|
On February 17 2013 11:58 Rabiator wrote:
You REALLY dont get it, eh? This thread is about DESIGN and NOT BALANCE. Playing the game has zero impact for this and is totally unnecessary. Elegant game design is different from what Blizzard does (just read Grumbels definition and you might get it).
Really, it's about design and not balance? I guess that's why the word "balance" is in the title of the topic, and first sentence of the OP is discussing balance vs design decisions. Apparently you are either trolling, or lack the reading comprehension to understand that. It's about both.
This is besides the fact that the OP mentions many balance problems, and what he would have done to fix them. That is a discussion about balance, not design.
You seem to be tossing the word "design" around a lot anyway, and you are completely mis-using it. The design is the underlying theories behind the mechanics of the game. Everything that you have been naming that you think is a "design" decision is a balance decision. Same with the majority of the OP being balance decisions and not design decisions.
You also dont get the difference between morphing (an evolutionary one-way-process) and transforming (a reversible mechanical process).
As I said in my last post, call it whatever the hell you want. It doesn't change the fact that the Hellion and Hellbat are two different units. If you actually had the beta you would know this by clicking a Factory and seeing the little icon for Hellbats on your command card.
You have multitudes of information showing you the Hellion and Hellbat are two different units. Different names, different stats, different movement speeds, different cargo, different command cards, different pages on help, different strategy pages on the website, different training slots on a factory. Different unit.
Just to make it absolutely clear ... THIS ISNT ABOUT BALANCE!
Actually its about design and balance, even the OP said so.
Even from a design perspective, all the design decisions make sense if you consider them different units. As I said before, Blizzard considers them different units, so why don't you? They have gave you many indications of this. Stop ignoring it.
Show nested quote +On February 17 2013 11:02 CoR wrote:why it is illogical only 2 battle helions can take place of 4 helions ? when i lay my shirts i get alot in a bag but if i just stomp them into it its like only 2/3 of them ^_^ when they are transformed they are just not that nice to park anymore (each 2 over each other) and they have to remove the 2nd floor and because they not like line but more like circle units, they also cant put them next to each other ^^ its totaly logical they can only fit 2 in them transformed  ps: sry for english its 3am i miss 3/4 of the words i need ^^ Battle Hellions are "tougher" and thus should MORE COMPACT than Hellions. So in your comparison the Battle Hellions are the neatly folded shirts.
That doesn't even make sense. Marauders are bigger than Marines. Ultras are bigger than Lings. In general the weaker units are smaller, tougher units are bigger. If Hellbats are tougher, why the hell would they be more compact?
I know you havent seen the animation in game, but when you change in to a Hellbat, you grow in height AND width. This is not more compact. Even though this whole "logical" argument is pointless anyway, because this is a multiplayer mode which has suspense of disbelief for obvious reasons.
You really are just trying to waste everyones time, arent you? If you think the design of the game is so bad it would do everyone here a favor if you left, because your posts aren't constructive, you trash talk strategies that you haven't even played, you go to every single topic about balance and trash talk the balance (of the game you never played) then claim your talking about design (even in topics about nothing but balance), it boggles the mind why you have been allowed to crap on so many topics. Instead of constructive topics on the HotS forum we have a bunch of people who aren't in the beta crapping up the forum and pushing down the topics that are actually informative...
|
On February 14 2013 22:33 MoonCricket wrote:Show nested quote +On February 14 2013 22:07 Tuczniak wrote:
Although I agree with most of things you wrote, having overseer at hacthery would mean too easy scouting. I don't think it would be good. I agree with your criticism in sentiment, because I don't want to eliminate the playskill of knowing when to send in Overlords for scouting information either. However, the problem is that Zerg is the only race without access to mobile detection in the early game in order to off set the Widow Mine - Terrans can Scan and Protoss can build either Observers or Oracles much earlier than Zerg can research Lair and Morph Overseers.
I wholly disagree with this in both sentiment and logic. You can get Lair right after pool and gas if you so choose. Protoss has to invest 300 gas plus core, stargate build time for an oracle and 175 gas and core/robo build time for an observer. Terran Scan is kind of silly but it isn't going anywhere unfortunately.
So many Zergs I see now (and I say this as a former Random player who had to learn to deal with it) make the choice to go for a really quick third hatchery. If you do that, you need to be comfortable with the fact that your detection will be behind or that you'll have to make a couple preemptive spores (which I also think is a problem really, being able to make them without evo chamber). It's a tradeoff to a choice you make in game. I don't see the problem with it.
