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On April 13 2010 11:10 FrozenArbiter wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2010 11:02 iG.ClouD wrote:On April 13 2010 10:59 FrozenArbiter wrote: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 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~~
Seems quite farfetched yet it's such a late game and complex option I don't really think it was what he was talking about. Anyway of course I hope I'm wrong, but these new patches are just not what we would expect from Blizzard.
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On April 13 2010 11:17 iG.ClouD wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2010 11:10 FrozenArbiter wrote:On April 13 2010 11:02 iG.ClouD wrote:On April 13 2010 10:59 FrozenArbiter wrote: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 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~~ Seems quite farfetched yet it's such a late game and complex option I don't really think it was what he was talking about. Anyway of course I hope I'm wrong, but these new patches are just not what we would expect from Blizzard.
I don't know what we'd expect from blizzard. From the WC3 beta, they were literally just DOING THINGS just to do things with no rationale and analysis behind them.
I mean, we got a steam engine where you could put riflemen in. wtf.
SC1 was created based on completely batshit racial balancing that would have been derided by the competitive community for being counter competitive.
Stuff just works out.
I'm not saying you should stop criticizing design, but the actual method of desighn is fine imo. Making games to be balanced is stupid. Making games to be awesome then balancing is correct regardless of whether your making a competitive game or a casual game.
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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?
*whine whine bitch whine no constructive criticism*
Great post right there.
On April 13 2010 11:08 iG.ClouD wrote:Show nested quote +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.
Balancing the game is easy when you have as much info as Blizzard does, as far as damage and health numbers are concerned. Is X race winning too often in matchup Y by massing Z unit? Nerf unit Z, you're done. It doesn't take a rocket scientist or a progamer to figure that out- however, you need actual game designers to figure out stuff like, which units to include in the game? Which abilities to give them? What build time should they have?
As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
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This makes me appreciate the design of SC more. Not so much SC II.
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They should have focused on making the dynamics between each matchup as interesting and varied as possible and then designed units around that paradigm. Instead, they designed interesting and varied units that eventually lost sight of their original design and had to be nerfed or buffed into a different role for the sake of balance.
This detrimental and often homogenizing effect occurs often when there is no overall design goal to work with.
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I'm pretty sure this interview was done before the patch that changed warp gate research times. The changes just fit too well with exactly what he was talking about to be coincidence.
And as other people have said, sites will sometimes sit on content for a good while as buffer for the news doldrums.
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This detrimental and often homogenizing effect occurs often when there is no overall design goal to work with.
Yeah, this is it. Its frustrating the way he said it, as there probably was more thought and planning in the process.
Its fine that most people talk about balancing, but that is not what is necessary. If you make all races play the same way, then you will achieve balance. Very critical that you don't get to this. With a good design, you don't have to worry about such things.
I also don't think it is critical for them to really achieve A level proficiency in their game, and even "misunderstand," that is make units and abilities that are really difficult to account for in a high level game (like the investment in queen). Because it was designed around a general idea of spellcasters, that is massive game changing abilities with casting, which was taken to the edge by the players. Its fine if few units become obsolete with these design ideas, as long as there exists the understanding of what they expect out of the game.
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On April 13 2010 11:52 LunarC wrote:
They should have focused on making the dynamics between each matchup as interesting and varied as possible and then designed units around that paradigm. Instead, they designed interesting and varied units that eventually lost sight of their original design and had to be nerfed or buffed into a different role for the sake of balance.
This detrimental and often homogenizing effect occurs often when there is no overall design goal to work with.
I don't think that's necessarily a bad design process. To be honest, I don't think having a pre-determined plan would have helped out any simply because it would have been reiterated a hundred times anyway. With a complex series like Starcraft, I don't think there's really a way to plan it out other than just the basics since a lot of the design in SC1 only worked by pure accident.
The problem is that Blizzard never seems to be able to bite the bullet and axe a unit if it isn't working out. For whatever reason, Blizzard seems to absolutely love units like the Thor, Mothership, and Roach. And despite the increasingly clear evidence that they don't have a defined role, Blizzard still fights tooth and nail to keep them in the game. It only gets worse when you consider how Blizzard is even starting to play up these units as mascots of their respective races. The Collector's Edition has a feature purely for the Thor, then you have that Mothership short story and what I'm sure will be a major role this unit will have in the campaign, and I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if there was something in the game that basically brags about how awesome the Roach is. Maybe I'm wrong about this, but I definitely do think this theory has some validity.
