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On May 26 2010 19:35 FuRong wrote:
I think what the OP is getting at is that if there are too many "hurdles" for new players (casuals, people lacking RTS experience, whatever you want to call them) to jump over, then they will be quickly discouraged and quit.
So let them quit, multiplayer isn't for everyone. There's plenty to do in SC2 that doesn't involve laddering. And the ladder system in SC2 is way more noob friendly than BW multiplayer is already.
BW sold what, 11 million copies? Have we really devolved this much as gamers over the last decade that this isn't good enough for Blizzard and we have to dumb it down? I'm all for making certain things easier and less tedious than they were (technology and UI's advance over time) but if a new player gets rolled by cheese then well, maybe this isn't the game for them or they should go play single player maps. If Blizz wants to fix some of that stuff fine, as long as it doesn't affect high level play. I'd just work on high level play first.
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A casual player could be the next WhiteRa or Sen. You just don't know. But if they lose 10 times to a cheese, they aren't going to think "well, I need to L2P". They will just leave because they think the game is shit and your game will die.
That seems to be the motivation of the OP for suggesting his concept of 'casual balance'. I'd like to retort by suggesting that the attitude of 'I've lost to this 10 times so the game must be broken' disqualifies that person from ever being any good at this (or any) game.
As stated by various people, the best approach is to assume that the game is balanced and learn to adapt. It's the only way to improve and enjoy the game. Whining about imbalance is rarely going to impact the developers and instead stunts your own development.
tldr: l2p
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then youll get better and play better players. Thats the entire point of the way the ladder is. What the hell is your problem.
Sigh... again... calm down...
I think you might be missing the point. I am not talking about me... I am past that stage of SC development, I'm on a forum and watch replays nor have I made a single complaint about a particular strategy being OP. I know the upper level games are less cheesy. I'm talking about the perspective of new players.
The point is, that if you were new to the game and this represented your first experience of the game, it might convince you that the game wasn't worth investing time in because your first 20 ladder matches were 1-dimensional and boring, leading to the overall shrinking of the fan-base and player pool. If your opinion on their reaction is 'shutup and go away' then so be it. We can leave it at that, just think before you start posting insults please.
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On May 27 2010 00:52 Sadist wrote:Show nested quote +On May 27 2010 00:50 Goobahfish wrote:wow the level of posting in the sc2 forum is fucking atrocious. Noobcakes? Are you kidding me? I was just trying to be light-hearted. Calm down. Calling them noobcakes and cheeseballs makes it sound a bit more fun and kind of describes them in a slightly less, 'you suck' kind of way. Learn to defend zergling rushes you nitwit, or Dt rushes, or cannon rushes, it would be like me losing in 4 moves in chess and complaining after i lose to it over and over.
Being able to beat "cheeseballs" should give you a sense of accomplishment. God you guys are terrible. Ok, as this follows on to a direct quote form a term I coined, I can only interpret this comment as being directed at me. What the hell are you talking about? The above stated rushes are easy to defend, they are just boring to play against because it makes the game 1-dimensional (rush works/doesn't work... gg). The reason it doesn't give a sense of achievement is because it repetitive. Using your own analogy, it's like a 4-move mate, except there is a 6-move counter-mate. Either way I'm stuck with a 6-move game... huzzahs >_> then youll get better and play better players. Thats the entire point of the way the ladder is. What the hell is your problem.
![[image loading]](http://img243.imageshack.us/img243/4053/ahhhigottakillem.gif)
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United States22883 Posts
On May 27 2010 01:04 Goobahfish wrote:Show nested quote +then youll get better and play better players. Thats the entire point of the way the ladder is. What the hell is your problem. Sigh... again... calm down... I think you might be missing the point. I am not talking about me... I am past that stage of SC development, I'm on a forum and watch replays nor have I made a single complaint about a particular strategy being OP. I know the upper level games are less cheesy. I'm talking about the perspective of new players. The point is, that if you were new to the game and this represented your first experience of the game, it might convince you that the game wasn't worth investing time in because your first 20 ladder matches were 1-dimensional and boring, leading to the overall shrinking of the fan-base and player pool. If your opinion on their reaction is 'shutup and go away' then so be it. We can leave it at that, just think before you start posting insults please.
Again, that's why there's tutorials and the novice setting. You should probably be able to get 10+ games before entering real competition, if you so choose.
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btw...
Anyone who hates cheese and likes mid level competition can always play against me in some custom games. I don't cheese, I don't like 5 minute games with one sided victories and enjoy playing for fun.
I'm sure there will be thousands of players like me once the game is actually released, no real reason to ladder if you only play a few hours a week (aka casual).
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That was really interesting, but it doesn't quite hit the mark.