|
On February 17 2013 16:47 Spyridon wrote:Show nested quote +On February 17 2013 11:58 Rabiator wrote:
You REALLY dont get it, eh? This thread is about DESIGN and NOT BALANCE. Playing the game has zero impact for this and is totally unnecessary. Elegant game design is different from what Blizzard does (just read Grumbels definition and you might get it). Really, it's about design and not balance? I guess that's why the word "balance" is in the title of the topic, and first sentence of the OP is discussing balance vs design decisions. Apparently you are either trolling, or lack the reading comprehension to understand that. It's about both. This is besides the fact that the OP mentions many balance problems, and what he would have done to fix them. That is a discussion about balance, not design. You seem to be tossing the word "design" around a lot anyway, and you are completely mis-using it. The design is the underlying theories behind the mechanics of the game. Everything that you have been naming that you think is a "design" decision is a balance decision. Same with the majority of the OP being balance decisions and not design decisions. Show nested quote +You also dont get the difference between morphing (an evolutionary one-way-process) and transforming (a reversible mechanical process). As I said in my last post, call it whatever the hell you want. It doesn't change the fact that the Hellion and Hellbat are two different units. If you actually had the beta you would know this by clicking a Factory and seeing the little icon for Hellbats on your command card. You have multitudes of information showing you the Hellion and Hellbat are two different units. Different names, different stats, different movement speeds, different cargo, different command cards, different pages on help, different strategy pages on the website, different training slots on a factory. Different unit. Actually its about design and balance, even the OP said so. Even from a design perspective, all the design decisions make sense if you consider them different units. As I said before, Blizzard considers them different units, so why don't you? They have gave you many indications of this. Stop ignoring it. Show nested quote +On February 17 2013 11:02 CoR wrote:why it is illogical only 2 battle helions can take place of 4 helions ? when i lay my shirts i get alot in a bag but if i just stomp them into it its like only 2/3 of them ^_^ when they are transformed they are just not that nice to park anymore (each 2 over each other) and they have to remove the 2nd floor and because they not like line but more like circle units, they also cant put them next to each other ^^ its totaly logical they can only fit 2 in them transformed ps: sry for english its 3am i miss 3/4 of the words i need ^^ Battle Hellions are "tougher" and thus should MORE COMPACT than Hellions. So in your comparison the Battle Hellions are the neatly folded shirts. That doesn't even make sense. Marauders are bigger than Marines. Ultras are bigger than Lings. In general the weaker units are smaller, tougher units are bigger. If Hellbats are tougher, why the hell would they be more compact? I know you havent seen the animation in game, but when you change in to a Hellbat, you grow in height AND width. This is not more compact. Even though this whole "logical" argument is pointless anyway, because this is a multiplayer mode which has suspense of disbelief for obvious reasons. You really are just trying to waste everyones time, arent you? If you think the design of the game is so bad it would do everyone here a favor if you left, because your posts aren't constructive, you trash talk strategies that you haven't even played, you go to every single topic about balance and trash talk the balance (of the game you never played) then claim your talking about design (even in topics about nothing but balance), it boggles the mind why you have been allowed to crap on so many topics. Instead of constructive topics on the HotS forum we have a bunch of people who aren't in the beta crapping up the forum and pushing down the topics that are actually informative...
1. Did you even TRY to THINK what I meant with "this is about design and not balance"? I dont think so, so let me explain ...
As you figured out yourself balance and design are connected ... or are they? Balance doesnt really have a connection to the "design style", but balancing - the verb - does. If you design a game with very complicated mechanics you will make balancing the game difficult, because you have too many variables to fiddle with. If you keep your design simple and elegant you will not have as many problems with balancing ... because there are fewer variables to fiddle with.
An easy example: The bonus damage / damage reduction systems of SC2 and BW. In BW you had fixed percentages for damage reduction of certain attacks, but in SC2 every bonus damage is specially defined. Sure you might think that you have more freedom, but that isnt really the case, because you have to think about too many variables when adjusting the damage ("How much do we increase the bonus damage and how much the base damage?") So BW damage reduction was more elegant and simpler than the one from SC2 and yet it didnt make the gameplay boring. Simple and elegant does NOT equal boring or dumbed down!
There are more examples of where Blizzard made SC2 needlessly inelegant by adding mechanics which make balancing rather hard.
2. Lets find a real life equivalent of the Hellion. I would say a "Dune Buggy with a flame thrower" sounds about right. I would say that buggy is smaller than any tank and is made up of a few bars strapped together in a rather open construction. What would be the consequence of folding that construction up into a tight walker type? Would it increase in size? If yes then where does that extra material come from and why is it tougher than the already loose dune buggy vehicle? If no, why should it require more transport space in a medivac?
|
Hardcounter is a bad design for sc2 in my opinion, it kinda deny the possibilities to micro. For example, there is no way zealot /ling can be micro to be more effective against hellbat. The term "micro" in Blizzard's dictionary is pull back all your units until the VR timer reach zero. Is cool but is not good.
Then the other problem is they made the game too simple in certain way, like showing health bar, timer and selecting all units with 1 hotkey. The gap between amateur and pro become so small. I do understand this is for drawing more causal players to sc2 but this kinda suck.
