EPT[D] The cost of Burrow - Page 5
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Templar.
Canada133 Posts
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ComradeDover
Bulgaria758 Posts
On April 26 2010 05:49 Templar. wrote: I don't see why blizzard didnt just leave burrow at 50/50 cost, and then make the length of roach upgrade alot longer, because ya.. i never see anyone burrow anymore :/ Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it isn't happening. There's a truckload of people complaining that Protoss are underpowered and lose a ton of games, when statistically they have a 5% winrate advantage on Terrans as of the last patch. | ||
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skippy2591
United States46 Posts
On April 26 2010 05:49 Templar. wrote: I don't see why blizzard didnt just leave burrow at 50/50 cost, and then make the length of roach upgrade alot longer, because ya.. i never see anyone burrow anymore :/ yea, like i said earlier, i haven't played sc2 at all, and my opinion is one of an outsider player looking in. that said, why should it matter the price if macro is used properly?? a price change just means you have to adjust the time you research burrow, it dosen't necessairly mean that its impossible to use anymore. maybe pplz were so close to a standardized build that as soon as the cost went up, pplz begain to claim that it ruined the use of burrow... To the people who think that above though: that is not true, ur just jumping the gun if your thinking that way. all a price change means is that you'll have to dramatically alter the build ur use to, and find another one more optimized to take advantage of the upgrade while remaining relative to everything else. | ||
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Wr3k
Canada2533 Posts
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shindigs
United States4795 Posts
why should it matter the price if macro is used properly?? a price change just means you have to adjust the time you research burrow, it dosen't necessairly mean that its impossible to use anymore. It's not impossible to use, but based of your assumptions of "using macro properly" it seems that cost doesn't matter at all in anything if you "macro properly." This is simply not the case. Burrow costs something just like everything else. Macroing properly consists of allocating your resources wisely and that requires good decision making. It's not about just playing with good mechanics, it means you have to think and consider what you're doing, and there's tension in that consideration since all those resources can possibly be spent elsewhere. EDIT SIDE NOTE: It's good that you're seeing counters to problems you've been watching on the streams, but unfortunately I think you'd just have to play the game to see why burrow may be a bit underused against forcefields. Again, I want to emphasize you're idea isn't a bad one, but it seems that this thread is making it seem like a simple decision to avoid mass sentry forcefields. It's not, and that's why it's been avoided. | ||
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poor newb
United States1879 Posts
the roach concept is just plain stupid, and we all knew it from the beginning, but instead of letting it go they stuck with it and end up with a poorly designed unit that needs 4 upgrades to be balanced. if you need 500/500 just to fully upgrade a unit its just plain wrong, especially with all the hard counters in this game, so what do players do? they only get the upgrade that doesnt involve burrow and ditch the other 3 about burrow | ||
Carnivorous Sheep
Baa?21244 Posts
On April 26 2010 05:55 skippy2591 wrote: yea, like i said earlier, i haven't played sc2 at all, and my opinion is one of an outsider player looking in. that said, why should it matter the price if macro is used properly?? a price change just means you have to adjust the time you research burrow, it dosen't necessairly mean that its impossible to use anymore. maybe pplz were so close to a standardized build that as soon as the cost went up, pplz begain to claim that it ruined the use of burrow... To the people who think that above though: that is not true, ur just jumping the gun if your thinking that way. all a price change means is that you'll have to dramatically alter the build ur use to, and find another one more optimized to take advantage of the upgrade while remaining relative to everything else. I don't think your opinion is very valid then if you haven't even played. As I said before, 100/100 means that there are 10000 things you're going ot upgrade before Burrow because they'll provide more utility. The tradeoff of cost-gain is simply too high for Burrow. Reducing it to 50/50 encourages more people to upgrade it, without making it overpowered in an way, shape, or form, which honestly is the only concern of all the Terran/Toss icons whining in this thread | ||
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ComradeDover
Bulgaria758 Posts
