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This is my first time making a topic on TL so please give me a break if I've done something wrong.
So essentially I want to talk a little bit about the lack of ultralisk usage in competitive play, the reasons for that and a potential solution to the problem.
IN SC:BW, ultra/ling was a great combination especially against terran bio. Why? The ultras ate the damage that allowed your cracklings to close. Even large groups of zerglings are very bad against an MM ball of sufficient size because they simply can't get close enough... a classic example of critical mass. Mixing in ultras made it possible for zerglings to kill marines. When combined with dark swarm, the ultra/ling strategy became even more powerful. Ultras were also used in ZvP since the primary midgame protoss army consisted of zealots, sairs, archons and a lot of storm. Storms were significantly less effective against ultras than against hydras or lings, and ultras also went up well against zealots.
So why aren't Ultras used much in SC2? They now have more hitpoints, more damage and hit in an area of effect. They also start fast and don't need a speed upgrade (although they're I believe slightly slower compared to their BW version). On paper, the SC2 Ultralisk looks much more powerful... but at present they really aren't.
So why is this? One of the obvious reasons is that there isn't any dark swarm in SC2, but the main reason is that they simply aren't able to synergize well with zerglings. Why not? They're really fat.
It takes only 1 or 2 ultralisks to essentially block off your entire zergling force from reaching your opponent if you're attacking through even a moderately large choke. If you send the zerglings first, they will get focus fired and die. Blizzard responded to the lack of ultra usage by giving them more damage to armored targets but reducing their hitpoints... a change that many TL users were not happy with because it really does not fit what the classic Ultra role is... tanking, not as a crackling substitute.
How do I suggest we fix the Ultra? Given them no collision with units with the "light" modifier. The concept is simple, allow zerglings to run at the feet of Ultralisks and attack with them. The idea is, the Ultra engages first and the lings run between their legs and start causing havok. This would also allow the Ultra to better fulfill the roll Blizzard intends, which is anti-armor. Let's think about each MU.
1) ZvT. Against bio, the effect is obvious. It's pretty much exactly as I describe above. Large marine counts may even warrant banelings between the Ultra's legs... Against mech, zerglings running underneath an ultra would face full tank splash, so that isn't necessarily the desired effect... but now consider that marines and helions are the two most common tank support unit, and both of them have the light modifier. Your ultras could just ignore and run over the marines or helions (both of which deal very little damage to ultras due to high armor) and start killing tanks with their boosted damage to armored units.
2) ZvP. One of the hardest late-game army compositions for a zerg to deal with is collosus, stalker, sentry, zealot. Blizzard has already removed the ability of forcefield to block an ultra, and this modification would mean that zealots can't either. The Ultra could run right past the zealots and start smacking the collossi and stalkers. Additionally, the zergling synergy would bode well since stalkers are quite bad against zerglings. A protoss player that elects to make immortals to kill ultras would have issues dealing with zerglings since doing so would eat into their collosus count by occupying their robo.
3) ZvZ. ZvZ rarely reaches such a late game, but in the rare cases that it does, ultra/ling would be a nice counter to mass hydra.
I'd love thoughts, comments.
Poll: Should Ultras have no collision with light units?Yes. (197) 56% No, Ultra's are fine the way they are. (78) 22% No, there's a better way to fix the Ultra. (46) 13% Yes, but this isn't enough. (15) 4% Yes, but we'd have to nerf them some other way. (13) 4% 349 total votes Your vote: Should Ultras have no collision with light units? (Vote): Yes.
(Vote): Yes, but this isn't enough.
(Vote): Yes, but we'd have to nerf them some other way.
(Vote): No, Ultra's are fine the way they are.
(Vote): No, there's a better way to fix the Ultra.
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Not colliding with light units would be the perfect way to make them viable, i doubt they will be too strong either as there are lots of counters to Ultralisks (Marauders, Immortals, Hydralisks to name a few.).
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it is already viable just look at TLO's ZvT
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Banelings aren't light, so they wouldn't fit perfectly with ultras, but other than that, this sounds good. And crimsn, weren't those matches on Metalopolis, and the ultras only engaged in open spaces? Seems a bit too specific to make a case for it. Correct me if I'm wrong.
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Do what was done with the Thor and just make the model smaller.
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ultralisks are much stronger in the current patch. I dont think that dumbing down micro would be a good change at all.
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If anything needs to be done to improve ultralisks, which is unclear cause the last patch has has way too little uptime, I wouldn't change anything that would trivialize unit control (micro).
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On June 13 2010 23:30 crimsn wrote:
it is already viable just look at TLO's ZvT
Or ZvP.
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I completely disagree .. This only makes you able to a-move the 1 control group. Just control better, use the other numbers.
What's funny to me is that in the beginning everyone was saying that sc2 required no mechanical skill and now everyone wants to make it easier.. :D
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I think one possible solution would be to keep the model size of the ultralisk the same but make the collision size slightly smaller than the ultra. This would allow zerglings to run through and maybe room for a roach/hydra on the side to support. I don't think an ultralisk should be sitting on top of 8 hydras.
A more realistic option would be to create collision points only where the ultralisks' feet are.
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A more realistic option would be to create collision points only where the ultralisks' feet are.
I like this, but I still think that an ultra should not be able to stand over a tank or collosus, so we would still have to use the light modifier thing except where the feet are.
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Ultralisk are already viable.. i seen quite a few top zerg use them in the last patch. Just give it a bit more time and more will use them when they learn that they aint that bad anymore.
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Making them not collide would make it too easy, probably too powerful aswell.
Ultras are already viable, as has been proven already.
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I wouldn't mind a smaller ultralisk, but I'm not convinced the unit needs adjusting. I've seen at least a few good zergs use them effectively, and I've personally used them and faced off against them in ZvP where they're arguably the most useful. Ultras completely destroy a huge stalker army and they laugh at colossi.
In TvZ even if your'e right in saying that the ultras obstruct your army, they do their job of soaking up damage, letting your lings at least get close to that bio/mech ball. Yes 4 ultralisks don't destroy everything in their path, and they do seem to not usually be an insta-win once you get to them but I really don't think they've been explored enough to call them crap or even underwhelming. People just get their ultralisk cavern up and say "ok, nothing but ultras hehehehe".
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The major issue with Ultralisks is their collision with other units. Thors do have the same problem. This blocking results in them being useless, i.e. unable to reach their target to deal damage. Especially when trying to charge a Terran mech position it seems pointless to use Ultralisks when the tanks will kill them before they even get close. This will not change if the Ultralisks can walk over small units, because they will get killed before by a surplus of tanks anyways. If there is no surplus of tanks the Ultralisks are actually able to reach their target if used correctly. Zerg also have two other methods of deploying their ground forces and these should be used. For some inspiration I urge everyone who wants to figure out how to use them to watch Day[9] daily 131 and observe / listen how TLO uses them.