On May 26 2010 07:26 Edmon wrote:
Imagine if you will that overlords have the ability to infest buildings. This would be silly but hear me out. So, they have this ability and it only works on terrans. The overlord has to float over the command center, some tenticles lower into it. They damage it at 50 HP/Second and once it goes red, it's an SC1 style infested building.
Now, this so far, is balanced on the competitive tier. A competitive terran will -never- allow this to happen. He will have marines out in time and he'll have that overlord shot down so fast it will not know what hit it. Zerg will be down an overlord critically early, so most good players won't even bother to try it. Later on, a single turret will prevent this from ever happening ever again.
On the casual tier, this ability is a huge cheese and it may work almost all of the time. Players with poor timings don't have defences down in time. If they do, they forget the simple things all competitive players remember to do at the same time. Like wall in/off and panic. They lose over and over and they rage all over the forums about it.
This is an excellent point. However, you cannot make a game both casual and competitive at the same time. When you make the game more competitive, casual players will suffer. When you make the game more casual, the competitive level will stagnate.
No hardcore fanbase is an island. You need the new blood. Once casuals are addicted to the game and -not- before, will they decide "I want to be better" and start playing hard to win. Maybe, a year down the line, one of these guys will be epic and Day[9] will be blah-blah-blahing about him being a hero. You just don't know.
I don't know about this part because from adversity, comes greatness. A player must hit rock bottom to reach new heights. There aren't as many casuals who become great as those who do it for the love of the game. You're absolutely right about the new blood though. They are necessary to advance the level of play (even by serving as cannon fodder). The major problem is... where do we draw the line? Consider this: If we could put casuals together in a single division, the person closest to playing like a pro will dominate the division. We can't move him to the pro division since he will be crushed by everyone, but we can't keep him in the casual division either. You can't really solve this problem because it is up to the casual players to overcome the barrier.
When I see this change, I quickly realise that, it's not going to change competitive play, because that tier will adapt. Cheese rarely ever works against competitive players, so why even have it all (The cheese not the ability) if you can prevent it? Plus, in this example, overlords now having energy means that you could kill them with feedback. This is a change, maybe for the better, maybe not. Imagine a doomdrop being stopped with feedback. Sometimes when we elimate cheese we can create new, epic plays.
Sometimes, it's necessary to keep cheeses in order to balance the game itself. By having the threat of cheeses, you cannot simply go for the most efficient economical build every single time. The threat of cheese is much more valuable than the actual cheese itself, since it adds more options to both the attacker and defender. Should they build more workers? Pump more units out? By keeping these lanes open, both players must also keep their cool while considering all the possibilities.
So, in conclusion I would say. Whatever the cheese is, be it void ray, reaper, cannons. I ask not that you say "L2P, L2S, etc" and just stop and think... can we keep these players without ruining the competitive game? Can we remove the cheese but keep the strategy? Can it be balanced for both tiers?
I would argue that a good balance designer can have his delicious competitive cake and have a casual player eat it and that this is what will determine if this game is still around 10 years from now. So the next time a flavour of the month cheese fills the forum, I would ask only that you think of a solution, before reaching for the L2P-bat.
Because in the end, it will make the game better for everybody if you do.
Thanks for reading.
It can't be balanced for both tiers as I mentioned in my previous comments. As for the "L2P, L2S, etc", there really isn't any better medicine than that. It's very harsh, but it is what all the better players have done. They didn't skirt around it, they guzzled that **** to play better.
Furthermore, we shouldn't underestimate the resilience of casuals. If you look at fighting games, casuals still play it, despite getting crushed by better players. Other RTS? They play it. World of WarCraft? Ugh! Despite the skill difference in StarCraft 1 and 2, they are able to survive at least in the early to mid game.
Even if they stop playing SC2 ladder, there will always be UMS... =D
<Edit: Fixed bold tags to work properly!>
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Balance on any level is easier said than done, but the OP does bring up a good point.
The success of SC2 won't only depend on how it plays on high level competition, but how well it draws lower level players as well. If SC2 is accessible on all levels then it will be universally popular.
BW was universally accepted as being perfectly balanced - and the truth is it may have been as much as it wasn't. But pros kept trying to continuously find counters for everything they encountered, because they accepted the fact that it wasn't the game was broken, it was their play.
With SC2, it's easier to throw around the word "imbalanced" because of its stage in early development. It's hard to find what really is imbalanced among the noise of everyone shouting IMBA. Imbalances do exist, but it's best to play the game knowing you can counter everything.
Morale of the story: Everything is more complicated than it seems.
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this is retarded. How do you plan on balancing a game between 2 bad players, 1 masses roaches the other masses mutas. Mutas are bullshit.
quit game forever
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Thanks for posting this Edmon!
(Too bad it's too much elitism in these forums)
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I am afraid it has little to do with elitism and more to do with unrealistic goals.
