|
I'd like to see more with larva creation. For example, the ability to drop larva from an overseer would be pretty interesting. Maybe allow overseer to drop a larva for ~100 energy, move Infested terrans back to Infestors, then create corruption to be something like:
Upon being destroyed, a unit will cause a 10% decrease in attack speed over n seconds to x AoE.
The synergy would be that the zerg player could have increased mobility in spawning single units as harassment or establishing/denying island bases with overlord/overseer. Also, the corruption could be used in conjunction with a burrowed roach to set up ambushes on terran mech. (Burrowed roach hit by corruption burrow moving on an enemy position then unburrowing causing speed decrease to tanks/other defensive units.)
|
I've always felt that from a flavor standpoint the strike cannons should function like AA flak guns and have synergy with the sensor tower. Thors should be able to use the strike cannon ability to siege up and hammer air, very similar to siege tanks on the ground. Attacking a spot with the strike cannon should launch large AOE air-only splash attacks into areas without vision, possibly when aided by detection from the sensor tower. This gives the thor a role in static air defense without stepping on the the of the radar tower as a detector, increases the usefulness of sensor towers for scouting and brings the thor closer to being the heavy mech/AA goliath replacement they're intending it to be.
For Zerg I'd like to see unit HP reduced, build times decreased and dps increased. Zerg doesn't feel swarm-y enough to me. An upgrade that lets Zerg break the food limit might accomplish this. Zerg casters need a lot of help, but a good start would be the removal of infested terrans.
|
On June 10 2010 04:26 CharlieMurphy wrote:
I didn't read the wall of text in the op or any replies, but I skimmed it and it seems you want more wc3-esque abilities. These sound ok on paper, but in practice its cluttery, confusing, and just unnecessary imho.
I really don't value your honest opinion if you haven't even read the posts. Sure, you 'skimmed' them, but you're missing the majority of what people have said in their respective posts. Just don't post if you don't know what you're talking about, please.
And these changes ARE necessary. The abilities are practically useless, corruption and frenzy are rarely ever used from what I've seen as a random player, and someone who watches a ton of games. Make Frenzy worth casting, and make corruption good enough to where it is actually used, and give zerg a way to combat late game terran a little bit easier.
|
What if the corruptor cast corruption by landing and effectively burrowing. Its tentacles then corrupting all enemy units within a certain radius. The corruptor could be effectively cloaked and immobile, not attacking. The effect could be timed, or until the corruptor was killed. I think such a unit design could make the corruption skill more useful and also provide sufficient incentive to focus on the positioning of relatively slow corruptors for casting corruption which, as stated before, can be very vulnerable when a moved into a battle. Also, since muta still seem preferable to corruptors for air control, especially vs. vikings, I think that such a change could spice of the corruptor by giving it some influence over ground engagments.
|
Corruption: The spread upon death idea is great. Even then, the range on it is terrible, I rarely use corruptors because, honestly, why would I want an anti air unit with one very niche ability when I could just as easily go mass mutalisk and be just as effective?
If corruption was a 10% damage taken increase(instead of 20%) and spread to 2 more targets every time one target died, it could be allot more useful. Now corruptors are slow anti-air units, AND have the ability to give support against mass ground(similar to how phoenix are great against siege and immortals).
Frenzy: It's definitely unique, not many other units can buff. Unfortunately it's like Todie said; it's only really useful for ultralisks. I think we can fix this a couple different ways. Again, this is brainstorming so if it's a stupid idea, say it's a stupid idea.
1. make frenzy AoE, and instead of a damage increase, it gives you a movement increase, also have it cost significantly more. This way if you have nothing to mind control you can give your army that offensive push that zerg players love so much. I read this and think of it like the opposite of a forcefield. It's something used to push hard and fast, and can punish terrans who turtle with siege tanks.
OR
2. make frenzy an auto cast aura with a sister ability. like:
Frenzy - provides units within x yards of the infestor a *% attack speed increase
Bulwark - provides units within x yards of the infestor a +* armor increase
Infestors are already pretty damn squishy, and an aura buff would give players a serious incentive to try and micro them down first.
*something small like 5 to 10% increase, and 1 to 2 armor increase
|
I really like OP's idea of how to make corruption cooler. Right now corruption and frenzy are EASILY the 2 lamest spells in the game.
They really should just get rid of frenzy. it's way too warcraftey, extremely similar to corruption, extremely 1-dimensional, and completely uninteresting to play with, against, or even watch. They really should just replace it with a new spell that helps support melee units against ranged armies. My original idea for this was just an AoE "blind" type spell that reduces sight and range of all units affected. Another Idea I just thought of would be called dark swarm but just completely cuts visibility of the affected area, basically making a bunch of LoS blockers. You could cast it in front of the opponent's army and then they cant see what's inside the cloud until they put something in it (or something like that).
