up six supply so that only one would fit in a medivac (and perhaps there should be a really short delay before it could fire -- 1 second or so). This would allow mech to be more mobile and to be more cost efficient (since you don't have to necessarily lose your siege tanks if you lose an engagement, and as you mention promoting medivac use synergizes well with hell bats. It could also make drops a lot scarier. At the very least I think this change would make bio mech a lot more viable in tvp, which would be nice to see. I think this is something that definitely should be tried in the beta, regardless of whether it makes mech viable.
I agree, with six supply and visual of Tank underneath the Medivac, this could be really interesting. Not only would it provide synergy with Hellbats, but also Vikings (to protect the Medivac while it's moving with expensive cargo). It seems like there are SO many micro opportunities here, like in TvT dropping an entire line of tanks into position so they only take one volley (and that's only if it's with delay; if no delay, it'd be an even exchange). The more drops you can manage at the same time, the more cost-effective your army will be. Very, very high skill ceiling.
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So much trolling.
If you guys aren't careful, Browder will bite on one of these.
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On January 10 2013 06:29 The_Darkness wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 05:49 Cartacea wrote:
What if Medivacs could transport sieged tanks?
Maybe adding a small delay before they can fire when dropped off. It would encourage making medivacs when meching, which synergize well with hellbats. I actually really like this idea. Players with really good micro probably could exploit it in interesting ways. Perhaps in siege mode a tank should take up six supply so that only one would fit in a medivac (and perhaps there should be a really short delay before it could fire -- 1 second or so). This would allow mech to be more mobile and to be more cost efficient (since you don't have to necessarily lose your siege tanks if you lose an engagement, and as you mention promoting medivac use synergizes well with hell bats. It could also make drops a lot scarier. I think this is something that definitely should be tried in the beta, regardless of whether it makes mech viable.
And as a plus, it would look awesome. If anyone has ever seen when MKP drop microed a set of 4 thors against zerglings, it was a joy to watch. I think everyone would love to see medivacs pick up siege tanks seconds before a wave of zerglings hit. For further awesome, it should be a single siege tank per medivac, just like the thor, for the visual. That with a reasonable buff to siege tanks, it would make watching mech that much more exciting.
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On January 10 2013 06:43 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 06:29 The_Darkness wrote:On January 10 2013 05:49 Cartacea wrote:
What if Medivacs could transport sieged tanks?
Maybe adding a small delay before they can fire when dropped off. It would encourage making medivacs when meching, which synergize well with hellbats. I actually really like this idea. Players with really good micro probably could exploit it in interesting ways. Perhaps in siege mode a tank should take up six supply so that only one would fit in a medivac (and perhaps there should be a really short delay before it could fire -- 1 second or so). This would allow mech to be more mobile and to be more cost efficient (since you don't have to necessarily lose your siege tanks if you lose an engagement, and as you mention promoting medivac use synergizes well with hell bats. It could also make drops a lot scarier. I think this is something that definitely should be tried in the beta, regardless of whether it makes mech viable. And as a plus, it would look awesome. If anyone has ever seen when MKP drop microed a set of 4 thors against zerglings, it was a joy to watch. I think everyone would love to see medivacs pick up siege tanks seconds before a wave of zerglings hit. For further awesome, it should be a single siege tank per medivac, just like the thor, for the visual. That with a reasonable buff to siege tanks, it would make watching mech that much more exciting.
Ooooooooooooh i want to say yes.
Let's hope Dustin Browder read this !
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On January 10 2013 06:43 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 06:29 The_Darkness wrote:On January 10 2013 05:49 Cartacea wrote:
What if Medivacs could transport sieged tanks?
Maybe adding a small delay before they can fire when dropped off. It would encourage making medivacs when meching, which synergize well with hellbats. I actually really like this idea. Players with really good micro probably could exploit it in interesting ways. Perhaps in siege mode a tank should take up six supply so that only one would fit in a medivac (and perhaps there should be a really short delay before it could fire -- 1 second or so). This would allow mech to be more mobile and to be more cost efficient (since you don't have to necessarily lose your siege tanks if you lose an engagement, and as you mention promoting medivac use synergizes well with hell bats. It could also make drops a lot scarier. I think this is something that definitely should be tried in the beta, regardless of whether it makes mech viable. And as a plus, it would look awesome. If anyone has ever seen when MKP drop microed a set of 4 thors against zerglings, it was a joy to watch. I think everyone would love to see medivacs pick up siege tanks seconds before a wave of zerglings hit. For further awesome, it should be a single siege tank per medivac, just like the thor, for the visual. That with a reasonable buff to siege tanks, it would make watching mech that much more exciting.
a 6supply tank would need a new name. Like, "Apocalypse Siege Tank". Sold, DB will implement this tomorrow. 
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New patch is up!
Free Siege mode.
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On January 10 2013 07:05 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 06:43 Plansix wrote:On January 10 2013 06:29 The_Darkness wrote:On January 10 2013 05:49 Cartacea wrote:
What if Medivacs could transport sieged tanks?
Maybe adding a small delay before they can fire when dropped off. It would encourage making medivacs when meching, which synergize well with hellbats. I actually really like this idea. Players with really good micro probably could exploit it in interesting ways. Perhaps in siege mode a tank should take up six supply so that only one would fit in a medivac (and perhaps there should be a really short delay before it could fire -- 1 second or so). This would allow mech to be more mobile and to be more cost efficient (since you don't have to necessarily lose your siege tanks if you lose an engagement, and as you mention promoting medivac use synergizes well with hell bats. It could also make drops a lot scarier. I think this is something that definitely should be tried in the beta, regardless of whether it makes mech viable. And as a plus, it would look awesome. If anyone has ever seen when MKP drop microed a set of 4 thors against zerglings, it was a joy to watch. I think everyone would love to see medivacs pick up siege tanks seconds before a wave of zerglings hit. For further awesome, it should be a single siege tank per medivac, just like the thor, for the visual. That with a reasonable buff to siege tanks, it would make watching mech that much more exciting. a 6supply tank would need a new name. Like, "Apocalypse Siege Tank". Sold, DB will implement this tomorrow.
