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I feel the need to address this whole Korea > rest of the world sentiment. While this is largely true, and extremely apparent in the case of SC1, I think most people have misconceptions about why this is. Its not as if Korean players have some genetic or cultural edge that gives them a static advantage at gaming. Korean superiority at SC1 is quite easily explained by simple math. The incentive for pro-gaming is much higher, and thus the player pool for potential SC genius is MUCH larger. If you have 800 pro gamers from say Germany, take the top ten of those players..and then run them against the top 10 players from Korea's player pool of 50000, who you think is gonna come out on top? This is what has been going on in SC1 for many years..which is why Korea embarrasses other competition.
This point might seem obvious to some, but it was important to clarify to address the Op's argument. In short, SC2 isn't nearly as widely played in Korea yet. If we take a look at games like Warcraft3, you will notice that the top competitors are far from exclusively Korean. While Korea is strongly represented, so is China and much of Europe. If someone were to claim that "night elf is obviously the best because the highest rated Korean players are vast majority Night Elf" the argument would hold much less weight than it would for a SC1 related issue.
My point is, unless SC2 achieves much more popularity in Korea than elsewhere, there is no reason to assume the absolute best players will all be exclusively Korean. For example Lucifron (one of the best War3 players in the world) may turn out to be the best Terran for all we know.
I guess what it comes down to, is I simply am not as optimistic as some that Korean pro gamers are going to "make the switch," to SC2; or that SC2 will otherwise become as big as SC1 was/is. I really hope it does however.
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You're basically skipping the important part of the argument, namely that BW and SC2 are closely related, and that skill is transferable from BW to SC2.
It's not the same, that goes without saying, but that there is a good chance of faster meta game development among skilled BW players is pretty obvious.
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I really do not understand why it is so difficult for people to see things from our (Zerg players) point of view. We are not trying to complain that our race is underpowered, because that is not the case, as is clearly evident from Zerg performance in high level play. Our complaint is that Zerg lacks diversity, resulting in fewer options and ultimately contributing Zerg gameplay being boring as hell.
Let me try to illustrate, and I will use TvT since it is the non-Zerg matchup I am most familiar with. In a typical TvT game, the initial stages are almost always the same. One goes banshees, the other counters with Vikings. That part is fairly predictable. After that, the TvT games vary pretty wildly. I've seen them revert to bioballs, I've seen tank crawls, and I've seen them continue the air war. Pretty much the only units that do not get used in a typical TvT are Battlecruisers (hardcountered by the vikings that will already be on the field, and thus useless) and Ghosts. All-in-all, watching a TvT is interesting, dynamic, and considered by many to be the best matchup in terms of player fun and viewer enjoyment.
Now let's look at the Zerg game. Matchup doesn't matter, really, because the Zerg army in its current state is totally predictable. Prior to patch 12, the composition was always Roach/Hydra, with maybe a couple of infestors thrown in. Post patch 12, it is Lings/Blings/Hydra, with maybe a few Mutas or Infestors. If the game goes past 20 minutes, might see a few Brood Lords.
These armies are effective, but they are boring as hell. There is no real thinking that goes into the strategy, because we have no other units to use. It does not matter which of the many possible strategies our opponent picks, because our response will be the same : use the only army we have. The units do not vary, only how many of each we get. Effective, yes. Interesting, no. And this is exactly what Artosis is saying in his post. The strategic thinking, the response to the opponent unit composition, almost does not exist as Zerg.
Go back to SCBW for a minute and look at a high-level matchup there. I'll use the recent Jaedong-Midas matches as an example. Those matches did not involve the Zerg using one strategy for the entire game, as they do in SC2. Jaedong goes through Muta/Ling, Lurker/Defiler, Ultra/Ling, and a couple others, all in response to what his opponent is doing (or to force the opponent to respond to him). They are dynamic matches that have you on the edge of your seat. Compare that to the NonY/IdrA matches in the HdH semifinals. Almost all of the interest in those matches came from what NonY was doing. Watching IdrA was boring, because he did the same thing all game, every game. The only interesting part of IdrA's play was the drop in game 3.
So please, people, stop telling us to L2Play, because we agree with you that Zerg is not underpowered. We want diversity, we want options in our play, WITHOUT making Zerg any more powerful than they are (or maybe even making them a bit weaker). We no longer want to be forced to use the same unit composition every single game, we want the choice that T and P both get. We want the fun back in our race, not this mechanical stuff we have currently, where an optimized robot could probably win most games as Zerg.