- Spread out the Ultralisks and attack several bases at once, thus maximizing the "front" at which you are fighting. This might mean that you are sacrificing one attack force, but that is a requirement to make your opponent defend everywhere.
- Only use a maximum of 3 Ultralisks in each attack force, unless the defensive positions of your opponent are weak AND they are wide open spaces (Metalopolis).
- Send in Ultralisks first to absorb the first shots from tanks and then run past them with Speedlings and after that your ranged units.
- Burrow(!) is a good upgrade for Ultralisks and obviously all armor upgrades will make it survive longer against smaller units with many shots.
- If you have an excess of Queens you might want to take them with the attack forces to act as combat medic for the Ultralisks. In BW there was Dark Swarm to prevent damage to Ultralisks, but in SC2 you have the power to heal them a big chunk instantly. Its the same effect, but SC2 is just a little more micro.
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NOOO,Terrans stormed this thread,run!
Ultra needs slight buff. No collision for light is a good idea.
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On June 14 2010 00:30 Kurumi wrote:
NOOO,Terrans stormed this thread,run!
Ultra needs slight buff. No collision for light is a good idea.
Protoss have storms ... Terrans nuke and EMP. :p
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Honestly I like your idea a lot.
But I only think zerglings and banelings would be the only unit who can fit in between the Ultra's legs. Zealots, marines, etc are just too big I find.
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i think that if they reduced the size of the ultra it would be alot better!! and the map design of almost all the blizzard maps is a graveyard for ultras its small maps with small chokes and lots of small ramps so if we got bigger maps with bigger ramps and bigger chokes that would actually make the ultra ALOT better..
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I think this would greatly enable the ultra to fit the role Blizz has set for it, a anti-armored unit. But since it's melee, it just can't get through the little guys fast enough. Plus with no collision from light, I could send my lings up the ramp at the same time as the clumsy ultras are trying to get up there.
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Ultralisks are viable. *points at TLO's usage on the Day9 Daily* You just need to send them in first, then the lings for the surround, with lots of infestors. As TLO said, they're better than they were in BW.
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I'm going to have to say that Ultras are viable if they can get to the enemy. Infestors really need to be there to FG infantry balls so they can't run away. Against mech... watch Day[9] #131.
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If your doing a normal ultra tech with ling infestor ultra, light armor units usualy don't give much problem when you add a couple fungal growths in the equation. Helion are lucky to hit more then 1 ultra, making helions meat at most. Marines get owned even worse by fungal growth. Zealots hold up a bit better, but again will be mostly just meat.
The zergling composition in the army is just one that you have to adjust in game. Alot of helions, stop making zerglings except to counter harass econs. Once they start popping out more marauders lings will do better in battle. Generally always try to flank with lings, if you attack on same side as ultras your wasting alot of units as they try to get in position. I think people need to stop thinking of ultras as tanks and lings as dps. Once you get a good amount of ultras with some infestor support they do plenty good damage to hold there own.
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I dont think its soon enough to talk about balance as there was next to no time testing the ultralisk 50 hp buff. Im afraid ignoring light unit collision would be too much, as much as I like the idea of it. Ultralisks being able to ignore zealots would be huge.
But in my opinion if anything finally reduce its collision size in general and just wait how it works out. The main reason I kind of dislike ultralisks are those famous memories of 2 of them blocking each other on a ramp and while hardly moving forward getting owned by a bunch of marines.
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If something about the ultra should be changed then probably the change that artosis is promoting in his recent vid. like increasing the range by 1-2.
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IMO, Ultras being larger than thors is a BAD idea. Ultra's can be morphed en masse, while thors cant. There will normally be a higher count of ultras to thors.
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Imo, ultras should just have a very small ranged attack that let the lings attack at the same time. No collision with lights would make it retarded.
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On June 14 2010 01:41 Fredz wrote:
Imo, ultras should just have a very small ranged attack that let the lings attack at the same time. No collision with lights would make it retarded.
^
That would be cool.
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On June 14 2010 01:43 Half wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 01:41 Fredz wrote:
Imo, ultras should just have a very small ranged attack that let the lings attack at the same time. No collision with lights would make it retarded. ^ That would be cool.
Yeah, Artosis and Tasteless and I think it should have a range of one or two for pathing.
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To all the ppl saying just look at TLO, may I ask which games are those? Links would be nice thank you.
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On June 14 2010 02:24 DunnyDman wrote:
To all the ppl saying just look at TLO, may I ask which games are those? Links would be nice thank you.
one of the latest day9 shows.
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On June 14 2010 02:24 DunnyDman wrote:
To all the ppl saying just look at TLO, may I ask which games are those? Links would be nice thank you.
It was in a Day9 daily on which TLO made a lenghty guest a appearance and that is why everyone and their dog has accepted it as the holy doctrine of starcraft 2 without regards to the fact that I dont think ultralisks have made a single appearance in a tournament game that wasnt clearly won (and even then, I cant recall seeing one).
Blizzard clearly has zero idea what it's doing in regards to the ultralisk. They had that super lengthy crap about how strong ultralisks were going to be and how they needed that huge HP decrease and in the end they had to give some of it right back along with a free upgrade.
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Ultralisks were viable in BW with collision, which also served to add a layer of complexity to the game. I don't remember the players, but there was a match in the OSL in which a terran defended against Ultras simply by keeping medics in their path while the bunkers continued to have free shots.
In my amateur opinion, a size reduction and an hp/armor boost would serve to make them viable more so than these ideas, but good thread regardless.
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btw ultralisk arent bad.....go to day9's blip and look for the interview with TLO where he uses ultras vs mech and destroys jinro. IN the interview TLO says utras are much better in sc2 than in sc1.
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Increased HP (by..400+?)
Anti-Armor attack properties plus cleave
Armor that no unit can deal extra damage to.
Done.
Increased HP:
The HP right now is pretty...low for such a powerful and menacing unit. In Broodwar so to speak, the ultra took so damn long to kill. Having more HP helps that.
AA attack+cleave: It makes ultras viable to do alot of damage because of its huge claws. Taking out Anti-armor would be fine if the damage output to everything else is good. Cleave should be what makes Ultras so threatning
Unique armor: If the armor is armored, anything thats an anti-armor will rip out ultras clean (such as immortals. God they do so much ****ing bonus damage). Having an armor that no unit does bonus damage (it's not light, not armored, not anything but... Dense Muscle Armor?) helps out so units that would do an absurd amount of high damage will...well
no longer can do bonus so they do regular damage. Thus helps ultra's live longer. If not even more difficult to take down.
Something along those lines.
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How do you make him not suck? Give him an actaul role that it could fill as a melee unit.
Currently it "looks" like a tank, but it's really not. The total health of 3 zealots (300 min cost) is 450, so they are a more affordable "tank" unit, not to mention if u put 3 zealots vs 1 ultra (which is 300/200 min/gas) the Ultra will only survive with 43 health. Therefore, it's not a tank unit.