It's kind of a shame since we're too far in beta to change anything now. Blizzard says that they're willing to remove/add units as necessary, but I honestly doubt that they're really being honest with that. I can almost guarantee that no unit will be dropped even if it were unanimously hated by the community. Oh well, maybe the expansions will help.
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As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
Huh? That just goes to show you are equally as unaware as dustin lol. In sc1 any decent player would ignore the pylon simply because if the probe is alive, he can just make 2 or even 3 pylons next to the one you are killing, and they will certainly morph before you have a chance at doing ANY DAMAGE at all.
You target the gateways (typically with workers and your initial attacking units) hoping to kill it before his first zealot pops out. If not, you target the zealot till it dies, and attack the gateways again.
If you read carefully, he stated if the probe is still alive, you don't target the pylon. If the probe is dead, and there is only 1 pylon, then certainly you kill it.
The point cloud is making is that he thinks some balancers don't understand these concepts, and can't read that deep into strategy.
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On April 13 2010 12:54 eXigent. wrote:Show nested quote +
As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
Huh? That just goes to show you are equally as unaware as dustin lol. In sc1 any decent player would ignore the pylon simply because if the probe is alive, he can just make 2 or even 3 pylons next to the one you are killing, and they will certainly morph before you have a chance at doing ANY DAMAGE at all.
I'm not going to argue with you about what a decent SC1 player would or wouldn't do. A decent SC2 player would kill the pylon if possible.
SC2 pylons don't have as many HP as SC1 pylons, and if he makes 2-3 more pylons, it's still easier to kill all of them than even one gateway. Whether or not he still has a probe nearby is irrelevant.
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On April 13 2010 13:15 Wintermute wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2010 12:54 eXigent. wrote:
As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
Huh? That just goes to show you are equally as unaware as dustin lol. In sc1 any decent player would ignore the pylon simply because if the probe is alive, he can just make 2 or even 3 pylons next to the one you are killing, and they will certainly morph before you have a chance at doing ANY DAMAGE at all. I'm not going to argue with you about what a decent SC1 player would or wouldn't do. A decent SC2 player would kill the pylon if possible. SC2 pylons don't have as many HP as SC1 pylons, and if he makes 2-3 more pylons, it's still easier to kill all of them than even one gateway. Whether or not he still has a probe nearby is irrelevant.
Killing the gateway ensures it won't be producing anything anymore, while going for pylons won't stop zealot production by any mean. Which one is better?
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On April 13 2010 13:21 iG.ClouD wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2010 13:15 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 12:54 eXigent. wrote:
As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
Huh? That just goes to show you are equally as unaware as dustin lol. In sc1 any decent player would ignore the pylon simply because if the probe is alive, he can just make 2 or even 3 pylons next to the one you are killing, and they will certainly morph before you have a chance at doing ANY DAMAGE at all. I'm not going to argue with you about what a decent SC1 player would or wouldn't do. A decent SC2 player would kill the pylon if possible. SC2 pylons don't have as many HP as SC1 pylons, and if he makes 2-3 more pylons, it's still easier to kill all of them than even one gateway. Whether or not he still has a probe nearby is irrelevant. Killing the gateway ensures it won't be producing anything anymore, while going for pylons won't stop zealot production by any mean. Which one is better?
Killing the pylons will stop production. and then you can kill the gateways unopposed.
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On April 13 2010 13:31 Wintermute wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2010 13:21 iG.ClouD wrote:On April 13 2010 13:15 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 12:54 eXigent. wrote:
As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
Huh? That just goes to show you are equally as unaware as dustin lol. In sc1 any decent player would ignore the pylon simply because if the probe is alive, he can just make 2 or even 3 pylons next to the one you are killing, and they will certainly morph before you have a chance at doing ANY DAMAGE at all. I'm not going to argue with you about what a decent SC1 player would or wouldn't do. A decent SC2 player would kill the pylon if possible. SC2 pylons don't have as many HP as SC1 pylons, and if he makes 2-3 more pylons, it's still easier to kill all of them than even one gateway. Whether or not he still has a probe nearby is irrelevant. Killing the gateway ensures it won't be producing anything anymore, while going for pylons won't stop zealot production by any mean. Which one is better? Killing the pylons will stop production. and then you can kill the gateways unopposed.
