EPTThe current form of obelisk comes with 2 spells, one is the dull proton charge where u just press a button and instantly inject ur nearby probes with bear semen to make them work harder for a set duration of time, and other other spell is the argus link, which is basically again a bear semen energy drinks for ur protoss spellcasters... needless to say both expends the obelisk's energy reserves.
Now, the dilemma is how the hell would argus link fit in a macro-centered sturcture? what blizz was trying to do was to introduce depth into the obelisk mechanics by implementing the need for judgement or decision between boosting ur economy or do something else useful, a perfect example would be the orbital command spells, do u use the energy to scan to gain intel, which is a major tactical advantage, or do u use the energy for beefing up ur econ? considering both the mules and proton charge does essentially the same thing, a comparison between argus link and scan easily reveals the contrast of design of the 2 mechanics, argus link is gimmicky at best considering the limitation that u need to have some casters closeby for it to be of any use, and lets not forget that u can easily hoard tonnes of obelisk to power ur templar army if neccesary at the mid to late game which of course creates a case of imba for the protoss army without striping away their proton charge econ advantage... imagine templars warped in with full energy, again u don neccesarily needs to be close to ur nexus or base since u can easily build an obelisk next to a pylon anywhere on the map where u need for them to warp in from. This doesn't happen with the Zerg or Terran macro mechanics of the queen or orbital command spells since its 1 per hatceries or per command centres. the obelisk proton charge then ends up as a no-brainer spam case 100% of the time without much of decision making involved.
Clearly its bad mechanics design, and here is my suggestions, let obelisk starts off with 150/200 energy, change the obelisk's energy consumption mechanic to the likes of the cloaking spell in good ole Broodwar wraith or ghost, proton charge cost for lets say 50 energy to activate and consumes 1 energy per second till the energy depletes or till u cancel the effects. for the other spells we could expand the usefulness of the obelisk shield battery spell. something like a area defensive shield spell lets just call it shield link, in any case which the situation calls for it u activate shield link which just like proton charge instantly consumes like 50 energy and 1 energy per second till u cancel the spell, when shield link in activated, lets say 75% of the damage on any structure or units within the obelisk pylon power range is redirected to the obelisk's shield. this link last till obelisk energy or shield depletes. and both proton charge and shield link cannot both be activated at the same time. what this does is gives protoss extra defensive power at the early stage of the game or defense against base siege or worker harass with the choice of econ powering. all the energy costs or how much shield or how much damage should the shield link absorb is of course subject to balance.
The main idea is that ideally to maximise the econ powering of proton charge u wanna minimize the re-activation count of proton charge channeling after it hits zero, ie the less u spend energy on the initial activation cost, but then ur now given a choice of whether u wanna power ur econ till ur energy hits zero or u wanna save some energy for defensive measures at the cost of lets say 10-20% lower up time on proton charge. so for a perfectionist pro players maybe they'll stop the proton charge at a specific energy count to maximise proton charge econ gain while maintaining the minimum amount of energy for defensive measures. Given the increased mobility of all races and harassment potential of all races and probes being the weakest bitch in game, this gives extra maybe 5-6 second survival time for expansion or probes before rallying up a defense or thwart a harass, this of course adds in a new element of econ and defensive gameplay for protoss, where their opponents could punish them for being greedy on using all their energy on proton charge by harassing them and forcing them to spend energy on shield link. Then we have the problems of multiple obelisk stacking on top of each other, imo blizz should just either limit to 1 per nexus or just roll the obelisk mechanics straight into the nexus by upgrades of some sort...
Not the best idea, but imo its the mechanics design that counts, balancing is developers work not ours...