Sounds about right. After all, a normal medivac can only carry 2 tanks, but they have to be bigger when seiged.
But we would need something to tell it apart from other, normal tanks. Like....two barrels. Wait....I see that before.
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On January 10 2013 07:05 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 06:43 Plansix wrote:On January 10 2013 06:29 The_Darkness wrote:On January 10 2013 05:49 Cartacea wrote:
What if Medivacs could transport sieged tanks?
Maybe adding a small delay before they can fire when dropped off. It would encourage making medivacs when meching, which synergize well with hellbats. I actually really like this idea. Players with really good micro probably could exploit it in interesting ways. Perhaps in siege mode a tank should take up six supply so that only one would fit in a medivac (and perhaps there should be a really short delay before it could fire -- 1 second or so). This would allow mech to be more mobile and to be more cost efficient (since you don't have to necessarily lose your siege tanks if you lose an engagement, and as you mention promoting medivac use synergizes well with hell bats. It could also make drops a lot scarier. I think this is something that definitely should be tried in the beta, regardless of whether it makes mech viable. And as a plus, it would look awesome. If anyone has ever seen when MKP drop microed a set of 4 thors against zerglings, it was a joy to watch. I think everyone would love to see medivacs pick up siege tanks seconds before a wave of zerglings hit. For further awesome, it should be a single siege tank per medivac, just like the thor, for the visual. That with a reasonable buff to siege tanks, it would make watching mech that much more exciting. a 6supply tank would need a new name. Like, "Apocalypse Siege Tank". Sold, DB will implement this tomorrow.
Not sure if joking or serious, so I'll clarify, the 6-supply is only for Medivac purposes. Lifting a tank in Siege Mode would take up an entire Medivac.
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Holy crap the patch notes are no joke. The Hellbat does 18 damage straight up, 30 vs light, no upgrade required. Thats pure non-sense.
And the HSM is not a range 10, AOE py-storm with a 5 second delay. 100 damage straight to your face for 75 E-straight up. Welcome to the club terrans! As a protoss, I feel you will enjoy these new long range AOE dealing machines.
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On January 10 2013 05:10 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 04:13 dicedicerevolution wrote:On January 10 2013 00:28 Rabiator wrote:On January 10 2013 00:14 Telenil wrote:On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:On January 09 2013 17:56 Telenil wrote:
Apart from "it is awesome in Brood War", why is that a terrible thing? There is no building in the game that can make you win games on its own, even barracks need medevacs. You would hate the game if mass stargates could stand against every composition, so why do you want pure factories to do that?
The core of mech is the positionnal play + harassing with faster unit. Something isn't mech just because it comes from the factory, but on the other hand, it can still be mech even if all units don't come from the same building. The "factory style" you describe has enough difficulty on its own due to the immobility, but "forcing" this style to rely upon units from other buildings too much is a terrible thing, because it makes it too complicated and in the end not worthwile. Against the Tempest you basically NEED the Viking, but WHY should it be necessary? Blizzard dont want to admit that they screwed up with the Tempest (and the Broodlord/Infestor combo) and change these units and so they are falling back to the "we dont intend to do this" option and just tell us to build other stuff too to make it work. If I remove the usual "I would design this game better than Blizzard" crap (sorry but that's what it is), the actual argument is "mech shouldn't have to rely on other buildings because, combined with its lack of mobility, it would make it too complicated". That sounds a bit... flimsy. Bio use barracks + vikings + medevacs, PvT protoss use gateway + robo, and if you want tanks involved, the compositions required to face zerglings/banelings/mutas were even more diverse. Factory + vikings is not more complicated than those strategies. In other words, why shouldn't players have to build vikings when TvZ involving marine/tank/medevacs/thors into vikings were considered fine? Mech - IMMOBILITY Bio - MOBILITY You notice the difference? Adding "mobile" units to get around the fact that mech is immobile is stupid, because it simply shows that mobility is too important in SC2 because the developers make these decisions. Its basically cheating and the merging of one upgrade for mech and air already blurs the lines between the races, because you are basically down to three upgrades to do it all ... just like Zerg and Protoss have it. Thats not good. Its all about the additional option of being able to play a "static" game of positioning and slowly creeping ahead. Sadly SC2 is all about mobility and thats a big part of the reason why mech doesnt work / works badly. The only solution to this - in Blizzards framework - is to buff the Siege Tank in such a way to make them SCARY to any kind of infantry; both other races have sufficient numbers of "tricks" to deal with static big targets that cant shoot air ... How do you explain BL/Infestor then? Mobile static defenses compensate for slow moving death ball? Sase made a case for that a while back. Both his and your arguments aren't necessarily invalid, especially pertaining to the existing framework of SC2, but the bigger issue is mining. Having more bases vs. an immobile composition is a standard RTS strategy but SC2 doesn't work that way. Mining is simply too efficient and being up 6 base to 3 is near meaningless in terms of mineral economy and the additional gas economy simply means "I'll get my shinier gas units to create my own, better, death ball than yours". Positional play and board control which everyone recognizes is important (including Blizzard, but it seems only superficially) simply isn't THAT important when the whole REASON you're jockeying for such control isn't additional income in an ECONOMY-BASED RTS (as you would hope, and expect) but THE (singular) decisive engagement. This is why Infestors are hard to balance (Zerg needs strong AoE because having more income and units isn't that effective when despite having more bases, they're not mining much more than their T and P counter-parts) and everything from the Protoss race (FF, gateway units, WG, etc.) to map size (there was a reason why early maps were so small, because mining maxed out so early, it made sense to position players in close proximity of each other to "fight for board control"). Mobile static bases do one thing: anchor the units on something and protecting the units (which cost gas) with something that doesnt and is cheap to repair. They do have a "downside" of being immobile and taking a long time to get up. The economy point you raise is sadly true ... and it is valid, because a Zerg on 6 bases basically have unlimited resources to recreate their army as much as they like and due to the larvae inject mechanic that isnt even too hard. So there still is an advantage from that and the Terrans will run out eventually ... and without scary space control units they cant even secure new bases easily after those first three. SC2 does have too many resources to produce units, but sadly Blizzard thinks that "more is better" and they are wrong. The Broodlord is a badly designed unit, because it creates its own "protective screen against ground units", because they have a range of 9.5 which then can even extend because the Broodlings have a decent lifetime and can walk a bit more. No ground unit has a range to beat that, so the only solution to kill these is air with a long range or super mobility in the form of Blink. Couple that with Fungal and you have a terrible unit design. A much better design for the BL would be to change the range to 3 and the mobility to something close to Mutalisk speed. That way you could use them as "bombers" but would have to endanger them while using them. "Invulnerable" units are bad design. Obviously there will be experts who will claim I have no clue to design a game or something like that, but at least I argue the point. Since the Thor is soooooooo sluggish and only has half a range increment over the Broodlord in its AA range it cant ever deal with that threat. You would need a *somewhat mobile* unit like the Goliath, but then you still have Fungal to sort out. The Thor really doesnt cut it and the only way to make it work would be to increase the damage of the new single target attack SIGNIFICANTLY, but then they would be a bit too good against all the smaller early air units, so that sounds like a "no go".
On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
Mobile static bases do one thing: anchor the units on something and protecting the units (which cost gas) with something that doesnt and is cheap to repair. They do have a "downside" of being immobile and taking a long time to get up.
I don't understand what you mean by "mobile static bases". Maybe you mean "mobile static-defenses" like spine/spore crawlers? Looking back, I should've cleaned up my own terminology so there would be less confusion. The bit about anchoring units is incomprehensible, please clarify 
On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
The economy point you raise is sadly true ... and it is valid, because a Zerg on 6 bases basically have unlimited resources to recreate their army as much as they like and due to the larvae inject mechanic that isnt even too hard. So there still is an advantage from that and the Terrans will run out eventually ... and without scary space control units they cant even secure new bases easily after those first three. SC2 does have too many resources to produce units, but sadly Blizzard thinks that "more is better" and they are wrong.
No, you misunderstand me. I believe that a player (any race) being ahead on bases does not confer enough of a mineral advantage. There's the illusion of a Zerg on 6 bases having unlimited resources because the additional income is primarily gas and it's simply just massing gas heavy units (typically hive tech, and typically BL/Infestor). I'm referring to one of LaLush's posts. That brings us to the crux of the issue. All this whining about Zerg late-game being OP is generic. If Terran had the best end-game composition then you could easily replace Zerg with Terran and keep the rest of the whine the same. The core issue is the mining system where having more income than 3bases (e.g. "a 6 base Zerg") only serves to bolster a gas-heavy army (for which something like mech would benefit more from than bio and why you don't see people massing 20 OC's late-game and mule-bombing expansions). The mineral advantage should help secure more bases or to trade reasonably with the gas units that a player on lesser bases may be massing. "Reasonably" would mean not completely obliterated, and for free, like with fungal, otherwise it's annihilation and not attrition.
On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
The Broodlord is a badly designed unit, because it creates its own "protective screen against ground units", because they have a range of 9.5 which then can even extend because the Broodlings have a decent lifetime and can walk a bit more. No ground unit has a range to beat that, so the only solution to kill these is air with a long range or super mobility in the form of Blink. Couple that with Fungal and you have a terrible unit design. A much better design for the BL would be to change the range to 3 and the mobility to something close to Mutalisk speed. That way you could use them as "bombers" but would have to endanger them while using them. "Invulnerable" units are bad design. Obviously there will be experts who will claim I have no clue to design a game or something like that, but at least I argue the point.
Since the Thor is soooooooo sluggish and only has half a range increment over the Broodlord in its AA range it cant ever deal with that threat. You would need a *somewhat mobile* unit like the Goliath, but then you still have Fungal to sort out. The Thor really doesnt cut it and the only way to make it work would be to increase the damage of the new single target attack SIGNIFICANTLY, but then they would be a bit too good against all the smaller early air units, so that sounds like a "no go".
That sort of argument is secondary to the real issues at hand, I'll break it down for you:
1.) There must be an increase in the skill ceiling for individual and group unit control for a game that uses mechanics as a subset for strategy
2.) Mining efficiency must be reworked to make board control actually matter for securing income and maintaining a late-game composition instead of the current, "fish for a decisive engagement" function
Tweaking unit values and debating the role of a unit are secondary to those 2 issues because the former provides the framework for the latter.
I know partially you mentioned a reworking of how the unit works rather than a simply tweaking of numbers, but it's still not quite right. The focus should be on making actually getting to and maintaining BLs to be difficult (because you need those bases). If a game like BW could have units that make BL/Infestor seem quaint in comparison yet still be better balanced due to how mining worked, then this should be the way to approach things (assuming the game emphasizes resource management rather than decisive engagements).
