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Almost all of SC2s current balance problems can be pinpointed on the roach.
The problem of massed maraunders bioballs, of terran mech underuse, the vast majority of SC balance and unit diversity gripes, the perception in increased "hardcounters" and obviously, of ZvZ, all more or less stem from this completely misguided unit.
Roaches are a unit that costs 75 minerals, 25 gas, yet somehow do the most basic ranged DPS in the entirety of T1. They have 145 health, the highest per cost, and the highest period outside of toss. They also are a ranged unit, with a range of 3, though they cannot attack air. To top things off, they somehow only cost 1 supply. And if they wasn't enough, I almost forgot, they start off unupgraded with two armor. And to make things even more absurd, they have upgrades to allow them to move at fast speeds, faster then any basic unit except zerglings, and regenerate health when burrowed.
And they can move while burrowed with the upgrade.
If someone told me a unit like this would stand a good chance at making it to retail before the onset of the SC beta, I would have told them they were insane. And retarded. On paper, the unit is simply absurd.
This isn't to say, within the context of the game, that this incredibly absurd, ridiculous unit is overpowered. I am not in fact, complaining that Zerg are OP
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That fact is precisely whats wrong with the game. The roach SHOULD be overpowered.
That a unit as absurd as a roach should be overpowered within a traditional SC framework. They are not. The reason they are not OP is problematic in itself. In order to ensure that the Roach is not OP, the Protoss and Terran recieved marauders and immortals.
Without these two units, terran would literally lose every game against the zerg, and the protoss would be at a ridiculous disadvantage.
They ensure that the Roach is not overpowered by creating a equally overpowering counter. A overpowered counter. Or a hard counter. Moreover, these counters are both easily available. Especially the Terran Marauder, which is extremely accessible, located at t1.5, or literally, a tier 1.1 unit, does 13.5 dps against the roach, for a relatively costly price of 100 minerals and 25 gas, or ~20 dps with stim packs. To put this in perspective, a unstimmed marauder in SC1 would do more damage then any other unit save a siegetank (including the battlecruiser).
While most T1 units do very good damage for their cost, this is usually balanced because they are easy to kill. 10 marines, 500 minerals, will outdps 500 minerals worth of carriers by 3x, but marines die easily to splash. The Marauder does not.
Once again, in a vacuum, the marauder is overpowered, like the roach. But because of the roach. Specifically, they are overpowered against roaches, and as a result, against armor in general.
This is discussed extensively in another thread on TL:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=118413
Finally, the protoss have the immortal. The immortal singe handedly makes TvP mech unviable. Sure, they can EMP, but it is not nearly a reliable as simply going bioball, or more recently, just massing marauders. The immortal, by any measure, is an overpowered unit. it is also the single largest "counter" in SC, doing +30 damage versus its correlating type, armored, the only unit in existence to carry more then a 50% bonus. Against armored, they do 35 DPS.
That is the single highest DPS in the entire game, save battlecruisers, in SC1 or SC2.
What we have is an effective arms race, caused by the roach. While SC2 damage is generally higher, it is usually by a magnitude of 30%-40%. Not 200%. The Marauder has too much health for its DPS potential (and too much health in relation to the theme of terrans), and the Immortal does simply too much damage versus armored, among other things.
The roaches role is screwed up. It originally gained 15 health every second, unburrowed, in its reveal in 08. Now it has been nerfed to gaining 15 health, upgraded, burrowed. Its role, initially creative, has been nerfed out of existence.
Zerg were not design to host a 145 2 armor 16 damage unit for 75 minerals and 25 gas. SC is not designed around such a unit. Originally thought of as a T2 unit with a crazy unique playstyle, it has proved imbalancable to the overall framework of the game. Even it its repeatedly nerfed state
The answer to almost all of SC2s current gameplay concerns stem from the existence of the roach. Remove it, or drastically rework it into something else, one more akin to the role of the Hydra (though I understand that it should not be another Hydra), rebalance the game accordingly, and most of the current gameplay problems in SC2 will no longer exist. Mech will be viable. Bioplay will be more diversified. PvZ will be more dynamic. Templars will be able to be balanced correctly (As health among T1 units will be more normalized against terran, rather then the enormous discrepancy we have now).
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roaches dont need to be nerfed and they dont need to be buffed. i think theyre just fine now. people just dont know how to use them. ive seen many players just mass roaches thinking theyre gonna win easily, then comes in mass rauders. a lot of players fail at mixing up their armies. its really not that hard to mix in a few hydras and ligns with roaches.
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On April 05 2010 10:48 Grim(Reaper) wrote:
roaches dont need to be nerfed and they dont need to be buffed. i think theyre just fine now. people just dont know how to use them. ive seen many players just mass roaches thinking theyre gonna win easily, then comes in mass rauders. a lot of players fail at mixing up their armies. its really not that hard to mix in a few hydras and ligns with roaches.
This is not a thread about roaches being imbalanced. Please read 
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On April 05 2010 10:48 Half wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2010 10:48 Grim(Reaper) wrote:
roaches dont need to be nerfed and they dont need to be buffed. i think theyre just fine now. people just dont know how to use them. ive seen many players just mass roaches thinking theyre gonna win easily, then comes in mass rauders. a lot of players fail at mixing up their armies. its really not that hard to mix in a few hydras and ligns with roaches. This is not a thread about roaches being imbalanced. Please read
actually it is lol, what else are you trying to say? you say roach is supposed to be OP but that this isnt a thread for balance. then you say that T and P have counters to the roach so that its NOT op.
OriginalPost is scatter brained imo, a lot of ranting and you dont really have a point.
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Why are these threads always written by tier 1 icon users...
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what exactly are the "problems" that roaches cause again?