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I'm not sure what all the hate in this thread for the OP was about, but Artosis has been around for a very long time in SC1, WC3, and SC2. If anyone's opinion should be valid it is his, I firmly agree with his assessment, Zerg dominates Asian servers because its an easier race to learn. And something which Artosis did not touch on in his article but I'll mention here is that Zerg is the least changed race from BW. The style of play for Zerg is more or less very similar to that of BW, as all the units available to you were really available in BW (save of course for Queen and Baneling and Infestor - lets face it Corrupters = Devourers and Broodlords = Guardians). Because of this the learning curve for pros and ex-pros is very small and that is why it seems like Zerg is 'dominating' in reality the people playing Terran and Protoss simply have not refined the play style as concretely.
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The complaint I hear most often about the zerg is that they do not have as much diversity. In BW Zerg players would switch up their army composition depending on what their opponent is doing. Whether that was lurker defiler, ling/ultra, or muta/ling or other combos. Prior to patch 12 my terran build was pretty standard because a majority of the time the zerg player would go all in roach and transition into roach hydra (which is not very diverse). Post patch 12, I see zerg players trying more combos and reacting more to what I build. For example will start with the bling bust to which I go ignitor hellion plus a few rines to which he moves to muta which i turn into mass rine plus medivac. then he moves to roach infestor. this game goes back and forth for about an hour both of us reacting to what the other person builds.
Now I dont think the roach needed a nerf in the early game in fact the two supply makes them much less useful in the early game. Possibly a slight increase in their cost would have been a better nerf. However imo I think the roach was overnerfed on purpose to force more zerg players to try out other units. Also with the upcoming ultra buff it wil be easier to transition from ling to ultra as the upgrades will carry over (even though we have no idea what buff the ultra is getting yet)
Also as in BW it was not uncommon for zerg players to get lings then completely skip over the hydra den and get the mutas first then move back to hydras later. What we are seeing here is pretty similiar. I see people ling/bling harass then switch to hydras or mutas then back down to roaches.
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Edited: Wrong thread, oops.
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On May 20 2010 00:18 s031720 wrote:
Edited: Wrong thread, oops.
Roach play worked in that game because of the backdoor on blistering sands.
MoMan abused the sole weakness of the terran mech: their limited mobility. With constant movement and backdooring he managed to delay the push and get BL out in time.
On any other map, where the Terran can just camp near his ramp all day until he has a big army, this type of play is less effective.
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A lot of ppl seem to be arguing or complaining about lack of diversity for Zergs play, because they don't have that many units? That playing Z in thier matchups is almost boring because they're "forced" to make the same units all the time. Well, Terran could have the same argument, although perhaps without the 'forced' part. Terran makes marauders 90% of the time in all their matchups.. Whereas some of their matchups are changing and people are getting more comfortable/confident to use other units in say, TvT, doesn't mean that they still mainly use 1-2 unit compositions.
It's the same for every race pretty much. You see zealot/sentry/immortal used just as much in PvZ as u do in PvP.. There are the chances or options to go fast void ray or soemthing, but it hardly wins a game, out right.. it may open a window of harass which will of course add up through other aspects of the game, like more harass, giving the Protoss player a quicker expand which leads to better macro etc. but just outright going void ray isn't going to kill a Z.
I think the point of this thread and most of the arguments is "where is the diversity" or that "Z doesnt have enough choices".. well c'mon.. Every race does the same build, more-or-less, in all their matchups. It was the same in BW. Zerg may have had 1-2 more units in BW, but they still did the same thing! Jaedongs ZvP? He was a god w/ Zerg but even he, did the same thing, every ZvP.. Muta rush with micro into mass hydra or maybe lurk contain to get economic advantage.
Same as in PvP for BW - reavers/zealots/dragoons always used early game (at least, mostly in pro-games, with a slight chance of DT usage) or Terrans using tank/vult in BW.. every game!
I dont think Z is any worse off than the other races.. And its their fault that they don't accept the Ultralisk as their own unit. I actually like using the ultralisk when I play Z.. Is it an awesome unit standard? no. but neither was it from BW. Once u get their armor/speed upgraded, then they become efficient. 0-0 ultra against toss army? may not be the best money u spend, but then again, if u're playing a protoss and get the chance to make ultras, yet haven't made any upgrades, well then.. thats your own fault. Even so, who cares if the ultra isnt used? Zergs like using broodlords anyway - which is totally imbalanced
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