Consider this, not too long ago (mid-late 2011), Zergs were struggling to fight Terran and Protoss armies and even the though of increasing the supply cap to 300 was being bandied about. Well we found the answer and it was abusing units like BL/Infestor and mobile static-defenses to make free units (basically having that additional supply). The core issue still remained, which was how mining worked and it's been glossed over by the red herring that is "Who has the ultimate late-game army and how can we nerf it so there are more viable allins to prevent them from getting there?"
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Well that "focus on mech" didnt go as expected lol
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On January 10 2013 08:25 ch4ppi wrote:
Well that "focus on mech" didnt go as expected lol
yeaaaa,
well ****
i guess they want the hellbat to be the core mech unit? maybe? i don't know....
ummmm i guess you can 1/1/1 a bit better now, ravens to kill the msc and then no siege mode research needed...i guess....
I honestly cannot think of a timing from protoss that could come before true meching player would have siege mode up (7:00-8:00) and really get messed up by the presence of siege tanks.
well, maybe we'll at least see some tank contains.......then it'll get nerfed or something....
damn I'm dissapointed
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On January 09 2013 23:22 rollAdice wrote:Show nested quote +On January 09 2013 23:15 Markwerf wrote:On January 09 2013 23:04 rollAdice wrote:
I think a lot people don't realize that the immortal is not an anti-mech unit - it's an anti high burst-damage unit. The problem with mech is that both the tank and the thor have high burst-damage with low attack speed. All units with high attack speed and low burst-damage do perfectly fine against immortals.
So the easiest fix is reduce the damage of thors to a half and double their attack speed, we just doubled the dps of thors vs immortals. Practically the only units with high burst damage are mech... The only other units doing much are the tempest and the ultralisk.. Why make ugly fixes to mech units just to bypass the problem of the immortal if you can fix the problem directly.. Not even mentioning that just making the thor do half damage at double speed is a huge buff against zerg because it won't overkill as much anymore... Lings are quite effective against thors because a thor wastes nearly 50% on every shot for example.. It would probably look ugly to if the thor fires so quickly and constantly turns to acquire new targets Well this was just a suggestion but the same could be accomplished by leaving the attack speed as is and increasing the shot count to 4. Also fixes the ling problem.
I like this idea, although changing Viking ground damage from 12 to 6x2 would also get you in the same area of having a mech unit doing multiple hits to the Immortal without triggering the shield. I fear that a 4 shot Thor might drop an Immortal's shield too quick. Alternatively, what of nerfing Hardened Shield by raising the limit to 15 from 10. This changes from 10 shots to 7 shots to drop the shield so that less damage is being wasted. The Immortal should still be strong and fulfilling its role, but it should be a bit easier to counter it then.
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On January 10 2013 07:05 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 06:43 Plansix wrote:On January 10 2013 06:29 The_Darkness wrote:On January 10 2013 05:49 Cartacea wrote:
What if Medivacs could transport sieged tanks?
Maybe adding a small delay before they can fire when dropped off. It would encourage making medivacs when meching, which synergize well with hellbats. I actually really like this idea. Players with really good micro probably could exploit it in interesting ways. Perhaps in siege mode a tank should take up six supply so that only one would fit in a medivac (and perhaps there should be a really short delay before it could fire -- 1 second or so). This would allow mech to be more mobile and to be more cost efficient (since you don't have to necessarily lose your siege tanks if you lose an engagement, and as you mention promoting medivac use synergizes well with hell bats. It could also make drops a lot scarier. I think this is something that definitely should be tried in the beta, regardless of whether it makes mech viable. And as a plus, it would look awesome. If anyone has ever seen when MKP drop microed a set of 4 thors against zerglings, it was a joy to watch. I think everyone would love to see medivacs pick up siege tanks seconds before a wave of zerglings hit. For further awesome, it should be a single siege tank per medivac, just like the thor, for the visual. That with a reasonable buff to siege tanks, it would make watching mech that much more exciting. a 6supply tank would need a new name. Like, "Apocalypse Siege Tank". Sold, DB will implement this tomorrow.
Nonono HellTank.
Ontopic: Free siege mode is the solution to a problem we dont exactly have IMO.
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Bwahahahaha! We got trolled So. Freaking. Hard! It's so sad it's funny! Sorry Mario, guess you'll be playing DOTA2.
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I just played a few games. and the hellbat now feels awesome and actually pretty mechy. i didn't get a chance to play any tvp but in the other matchups it just felt very mechy. Its slow, tough and hits hard. I think they have totally made mech way more viable. In my TvTs the other player would just lose every straight up engagement that was about even in terms of positioning. However, keeping my hellions in hellbat mode does cost you mobility. The one TvT I lost today to a bio player he did a three pronged drop and i couldn't move quickly enough w/ my hellbats. Having that choice to make is really great. It really is now a choice because there is a significant advantange to having them in hellbat mode.
When I first read the patch notes I thought this was a lousy patch but I loved the hellbat changes. they feel and function great
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On January 10 2013 07:25 dicedicerevolution wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On January 10 2013 05:10 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 04:13 dicedicerevolution wrote:On January 10 2013 00:28 Rabiator wrote:On January 10 2013 00:14 Telenil wrote:On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:On January 09 2013 17:56 Telenil wrote:
Apart from "it is awesome in Brood War", why is that a terrible thing? There is no building in the game that can make you win games on its own, even barracks need medevacs. You would hate the game if mass stargates could stand against every composition, so why do you want pure factories to do that?