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I actually posted this exact observation in the marauder thread. I think the overpowered roach is a result of the +armoured of the other two, but in reality it doesn't matter. The +armoured is the root of all problems in the game. It needs to be toned DOWN. Big time, and then the roach needs be nerfed to fall in line with its cost to help compensate.
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On April 05 2010 10:53 wrags wrote:
what exactly are the "problems" that roaches cause again?
TLDR the fact that roaches exist mean that immortals and marauders have to exist, and THOSE units are overpowered. or something like that.
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I do agree that something has to be done about the unholy trinity of boring-units, Roach-Marauder-Immortal.
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On April 05 2010 10:51 mOnion wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2010 10:48 Half wrote:On April 05 2010 10:48 Grim(Reaper) wrote:
roaches dont need to be nerfed and they dont need to be buffed. i think theyre just fine now. people just dont know how to use them. ive seen many players just mass roaches thinking theyre gonna win easily, then comes in mass rauders. a lot of players fail at mixing up their armies. its really not that hard to mix in a few hydras and ligns with roaches. This is not a thread about roaches being imbalanced. Please read actually it is lol, what else are you trying to say? you say roach is supposed to be OP but that this isnt a thread for balance. then you say that T and P have counters to the roach so that its NOT op. OriginalPost is scatter brained imo, a lot of ranting and you dont really have a point.
Overpowered is when a unit confers an unfair advantage over other races.
So obviously, no. The zerg are not a OP race, and the roach is not overpowered.
I'm saying that the roach is broken.
On April 05 2010 10:53 onmach wrote:
I actually posted this exact observation in the marauder thread. I think the overpowered roach is a result of the +armoured of the other two, but in reality it doesn't matter. The +armoured is the root of all problems in the game. It needs to be toned DOWN. Big time, and then the roach needs be nerfed to fall in line with its cost to help compensate.
How does that work o.o. If that was true, the roach would be light. The +armored units are a result of roachs, and to a lesser extent, each other.
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On April 05 2010 10:54 mOnion wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2010 10:53 wrags wrote:
what exactly are the "problems" that roaches cause again? TLDR the fact that roaches exist mean that immortals and marauders have to exist, and THOSE units are overpowered. or something like that.
no i understood that, i just don't understand why it's a "problem"
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i think what OP is saying(or should be saying anyway) is that roach is shitty, boring, unimaginative, unmicroable unit that is simply too good not to use.
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On April 05 2010 10:54 mOnion wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2010 10:53 wrags wrote:
what exactly are the "problems" that roaches cause again? TLDR the fact that roaches exist mean that immortals and marauders have to exist, and THOSE units are overpowered. or something like that.
Come on dude stop (intentionally?) dumbing down the discourse. The OP raises an interesting and valid point. The roach is literally the least exciting unit in existence.
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On April 05 2010 10:55 Jyvblamo wrote:
I do agree that something has to be done about the unholy trinity of boring-units, Roach-Marauder-Immortal.
yeh this sums up what OP was trying to say a little more concisely.
you cant just blame the roach.
although saying immortal is boring is a bit much. you dont spam them the way mara/roach are spammed. your main army composition is much more free, whether you want more blink, more charge, or more forcefield.
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I completely agree, but I would add the Marauder as well. Both those units just turn sc2 into ball vs ball.
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On April 05 2010 10:56 Sfydjklm wrote:
i think what OP is saying(or should be saying anyway) is that roach is shitty, boring, unimaginative, unmicroable unit that is simply too good not to use.
seems more like you're describing an ultralisk to me
edit: at least the shitty part
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On April 05 2010 10:56 wrags wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2010 10:54 mOnion wrote:On April 05 2010 10:53 wrags wrote:
what exactly are the "problems" that roaches cause again? TLDR the fact that roaches exist mean that immortals and marauders have to exist, and THOSE units are overpowered. or something like that. no i understood that, i just don't understand why it's a "problem"
Because you get absurdly powerful t1.5 units. Its pretty obvious why putting the most powerful units in t1.5 is problematic. Its also why the protoss have a more diverse play then the other 2 races atm. Because the immortal, while powerful, is not at t1.5, but t2, and on the path to a equally as powerful collosus (and its ok to be that powerful when its t3).
On April 05 2010 10:57 mOnion wrote:Show nested quote +On April 05 2010 10:55 Jyvblamo wrote:
I do agree that something has to be done about the unholy trinity of boring-units, Roach-Marauder-Immortal. yeh this sums up what OP was trying to say a little more concisely. you cant just blame the roach. although saying immortal is boring is a bit much. you dont spam them the way mara/roach are spammed. your main army composition is much more free, whether you want more blink, more charge, or more forcefield.
You can blame the roach. The roach is the main reason why they exist as they do.
Terran really could stand a fighting chance against toss without a marauder, and toss could stand a fighting chance without the immortal with a tech to HT. They could not however, stand a fighting chance against the zerg without those anti armored units (which really only attack one unit in the entirety of the zerg arsenal, save the never used ultralisk)
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I was about to write something about these 3 units (roach/marauder/immortal) lol
I like this thread a lot. I feel like the roach/immortal/marauder are all extremely boring units that are all almost only there to counter each other. They ARE the hard counter system that no one likes. I think they should be reworked or removed from the game to make it better. I seriously wouldnt miss them (in their current state) at all.
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I honestly wouldn't be surprised if removing roaches, marauders and immortals from the game made it 10x more interesting and fun to play/watch.
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i think i get what OP is saying. Roaches SHOULD be OP by looking at their stats. However, they are not because Protoss and Terran have direct counters to it. But due to designing counter units around a unit that SHOULD be OP we get these other problems of those units being too effective such as Immortal not allowing terran to go mech and marauders just owning.
Very interesting read
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EPT