I have debated as to if I even wanted to respond to this, but it appears people simply don't get it. I am more then a little surprised that the OP claims to be a game designer and has that little grasp on the difference between a casual player and a non casual.
Simply put your example is never going to happen and here is why; The mind set between a casual player and a competitive player are completely different. A Casual player is NEVER going to become a competitive player. I think the core problem here is that most do not understand the difference between a Casual player, a new player and a competitive player. The three are not the same and there are some extremely distinct differences.
A Casual player is just that, casual. They aren't thinking in the competitive "How to I get better" mind set, they are thinking "I just want to have fun". The amount of hours you play does not dictate the type of player you are. So while you may have casual play hours due to RL obligations, if you think in a competitive mindset you are still a competitive player not a casual. I would go so far as to say there are few to no true casual players on this forum, but competitive players who have just had to accept playing casually due to other obligations.
A competitive player is constantly thinking on how to improve their game.
A new player could become casual or competitive, it simply depends on if they think "I want to have fun" or "How do I get good?".
So the real argument is does the product drive off a new player who could become competitive in your example? That question is difficult to answer because it really just depends on the individual player. If a player likes the overall game, then they are going to continue pushing to get better. If they don't they are going to move on when something else comes along. The balance you speak of is only going to be an issue on ladders, most true casual players are not going to bother with ladders. At the very least the tutorials and single player mode that we do not have here are going to up their skill sufficiently that the op example is a moot point anyhow.
I could go into a long drawn out debate as to why not catering to casual players is not going to affect this particular game, but I doubt most would read or comprehend it anyhow. Suffice to say I have been around this block more then a few times and catering balance on a casual level has always failed. There is not a single multiplayer game out that attempted to balance around casual play that survived. Every single game including WoW which is arguably one of the lowest skill demanding games out there is still balanced around the Max potential. To even attempt to argue that a game like this should be balanced around casual concerns such as suggested by the OP is simply absurd and smacks of a complete misunderstanding of gameplay balance.
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To add to the above post, the large majority of multiplayer RTS's do not truthfully support casual (playing just to have fun) gameplay. It can happen as a side outcome, but definately not as it's main objective. Because at the end of the day, the game is designed as a "you try to beat him" strategy game.
To walk a thorny road, we may cover its every inch with leather or we can make sandals.
The reason people get angry when they are cheesed, is because they are scared. They don't know how to handle it, they weren't expecting it, and it exposed a critical weakness in their playing style. Instead of seeing it as a wonderful experience that allows them to notice said weakness, and to learn from it, they get defensive and instead blame the system. Truth be told, countering cheese tactics isn't a difficult thing when you properly practice against them and be constantly weary of their possibility. And it almost always has the highest pay-off capacity for any defensive manuvere.
To those who are casual and want to just play around with units, well there's single player, and custom games. But considering that the main premise of this game is to have a competitive RTS format, the game should not be balanced to please those who are effectively too lazy, or have ego's too large to accept their losses for what they really are.
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I thought the discussion flew over everyone's head by page 6 but the last 4 pages are just fail.
If you don't understand the OP, ask for clarification. Don't derail the thread into stupid elitist nonsense.
Oh TL, what is happening to quality?
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On May 27 2010 02:39 Vexx wrote:
I thought the discussion flew over everyone's head by page 6 but the last 4 pages are just fail.
If you don't understand the OP, ask for clarification. Don't derail the thread into stupid elitist nonsense.
Oh TL, what is happening to quality?
There's plenty of good debate going on here. Don't derail it by causing an argument about derailing it.
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Your example is I know just something picked to illustrate the point but it's not a good example. You have suggested a bad game design cheese- that is it's a specific ability that messes up new players and is useless among normal players. This ability should be cut from the game.
What is called a cheese however is very variable, especially new players will call anything that causes them to lose a cheese like getting ranged goons early and microing hard vs a Terran who's trying to mechanically copy a fast siege expand build with little understanding of the necessary building blocking, unit placement and SCV blocking required to succeed. They don't understand that it's their own failure to know how to play the corner cases and extremes of strategies they see others do that causes their problem, not a problem with the game.
'Cheese' is inevitable in a game like Starcraft, and cannot and should not be cut out just because new players lose to it. A game like Starcraft means units and abilities are powerful and swingy, small things will end the game. The nature of build orders and timing means that it will inevitably be possible to concentrate these abilities before the unaware opponent is ready for that ability. Now sometimes it is necessary to nerf the cheese for all players but usually it represents the need to gain a particular understanding of the game to defeat the cheese. I've found Starcraft:BW to be unique in that techniques and builds do counter cheese quite easily, it's fantastic after suffering through the various phases of bullshit in WC3 (ZOMG Beastmaster si balanced joo just suck for however many months before they fixed it as half the ladder cheesed away).