The core of mech is the positionnal play + harassing with faster unit. Something isn't mech just because it comes from the factory, but on the other hand, it can still be mech even if all units don't come from the same building. The "factory style" you describe has enough difficulty on its own due to the immobility, but "forcing" this style to rely upon units from other buildings too much is a terrible thing, because it makes it too complicated and in the end not worthwile. Against the Tempest you basically NEED the Viking, but WHY should it be necessary? Blizzard dont want to admit that they screwed up with the Tempest (and the Broodlord/Infestor combo) and change these units and so they are falling back to the "we dont intend to do this" option and just tell us to build other stuff too to make it work. If I remove the usual "I would design this game better than Blizzard" crap (sorry but that's what it is), the actual argument is "mech shouldn't have to rely on other buildings because, combined with its lack of mobility, it would make it too complicated". That sounds a bit... flimsy. Bio use barracks + vikings + medevacs, PvT protoss use gateway + robo, and if you want tanks involved, the compositions required to face zerglings/banelings/mutas were even more diverse. Factory + vikings is not more complicated than those strategies. In other words, why shouldn't players have to build vikings when TvZ involving marine/tank/medevacs/thors into vikings were considered fine? Mech - IMMOBILITY Bio - MOBILITY You notice the difference? Adding "mobile" units to get around the fact that mech is immobile is stupid, because it simply shows that mobility is too important in SC2 because the developers make these decisions. Its basically cheating and the merging of one upgrade for mech and air already blurs the lines between the races, because you are basically down to three upgrades to do it all ... just like Zerg and Protoss have it. Thats not good. Its all about the additional option of being able to play a "static" game of positioning and slowly creeping ahead. Sadly SC2 is all about mobility and thats a big part of the reason why mech doesnt work / works badly. The only solution to this - in Blizzards framework - is to buff the Siege Tank in such a way to make them SCARY to any kind of infantry; both other races have sufficient numbers of "tricks" to deal with static big targets that cant shoot air ... How do you explain BL/Infestor then? Mobile static defenses compensate for slow moving death ball? Sase made a case for that a while back. Both his and your arguments aren't necessarily invalid, especially pertaining to the existing framework of SC2, but the bigger issue is mining. Having more bases vs. an immobile composition is a standard RTS strategy but SC2 doesn't work that way. Mining is simply too efficient and being up 6 base to 3 is near meaningless in terms of mineral economy and the additional gas economy simply means "I'll get my shinier gas units to create my own, better, death ball than yours". Positional play and board control which everyone recognizes is important (including Blizzard, but it seems only superficially) simply isn't THAT important when the whole REASON you're jockeying for such control isn't additional income in an ECONOMY-BASED RTS (as you would hope, and expect) but THE (singular) decisive engagement. This is why Infestors are hard to balance (Zerg needs strong AoE because having more income and units isn't that effective when despite having more bases, they're not mining much more than their T and P counter-parts) and everything from the Protoss race (FF, gateway units, WG, etc.) to map size (there was a reason why early maps were so small, because mining maxed out so early, it made sense to position players in close proximity of each other to "fight for board control"). Mobile static bases do one thing: anchor the units on something and protecting the units (which cost gas) with something that doesnt and is cheap to repair. They do have a "downside" of being immobile and taking a long time to get up. The economy point you raise is sadly true ... and it is valid, because a Zerg on 6 bases basically have unlimited resources to recreate their army as much as they like and due to the larvae inject mechanic that isnt even too hard. So there still is an advantage from that and the Terrans will run out eventually ... and without scary space control units they cant even secure new bases easily after those first three. SC2 does have too many resources to produce units, but sadly Blizzard thinks that "more is better" and they are wrong. The Broodlord is a badly designed unit, because it creates its own "protective screen against ground units", because they have a range of 9.5 which then can even extend because the Broodlings have a decent lifetime and can walk a bit more. No ground unit has a range to beat that, so the only solution to kill these is air with a long range or super mobility in the form of Blink. Couple that with Fungal and you have a terrible unit design. A much better design for the BL would be to change the range to 3 and the mobility to something close to Mutalisk speed. That way you could use them as "bombers" but would have to endanger them while using them. "Invulnerable" units are bad design. Obviously there will be experts who will claim I have no clue to design a game or something like that, but at least I argue the point. Since the Thor is soooooooo sluggish and only has half a range increment over the Broodlord in its AA range it cant ever deal with that threat. You would need a *somewhat mobile* unit like the Goliath, but then you still have Fungal to sort out. The Thor really doesnt cut it and the only way to make it work would be to increase the damage of the new single target attack SIGNIFICANTLY, but then they would be a bit too good against all the smaller early air units, so that sounds like a "no go". On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
Mobile static bases do one thing: anchor the units on something and protecting the units (which cost gas) with something that doesnt and is cheap to repair. They do have a "downside" of being immobile and taking a long time to get up.
I don't understand what you mean by "mobile static bases". Maybe you mean "mobile static-defenses" like spine/spore crawlers? Looking back, I should've cleaned up my own terminology so there would be less confusion. The bit about anchoring units is incomprehensible, please clarify On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
The economy point you raise is sadly true ... and it is valid, because a Zerg on 6 bases basically have unlimited resources to recreate their army as much as they like and due to the larvae inject mechanic that isnt even too hard. So there still is an advantage from that and the Terrans will run out eventually ... and without scary space control units they cant even secure new bases easily after those first three. SC2 does have too many resources to produce units, but sadly Blizzard thinks that "more is better" and they are wrong.