|
On February 14 2013 23:54 vthree wrote:Show nested quote +On February 14 2013 23:43 MoonCricket wrote:On February 14 2013 22:54 moskonia wrote:
When I first read the title I thought this will be a discussion on the way to balance a game, not balance suggestions and a whine fest. You do mention some of the design, but you're clearly not focusing on that. I suggest you try to focus on either making a suggestion or on the design of the game, cause making both makes your post pretty silly. The idea of the thread was that Blizzard's current design solutions for the Hellbat are "ugly and illogical" and that they don't address the issues of Hellbats still being an under costed, over powered unit for the minimal tech investment of an Armory and that the Factory Tech Lab upgrades no longer have any signifigance on Terran build orders. Infernal Pre-Igniters do not affect Hellbats, and building the Armory is a more cost effective investment than building a Tech Lab and researching Infernal Pre-Igniters anyway. Siege Tech is still free, despite not accomplishing its stated goal of making Mech viable in TvP, and it has had a significant impact on early Zerg aggression in TvZ, As long as Siege Tech is not an upgrade and Infernal Pre-Igniters are an ineffectual upgrade for Hellions compared to the Armory, the Factory Tech Lab upgrades will have no sigificant role in Terran build orders compared to the Barracks Tech Lab upgrades and Starport Tech Lab upgrades. I'm not whining, I'm a random player, this is a discussion based on how Blizzard is choosing to buff and nerf Terran and its indirect effects on the Terran tech tree and ZvT. Their decisions aren't addressing the imbalance in TvZ, from free Siege Tech affecting Zerg timing attacks to free Spore Crawlers not affecting Widow Mine's ability to stop counter attacks and that if Blizzards looks at alternatives to solving its problems, from returning Siege Tech to the Tech Lab, replacing Infernal Pre-Igniters with Transformation Servos, returning the Spore Crawler to the Evolution Chamber, moving Overseer tech to Hatchery + requires Evolution Chamber then Blizzard can institute similar changes in terms of what they want to accomplish with out arbitrary, illogical changes like 1) Hellbats, which have quivalent size and mass to a Hellion, taking up twice as much space in a Medivac 2) Infernal Pre-Igniter being an upgrade that only affects the flamethrower of one unit when it is transformed into car mode but mysteriously doesn't affect the same unit when transformed into battle armor mode 3) Zerg getting essentially free tech for anti-air and immobile detection compared to the other races having to tech to anti-air and immobile detection etc. that just make you scratch your head and say WTF. I think you can look at the design philosphy of what they are doing as a whole, like giving Spore Crawler and Widow Mines bonus Biological and Shield damage, but size, armor and category type damage bonuses are a far cry from being clearly bad design decisions compared to a transforming Hellion that increases in size and mass, Infernal Pre-Igniters that stop working in armor mode and re-writing almost canon design decisions like researching Siege Tech or a building being required for a races anti-air, immobile detection structure. I think the balance decision are ugly, and I gave examples of how design decisions regarding the Armory, Tech Lab, upgrades and moving minor tech downwards in the Zerg tech structure will accomplish what they want better without being nearly as hideous to look at. I'm sorry I can't address the problems in TvP in the same thread from an overall perspective of inelegant balance vs elegant design, but there's only so much one thread can address. If you think that's silly, then you're entitled to your own opinion and welcome to write something better. Well, if you really want to get into inelegant balance vs elegant design. You have to start with AoEs and why some have friendly fire and some don't. How do zealots avoid splash from their own colossi? How to Zerg units avoid fungals from their own infestors?
Zealots dodge splash from colossi because those colossi are so advanced in technology they can make the beam go exactly around the zealot without touching it. For the sake of our poor computer handling that ingame, it is not shown as it really works, but it is shown in a more simplistic way.
Zergs avoid being damaged by their own fungal because the kind of agressive bio-organism contained in the fungal is guided by the overmind to not harm his own kind (but harm other species dissident zerg factions :D)
On the other hand, you could try as hard as you would want, you could not explain why helions becomes biological when transforming into a robot. You could say the driver of the helion remains in the combat suit of the hellbat to control it, but then once again why would medivac heal the combat suit (mechanical stuff) and not the car itself when it's transformed in a helion?
|
For that matter, why do queens, drones and hydralisks have odd movement speed bonuses on creep? why can't reapers use stimpacks? why don't spine crawlers lose health when off-creep if uprooted? why do tempests and battlecruisers have a different attack vs air and vs ground? why do marauders have more range than a marine, yet can't shoot air? why doesn't a hellion that shoots flame not require gas? why can you mind control purely mechanical units like probes? why does a raven have an infinite supply of turrets and drones? why don't infestors, banelings, hellions, colossi do friendly fire? why do banelings take up more space than zerglings in an overlord? how can a medivac ever carry a siege tank or a thor?
Lots of silly questions one can ask. I think some of them require nothing more than suspension of disbelief and are simply nitpicking, but others are valid; it's a judgement call I suppose.
|
On the other hand, you could try as hard as you would want, you could not explain why helions becomes biological when transforming into a robot. You could say the driver of the helion remains in the combat suit of the hellbat to control it, but then once again why would medivac heal the combat suit (mechanical stuff) and not the car itself when it's transformed in a helion?
In the WoL campaign, you obtain Zerg bio samples and use them to research valuable upgrades for your army. Fortified bunkers, cellular reactors, regenerative bio steel are all upgrades that affect nonbiological units/buildings but were developed with biological materials. It's not unreasonable that the Raiders, or the Dominion with its superior resources, could develop a special bio armor that can be repaired using the same nanites used to heal infantry. The armor is tucked under the Hellion's regular plating; when the Hellion converts, the plates flip around with the bio armor, which uses atmospheric gases to expand and congeal. Why doesn't the Hellion use the bio armor all the time? Why doesn't the Batmobile from the Burton movies use the 'shields' all the time? It's heavy and would take up too much space, perhaps.