It's supposed to be an "Anti Armored Unit", but the majority of armored units have range over it, and typically only 1 Ultra can attack at a time due to their size. So it really cant function as an anti armored unit. Hell ONLY 3 marauders (which are armored and FAR lower tier) bring a single ultralist to about 40% health. 1 Thor vs 1 Ultra and the Ultra only survives with 35 health. Immortals beat Ultras, and have range. The only heavy units it is really effective against is Marauder and Colossus (but it can never get to the desired units to do damage. So it really does not fit an anti armored role.
Furthermore, compared to the Broodlord, it has pretty much no weaknesses. Broodlord obviously has the advantage vs anything that cant hit air, and only being able to be attacked by Marines, Thors, Stalkers, Phoenix, Voids - those units are far easier to deal with. Besides, even against those units, BL do not have any problems handling either of those at all except Phoenix and Void (which are easy to handle with a couple hydras right next to the BL, considering BL's huge range.
Why would anyone pick Ultra over a Broodlord right now? The only reason at all is for the additional damage to buildings. But considering how hard it is to actaully take that advatnage, and how you can rarely even get more than 1 ultra attacking the same building, that's pretty wasteful.
Sure the Ultra has AOE damage, but only 1 ultra can attack a selected unit at a time due to their size. Compared to BL, the Broodlings are their AOE damage. In most scenarios, having broodlings that ALSO TANK, that ALSO block the path and trap your enemies movement, AND that do the "aoe damage" at a HUGE range that you could also have units in front of your BL also simultaneously attacking.
But seriously guys, ignore what TLO said. Test all that I've mentioned in the Unit Tester. Try putting the Ultra against equal mineral value of the other units. Ultra typically "barely" has the advantage against teh units its strong against - which is compeltely unacceptable for a t3 unit. Every other T3 unit in the game has a HEAVY advantage against its desired matchups, typically regardless of scenario.
Just because TLO has been able to make them work in their strategy, does not mean that they are a worthy unit in comparison to other units. The unit tester is perfect to see whats better. Use the strategy he mentioned and replace the Ultra with Broodlords and watch how much more efficient it is. Test it vs both Mech and Robo. You will see. I've tested and tested since the beta went down, and there is literally NO scenario outside of attacking buildings that an Ultra would be preferred over a BL, unless you have a sub-par unit mix. TLO used them as a meat shield, but why would you ever pick them as a meat shield over Roaches when you could get 4 Roaches for equal minerals and half the gas of a Ultra - PLUS combined the 4 roaches have more health than a single Ultra??? Only advantage is the (small) population difference - which is worth it for the extra health.
The current Ultralisk would not even be very useful if we got it in T2. Which is a damn shame.
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You're right about the issue, but I'm not sure about the solution you've provided. I think if Ultra's had a range of 2, and could attack over zerglings, they'd be perfect...and Bliz could stop tinkering with them...
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After day9s daily with TLO I had some success in the short time beta was left with the infestors/ultra build. However, I also feel like my opponents were taken off guard. It may not work as well when people figure out how to deal with it better. When beta is up for a couple weeks we will know if the ultras are actually viable.
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I find it hilarious that all the sheep are saying ultras are viable just cause TLO said so. Would be nice if, ya know, people actually thought for themselves but I guess that would be expecting too much. Probably the same people a month ago that were flooding the forums with how much ultras suck.
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On June 14 2010 03:37 Bull-Demon wrote:
I find it hilarious that all the sheep are saying ultras are viable just cause TLO said so. Would be nice if, ya know, people actually thought for themselves but I guess that would be expecting too much. Probably the same people a month ago that were flooding the forums with how much ultras suck.
Yep. Like I mentioned, bust out the unit tester and see for yourself.
Hell you can even make a Robo or Mech army to fight, and switch Ultras in and BL and see which perform better.
You'll see that my above claims are all true. He has VERY few fights where he has an actual advantage, and far too many fights that he is equal or disadvantaged in.
Heres a list of how the Ultra performs vs Terran units that it could attack and be attacked by...
1 Ultra vs 6 Marines - Ultra survives with half health.
1 Ultra vs 3 Marauders - Ultra survives with half health unmicroed. With Mara Micro, they recieve no damage due to the dodging bug.
1 Ultra vs Hellions - Ultras large advantage.
1 Ultra vs 2 Unsieged Tanks - Ultra survives with 50% health
1 Ultra vs 2 Sieged Tanks - Ultra survives with 60% health
2 Ultras vs 4 Sieged Tanks - Both Ultras barely survive (therefore the more tanks the worse ultras do)
1 Ultra vs 1 Thor - Ultra Barely Survives.
Therefore, the only notable strengths Ultra has is vs Marines, Marauders, and Hellions. Tanks are not even worth listing, because barely surviving vs 4 tanks alone means that with fire from any other units, those Ultras woudl have been dead far before the Tanks. Also in a realistic scenario, Ultras do not perform very well vs MMM due to the huge amounts of focus fire, and simultaneous damage from the rest of their army. So what are Ultras real strengths?
Lets compare that to the Broodlord.
Broodlord has a heavy advantage vs Marauders, Hellions, Tanks, as none of them can hit a BL.
Broodlord can only be hit by Marines and Thors.
Broodlords easily handle Marines as they have to get very close to the BL to do their damage, which means going in to attack range of the other Zerg units.
2 Broodlords vs 2 Thors (both focus firing) = Both Broodlords survive (1 of them barely survived at 6 health).
The weakest matchups for BL are still fairly even. That's the same scenario nearly every other T3 unit in the game has. T3 units are (typically) stronger than most other matchups aside from the hard counters. For example, Battlecruisers have a huge advantage over most units, where things like Corruptors only have a slight advantage if equal min amounts. Thors have a 50% advantage over most units. Even Immortals have far more strengths than the Ultra does. The Ultra was not designed to be stronger than most of it's matchups - which makes it unique for a T3 unit (or even T2). The only strengths it really has is vs t1 units, and even that's negligible due to his range and fact that they took away his DPS vs light units.
I've analyzed EVERY SINGLE UNIT in the game this way. The Ultra seriously has far less performance than any other T3 unit if you factor equal mineral/gas values. As mentioned before, its barely on par with many T2 units.
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Yes Ultras used to suck so bad but Patch 14 ultras are a lot better than patch 12 ultras..
Day 9's 131 doesn't even matter, I have used ultras since patch 14 and I can say they are already decent units with a role. They are already viable, the reason you dont see them in competetive play is that there were only a few tournaments after patch 14 and most programers (I think) didn't want to risk using ultras yet since there were not much time to test them. However some of the latest plays do show ultralisk usage just like with Haypro and Check.Prime
IMO: crackling-infestor-ultra > roach-hydra-infestor when face Terran mech or Collosus-sentry
To the OP: Have you actually used them? Or did you just see that that they weren't the tournament replays you watched and instantly assumed that they are not viable?