No, you misunderstand me. I believe that a player (any race) being ahead on bases does not confer enough of a mineral advantage. There's the illusion of a Zerg on 6 bases having unlimited resources because the additional income is primarily gas and it's simply just massing gas heavy units (typically hive tech, and typically BL/Infestor). I'm referring to one of LaLush's posts. That brings us to the crux of the issue. All this whining about Zerg late-game being OP is generic. If Terran had the best end-game composition then you could easily replace Zerg with Terran and keep the rest of the whine the same. The core issue is the mining system where having more income than 3bases (e.g. "a 6 base Zerg") only serves to bolster a gas-heavy army (for which something like mech would benefit more from than bio and why you don't see people massing 20 OC's late-game and mule-bombing expansions). The mineral advantage should help secure more bases or to trade reasonably with the gas units that a player on lesser bases may be massing. "Reasonably" would mean not completely obliterated, and for free, like with fungal, otherwise it's annihilation and not attrition. On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
The Broodlord is a badly designed unit, because it creates its own "protective screen against ground units", because they have a range of 9.5 which then can even extend because the Broodlings have a decent lifetime and can walk a bit more. No ground unit has a range to beat that, so the only solution to kill these is air with a long range or super mobility in the form of Blink. Couple that with Fungal and you have a terrible unit design. A much better design for the BL would be to change the range to 3 and the mobility to something close to Mutalisk speed. That way you could use them as "bombers" but would have to endanger them while using them. "Invulnerable" units are bad design. Obviously there will be experts who will claim I have no clue to design a game or something like that, but at least I argue the point.
Since the Thor is soooooooo sluggish and only has half a range increment over the Broodlord in its AA range it cant ever deal with that threat. You would need a *somewhat mobile* unit like the Goliath, but then you still have Fungal to sort out. The Thor really doesnt cut it and the only way to make it work would be to increase the damage of the new single target attack SIGNIFICANTLY, but then they would be a bit too good against all the smaller early air units, so that sounds like a "no go".
That sort of argument is secondary to the real issues at hand, I'll break it down for you: 1.) There must be an increase in the skill ceiling for individual and group unit control for a game that uses mechanics as a subset for strategy 2.) Mining efficiency must be reworked to make board control actually matter for securing income and maintaining a late-game composition instead of the current, "fish for a decisive engagement" function Tweaking unit values and debating the role of a unit are secondary to those 2 issues because the former provides the framework for the latter. I know partially you mentioned a reworking of how the unit works rather than a simply tweaking of numbers, but it's still not quite right. The focus should be on making actually getting to and maintaining BLs to be difficult (because you need those bases). If a game like BW could have units that make BL/Infestor seem quaint in comparison yet still be better balanced due to how mining worked, then this should be the way to approach things (assuming the game emphasizes resource management rather than decisive engagements). Consider this, not too long ago (mid-late 2011), Zergs were struggling to fight Terran and Protoss armies and even the though of increasing the supply cap to 300 was being bandied about. Well we found the answer and it was abusing units like BL/Infestor and mobile static-defenses to make free units (basically having that additional supply). The core issue still remained, which was how mining worked and it's been glossed over by the red herring that is "Who has the ultimate late-game army and how can we nerf it so there are more viable allins to prevent them from getting there?"
I was only talking about turrets and bunkers ... real STATIC defensive structures and not about mobile stuff (although Zerg use their massive Spine Crawler walls for something similar). Bunkers can shield tanks against Zerglings and turrets should push away Overseers, Overlords and Corruptors to reduce vision and drop potential.
I am fully with you on the "units need to require more skill to use", but personally I would think that this cant be done "the Browder way" by adding activateable skills to them (like the turbo boost for Medivacs or Blink or Hellion transformation) but rather by making them harder to use (like the Carrier micro) but still useable without such micro. The Stalker is a really good example why their way is bad, because they balanced the unit stats to REQUIRE blink useage or Forcefield for the unit to be viable. Without these two gadgets Stalkers are simply killed by a-moving a bunch of cheap Zerglings and that is terrible.
The thing is that all Zerg units basically have a "microing ability" (burrow) but that practically no one uses it during a fight. This is the second example against microing abilities, but it also shows untapped potential for Zerg to use while they keep complaining about being so weak.
On January 10 2013 08:25 ch4ppi wrote:
Well that "focus on mech" didnt go as expected lol
Exactly as expected ... Browder is 100% off the target. I cant wait for HotS to be released to have a few months of "WoL Mass Reaper"-equivalent-imbalance in all the big tournaments. Should be entertaining to watch if you can keep sane. "Remove upgrades" is their standard answer to buffing everything now it seems ...
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On January 10 2013 14:53 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 07:25 dicedicerevolution wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On January 10 2013 05:10 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 04:13 dicedicerevolution wrote:On January 10 2013 00:28 Rabiator wrote:On January 10 2013 00:14 Telenil wrote:On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:On January 09 2013 17:56 Telenil wrote:
Apart from "it is awesome in Brood War", why is that a terrible thing? There is no building in the game that can make you win games on its own, even barracks need medevacs. You would hate the game if mass stargates could stand against every composition, so why do you want pure factories to do that?