I mean, how exactly does the Medivac's healing beam work anyway? Those nanites have to be pretty damn effective to restore a Marine crippled to the edge of death, to full health, within a matter of seconds, or even minutes.
|
On February 19 2013 01:19 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On February 17 2013 16:47 Spyridon wrote:On February 17 2013 11:58 Rabiator wrote:
You REALLY dont get it, eh? This thread is about DESIGN and NOT BALANCE. Playing the game has zero impact for this and is totally unnecessary. Elegant game design is different from what Blizzard does (just read Grumbels definition and you might get it). Really, it's about design and not balance? I guess that's why the word "balance" is in the title of the topic, and first sentence of the OP is discussing balance vs design decisions. Apparently you are either trolling, or lack the reading comprehension to understand that. It's about both. This is besides the fact that the OP mentions many balance problems, and what he would have done to fix them. That is a discussion about balance, not design. You seem to be tossing the word "design" around a lot anyway, and you are completely mis-using it. The design is the underlying theories behind the mechanics of the game. Everything that you have been naming that you think is a "design" decision is a balance decision. Same with the majority of the OP being balance decisions and not design decisions. You also dont get the difference between morphing (an evolutionary one-way-process) and transforming (a reversible mechanical process). As I said in my last post, call it whatever the hell you want. It doesn't change the fact that the Hellion and Hellbat are two different units. If you actually had the beta you would know this by clicking a Factory and seeing the little icon for Hellbats on your command card. You have multitudes of information showing you the Hellion and Hellbat are two different units. Different names, different stats, different movement speeds, different cargo, different command cards, different pages on help, different strategy pages on the website, different training slots on a factory. Different unit. Just to make it absolutely clear ... THIS ISNT ABOUT BALANCE! Actually its about design and balance, even the OP said so. Even from a design perspective, all the design decisions make sense if you consider them different units. As I said before, Blizzard considers them different units, so why don't you? They have gave you many indications of this. Stop ignoring it. On February 17 2013 11:02 CoR wrote:why it is illogical only 2 battle helions can take place of 4 helions ? when i lay my shirts i get alot in a bag but if i just stomp them into it its like only 2/3 of them ^_^ when they are transformed they are just not that nice to park anymore (each 2 over each other) and they have to remove the 2nd floor and because they not like line but more like circle units, they also cant put them next to each other ^^ its totaly logical they can only fit 2 in them transformed ps: sry for english its 3am i miss 3/4 of the words i need ^^ Battle Hellions are "tougher" and thus should MORE COMPACT than Hellions. So in your comparison the Battle Hellions are the neatly folded shirts. That doesn't even make sense. Marauders are bigger than Marines. Ultras are bigger than Lings. In general the weaker units are smaller, tougher units are bigger. If Hellbats are tougher, why the hell would they be more compact? I know you havent seen the animation in game, but when you change in to a Hellbat, you grow in height AND width. This is not more compact. Even though this whole "logical" argument is pointless anyway, because this is a multiplayer mode which has suspense of disbelief for obvious reasons. You really are just trying to waste everyones time, arent you? If you think the design of the game is so bad it would do everyone here a favor if you left, because your posts aren't constructive, you trash talk strategies that you haven't even played, you go to every single topic about balance and trash talk the balance (of the game you never played) then claim your talking about design (even in topics about nothing but balance), it boggles the mind why you have been allowed to crap on so many topics. Instead of constructive topics on the HotS forum we have a bunch of people who aren't in the beta crapping up the forum and pushing down the topics that are actually informative... 1. Did you even TRY to THINK what I meant with "this is about design and not balance"? I dont think so, so let me explain ... As you figured out yourself balance and design are connected ... or are they? Balance doesnt really have a connection to the "design style", but balancing - the verb - does. If you design a game with very complicated mechanics you will make balancing the game difficult, because you have too many variables to fiddle with. If you keep your design simple and elegant you will not have as many problems with balancing ... because there are fewer variables to fiddle with. An easy example: The bonus damage / damage reduction systems of SC2 and BW. In BW you had fixed percentages for damage reduction of certain attacks, but in SC2 every bonus damage is specially defined. Sure you might think that you have more freedom, but that isnt really the case, because you have to think about too many variables when adjusting the damage ("How much do we increase the bonus damage and how much the base damage?") So BW damage reduction was more elegant and simpler than the one from SC2 and yet it didnt make the gameplay boring. Simple and elegant does NOT equal boring or dumbed down! There are more examples of where Blizzard made SC2 needlessly inelegant by adding mechanics which make balancing rather hard. 2. Lets find a real life equivalent of the Hellion. I would say a "Dune Buggy with a flame thrower" sounds about right. I would say that buggy is smaller than any tank and is made up of a few bars strapped together in a rather open construction. What would be the consequence of folding that construction up into a tight walker type? Would it increase in size? If yes then where does that extra material come from and why is it tougher than the already loose dune buggy vehicle? If no, why should it require more transport space in a medivac?
1) Design and balance are different things, as I've stated before, but the majority if your complaints are balance complaints and not design complaints.
Your talking like BW's system was "simpler and more elegant", but that couldn't be farther from the truth. Just because all units shared the damage types doesn't mean it was simpler, nor was it easier to understand. Every single one of the damage types had MULTIPLE ratios you had to memorize, plus special affects such as always doing full damage to shields.
Once again, elegance has a different definition depending who you are talking to. You just stated your description of elegant, which you have before, but many others (here and in the old topic you brought the same argument in to) disagree with that sentiment being elegant, and hell they even disagreed with it being simpler.