On April 26 2010 06:18 poor newb wrote: burrow roaches just arent worth it, you have to tech all the way up to lair and get two more upgrades before you can even use it, by then your oopponents can easily get detectors to counter it the roach concept is just plain stupid, and we all knew it from the beginning, but instead of letting it go they stuck with it and end up with a poorly designed unit that needs 4 upgrades to be balanced. if you need 500/500 just to fully upgrade a unit its just plain wrong, especially with all the hard counters in this game 500/500 is in the ballpark of what it costs to fully upgrade marines. In fact, it costs more if you consider the bunker space upgrade to be an upgrade for the marine. And with colossi and fungal growth and tanks, there are plenty of things "hard countering" (Whatever the fuck that means) marines. I guess we should scrap the unit concept of the marine, too. On April 26 2010 06:21 Carnivorous Sheep wrote: As I said before, 100/100 means that there are 10000 things you're going ot upgrade before Burrow because they'll provide more utility. The tradeoff of cost-gain is simply too high for Burrow. Reducing it to 50/50 encourages more people to upgrade it, without making it overpowered in an way, shape, or form, which honestly is the only concern of all the Terran/Toss icons whining in this thread Then the Zerg players choose to get those 10000 things rather than going burrow. They've made their own choices. Why are they now trying to stack the decks in their favor, over a choice they themselves made? | ||
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skippy2591
United States46 Posts
On April 26 2010 06:02 shindigs wrote: It's not impossible to use, but based of your assumptions of "using macro properly" it seems that cost doesn't matter at all in anything if you "macro properly." This is simply not the case. Burrow costs something just like everything else. Macroing properly consists of allocating your resources wisely and that requires good decision making. It's not about just playing with good mechanics, it means you have to think and consider what you're doing, and there's tension in that consideration since all those resources can possibly be spent elsewhere. EDIT SIDE NOTE: It's good that you're seeing counters to problems you've been watching on the streams, but unfortunately I think you'd just have to play the game to see why burrow may be a bit underused against forcefields. Again, I want to emphasize you're idea isn't a bad one, but it seems that this thread is making it seem like a simple decision to avoid mass sentry forcefields. It's not, and that's why it's been avoided. ok, 2 things i have to address alright, alright, you have a point on the statements that you made on my rathere "jaded" sense of using macro properly, and i do understand what your pov of macroing properly consist of (which is a little more grounded than mine might i add  On ur edited side note, I'll first say that i know there is a big diffrence between knowing about something and actually experienceing it, and thats why i made it clear that i waz just an outside person looking in. Addressing the second half of what you stated, i will say that i think u may be mistaking a few of the posters statements as oversimplifications of the issue, and, while there are a few suggesting that this is the end all be all solution, i'm pretty sure we all do know that this is beyond a simple decision for zergs dealing with force fields. That said, this does not by any means mean that we should completly take this option off the table, but we should rather take it into consideration, throw the idea around a little, and hopefully some gosu player will take it from there and revolutionize the game we could trigger someones upbringing just by a simple argument ^^ how awsome | ||
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shindigs
United States4795 Posts
On April 26 2010 06:21 Carnivorous Sheep wrote: I don't think your opinion is very valid then if you haven't even played. As I said before, 100/100 means that there are 10000 things you're going ot upgrade before Burrow because they'll provide more utility. The tradeoff of cost-gain is simply too high for Burrow. Reducing it to 50/50 encourages more people to upgrade it, without making it overpowered in an way, shape, or form, which honestly is the only concern of all the Terran/Toss icons whining in this thread Not playing the game denies you of how heavy some decisions can be. It's easy for any of us to watch a stream and say "Why couldn't player A counter Player B with so and so counter?" but the reality is that Player A was most likely weighing a load of other options in his head, which Player B could respond to. There's definitely mind games to everything you watch which doesn't make everything as straightforward as it seems. ok, 2 things i have to address alright, alright, you have a point on the statements that you made on my rathere "jaded" sense of using macro properly, and i do understand what your pov of macroing properly consist of (which is a little more grounded than mine might i add On ur edited side note, I'll first say that i know there is a big diffrence between knowing about something and actually experienceing it, and thats why i made it clear that i waz just an outside person looking in. Addressing the second half of what you stated, i will say that i think u may be mistaking a few of the posters statements as oversimplifications of the issue, and, while there are a few suggesting that this is the end all be all solution, i'm pretty sure we all do know that this is beyond a simple decision for zergs dealing with force fields. That said, this does not by any means mean that we should completly take this option off the table, but we should rather