EPTBut of course, maybe they forgot how fun conquering feels. I think conquering missions will be a big thing in HotS. I just hope they use their design ingenuity to think of ways to add a different "twist" to each of them.
[D] Distribution of missions in WoL/HotS Campaign - Page 2
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nerak
Brazil256 Posts
But of course, maybe they forgot how fun conquering feels. I think conquering missions will be a big thing in HotS. I just hope they use their design ingenuity to think of ways to add a different "twist" to each of them. | ||
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schwarzer
Argentina25 Posts
On February 14 2013 01:03 Dante.StarCraft wrote: In Vanilla and Brood War, a mission usually came down to destroying the enemy, where the only real challenge was the limits of your patience. You just defended until you had a large enough army, and attacked This. Last year I had replayed WCII, WCIII and SC:BW campaigns, and I have to say: man, it was tough. Painful, at times. The only thing that kept me motivated is the great stories / storytelling. Every campaign has its moments, but the majority of the missions were A type, with some really awful designs. A Warcraft II mission briefing example: "Good job crushing every single possible combination of human nation. But while you were attacking, Cho'gall and Gul'dan betrayed you to reach the tomb of Sargeras. Your new mission: destroy every single enemy colored orc entity (and yes, including every single of their oil tankers... those bastards won't steal MY oil). Make it haste, so you can travel to Dalaran to destroy again every single human nation there." In all seriousness, A type missions, where your goal is to max out then a-move and win without any constraint o significant challenge are really boring because the IA can't compete with you in that situation. You want a good macro mission? Take mission 3 of the Night elf campaign in WCIII RoC. In that mission your objective is to kill some guardians. You can build what you want and take an expansion if you desire. But you must kill them before the undead reach you (nearly 15 minutes in hard I think). That's a very good macro mission, because you have to be very efficient with your resources, army and upgrades to deal with the annoying orc encampment between you and the objective, and with the not-so-easy to kill guardians. That's good mission design, and fortunately it seems Blizzard has aknowledged that. | ||
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paralleluniverse
4065 Posts
Type A macro missions are boring and tend to have little variety. There usually isn't too many ways to vary the objectives of these missions. Having more Type C missions allows for greater variety. The mission structure of WoL is very good. Campaign doesn't necessarily need to prepare one for ladder play, and I doubt that it could even if there were more Type A missions. | ||
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DusTerr
2520 Posts
edit: The only real criticisim/input I have is that I don't like so many early game macro missions where you don't have full tech options... | ||
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Telenil
France484 Posts
Even "conquer" missions in WoL were more like surgical strikes, you could sometimes win without overpowering the enemy. When I first beat the PvP level on Brutal, I went through a part of the enemy base and had my force survive just long enough to destroy the prisons. | ||
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Warpish
834 Posts
My main problem with the WoL missions is the fact that they are so unidimensional. Most of the times there's only one way to complete the mission; you have to use a specific tactic or unit. The problem is even worst because in the first half of the campaign you have most of your tech tree locked. Because of this, the whole gameplay feels very scripted. In my opinion this removes the excitement of trying to find the best tactic or unit composition. The tactic and unit to use is always clear is just a matter of execution. By the way, in my opinion the best mission in WoL is Shatter the Sky. What I hope to see in HotS is missions that allow for different tactics / units, but I'm not very confident about this given the mission previews. | ||
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Millet
Sweden143 Posts
Shatter the sky is a really nice mission for sure, personally my favorite is the Tosh mission. | ||
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DarthB
Germany1 Post
There might be better support of blizzard to train new players for multiplayer. They shall integrate mini games like the multi task trainer with achievements or make a build order trainer more easier to use than YABOT. | ||
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Don.681
Philippines189 Posts
I think WoL missions depended on how the story was written. I think the story was written first and then the level designers made the missions around them. | ||
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Telenil
France484 Posts
On February 16 2013 02:32 Don.681 wrote: I think WoL missions depended on how the story was written. I think the story was written first and then the level designers made the missions around them. I think it was the other way around. First the designers came with a concept ("let's make a giant laser you can use to accomplish the objective or burn the opponent"), then the writers tried to put something on it. There are plenty of missions that bring new things to gameplay but nothing to the plot. Specifically, I don't think the Tal'darim missions and their dialogs would be literally exchangeable if the story had come first. | ||
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HeeroFX
United States2704 Posts
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Lobotomist
United States1541 Posts
On February 16 2013 06:57 Telenil wrote: agreed. this approach was terrible for the story, but great for the missions themselves. I think it was the other way around. First the designers came with a concept ("let's make a giant laser you can use to accomplish the objective or burn the opponent"), then the writers tried to put something on it. There are plenty of missions that bring new things to gameplay but nothing to the plot. Specifically, I don't think the Tal'darim missions and their dialogs would be literally exchangeable if the story had come first. | ||
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JDub
United States976 Posts
On February 16 2013 07:14 Lobotomist wrote: agreed. this approach was terrible for the story, but great for the missions themselves. Without insider information, I don't see how we can determine how the campaign was put together. | ||