Do you really think it's easier to remember "a Ghost does X damage to small units, X damage to medium units, X damage to large units, X damage to small units with shields, X damage to medium units with shields, X damage to large units with shields"? For every single unit in the game? Compared to SC2's version of "a Ghost does 10 damage, +10 to light units".
Your ignoring the fact that SC2's version was designed with the specific intent to make it easier for players to understand because the majority of SC1 players didn't fully understand how the damage compared to other units. This, by your own definition of elegant, would be more elegant than the BW system.
2) We're not in a "real life future sci-fi" setting. We don't have mechs walking around our planet, nor do we have soldiers walking around in metal exo-skeleton suits with hydraulics. We don't know the details for how it switches from a "dune buggy" to the mech.
The only little bit of information we have is A) The animation itself makes the unit grow in size in both height and width, B) it has more HP and slower runspeed indicating more mass. So what's the logical conclusion of all this? It could by all means take more cargo space.
Who knows where the extra materials come from? They are in space in a sci-fi setting with loads of alien technology. They could have this happen in so many different ways, but it's all irrelevant unless your a lore buff. Like I said in an earlier post, you could easily explain it as researchers implemented Zerg technology in to the Hellion and allowed it to morph in to the new Hellbat units, as a Bio/Mechanical hybrid. Therefore it can be healed and grow in size. That is completely justifiable in a Sci-fi setting and fits in the current SC2 lore, but apparently that's not good enough for you...
If your going to get caught up on that, why not get caught up on hundreds of marines all somehow living in one tiny barracks, scv's being healed or repaired, bc's not doing damage when they get shot down, or the any other multitudes of unexplained things?
This is all 100% besides the point anyway, because the point is Hellions and Hellbats are 2 different units. That's the important thing no matter if you are talking about design OR balance. And from a design and balance perspective, if they are 2 different units, differences between the 2 units make sense. No matter what the lore uses as a sci-fi justification to make it work.
|
On February 19 2013 03:52 starimk wrote:Show nested quote +On the other hand, you could try as hard as you would want, you could not explain why helions becomes biological when transforming into a robot. You could say the driver of the helion remains in the combat suit of the hellbat to control it, but then once again why would medivac heal the combat suit (mechanical stuff) and not the car itself when it's transformed in a helion? In the WoL campaign, you obtain Zerg bio samples and use them to research valuable upgrades for your army. Fortified bunkers, cellular reactors, regenerative bio steel are all upgrades that affect nonbiological units/buildings but were developed with biological materials. It's not unreasonable that the Raiders, or the Dominion with its superior resources, could develop a special bio armor that can be repaired using the same nanites used to heal infantry. The armor is tucked under the Hellion's regular plating; when the Hellion converts, the plates flip around with the bio armor, which uses atmospheric gases to expand and congeal. Why doesn't the Hellion use the bio armor all the time? Why doesn't the Batmobile from the Burton movies use the 'shields' all the time? It's heavy and would take up too much space, perhaps. I mean, how exactly does the Medivac's healing beam work anyway? Those nanites have to be pretty damn effective to restore a Marine crippled to the edge of death, to full health, within a matter of seconds, or even minutes.
I think it is pretty clear that medivacs are powered by wizards and wizards can do whatever they want. Pick up thors, check. Heal robot men with drills on their hands and flamethrowers on their heads, check. Fly faster than the speed of sound, check.
Wizards.
|
On February 19 2013 01:19 Rabiator wrote:
1. Did you even TRY to THINK what I meant with "this is about design and not balance"? I dont think so, so let me explain ...
As you figured out yourself balance and design are connected ... or are they? Balance doesnt really have a connection to the "design style", but balancing - the verb - does. If you design a game with very complicated mechanics you will make balancing the game difficult, because you have too many variables to fiddle with. If you keep your design simple and elegant you will not have as many problems with balancing ... because there are fewer variables to fiddle with.
An easy example: The bonus damage / damage reduction systems of SC2 and BW. In BW you had fixed percentages for damage reduction of certain attacks, but in SC2 every bonus damage is specially defined. Sure you might think that you have more freedom, but that isnt really the case, because you have to think about too many variables when adjusting the damage ("How much do we increase the bonus damage and how much the base damage?") So BW damage reduction was more elegant and simpler than the one from SC2 and yet it didnt make the gameplay boring. Simple and elegant does NOT equal boring or dumbed down!
Lol... You don't have to fiddle with more variables. It's much easier to balance if you can adjust more variables, but you absolutly don't have to.
An easy (BW-) example: If you would want to tune down the damage of Tanks vs Marines specifically to make bioplay in TvT possible and make the game better, you have to accept that the tank will also do less damage vs every other unit, or you would have to make an extra category of damage (like it was done for the Devourer), or you would have to switch the Tanks damage to normal while changing the stats.
Not to mention that Broodwar had a fuckton of damage modifications as well:
-) the 4 reduction calibrations: concussive vs large, concussive vs medium, explosive vs medium, explosive vs small
-) normal damage, concussive vs small and explosive vs large
-) ability damage
-) special damage
-) full damage to shields
-) multiple attacks
-) highground and doodad 53.125% miss modification for ranged units (but not for melee units)
-) dark swarm modification (only to ranged, non-splash, non-ability; but not protecting buildings)
-) firebats multiple hit attack which would trigger 3times instead of 2times against certain medium/large units (at least that's what liquipedia says)
-) EMP only working vs Shields
-) Maelstrom only working vs bio
-) Irradiate only working vs bio
-) Don't ask me how Defense Matrix influencese damage exactly. I have no clue and can't find out from Liquipedia alone. It's a very special case.