Only if the probe that can warp in additional pylons is also dead. If not, then you need to target the Gateways.
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On April 13 2010 13:54 LunarC wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2010 13:31 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 13:21 iG.ClouD wrote:On April 13 2010 13:15 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 12:54 eXigent. wrote:
As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
Huh? That just goes to show you are equally as unaware as dustin lol. In sc1 any decent player would ignore the pylon simply because if the probe is alive, he can just make 2 or even 3 pylons next to the one you are killing, and they will certainly morph before you have a chance at doing ANY DAMAGE at all. I'm not going to argue with you about what a decent SC1 player would or wouldn't do. A decent SC2 player would kill the pylon if possible. SC2 pylons don't have as many HP as SC1 pylons, and if he makes 2-3 more pylons, it's still easier to kill all of them than even one gateway. Whether or not he still has a probe nearby is irrelevant. Killing the gateway ensures it won't be producing anything anymore, while going for pylons won't stop zealot production by any mean. Which one is better? Killing the pylons will stop production. and then you can kill the gateways unopposed. Only if the probe that can warp in additional pylons is also dead. If not, then you need to target the Gateways.
Did I miss some development where pylons are free and warp in instantly?
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On April 13 2010 10:59 Half wrote:
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)
Wait, he was a major part of BFME? That piece of crap game that was a complete waste of everyone's money who bought it. For those who thankfully didn't waste their money, BFME 2 had a great looking demo so much so that you thought the game would be the next big thing. The units were somewhat unique and a unique economy that looked like it promoted spreading out and fighting at multiple fronts.
Then you bought it and saw the worst multiplayer experience ever. Completely uneven maps (one side could have twice the starting resources, using SC2 terms one side would have double the starting gas/minerals as the other guy.... plus a freakin wall the other guy didn't have). Bad patch after bad patch after bad patch. Basically everything after the demo was complete crap.
You can tell when people who are in charge of balance don't play the game. You see wtf after wtf in consecutive patches.
Now I'm having second thoughts on if I really will buy the game lol.
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On April 13 2010 14:07 Wintermute wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2010 13:54 LunarC wrote:On April 13 2010 13:31 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 13:21 iG.ClouD wrote:On April 13 2010 13:15 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 12:54 eXigent. wrote:
As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
Huh? That just goes to show you are equally as unaware as dustin lol. In sc1 any decent player would ignore the pylon simply because if the probe is alive, he can just make 2 or even 3 pylons next to the one you are killing, and they will certainly morph before you have a chance at doing ANY DAMAGE at all. I'm not going to argue with you about what a decent SC1 player would or wouldn't do. A decent SC2 player would kill the pylon if possible. SC2 pylons don't have as many HP as SC1 pylons, and if he makes 2-3 more pylons, it's still easier to kill all of them than even one gateway. Whether or not he still has a probe nearby is irrelevant. Killing the gateway ensures it won't be producing anything anymore, while going for pylons won't stop zealot production by any mean. Which one is better? Killing the pylons will stop production. and then you can kill the gateways unopposed. Only if the probe that can warp in additional pylons is also dead. If not, then you need to target the Gateways. Did I miss some development where pylons are free and warp in instantly?
When somebody is committed to proxy gateways, they will continue to produce/cancel pylons as needed. They have a steady stream of minerals and pylons are relatively cheap. They also warp in much faster than Gateways, whereas a couple workers can deal significant damage to a Gateway with sustained attack. Then once your own basic units are out, you can finish off the Gateways relatively quickly. If you are busy going from pylon to pylon and try to take them down instead, the Gateways will warp in at full health, by which point they will start to produce Zealots.
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On April 13 2010 14:55 LunarC wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2010 14:07 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 13:54 LunarC wrote:On April 13 2010 13:31 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 13:21 iG.ClouD wrote:On April 13 2010 13:15 Wintermute wrote:On April 13 2010 12:54 eXigent. wrote:
As to attacking the Gateways... you're just dead wrong there. Why kill two buildings with 1000 health apiece when you can kill one pylon with 400 health?