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Tuczniak
1561 Posts
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Goldfish
2230 Posts
On February 16 2013 01:29 Warpish wrote: My main problem with the WoL missions is the fact that they are so unidimensional. Most of the times there's only one way to complete the mission; you have to use a specific tactic or unit. The problem is even worst because in the first half of the campaign you have most of your tech tree locked. Because of this, the whole gameplay feels very scripted. In my opinion this removes the excitement of trying to find the best tactic or unit composition. The tactic and unit to use is always clear is just a matter of execution. It depends on what you mean. On Brutal and trying to get all achievements, there were specific routes I could have chose to get. For example, I could save certain missions for later until I got certain units for them. The tech tree being locked is the fun part IMO. For example, lets say you are trying to get an achievement (like the one where you have to clear out the infested terran on some planet) - You could wait until you get Battlecruisers and finish that mission if you wanted to. (Of course that's an example. I forgot other examples but I remember sort of taking advantage of that aspect of the campaign to get most brutal achievements.) (Edit - Okay now I remember. The one where you chased the trains. On Brutal, it would be difficult if you went to that mission right away [especially if you want to collect all the defiler bones and complete all the achievements, one which involves not letting any trains pass I think]. There are three alternatives to doing that and getting all the achievements - Get siege tanks, then do the mission "or" get Banshees and Vikings then do that mission "or" get solid upgrades for your all your units and structures. There's definitely many different ways to play the campaign, especially on brutal when you need to really use the best of everything to complete it, and all the achievements at the same time too.) If the tech tree was unlocked from the beginning, you'd likely build the same units over and over again. (Most mech besides the goliath and siege tank were bad. Reapers would likely never be used at all as medics can't come with them an reach them. Ghosts and Spectres would also rarely be used, unless you had the permanent ghost upgrade. Thinking about it, most units are actually bad in single player. I'd probably never bother building most units if I had access to the whole tech tree in the beginning of the game.) Also single player is and probably will never be able to teach or get casuals into playing MP correctly. The thing is, in MP you need to memorize a lot of BOs and everything is different almost every game. A lot of stuff can't really be taught in a single player environment. The difference between bronze and silver is probably mechanics (and single player, especially on brutal, does a good job at doing that). The difference between silver and masters is mostly game knowledge (knowing build orders, timings, what to do against certain situations, etc) which cannot be easily be taught in single player at all. We have to remember Destiny's "you need to appeal to casuals to keep competitive play alive" (or whatever that topic was called). The single player experience is one of the greatest single player RTS experiences ever. Making it fun (not teach) is the #1 most important thing. Though honestly, SC2 is mostly a game about winning and not actually "playing it" to have fun. You need to win or progress up the ladder to have fun (for most people anyway). (That's why it's not a "casual friendly game" because if you're not winning, you're probably not having fun.) Brood War succeeded so well (especially in South Korea) because it had almost no competition at all. Nowadays though, there are so many other games you could play besides SC2. SC2 needs to succeed in making the game more fun to attract more players (like someone said - for anyone that isn't a pro player, SC2 is just a video game and video games are mostly about having fun). If single player attracts casuals, and if they had fun with it, they're more likely to play and try multiplayer. | ||
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Thieving Magpie
United States6752 Posts
Except... WHY THE FUCK AM I DOING A TRAIN ROBBERY DURING A MISSION TO SAVE THE UNIVERSE! Why is it so fucking hard for Raynor to side with the Protoss to burn down a colony? MISSION ONE OF SC1 was RAYNOR BURNING DOWN A COLONY! Sure it made meta-sense to be doing side missions and what not, and sure those side missions were not needed; but instead of having 30+ missions worth of narrative telling me the rise and fall of Humanity in the brink of extinction--we get a handful of missions to explain Raynors story and 20+ missions of saving prisoners and killing zombies. Now, each of those missions were designed great--but really now? Would you rather have 20+ side quests and a tiny story, or a HUGE story with a few side quests? | ||
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achan1058
1091 Posts
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algorithm0r
Canada486 Posts
2) I agree the distribution was a bit off. As a macro oriented player I think more macro games make sense. Also HotS seems the perfect time to focus more on macro than army control. You are the ZERG! Good thread. | ||
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JDub
United States976 Posts
On February 21 2013 05:12 algorithm0r wrote: 1) What's with the hate on a positive thread meant to improve the game? 2) I agree the distribution was a bit off. As a macro oriented player I think more macro games make sense. Also HotS seems the perfect time to focus more on macro than army control. You are the ZERG! Good thread. What hate exactly? I feel like this thread spawned a pretty solid discussion about the campaign design. | ||
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naastyOne
491 Posts
While true that missions didn`t offer a lot of varaety in terms of completion by themselves, there was a lot of it if you factor in the unlinear nature of campain, and that you could have totally different tech options depending on when you play the mission, and what upgrades you purchase. That created more than enought varraety for me to do 3+ runs of WOL campain, which, for RTS campain, is huge replay value. And i certainly do not want to see more type A missions, they tend to not be as fun as missions C anyway. | ||
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