...
However, the exact damage system hardly matters in BW. The game was balanced because of the movement and selection making actual unit relationship balance irrelevant. Line movement makes it irrelevant whether Unit X beats Unit Y in certain bigger amounts for many units. It really doesn't matter that Zerglings are incredibly broken in terms of costefficientness. The 12dragoons are still better than the 12Zerglings. Even more with line movement and bad targeting/friendly blocking incredibly "nerfing" melee units.
|
On February 19 2013 06:36 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On February 19 2013 01:19 Rabiator wrote:
1. Did you even TRY to THINK what I meant with "this is about design and not balance"? I dont think so, so let me explain ...
As you figured out yourself balance and design are connected ... or are they? Balance doesnt really have a connection to the "design style", but balancing - the verb - does. If you design a game with very complicated mechanics you will make balancing the game difficult, because you have too many variables to fiddle with. If you keep your design simple and elegant you will not have as many problems with balancing ... because there are fewer variables to fiddle with.
An easy example: The bonus damage / damage reduction systems of SC2 and BW. In BW you had fixed percentages for damage reduction of certain attacks, but in SC2 every bonus damage is specially defined. Sure you might think that you have more freedom, but that isnt really the case, because you have to think about too many variables when adjusting the damage ("How much do we increase the bonus damage and how much the base damage?") So BW damage reduction was more elegant and simpler than the one from SC2 and yet it didnt make the gameplay boring. Simple and elegant does NOT equal boring or dumbed down! Lol... You don't have to fiddle with more variables. It's much easier to balance if you can adjust more variables, but you absolutly don't have to. An easy (BW-) example: If you would want to tune down the damage of Tanks vs Marines specifically to make bioplay in TvT possible and make the game better, you have to accept that the tank will also do less damage vs every other unit, or you would have to make an extra category of damage (like it was done for the Devourer), or you would have to switch the Tanks damage to normal while changing the stats. Not to mention that Broodwar had a fuckton of damage modifications as well: -) the 4 reduction calibrations: concussive vs large, concussive vs medium, explosive vs medium, explosive vs small -) normal damage, concussive vs small and explosive vs large -) ability damage -) special damage -) full damage to shields -) multiple attacks -) highground and doodad 53.125% miss modification for ranged units (but not for melee units) -) dark swarm modification (only to ranged, non-splash, non-ability; but not protecting buildings) -) firebats multiple hit attack which would trigger 3times instead of 2times against certain medium/large units (at least that's what liquipedia says) -) EMP only working vs Shields -) Maelstrom only working vs bio -) Irradiate only working vs bio -) Don't ask me how Defense Matrix influencese damage exactly. I have no clue and can't find out from Liquipedia alone. It's a very special case. ... However, the exact damage system hardly matters in BW. The game was balanced because of the movement and selection making actual unit relationship balance irrelevant. Line movement makes it irrelevant whether Unit X beats Unit Y in certain bigger amounts for many units. It really doesn't matter that Zerglings are incredibly broken in terms of costefficientness. The 12dragoons are still better than the 12Zerglings. Even more with line movement and bad targeting/friendly blocking incredibly "nerfing" melee units.
Yup. That's only a fraction of the special situations in the game as well. For example special cases like Devourer spores not working on Carriers, etc.
SC2 system was intentionally made simplier and easier to understand. I could understand if he wasn't aware of all this, but he has argued this point in multiple different topics, so he's more than aware of how it works by now.
I have a feeling we are all getting trolled. As I said earlier in the topic it's obvious this guy has ulterior motives. He has no reason to be in every single topic discussing balance on the HotS forum when he's not even in the beta, arguing about every balance and "design decision" in the game. Has to be either trolling or a superiority complex where he thinks his opinion (based on limited information) is fact.
|
oh look, big j and spyridon tag teaming in missing the point again. Just because you want to shill for a game doesn't mean you can ignore when a game has flaws, which SC 2 has many, that are at the core of its soul and will never go away without introspection on blizzard's part.
|
On February 19 2013 10:56 Serpico wrote:
oh look, big j and spyridon tag teaming in missing the point again. Just because you want to shill for a game doesn't mean you can ignore when a game has flaws, which SC 2 has many, that are at the core of its soul and will never go away without introspection on blizzard's part.
I agree SC2 has flaws. But if you want to argue or have a debate about what they are, how about providing some evidence that is actually substantial?
Rab's argument about damage types is very debatable to say the least, all but the very most hardcore BW players knew exactly what units were better against others, even players for years didn't understand the complexities of the system.
This is besides the fact that the SC2 system does exactly what Rab said would be "simpler and more elegant".
And arguments about the lore of the unit are completely pointless when it comes to design or balance.
I have no problem giving credit to a well thought out argument about the flaws, but there is a very distinct line between pointing out a flaw, and pointless hating on every single balance, design, and lore decision in the game. Which is what he has done. Aside from his one argument about the SC2 economy (which does have some merit, although his presentation is extremely opinionated) he hasn't contributed anything constructive, and even his economy argument isn't even really very constructive since all it consists of is complaining.