Huh? That just goes to show you are equally as unaware as dustin lol. In sc1 any decent player would ignore the pylon simply because if the probe is alive, he can just make 2 or even 3 pylons next to the one you are killing, and they will certainly morph before you have a chance at doing ANY DAMAGE at all. I'm not going to argue with you about what a decent SC1 player would or wouldn't do. A decent SC2 player would kill the pylon if possible. SC2 pylons don't have as many HP as SC1 pylons, and if he makes 2-3 more pylons, it's still easier to kill all of them than even one gateway. Whether or not he still has a probe nearby is irrelevant. Killing the gateway ensures it won't be producing anything anymore, while going for pylons won't stop zealot production by any mean. Which one is better? Killing the pylons will stop production. and then you can kill the gateways unopposed. Only if the probe that can warp in additional pylons is also dead. If not, then you need to target the Gateways. Did I miss some development where pylons are free and warp in instantly? When somebody is committed to proxy gateways, they will continue to produce/cancel pylons as needed. They have a steady stream of minerals and pylons are relatively cheap. They also warp in much faster than Gateways, whereas a couple workers can deal significant damage to a Gateway with sustained attack. Then once your own basic units are out, you can finish off the Gateways relatively quickly. If you are busy going from pylon to pylon and try to take them down instead, the Gateways will warp in at full health, by which point they will start to produce Zealots.
It's still not clear to me how the gateways are going to warp in any units when they don't have power. Every time a pylon goes down, that's -100 minerals and a lack of power.
Of course I would attack a gateway that already exists vs attacking a pylon thats still warping in, but given a choice of a full health pylon and a full health gateway, I'd kill the pylon, because even if he has 2-3 of them. they're still easier to kill than gateways, and once they're dead, the gateways are effectively dead until he builds more pylons.
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lol that quote made my stomach churn
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On April 12 2010 19:10 norlock wrote:
Respond to my previous post! please
haha someone acknowledge meeeee!!! >_<
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On April 13 2010 09:36 Falling wrote: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.
Eh... You're taking a very specific example and then generalizing it. That is, you're taking the example of where developers want to have a sizable amount of very easily balanceable factions- they don't care too much about the factions being unique and in some ways they don't even want them to be too unique because they want players to be able to keep track of the differences- and then you're saying that is the *only* alternative to Dustin Browder's proposal for designing RTS factions/units. That's rather far from the truth.
The more common starting point for a game that aspires to have a few unique races is to determine defining characteristics of each race- what makes them different and in what ways do they/should they feel unique? This process does generally involve having some basic concept of a generic race that perhaps one of your races will fulfill or perhaps none of them will, but either way this generic race has the basics of what all of your races can have in a rather plain fashion. This race is never detailed, but the broad view of it, the economic methodologies, basic unit requirements, basic tech requirements, etc... are glossed over. From this base, creating your races is an additive, subtractive, and substitutional process.
This is just one method, but we can explore where it leads us for a bit. Taking StarCraft, we can see that all races share the same, basic economic model where there are two types of resources on the map and expensive, command structures allow harvesters/workers to return those resources for usage. In their harvesting roles, the workers are identical. However, workers can also construct buildings, and here they diverge, giving each race a different feel. Drones' sacrificing of themselves to construct structures is offset by their production methodology which allows them to be produced more rapidly (alternately, the sacrificing of Drones offsets Zerg's production methodology to minimize their immediate potential to gain an undue economic advantage). Along parallel lines, Zerg's pruduction is streamlined to their command structures (Hatcheries) to minimize the amount of Drones they need to sacrifice to produce units and tech up. Chicken and egg scenario (shrug). Meanwhile, Terran and Protoss workers have their own construction quirks to further racial identity.
