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First off, Spore Colonies are the worst defensive structure in BW and are very rarely used. This is mostly due to having the highest hp out of all defensive structures and the lowest damage, which is a counter-intuitive and ineffective design for an anti-air defensive structure.
You don't want your anti-air to tank the enemy drop, you want the dropships destroyed, before they can unload all their cargo, and the high hp/low damage combination is ill suited to deal with that. Similarly, if enemy air units are probing around, dealing as much damage as possible to them is what's important, instead of having high hp.
So I was a bit dissapointed, when I saw that Spine Crawlers have almost the same stats. Defensive structures are improved in general in their transitions from BW to SC2 and the crawler gets a 25 minerals price decrease, but it's damage/hp remains the same and it gets 1 armor increase(even more durability...). There's also the addition of Void Rays, which are quite good at taking down high hp/low damage units, because they have more time to charge their beams.
I would think that changing them to something like 250 hp and 25 damage would be a much better improvement and using spore crawlers might actually become effective.
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Have you sent this feedback to Blizzard?
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I don't have any hard evidence to back this up with, but I remember reading somewhere that because the Spore Colony shoots a bit faster than other anti-air defense structures, the overall DPS comes out pretty similar to cannons and turrets, and it's damage is only significantly inferior against high-armor units. Can anyone else confirm/deny this?
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On February 28 2010 22:22 lolaloc wrote:
Have you sent this feedback to Blizzard?
Seconded. Although they read these forums, they're much more likely to respond to something on their own forums. Make a thread, put in a link, and TL beta players who agree can support you there.
As far as my thoughts on defensive anti-air, I think this is a good suggestion. However, SC2 has shown that you can have anti-air that is too effective in the missile turret. 28 damage per volley to armoured units is ridiculous when compared to the glass nature of high-tech air units. I think the extra damage needs to be toned down a little, maybe 7+3 instead of 7+7. Air just melts if they try and engage the terran base, especially protoss air (warp ray/void ray/carrier/mother are all armoured, phoenix is AtA only).
Edit:
On February 28 2010 22:26 ComradeDover wrote:
I don't have any hard evidence to back this up with, but I remember reading somewhere that because the Spore Colony shoots a bit faster than other anti-air defense structures, the overall DPS comes out pretty similar to cannons and turrets, and it's damage is only significantly inferior against high-armor units. Can anyone else confirm/deny this?
Awesome if true - that's a good way to make counters without this "250% damage to armoured" etc. that's being thrown around.
+ Show Spoiler +I'm looking at you, immortal.
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spore colonies are actually much stronger then cannons and turrets in sc1. the fact that they can out last a cannon and turret=more dmg being dealt to the target before it dies. it also fires slightly faster then cannons and turrets.
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Spore colonies fire exactly as fast as turrets in SC1, but turrets have have less than half the cost, so they are vastly more efficient, deal higher dps and have higher total hp.
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I'll agree that they aren't the most effective unit, but does zerg really need this? Their units are mobile enough to defend multiple fronts at once, I think the spore colony does it's job pretty well (in bw at least being a zerg player myself).
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i feel that the spore colonies are good as itself already, unless you want to be a turtle zerg player and tech all the way to ultra or smth -.-
i forgot to add that a zerg player should not be using spore colonies to defend his base. he should be using scourge and nearby zergling/lurkers to do so
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On February 28 2010 22:35 Ballistixz wrote:
spore colonies are actually much stronger then cannons and turrets in sc1. the fact that they can out last a cannon and turret=more dmg being dealt to the target before it dies. it also fires slightly faster then cannons and turrets.
unless they run past it :0
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On February 28 2010 22:56 Zapdos_Smithh wrote:
I'll agree that they aren't the most effective unit, but does zerg really need this? Their units are mobile enough to defend multiple fronts at once, I think the spore colony does it's job pretty well (in bw at least being a zerg player myself).
thats actually true. there not needed. none of the static defense units are needed actually. in bw the only reason u put sunks up is because u dont have enought units to properly defend a expo or something and zerg units were less mobile then in sc2. not to mention u can make sunken walls in sc1. in sc2 its impossible to make any kind of wall with spine crawlers unless u want to be a dumass and waste minerals. and with the queen u should have more then enought lings to defend against any kind of rush.
this goes for protoss to. cannons are not nearly as good as in sc1. so puting even one up is a waste of minerals unless ur desprate. and trying to do a fast expand in sc2 as toss and expecting cannons to save ur ass like they did in sc1 when u fast expanded is suicide. especially if ur going up against a zerg. bunkers and turrets are actually still pretty good tho. terrans still have there trade mark of being the best defensive race in game.
so all in all cannons+spine crawlers=useless. spore crawlers+turrets+bunks= OK
u kinda need spore crawlers anyway for detection since overlords no longer detect anything (need a overseer now) it helps so no random ghost gets into ur base and nukes shit or random dts having a frenzy on ur dones.