take it into consideration, throw the idea around a little, and hopefully some gosu player will take it from there and revolutionize the game we could trigger someones upbringing just by a simple argument ^^ how awsome Like I said, it's good that you are trying to formulate counters to some situations you see appearing on the streams. It means you're thinking and strategical along with the player while watching the streams, and that is never a bad thing! I'll agree with you that we shouldn't take this option off the table completely. It's something I definitely want to try, but personally for me, if I find myself in that situation again I just wouldn't research burrow if I was trying to win due to all the oppurtunity cost arguments stated before. Personally when I attempt to imagine a game where you obtain burrow, a lot of other factors flood into my mind of what could counter my decision, and all those counters are outweighing the benefits. Of course, that puts me in the same situation as you, where I haven't even tried it and I'm making assumptions about it. In the end, I think I'm going to conclude that burrow needs to be 50/50 before it becomes part of Standard Play for the Zerg, which I think it should. At 100/100, it's not completely useless, but researching it means you're gonna be using it for some specific strategy outside of standard play (which isn't bad, it's just no obvious as you want it to be). Also keep in mind Standard Play is constantly evolving, so even that argument is questionable, and you definitely have a place to disagree with me. The beauty of StarCraft is that something we may consider not viable at one time may be standard play in a next paradigm. This is just my perception is a Zerg player, and I'm sort of playing the devil's advocate. From my experience, there are just so many other options that I could consider that will benefit me in the long run rather than burrow, such as melee or range upgrades. Finally, some posts about burrow comes off to me as an oversimplification of obtaining it. Not all, but some, but it's good to know that you understand the decisions that go into Lair tech. | ||
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poor newb
United States1879 Posts
On April 26 2010 06:23 ComradeDover wrote: 500/500 is in the ballpark of what it costs to fully upgrade marines. In fact, it costs more if you consider the bunker space upgrade to be an upgrade for the marine. And with colossi and fungal growth and tanks, there are plenty of things "hard countering" (Whatever the fuck that means) marines. I guess we should scrap the unit concept of the marine, too. get your numbers right it takes 150/150 for marines, 150/150 for stim which upgrades marauders as well, 100/100 is for bunkers not for marines you have to spend 400/400 just on roaches, and 100/100 on burrow | ||
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skippy2591
United States46 Posts
On April 26 2010 06:21 Carnivorous Sheep wrote: I don't think your opinion is very valid then if you haven't even played. As I said before, 100/100 means that there are 10000 things you're going ot upgrade before Burrow because they'll provide more utility. The tradeoff of cost-gain is simply too high for Burrow. Reducing it to 50/50 encourages more people to upgrade it, without making it overpowered in an way, shape, or form, which honestly is the only concern of all the Terran/Toss icons whining in this thread sorry sir, i still fail to see a reasonable justification on why my opinion is not valid. last i checked i waz free to state my opinions, and just because i havn't played the game dosen't mean i can't engage in a conversation about certain aspects of the game. yes, true, my opinion may be off because i didn't play the game, but i still fail to see what justifies the absolute throwing out of my opinion in this matter. Besides, as long as i'm not just spewing out retaurtedly stupid remarks, I don't see much issue with my statements. some of the bigest critics of pro american football players are the very people who can't qualify for a local team themselves, yet you don't hear them cutting their toungs often in a football discussion now do you. | ||
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Rucky
United States717 Posts
It's only 50/50 more, no big deal. It's only 50/50 less, no big deal. | ||
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NicolBolas
United States1388 Posts
1: On the cost of burrow vs. the cost of other cloaking (DT tech, Banshee cloak, etc). There are many fundamental differences between these and burrow. One of the most important is that the units that have these forms of cloak are a lot more flexible than the Zerg units that can burrow. Banshees are flying units; they can attack from any angle. Whereas Roaches and Infestors are ground units, they must obey land constraints. Thus, it is easier to keep out Roaches & Infestors than Banshees. DTs are very much the same. DTs can be warp-in cloaked; all you see is a Warp Prism in Psi mode. Is he dropping DTs or is it a fake? Roach/Infestor drops aren't like that. If you see an Overlord, it might be a drop, but you'll know it's a drop when the Roaches/Infestors come out of it. You never have that moment of "Oh crap, I need detection to know if this is fake or not!" You might notice that I didn't mention other burrowed units. That's for a very good reason; all other burrowed units are static. Unlike Ghosts, DTs, or any of the rest, burrowed units can't move. They can't attack you. And they cannot attack you while burrowed, with the notable exception of the baneling. In short, these abilities/units cost more than burrow because they're more useful than burrow. 