Looking at the first tier of combat units we have Zerglings, Zealots, and Marines. All three are very different but fill the same initial role of being the first combat units out the door, requiring no gas to produce. Terrans prove very different here because their starting combat unit is ranged and it immediately begins to establish their identity as having copious glass cannons (the Medic was added in Brood War to extend the utility of these particular glass cannons beyond the early game). Also noteworthy is that the SCV's extra health was not only to cover for that the SCV was the only worker that needed to remain alive throughout a structure's construction in order to complete, but also because Terrans have no access to a melee combat unit until the Firebat (which requires gas) and by amping the SCV's (non-free-regenerable) health it can be used as necessary to protect the glass cannon Marines at the expense of not being used to mine/construct (so we can already see that the increased health SCVs have is synergistic in three ways- whether this actually happened by chance or by design we don't care because if we're looking at actually designing the Terrans, these are racial identity questions that we want to ask and solve- we want to ask, "How should our workers for this race construct buildings? Should workers for this race be more or less viable in combat than workers of another race? How does this race handle hp regeneration, and knowing that how do we want this unit to handle hp regen?"). With the Zergling, we get a more "standard" starting unit that is melee, cheap, and relatively weak. However, we see that this fits the Zerg race well because it produces quickly and is nicely massable and thus uniquely fills our requirements for the race's starting combat unit. And finally we have the Zealot, which to fulfill the racial vision for the Protoss needs to be expensive but powerful, so it ends up costing twice as much as the "generic" unit here but it has quite a bit more durability and attack power than its cousins. It's quite notable that we could consider a Zealot to be an expensive, suped-up Zergling to which many here will reel with horror again, but that's all it really is when we look at its stats, but when we put those stats in context we find it to be a rather wholly different unit. However, it's not particularly "cool" or overwhelmingly "unique", it just fulfills a role for the Protoss army in a "Protss-y" manner.
We could go through all of the units in StarCraft, but that would be a rather long post 
It may be a bit more helpful though to take a brief look at a completely different game. Dawn of War 2 (oh no, more squeals of horror!) homoginizes its races a fair bit more than StarCraft does as DoW 2 (Dawn of War 2) seeks to streamline the macro components of its game mechanics, leaving all races with rather identical macro mechanics and tech trees. This rather harshly simplifies the more overarching elements of racial identity that StarCraft draws from, and thus much more emphasis is placed on the units (on a side note, I will say that DoW 2 has nowhere near the macro depth of SC or SC2, but the macro depth it does have is sufficient for its purposes- the lack of base-building is not much of an issue as it makes up for it in other ways and it does specifically put more emphasis on micro than macro as well as much of its macro resulting from micro)- and the setting is the Warhammer 40,000 universe, so the races really do need to feel and play very differently for the game to have any chance of successfully representing its source material.
DoW 2 solves its problems by keeping a loose structure for the units of all of its races, to the point where Relic really doesn't seem to care that the Predator Tank is more or less present in Space Marines, Orks, and Chaos Space Marines. The loose structure provides a base for balance, as well as base for Relic to craft the method in which each race fulfills its roles. Space Marines have no T1 melee unit (I consider Assault Space Marines T1.5 because they require a sizable amount of power; for those not familiar with DoW 2, power functions somewhat similar to Vespene as the secondary resource that plays a big role in teching and sustaining advanced units) but they compensate for this with a very durable T1 staple ranged unit (Tactical Space Marines) and a fast T1 support ranged unit that can be upgraded to provide substantial microable counters to melee units (Shotguns and/or frag grenades). On the other hand, Orks have a pretty standard T1 set-up with two staple units, the melee Sluggas and ranged Shootas. Sluggas get their twist by being extremely powerful and durable in melee combat and being rather cheaply reinforcable, and they're downright deadly in numbers. Shootas on the other hand are pretty weak ranged units, but in large numbers and well-upgraded they can be dangerous (rarely ever a threat to Tactical Space Marines though) to many units from many races- they represent the wonky kinda glass cannon side of Orks despite that cannon isn't super powerful with enough of them it could be just powerful enough maybe while Sluggas are the more durable, in-your-face side.
However, the remaining three races have a similar T1 set-up, as Eldar have Guardians and Banshees (ranged and melee respectively), while Tyranids have Hormagaunts and Termagaunts (melee and ranged respectively), and Chaos have Heretics and Chaos Space Marines (melee and ranged respectively). The cost differences between these are far less drastic than the cost differences between Zerglings and Zealots, but nonetheless Hormagaunts control, feel, and are used much differently than Ork Sluggas, proving quite less durable but more lethal when they are in a winning battle. Howling Banshees for Eldar are similar in this respect, but more able to stand and fight yet being more expensive and glass cannon-y. The only two unit sets that really feel at all similar are Shootas and Termagaunts and Space Marines and Chaos Space Marines- the latter two are obvious but while they start similarly, they diverge a fair bit in the later game while Shootas and Termagaunts tend to differ a fair bit less on a unit level but diverge more on a racial level as other units and race elements (for example the very powerful Nob leaders that can be added to Shoota squads while Termagaunts rely on ranged synapse to provide this buff; this reflects Orks as still being a somewhat mass-y race but being stronger than Tyranids individually while the Tyranids rely more on thier hive/swarm style) combine to diverge them.