I mean frenzy is just so unbelievably place-holder and 1-dimensional it makes me sick. I used to complain that infested terrans were uninspired and horribly boring, but frenzy makes me almost miss them on the infestor.
|
I wasn't sure they needed fixing, but there are some interesting ideas here I suppose.
|
On June 10 2010 04:57 Salty wrote:
Corruption: The spread upon death idea is great. Even then, the range on it is terrible, I rarely use corruptors because, honestly, why would I want an anti air unit with one very niche ability when I could just as easily go mass mutalisk and be just as effective?
If corruption was a 10% damage taken increase(instead of 20%) and spread to 2 more targets every time one target died, it could be allot more useful. Now corruptors are slow anti-air units, AND have the ability to give support against mass ground(similar to how phoenix are great against siege and immortals).
Frenzy: It's definitely unique, not many other units can buff. Unfortunately it's like Todie said; it's only really useful for ultralisks. I think we can fix this a couple different ways. Again, this is brainstorming so if it's a stupid idea, say it's a stupid idea.
1. make frenzy AoE, and instead of a damage increase, it gives you a movement increase, also have it cost significantly more. This way if you have nothing to mind control you can give your army that offensive push that zerg players love so much. I read this and think of it like the opposite of a forcefield. It's something used to push hard and fast, and can punish terrans who turtle with siege tanks.
OR
2. make frenzy an auto cast aura with a sister ability. like:
Frenzy - provides units within x yards of the infestor a *% attack speed increase
Bulwark - provides units within x yards of the infestor a +* armor increase
Infestors are already pretty damn squishy, and an aura buff would give players a serious incentive to try and micro them down first.
*something small like 5 to 10% increase, and 1 to 2 armor increase
I think you're going about this in a totally drastic way. We're trying to tweak the ability to make it viable, not totally change it completely.
Also, increasing the speed of units would be beneficial, but it would just be the same units, but faster. Frenzy gives them more DPS, allowing units to get more use.
Also, infestors are insanely high on the unit priority, so microing them down really isn't as much as an issue, and aura abilities would be a good idea, except that the infestor would die too fast to be of any use with the aura ability. Abilities that aren't specifically linked to the infestor are a must, because it has as much HP as a sentry, and is an armored unit.
|
Looking back, auras are pretty iffy, and a cheap auto cast frenzy might feel too much like shamans in WC3. I sadly cannot think of any useful way to use {the current} frenzy aside from ultralisks.
If damage bonus was changed to attack speed you could at least frenzy things like brood lords for faster broodling spawns.
Edit: if you make it castable on non-bio units it could be really interesting. buffing teammates' thors or colossi would definitely make it more viable in any team game, without breaking its mechanic.
|
On June 10 2010 05:23 Ideas wrote:
I really like OP's idea of how to make corruption cooler. Right now corruption and frenzy are EASILY the 2 lamest spells in the game.
They really should just get rid of frenzy. it's way too warcraftey, extremely similar to corruption, extremely 1-dimensional, and completely uninteresting to play with, against, or even watch. They really should just replace it with a new spell that helps support melee units against ranged armies. My original idea for this was just an AoE "blind" type spell that reduces sight and range of all units affected. Another Idea I just thought of would be called dark swarm but just completely cuts visibility of the affected area, basically making a bunch of LoS blockers. You could cast it in front of the opponent's army and then they cant see what's inside the cloud until they put something in it (or something like that).
I mean frenzy is just so unbelievably place-holder and 1-dimensional it makes me sick. I used to complain that infested terrans were uninspired and horribly boring, but frenzy makes me almost miss them on the infestor.
I agree that damage % increases are awfully akin to WC and smell like MMO gameplay dynamics to me. I don't think that fits to well with SC2. I really like the blind debuff idea. An infestor could burrow walk close enough to the ranged army to get a cast off. And then lings could actually be worth their hive tech upgrade. I think its a clever way to make zerg melee more effective verses range and siege without relapsing to defilers and dark swarm.
|
I personally like my 1-shot block idea.
|
Suggestion for either of those abilities after watching the Jerry Springer Show. Cast on 2 non-massive enemy units of the same type. They randomly arent controllable and will attack eachother until the units are at 50% health.
|
The current state of these two spells simply don't fit in SCII. They are usefull? Arguably yes, they can change the battlefield, they can be mastered they can affect the gameplay. But they do it in a adequate fashion, and by adequate I mean in a way that add depth to the game, that add options, coolness, feeling, and that unique SC way to be where armys and not heroes fight upon supremacy, are these spells adequate, do they fit in this game? In my humble opinion: no.