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Turrets in SC2 are just RAPING armored targets!!!
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On February 28 2010 23:42 Ballistixz wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On February 28 2010 22:56 Zapdos_Smithh wrote:
I'll agree that they aren't the most effective unit, but does zerg really need this? Their units are mobile enough to defend multiple fronts at once, I think the spore colony does it's job pretty well (in bw at least being a zerg player myself). thats actually true. there not needed. none of the static defense units are needed actually. in bw the only reason u put sunks up is because u dont have enought units to properly defend a expo or something and zerg units were less mobile then in sc2. not to mention u can make sunken walls in sc1. in sc2 its impossible to make any kind of wall with spine crawlers unless u want to be a dumass and waste minerals. and with the queen u should have more then enought lings to defend against any kind of rush. this goes for protoss to. cannons are not nearly as good as in sc1. so puting even one up is a waste of minerals unless ur desprate. and trying to do a fast expand in sc2 as toss and expecting cannons to save ur ass like they did in sc1 when u fast expanded is suicide. especially if ur going up against a zerg. bunkers and turrets are actually still pretty good tho. terrans still have there trade mark of being the best defensive race in game. so all in all cannons+spine crawlers=useless. spore crawlers+turrets+bunks= OK u kinda need spore crawlers anyway for detection since overlords no longer detect anything (need a overseer now) it helps so no random ghost gets into ur base and nukes shit or random dts having a frenzy on ur dones.
The biggest reason you build the towers is because they cost no gas,take no supply and are still ranged. You don't have much option when it comes to gas free units and just having a ton of zerglings is worse than having a ton of zerglings with a one or two sunkens behind.
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United States7166 Posts
i'm more concerned about the Spine Crawlers (anti-ground)
in my experience they're far too weak and underused right now, and I feel like Blizzard may be overly concerned with its ability to move and so they kept it weaker. I like the move ability but as of right now the damage output is too low.
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Spine crawlers completely wreck roaches, and obviously other t1-t1.5 units.
But I do admit, spore crawlers do kinda suck. You have to have 5 all within the same location for them to be effective. And it seems, with a bit of micro and understanding of their range, to me at least, that people will just kill them off 1 by 1 very quickly. I use them as a last resort distraction for my Corruptors, Mutas or Hydras to either counter, or come back and defend really, and that's about all they're good for. Terran drops no way spores can counter them, and Protoss players don't seem to drop for some reason, and for detectors, I'd rather just pay 100 gas for a moving one for each base.
EDIT: And as a Zerg player, a good 600+ minerals invested well placed cannons will halt any Muta harass, meaning more gas for Sentry's = gg even faster.
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I'd like to see spine crawlers get their damage upped a little bit more. I have not seen many use spore crawlers so I cannot comment.
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Blizz can't make them too strong because it would be an open invitation to cheese, with overlords being able to dump creep anywhere and spine crawlers able to root up and walk to your enemy's base.
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I've already seen nydus worm -->roaches and attack units to get opponent preoccupied ---> drones into nydus --->spine crawlers in enemy base :D :D
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I don't think that spore colonies in BW were bad at all. I agree that they have a very narrow purpose, but they are not meant to be a staple unit, rather a specialist unit. Spore colonies are a very effective counter vs corsair/DT. They are also very effective in ZvZ. Their antiair isn't nearly as effective as scourges, but since they attack ground to air, can detect, and cannot get sniped, they have a viable purpose.
As for spine crawlers, I think it is a very powerful as it is. The reason why defensive structures must have high HP is because their purpose is to stall the enemy until your troops get there, and 300 hp + 2 armor does a decent job of that. They do 20 damage + 10 versus armored. That's extremely good. It's 100 minerals + a drone which is pretty cheap considering their stats. They are a very effective counter vs low tier units. Combined with overlords or creep tumors, you can do a spine crawler push or something. Overall, spine crawlers are definitely a good structure.
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All races don't have to be the same. If zerg players want GtA defense as strong as terran turrets, I as a terran player demand transport so efective as nydus worm!
Also they are mobile, nobody noticed this?? They can quite quickly move to the spot where they are needed. Terran and protoss players can have shitloads of turret/cannons and they are wortless if the enemy choose to attack a one weak spot.
So yes, I believe spore crawlers should have lesser DPS than turrets/cannons.
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I've had spore crawlers and spine crawlers save my butt on multiple occasions. They are not good against drop ships, they can just drop out of range and you are screwed. But against most tier 2 things air units like void rays and banshees, spore crawlers are very good in my mind.
They can move, for one. So you can defend what you need to.
They can be healed by your queen for 125 damage, which I constantly do and it works great when you are trying to buy time for units to hatch.
Their only real problem in my mind is that their range is just barely enough to take out those aforementioned air units. I've had some banshees dancing around my main at some points and you can end up losing stuff, but you can't uproot them all at the same time because then they can be picked off. Usually by the time it gets critical I can get out some hydras or mutas.
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EPT