The core of mech is the positionnal play + harassing with faster unit. Something isn't mech just because it comes from the factory, but on the other hand, it can still be mech even if all units don't come from the same building. The "factory style" you describe has enough difficulty on its own due to the immobility, but "forcing" this style to rely upon units from other buildings too much is a terrible thing, because it makes it too complicated and in the end not worthwile. Against the Tempest you basically NEED the Viking, but WHY should it be necessary? Blizzard dont want to admit that they screwed up with the Tempest (and the Broodlord/Infestor combo) and change these units and so they are falling back to the "we dont intend to do this" option and just tell us to build other stuff too to make it work. If I remove the usual "I would design this game better than Blizzard" crap (sorry but that's what it is), the actual argument is "mech shouldn't have to rely on other buildings because, combined with its lack of mobility, it would make it too complicated". That sounds a bit... flimsy. Bio use barracks + vikings + medevacs, PvT protoss use gateway + robo, and if you want tanks involved, the compositions required to face zerglings/banelings/mutas were even more diverse. Factory + vikings is not more complicated than those strategies. In other words, why shouldn't players have to build vikings when TvZ involving marine/tank/medevacs/thors into vikings were considered fine? Mech - IMMOBILITY Bio - MOBILITY You notice the difference? Adding "mobile" units to get around the fact that mech is immobile is stupid, because it simply shows that mobility is too important in SC2 because the developers make these decisions. Its basically cheating and the merging of one upgrade for mech and air already blurs the lines between the races, because you are basically down to three upgrades to do it all ... just like Zerg and Protoss have it. Thats not good. Its all about the additional option of being able to play a "static" game of positioning and slowly creeping ahead. Sadly SC2 is all about mobility and thats a big part of the reason why mech doesnt work / works badly. The only solution to this - in Blizzards framework - is to buff the Siege Tank in such a way to make them SCARY to any kind of infantry; both other races have sufficient numbers of "tricks" to deal with static big targets that cant shoot air ... How do you explain BL/Infestor then? Mobile static defenses compensate for slow moving death ball? Sase made a case for that a while back. Both his and your arguments aren't necessarily invalid, especially pertaining to the existing framework of SC2, but the bigger issue is mining. Having more bases vs. an immobile composition is a standard RTS strategy but SC2 doesn't work that way. Mining is simply too efficient and being up 6 base to 3 is near meaningless in terms of mineral economy and the additional gas economy simply means "I'll get my shinier gas units to create my own, better, death ball than yours". Positional play and board control which everyone recognizes is important (including Blizzard, but it seems only superficially) simply isn't THAT important when the whole REASON you're jockeying for such control isn't additional income in an ECONOMY-BASED RTS (as you would hope, and expect) but THE (singular) decisive engagement. This is why Infestors are hard to balance (Zerg needs strong AoE because having more income and units isn't that effective when despite having more bases, they're not mining much more than their T and P counter-parts) and everything from the Protoss race (FF, gateway units, WG, etc.) to map size (there was a reason why early maps were so small, because mining maxed out so early, it made sense to position players in close proximity of each other to "fight for board control"). Mobile static bases do one thing: anchor the units on something and protecting the units (which cost gas) with something that doesnt and is cheap to repair. They do have a "downside" of being immobile and taking a long time to get up. The economy point you raise is sadly true ... and it is valid, because a Zerg on 6 bases basically have unlimited resources to recreate their army as much as they like and due to the larvae inject mechanic that isnt even too hard. So there still is an advantage from that and the Terrans will run out eventually ... and without scary space control units they cant even secure new bases easily after those first three. SC2 does have too many resources to produce units, but sadly Blizzard thinks that "more is better" and they are wrong. The Broodlord is a badly designed unit, because it creates its own "protective screen against ground units", because they have a range of 9.5 which then can even extend because the Broodlings have a decent lifetime and can walk a bit more. No ground unit has a range to beat that, so the only solution to kill these is air with a long range or super mobility in the form of Blink. Couple that with Fungal and you have a terrible unit design. A much better design for the BL would be to change the range to 3 and the mobility to something close to Mutalisk speed. That way you could use them as "bombers" but would have to endanger them while using them. "Invulnerable" units are bad design. Obviously there will be experts who will claim I have no clue to design a game or something like that, but at least I argue the point. Since the Thor is soooooooo sluggish and only has half a range increment over the Broodlord in its AA range it cant ever deal with that threat. You would need a *somewhat mobile* unit like the Goliath, but then you still have Fungal to sort out. The Thor really doesnt cut it and the only way to make it work would be to increase the damage of the new single target attack SIGNIFICANTLY, but then they would be a bit too good against all the smaller early air units, so that sounds like a "no go". On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
Mobile static bases do one thing: anchor the units on something and protecting the units (which cost gas) with something that doesnt and is cheap to repair. They do have a "downside" of being immobile and taking a long time to get up.
I don't understand what you mean by "mobile static bases". Maybe you mean "mobile static-defenses" like spine/spore crawlers? Looking back, I should've cleaned up my own terminology so there would be less confusion. The bit about anchoring units is incomprehensible, please clarify On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
The economy point you raise is sadly true ... and it is valid, because a Zerg on 6 bases basically have unlimited resources to recreate their army as much as they like and due to the larvae inject mechanic that isnt even too hard. So there still is an advantage from that and the Terrans will run out eventually ... and without scary space control units they cant even secure new bases easily after those first three. SC2 does have too many resources to produce units, but sadly Blizzard thinks that "more is better" and they are wrong.
No, you misunderstand me. I believe that a player (any race) being ahead on bases does not confer enough of a mineral advantage. There's the illusion of a Zerg on 6 bases having unlimited resources because the additional income is primarily gas and it's simply just massing gas heavy units (typically hive tech, and typically BL/Infestor). I'm referring to one of LaLush's posts. That brings us to the crux of the issue. All this whining about Zerg late-game being OP is generic. If Terran had the best end-game composition then you could easily replace Zerg with Terran and keep the rest of the whine the same. The core issue is the mining system where having more income than 3bases (e.g. "a 6 base Zerg") only serves to bolster a gas-heavy army (for which something like mech would benefit more from than bio and why you don't see people massing 20 OC's late-game and mule-bombing expansions). The mineral advantage should help secure more bases or to trade reasonably with the gas units that a player on lesser bases may be massing. "Reasonably" would mean not completely obliterated, and for free, like with fungal, otherwise it's annihilation and not attrition. On January 09 2013 20:26 Rabiator wrote:
The Broodlord is a badly designed unit, because it creates its own "protective screen against ground units", because they have a range of 9.5 which then can even extend because the Broodlings have a decent lifetime and can walk a bit more. No ground unit has a range to beat that, so the only solution to kill these is air with a long range or super mobility in the form of Blink. Couple that with Fungal and you have a terrible unit design. A much better design for the BL would be to change the range to 3 and the mobility to something close to Mutalisk speed. That way you could use them as "bombers" but would have to endanger them while using them. "Invulnerable" units are bad design. Obviously there will be experts who will claim I have no clue to design a game or something like that, but at least I argue the point.