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The Ultra has a lot of HP and its damage is vicious, plus Zerg have lots of ways to make it more mobile (drops, Nydus, creep). If it isn't 'viable' then I don't know what ever could be.
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Just half its collision size. You can instantly get the best of both worlds.
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Also, about the Ultra/ling synergy, how about giving Ultralisk attacks a non-stacking temporary armor debuff of -1 or -2? It would make cracklings do 1 or 2 more damage per hit, which would make an enormous difference in the overall damage per second of zerglings. Even if the Ultralisk dies, as long as it gets a single hit off on a blob of enemy units, the lings will be doing bonus damage to the army. Before someone accuses this of being too Warcraft 3 or WoW like, think of it like acid spores in Brood War, except non-stacking and for ground units.
You could also probably nerf their damage and make them more of a tank/support unit rather than an expensive damage dealer. Then you would only need a small number of Ultralisks to reap a decent benefit from having them in your army, making their cost not quite as prohibitive.
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Cost v effect is what makes the Ultralisk bad. If making them have no collision with light units will bring their effect to equal their cost then that is fine. Otherwise I think they should be cheaper as Broods always seems like the better choice.
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Seriously, if you look at the test results I've posted, I dont know how anyone could say the Ultra is viable.
Comparing the mineral/gas efficiency of Ultras, the only time you even break even is vs very select units.
Which means more often than not, your losing more than you gain with Ultras. You need to do 300/200 worth of damage to even cut equal with an Ultra. Nearly every matchup does not allow this.
Also, please name ANY scenario where a Ultra will be able to do more damage than a BL.
On June 14 2010 04:01 IKenshinI wrote:
Cost v effect is what makes the Ultralisk bad. If making them have no collision with light units will bring their effect to equal their cost then that is fine. Otherwise I think they should be cheaper as Broods always seems like the better choice.
This guy is on the money, which my test results clearly backup. They are simply not worth the cost. Especially when EVERY OTHER T3 UNIT has HEAVY ADVANTAGE in most of its matchups aside from the hard counters.
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If you give ultras no-collision with light units that means no surround w/ lings or zealots which is quite frankly bad. Other than that I think it's a neat idea
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Besides the fact that I disagree that the ultralisk is "unviable", removing collision with light units is not the way to go, because that is not the reason that ultra/ling isn't as good as in BW. The reason that they aren't as good as in BW is because everything does full damage AND often times has bonus damage vs armored. Thus the ultralisk feels more frail than in BW even though it has more armor.
But all this falls into the idea that what works in BW has to work in SC2, which is just foolishness. So what if ultra ling isn't as good as in BW anymore? You can do ultra/something else. If you watch TLO in his ZvT in the recent Day9 daily you can see that ultralisk roach ling is super strong.
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People seem to be ignoring the fact that brood lords are much much easier to counter as terran. Get 10-12 vikings out and your broodlords are pretty much dead. You cant kill vikings sitting on top of tanks and thors, so if a terran is going mech and you go brood lords, once he gets vikings out broodlords cease to be useful. Ultras will actually at least break even on being cost effective in general vs mech, making them the better choice as they don't have such a hard counter as brood lords do. They definitely perform better then any other zerg ground unit vs terrans.
And no, i'm not just going from the TLO daily, I was experimenting with them almost every terran mech game for the last week or so of the beta and found them to be the best choice against terran mech late game.
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On June 14 2010 03:40 Spyridon wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 03:37 Bull-Demon wrote:
I find it hilarious that all the sheep are saying ultras are viable just cause TLO said so. Would be nice if, ya know, people actually thought for themselves but I guess that would be expecting too much. Probably the same people a month ago that were flooding the forums with how much ultras suck. Yep. Like I mentioned, bust out the unit tester and see for yourself. Hell you can even make a Robo or Mech army to fight, and switch Ultras in and BL and see which perform better. You'll see that my above claims are all true. He has VERY few fights where he has an actual advantage, and far too many fights that he is equal or disadvantaged in. Heres a list of how the Ultra performs vs Terran units that it could attack and be attacked by... 1 Ultra vs 6 Marines - Ultra survives with half health. 1 Ultra vs 3 Marauders - Ultra survives with half health unmicroed. With Mara Micro, they recieve no damage due to the dodging bug. 1 Ultra vs Hellions - Ultras large advantage. 1 Ultra vs 2 Unsieged Tanks - Ultra survives with 50% health 1 Ultra vs 2 Sieged Tanks - Ultra survives with 60% health 2 Ultras vs 4 Sieged Tanks - Both Ultras barely survive (therefore the more tanks the worse ultras do) 1 Ultra vs 1 Thor - Ultra Barely Survives. Therefore, the only notable strengths Ultra has is vs Marines, Marauders, and Hellions. Tanks are not even worth listing, because barely surviving vs 4 tanks alone means that with fire from any other units, those Ultras woudl have been dead far before the Tanks. Also in a realistic scenario, Ultras do not perform very well vs MMM due to the huge amounts of focus fire, and simultaneous damage from the rest of their army. So what are Ultras real strengths? Lets compare that to the Broodlord. Broodlord has a heavy advantage vs Marauders, Hellions, Tanks, as none of them can hit a BL. Broodlord can only be hit by Marines and Thors. Broodlords easily handle Marines as they have to get very close to the BL to do their damage, which means going in to attack range of the other Zerg units. 2 Broodlords vs 2 Thors (both focus firing) = Both Broodlords survive (1 of them barely survived at 6 health). The weakest matchups for BL are still fairly even. That's the same scenario nearly every other T3 unit in the game has. T3 units are (typically) stronger than most other matchups aside from the hard counters. For example, Battlecruisers have a huge advantage over most units, where things like Corruptors only have a slight advantage if equal min amounts. Thors have a 50% advantage over most units. Even Immortals have far more strengths than the Ultra does. The Ultra was not designed to be stronger than most of it's matchups - which makes it unique for a T3 unit (or even T2). The only strengths it really has is vs t1 units, and even that's negligible due to his range and fact that they took away his DPS vs light units. I've analyzed EVERY SINGLE UNIT in the game this way. The Ultra seriously has far less performance than any other T3 unit if you factor equal mineral/gas values. As mentioned before, its barely on par with many T2 units.
Ultralisk: Hatchery-pool-lair-pit-hive-cavern = morph ultra
Broodlord: Hatchery-pool-lair-spire-pit-hive-greaterspire = morph corruptor-then morph corruptor to BL. They are both T3 But you can get ultras faster than BL's more so BC's and carriers
Also Ultras have a good synergy in combination with all 3 skills of the infestors
Frenzy: this is obvious
Fungal growth: To prevent kiting
Neural Parasite: When ultras tank its easier for infestor to MC
And ultras go along the melee upgrades you use for zerglings and banelings
Im not saying that ultralisks are a better choice than broodlords
But you cant just look at the unit itself, but the entire game.. the build, timing, the combo of your units, the effectiveness of your army composition against your opponent's etc.. And of course even though the chances are lower.. THERE will be times that its better to get ultras than BL's
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On June 14 2010 04:02 Spyridon wrote:
Also, please name ANY scenario where a Ultra will be able to do more damage than a BL.
