EPTHow the heck can this guy be at the helm is beyond me.
Dustin Browder Interview - April 12 - Page 7
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bEsT[Alive]
606 Posts
How the heck can this guy be at the helm is beyond me. | ||
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Wintermute
United States427 Posts
On April 12 2010 14:55 Badred wrote: I wonder if that interview was done before or after the change in research time for warp gates, as some of the strategies he's describing do seem to be a few patches old. Well since he says "we're going to make some changes" I assume it had to be before. This interview seems to be actually quite old, done around the start or middle of march. Interesting though that even then they had some concept of the fact that they wanted to nerf roaches/hydras. That also sort of explains the baneling buff that no one really asked for, as a way to make those more of a "core" unit. Kind of hilarious to see him say that zerg had too many units at points in development, because right now they feel like they are short about 2 units. | ||
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Wintermute
United States427 Posts
On April 12 2010 17:45 Caphe wrote: A long interview but with very little information. I feel like I was reading a advertising article. Really, Mr. Browder you should read TL. In a long run SC2 is all about competitive online play, so we really do not care much about how you teach people into this game, If someone want to get good at the game, they will find a way to learn it. It's a good thing for Blizzard that they don't take this short sighted view. | ||
Falling
Canada11607 Posts
On April 13 2010 08:50 r-eye wrote: I think some of them are to much "original" and "creative" while all we want is the ultimate balanced RTS...again. Well, yes balanced in the end- that's what the beta has been about (and the alpha for that matter.) But if your starting point is 'balance' there is no room for creative units- something that everyone was complaining about with the triad of marauder, roach, immortal. They were too strong (balance) but they were also a bland unit on their own (creativity). Balancing is easy- just have your corresponding/ mirrored units on either side- like pretty much any other RTS- Warcraft II- Elven Rangers vs Troll Beserkers- one has a slight range advantage in range, the other in damage and healing. But basically the same unit with different art. Age of Empires, you have exact same units on either side, but some tech paths are denied. What's hard is balancing un-mirrored units. So the starting point has to be creativity, not balance. Their method of going in all directions, having 18 units for the zerg and then trimming it down is simply how the creative process works. The sky is the limit for new ideas, churn them out and see how they works. Once you have the ideas, you can start trimming out the bad ideas/ unworkable ideas. It's the same for pretty much any creative process from writing to art. Ideas first, then revision and editing. I really don't have a problem with Browder's comments at all. On April 13 2010 09:33 Wintermute wrote: It's a good thing for Blizzard that they don't take this short sighted view. Have agree with Wintermute, the entry point into the game should never be the chokepoint- only mastery. Why you would want to make learning the game a difficult endeavor is beyond me. | ||
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aTnClouD
Italy2428 Posts
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Lysis
United States147 Posts
Probably the one thing that should be happening is people should cease complaining and start thinking about how to play the game optimally. | ||
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OreoBoi
Canada1639 Posts
On April 13 2010 09:52 Lysis wrote: I personally am indifferent to the SC2 design team's methods of, well, design. They do what they do and we test it so they can tweak it. Also each race still has their "roles" from SC1. Zerg is the attack-move with a giant mass race (Reason: A lot of SC1 was heavily influenced by Warhammer 40k and vice versa. Take the Zergling for example. It is exactly like the Tyranid player's Hormagaunt: soak damage via mass so the Carnifex (Ultralisk) can get in and really mess up the other guy) Terran can go either mobile or slow push (Like the Space Marines) and the Protoss have a few but powerful units that cost a lot (no exact correlation in 40k but it lies somewhere split between the Eldar and the Tau). I feel that the design team has gotten these roles pretty much down (I still have a problem with the Roach but that's due to gameplay and not from a design standpoint) and that now is the fine-tuning stage of the beta. Probably the one thing that should be happening is people should cease complaining and start thinking about how to play the game optimally. I see what you're saying, and I mostly agree with you except for one thing: Your zerg view is completely wrong. Zerg in SC1 was never the attack-move race. There wasn't a real attack-move race in SC1. Some people will say it was protoss, but being good at protoss involved much more than 1a2a3a. Also, your zergling and ultralisk example is completely wrong. The ultras tank damage for the cracklings, not the other way around. Cracklings do more damage than ultras since they can surround a lot better, but since they are weak, the ultras need to soak up damage. | ||