Since the Thor is soooooooo sluggish and only has half a range increment over the Broodlord in its AA range it cant ever deal with that threat. You would need a *somewhat mobile* unit like the Goliath, but then you still have Fungal to sort out. The Thor really doesnt cut it and the only way to make it work would be to increase the damage of the new single target attack SIGNIFICANTLY, but then they would be a bit too good against all the smaller early air units, so that sounds like a "no go".
That sort of argument is secondary to the real issues at hand, I'll break it down for you: 1.) There must be an increase in the skill ceiling for individual and group unit control for a game that uses mechanics as a subset for strategy 2.) Mining efficiency must be reworked to make board control actually matter for securing income and maintaining a late-game composition instead of the current, "fish for a decisive engagement" function Tweaking unit values and debating the role of a unit are secondary to those 2 issues because the former provides the framework for the latter. I know partially you mentioned a reworking of how the unit works rather than a simply tweaking of numbers, but it's still not quite right. The focus should be on making actually getting to and maintaining BLs to be difficult (because you need those bases). If a game like BW could have units that make BL/Infestor seem quaint in comparison yet still be better balanced due to how mining worked, then this should be the way to approach things (assuming the game emphasizes resource management rather than decisive engagements). Consider this, not too long ago (mid-late 2011), Zergs were struggling to fight Terran and Protoss armies and even the though of increasing the supply cap to 300 was being bandied about. Well we found the answer and it was abusing units like BL/Infestor and mobile static-defenses to make free units (basically having that additional supply). The core issue still remained, which was how mining worked and it's been glossed over by the red herring that is "Who has the ultimate late-game army and how can we nerf it so there are more viable allins to prevent them from getting there?" I was only talking about turrets and bunkers ... real STATIC defensive structures and not about mobile stuff (although Zerg use their massive Spine Crawler walls for something similar). Bunkers can shield tanks against Zerglings and turrets should push away Overseers, Overlords and Corruptors to reduce vision and drop potential. I am fully with you on the "units need to require more skill to use", but personally I would think that this cant be done "the Browder way" by adding activateable skills to them (like the turbo boost for Medivacs or Blink or Hellion transformation) but rather by making them harder to use (like the Carrier micro) but still useable without such micro. The Stalker is a really good example why their way is bad, because they balanced the unit stats to REQUIRE blink useage or Forcefield for the unit to be viable. Without these two gadgets Stalkers are simply killed by a-moving a bunch of cheap Zerglings and that is terrible. The thing is that all Zerg units basically have a "microing ability" (burrow) but that practically no one uses it during a fight. This is the second example against microing abilities, but it also shows untapped potential for Zerg to use while they keep complaining about being so weak. Show nested quote +On January 10 2013 08:25 ch4ppi wrote:
Well that "focus on mech" didnt go as expected lol Exactly as expected ... Browder is 100% off the target. I cant wait for HotS to be released to have a few months of "WoL Mass Reaper"-equivalent-imbalance in all the big tournaments. Should be entertaining to watch if you can keep sane. "Remove upgrades" is their standard answer to buffing everything now it seems ...
I now understand what you mean by static defenses (they protect your gas investments per location, aka units), but I still don't understand what the point of pointing that out is.
I don't know if it can't be done with "the Browder way". However, one thing is for sure, spellcasters need to be balanced very carefully since they affect every other unit so profoundly (e.g. sentry/gateway unit relationship). Unfortunately even then the framework of whether we're truly operating under an economy-based or decisive engagement-based RTS must be laid out first.
However, as far as burrow goes, that's pure theory-craft. People used to use burrow to circumvent FF until they realized that Protoss can just FF on top of the slow-moving roaches to effective do the same thing as FFing unburrowed roaches (FF so they can't unburrow, retreat and repeat). Moving Infestors or Roaches around the map have already been done (Leenock vs. Life on Cloud Kingdom at MLG Dallas, Life vs. Terran for Infestors). As far as actively using it to fight better and not position or retreat, it's simply no where near the level of blink since you can't attack while burrowed (which with blink you can stop taking damage and continue to deal damage).
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Well i was expecting to be underwhelmed and slightly disappointed in whatever changers Blizz put in but they have really outdone themselves this time. To be fair though the tank change will probably make meching in TvT and TvZ a smidge easier and is a nice buff to TvZ in general as you spend less setting up your Mech and your always going to have siegemode ready vs a Z who does an early Bane or Roach rush
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i dont want mech to be the only unit comp that gets played in hots...the games that we will see will be a lot more boring and stagnant, atleast with bio its a lot more micro and multitasking involved. Mech in my opinion just needs an extra factory unit that tanks and deals enough of the damage needed to make it more viable for the matchup. In my opinion the warhound needs to come back with some added nerfs. But the sound of blizzard trying to make mech more powerful worries me due to tvz and tvt being a lot more varied. Now with any buffs to siege tanks/hellbat's/thors or whatever mech unit it is going to make it harder for both zerg and terran vs terran matchups if you are in a bio vs mech situation. And so therefore making mech the primary unit composition to go for in every matchup is not going to be good for the game due to people actually wanting to watch fun matches and entertaining scenarios. Even for players this is bad unless you just completely hate going any bio units because you cant either micro or just have always preferred mech's style of play.
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EPT