Against Vikings, Phoenix, or Blink-stalkers, the ultra should be in much better shape.
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What about bringing a few Queens into the battle und transfuse the Ultras a few times? Just need to have creep by either Overlords or Creep Tumors.
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I've had a ton of luck lately with Ultras, especially after that last patch. I don't think they aren't viable at all, you just have to use them in appropriate situations and tailor your build around them. TLO does it quite well, when he survives early on ling/infestor and rushes to hive tech. Give it a try; as long as you are clever and keep your opponent contained, maybe even manage a little harassment with the infestors, you'll be fine once the Ultras hit the field. Ultras definately need the upgrades; fortunately if you stay using lings, your upgrade path is quite clear.
Of course no one should assume that Ultralisks magically work now because TLO said so. No one should assume they don't work because you don't see them a lot in VoDs. Try them yourself; they are a powerhouse, as long as you can get them in position correctly.
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Actually against protoss I cant see the ultralisk being more useful than the broodlord. A phoenix does very little damage against armored targets and ultralisks wont really have fun fighting blink stalkers either.
But as someone mentioned already vikings can be very annoying to deal with, so on some maps I can totally see ultralisks being used against terran. They still kind of suck on maps with battles happening relatively close to small chokes or stuff like that but on open maps like metalopolis they can work as TLO showed. Then again Im not yet convinced of them, as you have to focus heavily on melee upgrades, which means the terrans will get a good sense of whats comming and just starting to counter it with thor ability, air or whatever.
Regarding ZvZ I've honestly no idea how they'd work out, as I've literally never seen a ZvZ lasting to hive tech within the last patches.
We need to see them used in some more games to really comment on their usefulnes I'd say.
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[*]Send in Ultralisks first to absorb the first shots from tanks and then run past them with Speedlings and after that your ranged units.
Too bad there is no tank overkill in SC
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Ultras are the most awkward unit to maneuver in the game. Blizzard realized the mistake they made with the Thor and they adjusted his size and now it works quite well. They just need to do the same with the Ultra. The problem right now is you send in your ultras, they punch through the initial units with some losses and you STILL can't maneuver them through the gap they've just created. They're about as awkward as a teenage boy at a middle school dance. Shrink the model, improve the pathing, do something. I'd probably use them with a nerf if they improved this facet.
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Ultras are the most awkward unit to maneuver in the game. Blizzard realized the mistake they made with the Thor and they adjusted his size and now it works quite well. They just need to do the same with the Ultra. The problem right now is you send in your ultras, they punch through the initial units with some losses and you STILL can't maneuver them through the gap they've just created. They're about as awkward as a teenage boy at a middle school dance. Shrink the model, improve the pathing, do something. I'd probably use them with a nerf if they improved this facet.
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On June 14 2010 04:46 Conflict wrote:
[*]Send in Ultralisks first to absorb the first shots from tanks and then run past them with Speedlings and after that your ranged units.
Too bad there is no tank overkill in SC
Why would you prefer that over sending broodlings that are free for the same purpose?
On June 14 2010 04:34 w_Ender_w wrote:
I've had a ton of luck lately with Ultras, especially after that last patch. I don't think they aren't viable at all, you just have to use them in appropriate situations and tailor your build around them. TLO does it quite well, when he survives early on ling/infestor and rushes to hive tech. Give it a try; as long as you are clever and keep your opponent contained, maybe even manage a little harassment with the infestors, you'll be fine once the Ultras hit the field. Ultras definately need the upgrades; fortunately if you stay using lings, your upgrade path is quite clear.
Of course no one should assume that Ultralisks magically work now because TLO said so. No one should assume they don't work because you don't see them a lot in VoDs. Try them yourself; they are a powerhouse, as long as you can get them in position correctly.
Sure, Ultras share upgrades, but use that video as an example. TLO was attacking with 7-10 Ultralisks at a time for quite a few waves. At least 3. You know how easy 10 Broodlings w/ a few infestors would have won that game? Even without the upgrades? Hell, even without the infestors, that many Broodlords can handle 2-4 Thors easily. Sure, he could have went vikings, but replace those zerglings TLO used with Hydras or Mutas and the game would have been over in half the time. He was also spending most his time trying to break thru the tanks - that issue would have been solved. Thing is, Broodlords dont even need the upgrades to be more cost effective.
Besides, if u want upgrade synergy - Broodlings ALSO USE THE MELEE GROUND UPGRADES!
I'm not saying you "cant win with Ultras", but I am saying it's not worth the cash. You need the economic advantage just to cut even using Ultras. They are, by far, the least cost effective unit Zerg has.
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I wouldn't really want Ultras to walk over zerglings. it would let them close faster against tanks, yes, but when the tanks target your ultras, the splash kills all the zerglings underneath as well. As it is, any tank shot on an ultralisk saves many zergling lives. It would only be a buff if Ultras somehow also shielded the units underneath them from splash.
Perhaps a better buff would be to make small unit AI (zerglings) prioritize getting out of the way of a moving Ultralisk. This lets them close into combat range (like the stacking suggestion), while still saving your zerglings from AoE. if you combined with the +1 range suggestion so they synergize better with zerglings, Ultralisks would actually have to be nerfed in some way (I'd lower their damage probably)
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Sigh.
Nobody has tried ultralisks long enough since the last patch to determine if they're viable (though some like TLO definitely feel that they are).
I'm really beginning to dislike this attitude that the route to fixing 'problems' is through patches and not player skill and adaptation. The first response to adversity is now 'how can this be patched'?
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Make the smaller and let them move while burrowed like roaches as well as upgrade their speeed.
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On June 14 2010 05:03 Hann1bal wrote:
Ultras are the most awkward unit to maneuver in the game. Blizzard realized the mistake they made with the Thor and they adjusted his size and now it works quite well. They just need to do the same with the Ultra. The problem right now is you send in your ultras, they punch through the initial units with some losses and you STILL can't maneuver them through the gap they've just created. They're about as awkward as a teenage boy at a middle school dance. Shrink the model, improve the pathing, do something. I'd probably use them with a nerf if they improved this facet.
I agree something needs to be changed about the maneuverability. Either have ultras be like colossi or make them smaller. Currently their role is quite undefined because right now we have a unit that has massive amounts of HP suggesting tank, but EVERYTHING does bonus damage to it making it weak and frail. It also does massive damage to buildings suggesting a good alternative to crackling drops in BW to take out key buildings to hamper tech or production; however, at 300/200 cost dropping like 3 of them to take out a cc or a couple of factories just isn't an economically sound decision. Ultras also do pretty good damage to armored units, but most armored units in the game also do extra damage against other armored units (IE tanks or maruaders), but in addition they have extra range which prevents the bulky (and kind of slow) ultralisk from even getting up to them in the first place (especially difficult in chokes). So now what you have is a unit which has all around good skills, but really no place in being used effectively.