2: On the utility of Burrow. Burrow sucks. Period. Let's go through the burrowing units and see how useful burrow is: Zerglings: The most you can do with burrowed Zerglings is lay some burrow traps. Unfortunately, any Protoss worth their salt will have an Observer with their army. Terran players have to pay for their scans early game, but by the mid-to-late game, when they have 3 or more OCs, scan's don't hurt. So the best you can say is that Zergling burrowing has utility in the early game. However, it should be noted that Zerglings are the most mobile unit in the Zerg army. Making them immobile basically takes away any of the advantages from the 100/100 Zergling speed upgrade. Banelings: This is the classic trap. However, there are some fundamental problems with it. Banelings are only cost effective against certain units. Against the Protoss, they're a waste of money unless you're specifically using them to bust a wall. Against Terrans, they're only useful against a Marine-heavy MMM ball. A Marauder-heavy ball, or just Hellion/Marauders/Thors has little to fear from immobile Banelings. Better to spend that 100/100 on an Infestation Pit. And of course, burrowed Banelings are stopped by the same things that stop burrowed Zerglings: detection. Hydralisks: No point. Burrowed Hydralisks are of no tactical value. Drones: Oh, it's nice to save your Drones from Hellion harassment. But if they throw down a scan, it's all over. Roaches: This used to be the go-to unit for burrow. This was why you bothered to research it, even when it was practically free. Times have changed. Burrowed regen has been nerfed, a lot. So in-combat burrow micro is only useful for saving damaged Roaches. The regen rate is only useful in the sense of rebuilding units that survived the battle. Burrowed movement has been nerfed hard as well. Not only does it cost 150/150, but it's excruciatingly slow. Trying to move Roaches in to harass or prepare a flank while burrowed takes way too long. By the time flanking burrowed Roaches get into position, the tactical battlefield will have changed. Simply put, it just doesn't matter anymore. Burrowed movement isn't worth 150/150, and regen isn't enough for 100/100. And Organic Carapace definitely isn't worth 150/150. Infestors: Burrowed movement for these units was always about keeping them alive. They can't cast while burrowed, so it's mainly a defensive tactic. The problems with this are many. Burrowed movement is too slow to keep up with the Zerg army. The upgraded burrow move speed is an added expense; you could get the +25 starting energy upgrade, which is much more valuable. Especially for a unit that can be quickly focused and killed. Ultralisks: Haha! That's a good one. Oh, you were being serious. Really? Building Ultralisks is a mistake in and of itself. And now you want to make them immobile. Why? So that you can spring a trap and have your Ultralisks die all the sooner? 100 Minerals 100 Gas at the Lair can build you an Infestation Pit. It can build you a Hydralisk Den. It's half of a Spire. Any of these other buildings provide far greater utility than burrow. 3: Better alternatives to Burrow. Overlord drops can do much of what burrow can. They can drop units into the middle of the enemy ball. If an army composition is susceptible to Banelings, Overlords are going to be more effective at delivering Banelings on target than burrow is. Yes, drop costs 250/250. Yes, it endangers the Zerg's food. But it is far more effective, because it is far harder to stop. And it can do far more than burrow. You can't set Overlord traps, this is true. But burrow traps are simply not a particularly effective use of the ability against most races. So that's my argument for dropping the cost of burrow. | ||
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ComradeDover
Bulgaria758 Posts
On April 26 2010 06:29 Rucky wrote: So all the arguments of comradedover can be used to defend warpgates cost being increased to 100/100? It is easy to argue for the way it is. If burrow was 50/50 how can you argue that it should be increased to 100/100? If warpgates was 100/100, how can you argue that it should be 50/50? The answer is you can't. The burden of proof is on the side that wants the change and since the threshold for change on small adjustments are so high, there will never be any change. It's only 50/50 more, no big deal. It's only 50/50 less, no big deal. Whatever. I don't care either way. Balance is good right now. I'd rather we don't fuck with it. Like you said. The burden of proof is on those that want a change. If you want to fuck with the good balance we have now, you better have a damn good reason. | ||