The core of the above point though about DoW 2 is that when looking at even the most basic units, they're all very similar in role, but they nonetheless *feel* different and further the uniqueness of their race.
And the point of all of that in relation to StarCraft 2 is that units do not need to be any less unique because they began their lives as just roles for a faction rather than as completely "unique and awesome units". When starting from the basis of the role, we pretty much know that a unit is going to work, and that it's just a matter of tweaking and tuning that particular unit to feel unique and different and to further the race's identity in a balanced way.
Now, it is also noteworthy that Blizzard's method of creating units first and then slapping them into the races and putting them through a trial by fire can produce the same results, and perhaps even better results because you may find that you can get away with some unique concepts that through a more traditional, "safer" development model you would have discarded. The key though is that you have to commit to this, "shotgun design", as NicolBolas I believe put it. For it to work, you need to accept that it's only a little better than using Random Sort on a list (for those who don't know what that is, imagine that you have all 26 letters of the alphabet in a line but they're out of order and you need to sort them so that they are in the proper order; with Random Sort, you basically just move a random letter to the first slot, another random letter to the second slot from the remaining letters, etc... until every slot has gotten its random letter; you then check it and if you sorted correctly then woohoo you're done; if not you do it again; Random Sort could potentially sort the letters properly the very first time it's run... or it could be run an infinite number of times and never work because it's completely random; shotgun design is slightly better than Random Sort because you are bringing some foreknowledge into your design and that will influence what you do, but it's still not nearly as consistent as coming in with a proper plan; however, like with Random Sort, it could work the very first time you try it or it could take thousands of tries to get it right), and you need to stick with it. If something isn't working, you have to be prepared to completely scrap it and try again.
The problem, again as others in this thread have recognized, is that Blizzard is not really following this method of design. They are putting firing limits on their shotgun and restricting its targets. For some reason or another, they are marking various units as "safe" and are focusing in on trying to balance those units rather than just scrapping them and trying a completely new design. Some balancing is fine and even necessary, but we're literally seeing units such as the Roach, Marauder, Thor, Mothership, etc... being completely transformed in the balancing process. They're really not the same units anymore, and yet in the process of being transformed, they haven't really been crafted to be "unique" or "awesome" either. Instead they've lost a lot of their "uniqueness" and "awesomeness" and this is why, when you're going to be doing a lot of balancing like this, you don't necessarily want the units to be "unique" and "awesome" to start with because it's much easier to add those elements in after the core elements of the units have been balanced. However, as mentioned, Blizzard's design style is *supposed* to sidestep this because the second a unit starts receiving major revisions, it should be completely redesigned and overhauled from the ground-up.
On top of Blizzard haivng taken a liking to the Thor, Mothership, Roach, Marauder, etc... they also seem to be struggling with an identity crisis of trying to make SC2 appear different from SC1 as much as they possibly can without making it too different. This is leading them to plant their heals on issues such as the Hydralisk being in T2 instead of T1/T1.5, which in turn is forcing them to cram what had been a unique unit into a void left by the Hydralisk, to fulfill a decent set of its roles despite that the Hydralisk still exists. Imo, moving the Hydralisk back down to T1.5 and rebalancing it for that as well (for the inevitable complaint about Hellions, consider that you'll be able to get more Hydralisks out earlier and that if you don't over-clump your Hydralisks and that if you leverage Hydralisks' range to force Hellions to move into range of Spine Crawlers in order to attack your Hydralisks [and you consider Spine Crawlers' ability to... crawl... so they can temporarily block ramps as necessary] I think you'll find that you can micro your way out of Hellion harass which I think is what we wall really want since that makes the game more entertaining to watch and more entertaining to play), and then moving Roaches up to T2 and rebalancing them for a less-massable role there would allow Roaches to resume many of their "unique" and "awesome" design elements, but Blizzard seems to refuse doing this and instead is intent on nerfing Roaches into a proper, massable T1/T1.5 role that is completely not what they were originally designed for.
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