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On June 14 2010 05:21 iEchoic wrote:
Sigh.
Nobody has tried ultralisks long enough since the last patch to determine if they're viable (though some like TLO definitely feel that they are).
I'm really beginning to dislike this attitude that the route to fixing 'problems' is through patches and not player skill and adaptation. The first response to adversity is now 'how can this be patched'?
Play some custom maps while BNet is down and test them for yourself. See how they compare to the other Zerg units. You may learn why so many people are upset with them.
After testing them a bit, watch the day9 with TLO on it again. Look at the army compositions and how far ahead on population and cash TLO has to be before he breaks thru. Look at the few Terrans defending. Watch how he attacks a handful of 4-5 tanks and 2-3 thors with 10 Ultras and still gets taken out.
Then create a map with 10 tanks 10 thors (just to make the Terran have even more of an advantage), and fight them with 10 Broodlords. Watch what happens.
Then try that with any other unit mix you would like, and find any unit mix that Ultras work better than BL on.
I did. The only time Ultra WITH upgrades outperforms BL WITHOUT upgrades, is pure marines unmicroed, pure mara unmicroed (and due to a big, you can kite Ultras without taking any damage), hellions, or under 4-5 tanks - the more tanks than that the more disadvantage Ultras have.
With any full mech or full robo army composition, BL perform far, far better.
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It would be nice if they just tweaked the ultra pathfinding so pretty much everything got pushed around by it. It happens with Archons. Why not just make it so nothing pushes ultras around besides ultras?
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On June 14 2010 05:33 Spyridon wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 05:21 iEchoic wrote:
Sigh.
Nobody has tried ultralisks long enough since the last patch to determine if they're viable (though some like TLO definitely feel that they are).
I'm really beginning to dislike this attitude that the route to fixing 'problems' is through patches and not player skill and adaptation. The first response to adversity is now 'how can this be patched'? Play some custom maps while BNet is down and test them for yourself. See how they compare to the other Zerg units. You may learn why so many people are upset with them. After testing them a bit, watch the day9 with TLO on it again. Look at the army compositions and how far ahead on population and cash TLO has to be before he breaks thru. Look at the few Terrans defending. Watch how he attacks a handful of 4-5 tanks and 2-3 thors with 10 Ultras and still gets taken out. Then create a map with 10 tanks 10 thors (just to make the Terran have even more of an advantage), and fight them with 10 Broodlords.
lol. This line of thinking doesn't work. The game doesn't play like this.
Whenever someone brings up a game of Ultralisks being used correctly, their is always that guy who say "OH BUT ZERG HAS AN ECO ADVANTAGE".
A economy advantage doesn't mean shit unless the zerg has a way of pressing it. Prior to the ultralisk buffs, you'd frequently have games in which a terran would beat zerg three bases to five.
The zerg only had one way of pressing a eco advantage lategame, and that was broodlords. Now they have two.
You people assume that Ultralisks are only balanced if someone can produce a game where Zerg is at a eco disadvantage, and then makes ultralisks and wins. That would mean ultralisks are overpowered. The function of zerg lategame is not to build them and suddenly come out of a eco disadvantage and win, as protoss tier 3 does, but rather to allow you to press a macro advantage and turn it into map control and eventually a win.
The Ultralisk fulfills that role nicely.
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On June 14 2010 05:38 Half wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 05:33 Spyridon wrote:On June 14 2010 05:21 iEchoic wrote:
Sigh.
Nobody has tried ultralisks long enough since the last patch to determine if they're viable (though some like TLO definitely feel that they are).
I'm really beginning to dislike this attitude that the route to fixing 'problems' is through patches and not player skill and adaptation. The first response to adversity is now 'how can this be patched'? Play some custom maps while BNet is down and test them for yourself. See how they compare to the other Zerg units. You may learn why so many people are upset with them. After testing them a bit, watch the day9 with TLO on it again. Look at the army compositions and how far ahead on population and cash TLO has to be before he breaks thru. Look at the few Terrans defending. Watch how he attacks a handful of 4-5 tanks and 2-3 thors with 10 Ultras and still gets taken out. Then create a map with 10 tanks 10 thors (just to make the Terran have even more of an advantage), and fight them with 10 Broodlords. lol. This line of thinking doesn't work. The game doesn't play like this. Whenever someone brings up a game of Ultralisks being used correctly, their is always that guy who say "OH BUT ZERG HAS AN ECO ADVANTAGE". A economy advantage doesn't mean shit unless the zerg has a way of pressing it. Prior to the ultralisk buffs, you'd frequently have games in which a terran would beat zerg three bases to five. The zerg only had one way of pressing a eco advantage lategame, and that was broodlords. Now they have two. You people assume that Ultralisks are only balanced if someone can produce a game where Zerg is at a eco disadvantage, and then makes ultralisks and wins. That would mean ultralisks are overpowered. The function of zerg lategame is not to build them and suddenly come out of a eco disadvantage and win, as protoss tier 3 does, but rather to allow you to press a macro advantage and turn it into map control and eventually a win.
That's not what I'm saying.
What I am saying is, the Ultralisk simply does not compare. NEARLY ANY SITUATION you go in with 3000/2000 mineral value of Ultralisks, you would be in better shape if you spent that cash on Broodlords.
They CANT "press" as hard as Broodlings, because each wave of broodlings is free, and 10 Ultras do LESS damage as a whole than 10 Broodlords. They are vulnerable to MANY more units and strategies.
The major "Defense" people have of Ultras is how TLO uses them, but can anyone seriously watch that video and say that if he used Broodlords instead, he would not have won the game way faster?
Doesnt it say something if the best display of Ultras we have available would have been better suited if he used BL?
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It's ridiculous how biased people are in this thread. You're seriously going to use one game as your evidence that ultralisks don't need adjustments? You destroy your own argument when you stoop that low.
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I find Ultralisk to be viable after the patch. Absolutely, no question about it.
But they are not really reliable. Pathing, modelsize and manouverability makes them behave diffrently from situation to situation, that would have to be changed. Make it possible to get full control over them (as with all other units) and I think the Ultra is fine as is. Atleast as fine as any unit atm.
The often suggested "short range"-attack is a bonus but not really necessary, as a little micro with the lings will go along way to avoid those problems (flanking with lings or sending them in after the Ultras), and more micro for Zerg is a good thing in my book. Having other units pass through them... might be one way to solve the problems I listed above, but not sure what I feel about that. Seems really artificial to me.
I am a zerg-player, and I get a bit worried with race-bias in this thread, because that might undermine the credibility for other zerg-issues that needs to be adressed more urgently imo; as the flat and flavourless spells (corruption, contaminate and infested terran).