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WaveMotion
United States147 Posts
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Lysis
United States147 Posts
On April 13 2010 10:03 OreoBoi wrote: I see what you're saying, and I mostly agree with you except for one thing: Your zerg view is completely wrong. Zerg in SC1 was never the attack-move race. There wasn't a real attack-move race in SC1. Some people will say it was protoss, but being good at protoss involved much more than 1a2a3a. Also, your zergling and ultralisk example is completely wrong. The ultras tank damage for the cracklings, not the other way around. Cracklings do more damage than ultras since they can surround a lot better, but since they are weak, the ultras need to soak up damage. I see your point on the Zergling/Ultralisk example, but the reason it's like that is because the metagame evolved in such a way that the ideal roles for the units was reversed. A bit of personal opinion but a race that's called the Zerg Swarm should be really good at just swarming the opponent with masses of units and not have to deal with intense micromanagement such as Mutalisk stacking or the hold-position Lurker trick. | ||
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phexac
United States186 Posts
On April 13 2010 09:52 Lysis wrote: I personally am indifferent to the SC2 design team's methods of, well, design. They do what they do and we test it so they can tweak it. Also each race still has their "roles" from SC1. Zerg is the attack-move with a giant mass race (Reason: A lot of SC1 was heavily influenced by Warhammer 40k and vice versa. Take the Zergling for example. It is exactly like the Tyranid player's Hormagaunt: soak damage via mass so the Carnifex (Ultralisk) can get in and really mess up the other guy) Terran can go either mobile or slow push (Like the Space Marines) and the Protoss have a few but powerful units that cost a lot (no exact correlation in 40k but it lies somewhere split between the Eldar and the Tau). I feel that the design team has gotten these roles pretty much down (I still have a problem with the Roach but that's due to gameplay and not from a design standpoint) and that now is the fine-tuning stage of the beta. Probably the one thing that should be happening is people should cease complaining and start thinking about how to play the game optimally. Just a correction - in BW it's the ultras that soak up the damage so that zerglings can get in and "really mess up the other guy." | ||
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LunarC
United States1186 Posts
On April 13 2010 10:19 Lysis wrote: I see your point on the Zergling/Ultralisk example, but the reason it's like that is because the metagame evolved in such a way that the ideal roles for the units was reversed. A bit of personal opinion but a race that's called the Zerg Swarm should be really good at just swarming the opponent with masses of units and not have to deal with intense micromanagement such as Mutalisk stacking or the hold-position Lurker trick. So Zerg should be easier to play than the other races? Unit and army control should be an integral part to any race in Starcraft. It should be the same for Starcraft 2. That means good synergy between units should be established. | ||
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Half
United States2554 Posts
On April 13 2010 09:36 Falling wrote: I really don't have a problem with Browder's comments at all. I would agree with you for the most part except his total nonsensical incoherent dialogue about protoss proxy gateways. I'm hoping he was just really nervous, Interviews can be pretty stressful. Otherwise... ~_~ I think the issue is that blizzard made units that were originally cool, and then they were unworkable, and instead of scrapping them, they tried to balance them, gradually making them lose more and more of their identity. See: thors, roaches, Mothership. These have been problematic because their role has been heavily changed while the developers still attempt to cling to their no longer valid flavor. While the units the that have been imo, relatively balanced and well liked have maintained a consistent role throughout the game. IE: Stalkers, Vikings, Banshees, Ravens, Ghosts, all of these units have been able to maintain their role. | ||