Why not. Zerg is the race with the fewer different units. The chance you have to add depth, to add choices and create new situations and possibilities in the game is to make these units usefull, to give them diversity to make them unique. Spells like the current frenzy and corrupt are simply too bland to add anything at all to Zerg gameplay, it's just dull. Right now the zergs need a spell that add things to the game, not a mechanic, dull, simple spell. Examples: in BW we have restoration from the medic. Usefull? Yes, in certain cases, but almost imperceptible, not a must have, not something to really worry about. And we have dark swarm from the defiler. Usefull? Maybe too much, it change entirely how the game flows in TvZ for example - note that I'm not saying that Dark Swarm should be brought back.
Maybe just messing around with these two spells isn't enoght. Maybe blizz will use this time with beta down to come up with a few ideas or new concepts to try out in the final stage of beta, because it'll be hard to try this new stuff after the release as the OP stated. And maybe, just maybe, they lurk around this f**** awesome site TL is to get some new ideas and find a thread named "Brainstorm around how to fix Frenzy & corruption" and think "woa, thats exacly what I needed, why don't give these guys a shot?". So, I think that anything goes. Let's post anything that may be usefull or may not, let's just bring some ideas to the table. That's what brainstorming is about, right? With this in mind I'd like to suggest a new version to corrupt:
Spawn Corruption - Costs xx energy or have a set number of uses, like vulture mines, or cost resources, or a combination of these.
Upon each use the corruptor spawns a flying, static, corruption mine that charges foward to any flying nearby enemies and - causes damage, slows down (cool to catch phoenixes), slows speed down, increase damage input, WE.
|
Corruption is amazing. pheonixes have graviton beam, which while more power, is made up for by the fact that pheonixes are easily killed and have to stay still to use it. corruption allows corruptors to help your army even when all the air units are dead. ALSO corruption allows a corruptor to 1v1 a viking and win, which is very good.
|
I like your take on corruption. That would indeed make it more interesting.
However, 20% extra damage is still a bland damage modifier. Change it to something more interesting, like some type of damage mechanic, and you got my vote. Heck, the corruptor's original ability to create corrupted masses sounds a 1000 times more entertaining than this. Same thing happened to the roach actually, it went from an interesting naturally regenerating unit to a big fat thing with ridiculous supply cost, damage, armor, HP and a burrowing regeneration mechanic that nobody used. I understand they were removed because they were difficult to balance. I don't understand that logic. You don't replace cool ideas with boring stuff just because its easier to balance, you balance, dammit!
In my opinion frenzy should be gone altogether. Even with your nice mechanic helping it spread, the ability is still a tacked on +2 upgrade. We got actual upgrades for that kind of stuff. Even if it was AoE, its still flat damage increase that would become mandatory in zerg play. About as fun as watching a candle melt.
There are simply so many cooler things that the zerg could do than friggin bloodlust. Blizzard's lack of creativity surprises me.
|
Corruption is fine. In fact for ZvZ I think it needs to be revised because it stops larvae from spawning and it prevents injected larvae from dropping to the ground while active. That's too powerful in ZvZ and it will break one base plays.
Aside from lings a lot of zerg units are really slow on the ground. I'm actually in favor of Frenzy just giving each unit a massive movement increase for 45 seconds at the cost of 25 mana.
|
On June 10 2010 04:26 CharlieMurphy wrote:
I didn't read the wall of text in the op or any replies, but I skimmed it and it seems you want more wc3-esque abilities. These sound ok on paper, but in practice its cluttery, confusing, and just unnecessary imho.
Huge reason why wc3 failed as a spectator sport
This. Lets please move away from abilities that are overly cluttering and just are not very obvious to the watcher.
|
maybe if they made frenzy an aeo buff with the same effects and increase cost to something like 100 energy or 150 it would definitely see more use.
Of course make the radius the same as that of storm to even it out
|
I think corruption would be useful if the unit released a patch of creep when it died. This way, after killing one, you could send in a bunch of zerglings with better results. This mixed with the spreading by death idea could be pretty useful.
|
Frenzy: A bonus to the unit's regeneration. This would easily fit with Zerg's lore, a temporary overdrive of the zergs metabolism or some such. Making it still mostly for larger units ie. the Ultras enabling them to be the tanks they ought to be.
Corruption: A static AoE cloud under which all units received a % extra damage. I think this would help zerg bust turtled players holding a static choke. Does not affect buildings.
Imagine a terran entrenched at a choke... you Frenzy ultras to run up and not be vaporized instantly, then throw down some Corruption clouds where the terran is holding his units. Now he is forced to either move or defend from what has now become a less favorable position.
I think this would reward more dynamic play.
I also like the idea of a spell where a unit gets infected with a larva, "hatching" when that unit dies... maybe to replace the almost universally recognized uselessness of infested terran.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