Edit;
Btw I find it increasingly annoying that ppl refer to TLO, Day[9], [insert blanc] as "end-all-discussion" arguments; not only here but in many threads, about many topics. Please, just play, learn and think for yourselves instead of refering to some "higher" authority like your part of a schoolastic sect.
They are great and all; but
1. Balance at top tier-lvl and balance on any other lvl is two diffrent things. I think Terran mech vs Z proves this point quite clearly.
2. The risk that your are misreprsenting their opinions are higher than the chance your are right. If they have anything to say about any topic, let them say it themselves.
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It is viable, why make a thread when you clearly haven't used them enough?
Making them pass through units would be ridiculous, just watching it would look dumb and totally not in the style of starcraft.
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Ultra do a pretty bad job at choke points because of their size, in open battle you still need to micro them one by one so they are in a more optimal position (they run left and right trying to find a space to fit in).
Experiments with ultra builds reminds me that 3/3 cracklings are nothing to sneeze at.
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At the very least, it won't hurt to reduce the size of Ultras a little, so that they become more mobile. Melee unit, which is too clumsy to reach its targets, is quite pathetic to watch.
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I think the ultra being made slightly smaller, like what was done with the thor would make it more viable.
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Ultralisks are fine now. People need to adapt to the changes after the last few patches and realize this.
However, I think the idea for having Zerglings not collide with Ultralisks needs to be looked at from the opposite direction. Give the zerglings a passive ability so that they do not collide with Massive. It would make them a better counter to Thors as well as increase synergy with Ultralisks.
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i think they should just give ultras a 1 or 2 range so they can attack over a zergling. allowing ultras to walk over zeals and marines and shit is pretty lame.
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I think taking away collision right now would be a little too soon in light of the recent changes that have been steadily made to them. I think if even after these changes have had time to settle, that the ultra still cannot find a place, then maybe it could be considered.
However, I do recall watching some casted matches recently by Day9 and Gretorp that featured some ultralisk use.
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The ultra isn't really viable, partially on account of pathing. Rather than prevent collision with light, we could prevent collision with our own units.
The Brood Lord is better than the Ultra in almost every situation, so the Ultra should either be able to tank for ground armies much more effectively, or it should be able to shred armor much more effectively. The second probably requires a really extreme bonus to armored on the ultralisk.
Also, the ultralisk costs the same as 8 banelings, except that they only take up 4 supply. The ultralisk attack does worse damage to buildings than a single baneling, and worse damage to all non-armored targets. How pathetic is that?
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Except it can attack more than once...
And you use banelings against non armoured units...
Most problems with ultralisks can be slightly accounted for by overlord dropping them. Many examples from the day 9 daily where TLO would have easily broken a base simply dropping ultras through the wall [to kill the tanks] instead of trying to take down the wall itself. Thors are basically walls as well and can't kill OLs fast enough to drop you dropping them onto sieged tanks.
I've seen much better players than me do much worse with ultras simply because they don't abuse this easy mechanic.
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Ultralisks are viable as far as I am concerned. Mixing lings in or dropping them does wonders.
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On June 14 2010 06:45 Ideas wrote:
i think they should just give ultras a 1 or 2 range so they can attack over a zergling. allowing ultras to walk over zeals and marines and shit is pretty lame.
They can already attack over a line of zerglings.
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Put range +2 and give them 50 more hp
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Just fired up kulas ravine in the map tester and played around with the ultras, confirming what I've been seeing when using ultras while playing when the beta was up. Ultras do indeed attack over one row, not more than one though, of lings so no need to have them not collide with light units. What would happen if they didnt collide with light units, well hydras are light so think about that(yes of course you could make an exception that ultras collide with hydras).
Most importantly though, how about...you not make ultras when you see that your terran opponent is going mech. If you insist on using ultras then you know that you are at somewhat of an disadvantage since mech is pretty efficient against ultras. This is not a flaw of the game it is a flaw of your decision making.
What would happen if you reduced the ultras size? well the splash from tanks would now start to hit other units close by and the role of the ultra as a tanking unit would severly diminish, basically it would be even less useful.
Regarding the day[9] daily #131, we could see that ultras dont just outright do nothing against mech. In other words you can get away with stubbornly hitting your head against a wall(figureatively speaking), but its nothing you actually would recommend to someone. We could also see that when the terran player is passive you abuse nydus worms and drops to great success(Hello Ultras!). Is it hard to use this playstyle? yes, quite alot for most people(myself included). Is it a flaw that it's hard, nope. You need to practice more or just use broodlords instead(with corruptors of course) together with some ground support.
Do the ultra actually need to be viable against everything and anything(except air if we are to be somewhat realistic)? No that would be silly. No unit is really viable against anything and everything. Is the Ultra perhaps less viable, it has a smaller window of use, than most other units? Yes. Is it too narrow though? I dont think so. I actually like it cos then you have an advantage off the bat when using your ultras, the so called element of surprise.
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It doesn't help that the current map pool is basically a big corridor. Ultra's don't really have a chance to shine unless they have the surface area to make contact. I suspect that if you played BW on the current map pool, BW ultras will also suck.
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On June 13 2010 23:50 Talic_Zealot wrote:
What's funny to me is that in the beginning everyone was saying that sc2 required no mechanical skill and now everyone wants to make it easier.. :D
^^ 
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On June 14 2010 07:21 FarbrorAbavna wrote:
Do the ultra actually need to be viable against everything and anything(except air if we are to be somewhat realistic)?
Nope.
But as a T3 unit, they should be viable vs any of the major strategies resource-wise.
In a Mech battle (or robo) with equal amounts of mineral/gas spent, Ultralisks lose more resources than damage they do.
They are simply not resource efficient against the majority of the units in the game. It's the ONLY T3 unit with more weaknesses and equalities than strengths.
That's why it's more than just "Zerg need a resource advantage to win". Ultra is literally the weakest T3 unit - it has the lowest amount of fights that are "strengths" of all T3 units of all races. I've listed the few units that the Ultra does have the advantage over, if you look at my earlier posts you will see it's only Marine, Mara, Hellion, or <4 siege tanks. None of those are even T3 tech. The Ultra has trouble with all other forms of T3 tech for all races. And in a realistic scenario, the Marines and Mara are very strong vs Ultras due to their synergy with Mech.
Shouldnt there be any endgame unit mix of varied T1-T3 units that each Ultralisk does more than 300mineral/200 gas worth of damage? It seems you think there should be by the part of the message that I quoted. Because honestly - right now, there is not. The only way to win with them is have enough of a resource advantage to pump wave after wave where you do less damage than you spend on the Ultras, and they are not even the strongest unit for that style of play.
The real question is - Should each Ultra actually be able to do 300/200 worth of damage to any endgame unit mix? The answer should be yes - it should at least be strong against or counter one endgame army mix. But it DOESNT! Against mech as you see in TLO's game you can clearly see each wave of Ultras hes not doing as much damage as resource value hes losing - That shows Ultras are NOT resource efficient against mech.