How can you defend someone who doesn't play beta and has involved himself in every balance discussion with non-constructive negativity? That's spreading false negative information to say the least, and every time I see it, it makes me question why it's even allowed here, since it degrades the quality of good constructive information you can receive from this forum.
|
On February 19 2013 02:19 Natalya wrote:Show nested quote +On February 14 2013 23:54 vthree wrote:On February 14 2013 23:43 MoonCricket wrote:On February 14 2013 22:54 moskonia wrote:
When I first read the title I thought this will be a discussion on the way to balance a game, not balance suggestions and a whine fest. You do mention some of the design, but you're clearly not focusing on that. I suggest you try to focus on either making a suggestion or on the design of the game, cause making both makes your post pretty silly. The idea of the thread was that Blizzard's current design solutions for the Hellbat are "ugly and illogical" and that they don't address the issues of Hellbats still being an under costed, over powered unit for the minimal tech investment of an Armory and that the Factory Tech Lab upgrades no longer have any signifigance on Terran build orders. Infernal Pre-Igniters do not affect Hellbats, and building the Armory is a more cost effective investment than building a Tech Lab and researching Infernal Pre-Igniters anyway. Siege Tech is still free, despite not accomplishing its stated goal of making Mech viable in TvP, and it has had a significant impact on early Zerg aggression in TvZ, As long as Siege Tech is not an upgrade and Infernal Pre-Igniters are an ineffectual upgrade for Hellions compared to the Armory, the Factory Tech Lab upgrades will have no sigificant role in Terran build orders compared to the Barracks Tech Lab upgrades and Starport Tech Lab upgrades. I'm not whining, I'm a random player, this is a discussion based on how Blizzard is choosing to buff and nerf Terran and its indirect effects on the Terran tech tree and ZvT. Their decisions aren't addressing the imbalance in TvZ, from free Siege Tech affecting Zerg timing attacks to free Spore Crawlers not affecting Widow Mine's ability to stop counter attacks and that if Blizzards looks at alternatives to solving its problems, from returning Siege Tech to the Tech Lab, replacing Infernal Pre-Igniters with Transformation Servos, returning the Spore Crawler to the Evolution Chamber, moving Overseer tech to Hatchery + requires Evolution Chamber then Blizzard can institute similar changes in terms of what they want to accomplish with out arbitrary, illogical changes like 1) Hellbats, which have quivalent size and mass to a Hellion, taking up twice as much space in a Medivac 2) Infernal Pre-Igniter being an upgrade that only affects the flamethrower of one unit when it is transformed into car mode but mysteriously doesn't affect the same unit when transformed into battle armor mode 3) Zerg getting essentially free tech for anti-air and immobile detection compared to the other races having to tech to anti-air and immobile detection etc. that just make you scratch your head and say WTF. I think you can look at the design philosphy of what they are doing as a whole, like giving Spore Crawler and Widow Mines bonus Biological and Shield damage, but size, armor and category type damage bonuses are a far cry from being clearly bad design decisions compared to a transforming Hellion that increases in size and mass, Infernal Pre-Igniters that stop working in armor mode and re-writing almost canon design decisions like researching Siege Tech or a building being required for a races anti-air, immobile detection structure. I think the balance decision are ugly, and I gave examples of how design decisions regarding the Armory, Tech Lab, upgrades and moving minor tech downwards in the Zerg tech structure will accomplish what they want better without being nearly as hideous to look at. I'm sorry I can't address the problems in TvP in the same thread from an overall perspective of inelegant balance vs elegant design, but there's only so much one thread can address. If you think that's silly, then you're entitled to your own opinion and welcome to write something better. Well, if you really want to get into inelegant balance vs elegant design. You have to start with AoEs and why some have friendly fire and some don't. How do zealots avoid splash from their own colossi? How to Zerg units avoid fungals from their own infestors? Zealots dodge splash from colossi because those colossi are so advanced in technology they can make the beam go exactly around the zealot without touching it. For the sake of our poor computer handling that ingame, it is not shown as it really works, but it is shown in a more simplistic way. Zergs avoid being damaged by their own fungal because the kind of agressive bio-organism contained in the fungal is guided by the overmind to not harm his own kind (but harm other species dissident zerg factions :D) On the other hand, you could try as hard as you would want, you could not explain why helions becomes biological when transforming into a robot. You could say the driver of the helion remains in the combat suit of the hellbat to control it, but then once again why would medivac heal the combat suit (mechanical stuff) and not the car itself when it's transformed in a helion?
Um...
Medivac laser can't reach driver in Hellion. When Hellbat mode activates enough of the Driver is exposed that the nanowhatevers can get inside.
Boom.
Colossi not hurting your own units when you splash--absolutely stupid. But so would banelings/lurkers hitting your own units when you splash.