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Crisium
United States1618 Posts
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Liquid`Jinro
Sweden33723 Posts
On April 13 2010 09:37 iG.ClouD wrote: This interview makes me think even more sc2 devs aren't just competent enough to balance this game. The latest patches were pretty self explainatory about that though. Last interview on that german site was even funnier, basically Dustin said he counters Marauders with Thors. Such a beautiful cluelessness Really? That sounds almost crazy enough to be an error in translation O_O Marauders are so tiltingly good vs Thors t.t | ||
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Half
United States2554 Posts
On April 13 2010 10:56 Crisium wrote: Depressing interview. This is what they get for getting Dustin Browder. The only logical conclusion to hiring him would be Command and Craft 2. Why couldn't Blizzard see this? Then why is this design philosophy the easily observable antithesis to the unit structure of LoTR Battle for middle earth? (Which he played a heavy role in designing, much moreso then he did in CC in which he played a less major role) | ||
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aTnClouD
Italy2428 Posts
On April 13 2010 10:59 FrozenArbiter wrote: Really? That sounds almost crazy enough to be an error in translation O_O Marauders are so tiltingly good vs Thors t.t He said he builds Thors to counter marauder/banshee combo. Cool stuff :p | ||
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LunarC
United States1186 Posts
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aTnClouD
Italy2428 Posts
On April 13 2010 11:02 LunarC wrote: Now don't rip on Dustin Browder. He's done a good job, considering that there was generally a lack of understanding in how Starcraft 1 was played at high levels. However, throughout the development period they should have had all of the design staff take a look at what made Starcraft 1 tick so that they could incorporate the basic designs and gameplay structure into Starcraft 2. And I'm talking about very general trends, not specifics. If the specifics aligned with the trends, then you could have a different game that functioned similarly to the original. They just needed to hire great, smart players to balance the game. It just seems they don't understand much of what they are doing. The part where the pylon is the weak point of a proxy gate rush made me rofl so bad. Any above average player would target the gateways unless the probe is dead, which is very unlikely in the vast majority of these games. | ||
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Liquid`Jinro
Sweden33723 Posts
On April 13 2010 11:02 iG.ClouD wrote: He said he builds Thors to counter marauder/banshee combo. Cool stuff :p Well, to be fair, if he builds tanks with the thors it's not terrible  I mean, it's the only alternative to building vikings >_<It's annoyingly immobile, but if you manage to scrounge up the gas for some point defense drones it's pretty strong vs that combo~~ | ||
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Half
United States2554 Posts
On April 13 2010 10:59 FrozenArbiter wrote: Really? That sounds almost crazy enough to be an error in translation O_O Marauders are so tiltingly good vs Thors t.t lol, its kinda disturbing, he said something along those lines, but not quite. He basically says he likes to use Thors in TvT to help kill banshees, vikings, and marauder, not that the thor counters banshees, vikings, and maruader. http://www.gamestar.de/interviews/2313674/starcraft_2_p5.html Yes. Or if you were mean you could call it the »super goliath«, because it's a very powerful anti-air weapon. I build it for a couple of reasons. I'm using it largely against other Terran players where its all-round nature helps me against marauders and banshees which are a pretty significant threat in Terran versus Terran games. I have also gotten some use out of the Thor against Zerg opponents who go for Roaches and Mutalisks. Because the Thor's powerful cannons can break a roach line and its anti-air-missiles can thrash a Mutalisk threat. But when I'm facing a lot of Zerglings or a lot of marines or a large force of zealots and immortals, I'm not feeling a lot of love for the Thor. Still, it's got a lot of uses. So if you have a lot of factory units and a lot of money, it's never a bad idea to build some Thors. He isn't suggesting you use it as a counter. I mean, it isn't super eloquently worded, but It isn't zomg wtf is he talking about if you view it in correct context. He isn't even saying build thors if they get marauder and banshees, he saying Thors are pretty decent if they have marauders and banshees if you have "A lot of factory units and a lot of money" I'd say thats fair. | ||
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