The problem with the mindset you're suggesting is that I think it is a poor approach to game design, by taking the approach that 'this is hard for new players, we must nerf it' you remove all the edges that make the game interesting for more experienced players and you don't seek to understand more fully why something is a problem. I don't believe that new players really do struggle excessively with many strats and certainly not if they have access to information about what to do, instead they focus on the strat as being unfair because they lost to it as they weren't ready. The extent to which new players 'aren't ready' though is far more than any game could ever cater for, new players are 'no rush 15 kk?' not ready. What skill level is this imaginary new player who struggles with a given strat and still cannot deal with it when told how?
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Those posting (understandably given what site this is) have missed an important point. Blizzard are in the business of making profit, or they cease to exist, and have to appeal primarily to the largest demographic. Many of their customers will never play online against another human being (possibly most - A good reference is the 'multiplayer' game Demigod - only 23% of players ever even tried a single game online!). Of those that do play SC2 online I suspect the vast majority will have never heard of a build order and will want to play UMS or no rush maps. If they have a bad experience then they may not buy blizzards next product, so who do you think blizzard must balance for? The OP is thinking exactly as the blizzard games designers must.
You could argue that e-sports will generate more sales, but I suspect the reason blizzard are trying so hard to balance the competitive multiplayer for a tiny minority is because all the employees enjoy it so much! Not because it's a sound idea for them but because they love the game.
A pro-mod version of the game could and probably will emerge to cater for the competitive scene in any case.
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Great post... sadly it's on TL.net (My favorite source for all things SC but one of my least as far as how raging and elite alot of the community is)... so yes I agree and good luck getting flamed!
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If a game is too competitive and hard, newer players will get fed up easily, and the game will slowly die since the older people of the community move on with their lives. You have no esport.
If a game is too noob-friendly, then competition gets too easy and nobody will enjoy watching it (look at CoD4). You have no esport.
It lies in the balance. If you look at starcraft and cs1.6, both games have lasted this long because of it.
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Just to nitpick on one point I disagree with.. you say cheese doesn't affect top players. It does, they might not fall for it but they have to prepare for it.
That said, what is the real point here, are you saying blizz isn't balancing for the casual players?
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Please stop the elitism. First off, I was there on release day for Starcraft, you were still 5-7 and playing some sort of game on your SNES, possibly Chrono Trigger or some other game that was SOMEWHAT challenging... And stating it was too hard. Yes, you were one of the people that started to make companies realize people ENJOY winning, being ABLE to win, etc... There are no Ghosts 'n Goblins, or Metal Slugs anymore for this reason.
Am I saying this is a bad thing? No, I am not. Stay with me here, don't get all angry at the bearer of reality. Games, even our beloved Starcraft, have to be ACCESSIBLE by ANYONE in order to make money. Multiplayer is NO different, this is why the league system has been established and why they will work well upon release ( in theory ). The OP pointed out a great example of why balance changes are important, but so many people let this in one ear and out the other, so let's make it personal.
When you started playing competitively, what was your game of choice? Mine, although I played SC and BW for a long time, I was an FPS player and my games were Tribes, followed by CS and CSS. I was Cal-I in CSS with team.Hyper relatively early on (first season Cal-i was introduced, and I stayed there until I had to take college seriously) which made me one of the top players in a game that had hundreds of thousands, if not millions were playing so trust me, I know competitive play more than the vast majority of you can even fathom. Did I start out this way? Hell no.
I played UMS maps in Broodwar because I really didn't care how well I did in multiplayer, it wasn't my thing. I was not a competitive player and I don't think I EVER touched the ladder because RTS wasn't for me back then. I was in it for Smash TV remakes, the little RPG's, Tower Defense, you name it... I was a baller because I was so damn good at all those, clearly this made me an AWESOME Starcraft player in 2001....
Soon after I went to Korea for the World Cup with some of my closest friends, and Starcraft became more and more appealing. It was like I was introduced to this entire new world just by going to a PC Bang... After this I would go through phases, playing it, not playing it... Getting better, getting frustrated when I thought I was unstoppable... Throwing my mouse, etc. I was becoming a competitive RTS player, and you know what? I HATED everyone that had been playing ladder for as long as I SHOULD have been playing it. I got so frustrated, the game was LITERALLY inaccessible for competitive play, no one likes losing 20-30 matches in a row on the big scary b.net ladder. I gave up, played games I knew how...
I came back to BW when I became a little more mature and understanding only to love it. Most people will never come back after going through what I did, I am sure you went through it as well, and I also know I have friends enjoying SC2 that never came back to BW after trying to go through the same process I did.
Why do people like SC2 so far, casuals and competitive? Because it is accessible, and it still has a high level of complexity for those that will be taking it more seriously.
Whine all you want, you're still going to buy the game... And so are millions of others, that aren't in the 1% of the player base that are competitive.
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EPT