The real reason? Tank splashing allies makes for cool dynamics. Firebats not setting marines and medics on fire makes for silly dynamics.
|
On February 19 2013 13:50 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On February 19 2013 02:19 Natalya wrote:On February 14 2013 23:54 vthree wrote:On February 14 2013 23:43 MoonCricket wrote:On February 14 2013 22:54 moskonia wrote:
When I first read the title I thought this will be a discussion on the way to balance a game, not balance suggestions and a whine fest. You do mention some of the design, but you're clearly not focusing on that. I suggest you try to focus on either making a suggestion or on the design of the game, cause making both makes your post pretty silly. The idea of the thread was that Blizzard's current design solutions for the Hellbat are "ugly and illogical" and that they don't address the issues of Hellbats still being an under costed, over powered unit for the minimal tech investment of an Armory and that the Factory Tech Lab upgrades no longer have any signifigance on Terran build orders. Infernal Pre-Igniters do not affect Hellbats, and building the Armory is a more cost effective investment than building a Tech Lab and researching Infernal Pre-Igniters anyway. Siege Tech is still free, despite not accomplishing its stated goal of making Mech viable in TvP, and it has had a significant impact on early Zerg aggression in TvZ, As long as Siege Tech is not an upgrade and Infernal Pre-Igniters are an ineffectual upgrade for Hellions compared to the Armory, the Factory Tech Lab upgrades will have no sigificant role in Terran build orders compared to the Barracks Tech Lab upgrades and Starport Tech Lab upgrades. I'm not whining, I'm a random player, this is a discussion based on how Blizzard is choosing to buff and nerf Terran and its indirect effects on the Terran tech tree and ZvT. Their decisions aren't addressing the imbalance in TvZ, from free Siege Tech affecting Zerg timing attacks to free Spore Crawlers not affecting Widow Mine's ability to stop counter attacks and that if Blizzards looks at alternatives to solving its problems, from returning Siege Tech to the Tech Lab, replacing Infernal Pre-Igniters with Transformation Servos, returning the Spore Crawler to the Evolution Chamber, moving Overseer tech to Hatchery + requires Evolution Chamber then Blizzard can institute similar changes in terms of what they want to accomplish with out arbitrary, illogical changes like 1) Hellbats, which have quivalent size and mass to a Hellion, taking up twice as much space in a Medivac 2) Infernal Pre-Igniter being an upgrade that only affects the flamethrower of one unit when it is transformed into car mode but mysteriously doesn't affect the same unit when transformed into battle armor mode 3) Zerg getting essentially free tech for anti-air and immobile detection compared to the other races having to tech to anti-air and immobile detection etc. that just make you scratch your head and say WTF. I think you can look at the design philosphy of what they are doing as a whole, like giving Spore Crawler and Widow Mines bonus Biological and Shield damage, but size, armor and category type damage bonuses are a far cry from being clearly bad design decisions compared to a transforming Hellion that increases in size and mass, Infernal Pre-Igniters that stop working in armor mode and re-writing almost canon design decisions like researching Siege Tech or a building being required for a races anti-air, immobile detection structure. I think the balance decision are ugly, and I gave examples of how design decisions regarding the Armory, Tech Lab, upgrades and moving minor tech downwards in the Zerg tech structure will accomplish what they want better without being nearly as hideous to look at. I'm sorry I can't address the problems in TvP in the same thread from an overall perspective of inelegant balance vs elegant design, but there's only so much one thread can address. If you think that's silly, then you're entitled to your own opinion and welcome to write something better. Well, if you really want to get into inelegant balance vs elegant design. You have to start with AoEs and why some have friendly fire and some don't. How do zealots avoid splash from their own colossi? How to Zerg units avoid fungals from their own infestors? Zealots dodge splash from colossi because those colossi are so advanced in technology they can make the beam go exactly around the zealot without touching it. For the sake of our poor computer handling that ingame, it is not shown as it really works, but it is shown in a more simplistic way. Zergs avoid being damaged by their own fungal because the kind of agressive bio-organism contained in the fungal is guided by the overmind to not harm his own kind (but harm other species dissident zerg factions :D) On the other hand, you could try as hard as you would want, you could not explain why helions becomes biological when transforming into a robot. You could say the driver of the helion remains in the combat suit of the hellbat to control it, but then once again why would medivac heal the combat suit (mechanical stuff) and not the car itself when it's transformed in a helion? Um... Medivac laser can't reach driver in Hellion. When Hellbat mode activates enough of the Driver is exposed that the nanowhatevers can get inside. Boom. Colossi not hurting your own units when you splash--absolutely stupid. But so would banelings/lurkers hitting your own units when you splash. The real reason? Tank splashing allies makes for cool dynamics. Firebats not setting marines and medics on fire makes for silly dynamics.
I already told you guys. The Hellbat was a Hellion merged with Zerg bio-technology! It's not the driver that's getting healed, it's the bio-suit itself! :p (Gameplay + balance is typically top priority when designing the game, and then lore is developed to explain it, this explanation is just an example of that. That's why it's pretty irrelevant - especially for the multiplayer portion of the game which is even more about gameplay > logic)
But seriously... The real reason is that Tanks and Widows seem to be intended as units focused on positional advantage. Splash damage causes punishment for improper positioning.
|
On February 19 2013 10:56 Serpico wrote:
oh look, big j and spyridon tag teaming in missing the point again. Just because you want to shill for a game doesn't mean you can ignore when a game has flaws, which SC 2 has many, that are at the core of its soul and will never go away without introspection on blizzard's part.
So where am I missing the point? Rabiator said that BWs system was simple. That was his point. Unless my english is hindering me, Im arguing that it wasnt. So right against his point.
Do I say that sc2 has no flaws? Hell no. That game is flawed as shit. God, basically any game with much stupider units could play out better if it simply gets the action/production ratio right. But that doesnt mean that I will agree with rabiators "less variables make an equation easier to solve"-bullshit while the whole scientific world solves their equations by introduction of more variables.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