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Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On April 26 2010 05:09 ComradeDover wrote: People love BW. They say it's the perfect RTS. If it's like that in BW, it can't be wrong. How is this a problem? If you're given the choice between an upgrade for your 24+ roaches or building one muta, and you choose building one muta, you've made the wrong choice. It isn't a burden now. 100/100 is dirt cheap. 100/100 is less than what Terrans would pay for one siege tank, never mind the siege mode upgrade or the cost of getting your mech infrastructure up. If zerg players choose not to get burrow (And make no mistake, they ARE making a choice), they have nobody to blame but themselves. Very good points that show the apparent unwillingness of Zerg players to look beyond their own plate. Compared to BW the Zerg have become lazy and complacent, because in BW they almost had to outbase the enemy by at least one base. Due to the Queen and getting enough larvae this isnt done in SC2, but it might be a mistake by the Zerg. They have the lowest cost for a new Harchery and the fastest method of saturating it with workers and yet they dont do it, because they are stuck in their "must-build-horde-and-ATTAACCCKKK" mode. Zerg could easily outresource all the others and with Spine Crawlers they also have the perfect static defenses to defend without troops. If they dont do it they shouldnt complain about the cost of a rather cheap upgrade. Burrow opens new attack methods (Baneling mines, Roach harrass, Infestor harrass) and forcing opponents to build lots of static defenses he didnt want to build to detect intruders is always a good thing ... at least thats what Day[9] tells us on a regular basis. Its your own fault if you dont do it and then get rather boring games. Sure the Roaches need their tunneling claws to move while burrowed, but Infestors dont and they have become very strong with the last patch. | ||
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Spaceninja
United States211 Posts
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ComradeDover
Bulgaria758 Posts
On April 26 2010 06:57 NicolBolas wrote: 3: Better alternatives to Burrow. Overlord drops can do much of what burrow can. They can drop units into the middle of the enemy ball. If an army composition is susceptible to Banelings, Overlords are going to be more effective at delivering Banelings on target than burrow is. Yes, drop costs 250/250. Yes, it endangers the Zerg's food. But it is far more effective, because it is far harder to stop. And it can do far more than burrow. You can't set Overlord traps, this is true. But burrow traps are simply not a particularly effective use of the ability against most races. So that's my argument for dropping the cost of burrow. I don't know how I missed this before. I'm sorry, but it looks like here, you're advocating researching an even more expensive ability than burrow, then loading up gas-heavy units into fragile air units and flying them into the middle of marine balls. If this is your argument against burrow, then I'd hate to have you be my attorney in court. Please tell me you're being sarcastic. Nobody can be this stupid. | ||
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ccou
United States681 Posts
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nodule
Canada931 Posts
SC2 will not be benefited by having lots of extremely cheap upgrades that everyone gets, because that reduces strategic variation. If everyone researches burrow immediately after getting lair, what's the point in making it an upgrade? You might as well just include it with the lair. Warpgates are a problem in this regard. Everyone will research it as soon as their cybercore finishes, because it is so cheap. Right now the only reason it exists is to delay when protoss gets warpgates rather than introduce strategic variation to the game... it would be practically identical if you just added a rule to the game which enabled warpgates 2 minutes after the core finished. Think about goon range in scbw. Yes, it was gotten almost every game, but it was expensive. It was worth not upgrading sometimes to get resources to execute some other strategy quickly. See, here's the thing with the costs of choices: things like warpgates that are cheap but take a long time to research don't have strategic tension with anything else besides the building they're occupying (so, you'd sacrifice warpgates to research hallu, for instance). Things which are expensive in terms of resources have strategic tension with every other fucking option. You need to give up eco, or units, or other tech to do it, and take a risk in that regard. That's not to say that time-based penalties aren't useful. The long time for weap/armor upgrades made for a good balance in scbw (but then again, this is mostly because the long time forced you to spend the $ for starting upgrades early, when it was hard to afford). But the trend for really cheap tech paths in sc2 is problematic, in my view. Warpgates are too critical to balance to change at this point, and I think concussive shells might be as well. But I hope the balancers at blizzard done go further down this path. Look, it the "value" of an upgrade is truly only 50/50, then it doesn't belong in the game. Is it seriously the extra 50/50 that is causing you to not use the ability to save your drones from harassment, plant baneling mines, move infestors under armies to get at the thor/colossi, move under forcefields, or have cloaked scouts? No, of course not. It is instead your inability to use burrow to make a meaningful difference in the game. Maybe burrow needs to be improved; maybe you need to learn to use it better. But the problem is certainly not the cost. | ||
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