I am not one of those guys going around "imbalance!" or "This is so bad!" etc.. I fucking love this game so far. Sure it has issues and those will most likely be dealt with. But one of the issues I fear will NOT get dealt with is the damage calculus for high ground.. or more specifically: The lack of.
In SCBW it was random. With direct vision or not, you shot at something that was up a ramp or over a cliff you were probably going to miss a few times. I liked this. I think it is close to "reality" in that there IS an advantage with high ground. The advantage is that sometimes, you are going to miss. I think this rewarded defensive positions but it gave MORE thought to the game.
In SC2 they removed this. Instead, if you have "direct vision" you do full damage. Blizz waves it's fingers at nay-sayers and says "THAT IS OUR RESPONSE!" But that is a load of crap. Seeing up a cliff doesn't make them the same as being on equal ground.. And NO I am not making this argument simply because it isn't "most likely to occur in real life" I am making this argument because it was a HUGE part of SCBW and it made the game great. This will HELP make SC2 a greatER game as well.
Why remove it?
1. It is more noob friendly. If unit A does X damage ALL the time it is far more simple to understand. Cliffs, close range, far.. etc.. same is good for MOST people.
2. Direct site change is "good": Rewards players who "scout" the vision.
3. Lack of foresight.
Why they need to implement it?
1. Competitors NEED things like this to make the game deeper and more strategical. If I have a smaller force but I can position them better up a ramp this changes virtually every aspect of the game. Did I cut my army to gain an economic advantage? Did I survive a conflict with an inferior force but better positioning? Did I scrap out that amazing battle because I was minding my units? These are all things that allow the COMPETITIVE gamers to divide themselves from the casual gamers.
B. It ADDS micro to the game. Ramp micro and cliff management is a huge skill barometer. Seems simple but it is there! If you remove it the game becomes THAT much simpler. And if this continues to be the trend across the board the SC2 that is simpler than what it could be will have a shallower experience that produces a shorter life span. And don't get me started on how the competitive scene is integral to a games lifespan.. without the community feeding the fire you will have a sc3, sc4 and sc5 within a few years JUST to try and recreate the event that was SC->SCBW.
2. This is a bad answer. It has no basing in reality and functions on a lower level in the game. It is also a small reward and something that is pretty intuitive beyond the ramp/cliff management which means it will happen MORE often on accident than anything with some brain power.
3. LET THIS THREAD be your foresight!
I will play this game until it dies with or without this fix. But I would be infinitely more impressed if blizzard had the balls to read a thread like this, and give me some answers. I am not the God of SC, I do not know everything that is best/good for it. But I feel really strongly about this. I would love to hear reasons why the way it was, is worse, than the way it is.
Randomness has no place in starcraft, never has and never will. This change is a big improvement over the original in my opinion, and gives you more options as a defender if you can take out the units giving your opponent vision uphill
On March 04 2010 19:55 StormsInJuly wrote: Randomness has no place in starcraft, never has and never will. This change is a big improvement over the original in my opinion, and gives you more options as a defender if you can take out the units giving your opponent vision uphill
Spoken like a guy who doesn't know sc very well.
Randomness has ALWAYS had a HUGE ROLE in sc/scbw/sc2.
Scarabs? Spawn locations? BO's? etc etc... It isn't like the randomness of shooting up a ramp or cliff makes no sense either.. it is a positional reward that completely alters the game IN A GOOD WAY. Should a guy standing up on a cliff be treated like a guy standing right in your face in a gun fight? Absolutely NOT.
On March 04 2010 19:59 {88}iNcontroL wrote: Randomness has ALWAYS had a HUGE ROLE in sc/scbw/sc2.
Scarabs? Spawn locations? BO's? etc etc... It isn't like the randomness of shooting up a ramp or cliff makes no sense either.. it is a positional reward that completely alters the game IN A GOOD WAY. Should a guy standing up on a cliff be treated like a guy standing right in your face in a gun fight? Absolutely NOT.
randomness isnt a good thing, but the old way was better than this
it should be every 4th shot misses or something that provides the same effect without having the situations arise where 20 goons are shooting uphill at a tank and take 3 volleys to kill it/2 goons are shooting uphill at a tank and dont miss once in 4 volleys.
On March 04 2010 20:10 IdrA wrote: randomness isnt a good thing, but the old way was better than this
it should be every 4th shot misses or something that provides the same effect without having the situations arise where 20 goons are shooting uphill at a tank and take 3 volleys to kill it/2 goons are shooting uphill at a tank and dont miss once in 4 volleys.
Or simply a % dmg reduction for the low ground units.
On March 04 2010 20:10 IdrA wrote: randomness isnt a good thing, but the old way was better than this
it should be every 4th shot misses or something that provides the same effect without having the situations arise where 20 goons are shooting uphill at a tank and take 3 volleys to kill it/2 goons are shooting uphill at a tank and dont miss once in 4 volleys.
You couldn't show me a situation where 20 goons shoot 3 volleys to kill 1 tank.
I get your point but the exaggeration detracts from what is being discussed here. Random is an integral part of the game.. I know for you greg this doesn't compute.
I'm sorry but "every 4th shot" is garbage. What if they shoot 3? Does the 4th shot from "anything" MISS 100% for the span of the rest of the game? Is there a clock on the miss? How do you calculate the 4th shot when everything is firing at once? Where is the reward in that anyways?
Random has to be a part of this game greg. Sorry. It has to. If it isn't you will be left with an inferior version of the game.
Imo it should not be random. It should be a set percentage of damage reduction, like most ranged units have a 30% damage decrease when firing from low to high ground, with exceptions like the colossus and siege tank and something for zerg (lurkers if they were in the game).
The same idea could possibly be applied with a smaller reduction to those line of sight "bushes" too but I think gameplay-wise they shouldn't. Firing with ranged units behind those bushes should be strategic enough by itself.
The best way to do this is have a 50 % damage reduction because if you use 30% it gets sketchy on the amount of shots required from each unit but with 50 % you know it will just take 2 times as many shots as you would before
While I know this is lame, I've always thought a good compromise would be to remove the miss chance, and just have a % damage reduction. That way there is no randomness, and gives high ground an advantage.
I don't really have a problem with a miss chance for it is fairly predictably random. In wc3 (not a wc3 hater, this is just the way it is) items are not predictably random, and do favor one side which is not a good thing.
High ground was definitely too strong in sc1. High ground does seems stronger than I thought it would be in sc2, but perhaps it should be a little better. Just basing this on streams.
I'm not sure if misses exist in StarCraft II altogether, probably not, as shots follow targets literally to the other side of the map like they do in WarCraft III with teleport, you can test this, - get a goon to shot at a zerg unit entering Nydus, come out on the other side and bam )))
What they could do, however is just decrease damage to 75% on every 2nd shot up the ground.
As for randomness there shouldn't be such thins as scarab glitch, worker glitch or anything like that. If you're working BOs to the point of a single second the success should only depend on the maths of skill vs. skill and BO vs. BO, not poor mechanics design.
EPT