Doesnt that indicate a problem?
Lets settle this an easy way - I challenge you to find any endgame unit mix that includes 1 unit from each of the 3 Tiers. For example, load up the Unit Tester map. (im just making up these numbers randomly) Spend 1k min/500 gas on t1 units, 2k min 1k gas on t2 units, and 2k min 1.5k gas on t3 units for each team. Use equivalent upgrades. Find any unit mix that Ultras perform better than Broodlords in.
Then you will see for your self how inefficient Ultralisks are. The worst part? They even take quite a beating from armored units, which they are apparently intended to counter.
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Ultra's should be like the mammoth tank of c&c zh, everything they run over, dies!
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TBH ultras are like they were in BW, you just need 3/4+ of them for them to be really tanky, you cant engage a 200/200 army with 1 or 2 ultras and speedlings. They worked wonders vs stalker heavy P forces in ZvP.
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Ultras should be easier to get IMO. Think how much easier it is to tech to Thor or Colossus than to get to Ultras.
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On June 14 2010 09:19 Subversion wrote:
Ultras should be easier to get IMO. Think how much easier it is to tech to Thor or Colossus than to get to Ultras.
Since infestors are critical to many mid-late compositions, all that is required is the time to build hive and ultra tech. Now that speed upgrade has been removed, you only need the armor upgrade. Ultras are combat-ready off 3 bases.
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Someone asked if I've even tried ultras or if I just concluded that they weren't useful from tournament replays... the answer is yes I've tried them, but that doesn't really mean much since I'm not much of a zerg player.
Since patch 15, I played like crazy since the beta was about to go down... except that I'm a protoss player who just plays a bit of random for fun. I'm a high-diamond protoss player, but when switching to random for more than a few days I actually drop to platinum... so that should give you an idea of how bad I am with Terran and Zerg. Why did I conclude that Ultras are underpowered? Nobody used them against me to any effect. I then went back to BW when the beta went down and have gotten rolled by Ultra/ling no less than 5 times in like 20 games.
As a protoss player, my end-game army composition includes collosus which kill zerglings and hydras very easily (especially with +2 weapons) and stalkers (to shoot the corruptors) and a sprinkling of sentries... I'm not actually that good with FF so I just use them for GS passed the mid game. What do I do when I see ultras (which I only saw like twice since patch 15)? Retreat (sacrificing a few stalkers), warp in a line of zealots and ROFL as the ultras can't get through to hit my collosus. I don't even need to make immortals. What do I do when I see broodlords? I go HOLY SHIT I NEED TO TECH SWITCH and usually end up losing.
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On June 14 2010 07:21 FarbrorAbavna wrote:
Just fired up kulas ravine in the map tester and played around with the ultras, confirming what I've been seeing when using ultras while playing when the beta was up. Ultras do indeed attack over one row, not more than one though, of lings so no need to have them not collide with light units. What would happen if they didnt collide with light units, well hydras are light so think about that(yes of course you could make an exception that ultras collide with hydras).
Most importantly though, how about...you not make ultras when you see that your terran opponent is going mech. If you insist on using ultras then you know that you are at somewhat of an disadvantage since mech is pretty efficient against ultras. This is not a flaw of the game it is a flaw of your decision making.
What would happen if you reduced the ultras size? well the splash from tanks would now start to hit other units close by and the role of the ultra as a tanking unit would severly diminish, basically it would be even less useful.
Regarding the day[9] daily #131, we could see that ultras dont just outright do nothing against mech. In other words you can get away with stubbornly hitting your head against a wall(figureatively speaking), but its nothing you actually would recommend to someone. We could also see that when the terran player is passive you abuse nydus worms and drops to great success(Hello Ultras!). Is it hard to use this playstyle? yes, quite alot for most people(myself included). Is it a flaw that it's hard, nope. You need to practice more or just use broodlords instead(with corruptors of course) together with some ground support.
Do the ultra actually need to be viable against everything and anything(except air if we are to be somewhat realistic)? No that would be silly. No unit is really viable against anything and everything. Is the Ultra perhaps less viable, it has a smaller window of use, than most other units? Yes. Is it too narrow though? I dont think so. I actually like it cos then you have an advantage off the bat when using your ultras, the so called element of surprise.
So according to you Ultras are bad against mech, and we all know they are useless against bio (mauraders) and they can't attack air. So basically they are useless against any terran army, and you think that is perfectly ok? Oh yeah, I forgot you can put them in a nydas worm!! That makes them perfectly balanced...
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ultras just seem really hard to make fit into this game. You make them too strong vs things and suddenly its an attack-move no skill ridiculous unit. Right now they just simply don't do much, they would counter units that are already not very useful and they have a lot of issues just simply related to the game engine. Letting them knock down forcefields is cool, but to use them to do that would make them more of a utility unit where you just want like 2 of them to do it at the start of the battle.
I dont know. There is just no synergy with the other units.
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On June 14 2010 09:33 farseer_dk wrote:
What do I do when I see broodlords? I go HOLY SHIT I NEED TO TECH SWITCH and usually end up losing.
You already have stalkers, so you research blink and pump out more of them and screw the tech switch.
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They should be able to walk over Zerglings but the fact that they cost as much as a Thor or Colossus, which are both ranged, is silly. If going against either of these, there is no point to using the ultralisk as it will most likely go down, cost for cost, the Ultralisk is garbage, not because of stats, but because it is melee. The ultralisk had a spot in Brood war, it doesn't in Starcraft 2. The removal of Dark Swarm makes them useless and the addition of Dark swarm would make them overpowered. I just forget they are there and am none the worse for it.
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Most people here should launch the game as Zerg ( IA cracking, Units Tester, anything ) ,make some Ultras and lings and just make them move , attacking a army, play them a little bit.
If u don't come back thinking Ultra need a patching buff/fix there is something wrong with you. :/
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i cant think of a situation where i would rather have an ultralisk over a broodlord. imho blizzard ended the ultralisk campaign with roaches (they fulfill the dmg soaking roll much better i think). also i just feel like late game melee is just not effective anymore (the only exception being zealots cuz they can charge). i think the ultralisk isnt the same without dark swarm. dark swarm MMM... good
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My suggestion would be to give Ultralisk 25mana and an on-use ability to leap(cost 25). I think tank siegerange is.. 13? then give it leap range 10 or whatever. Increases micro and how awesome would it not be! 
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On June 14 2010 17:06 Enoeda wrote:My suggestion would be to give Ultralisk 25mana and an on-use ability to leap(cost 25). I think tank siegerange is.. 13? then give it leap range 10 or whatever. Increases micro and how awesome would it not be!
This is not dota...
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Make them able to attack while burrowed.
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TL.net, where the word viable is more viable.
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On June 14 2010 09:53 nihlon wrote:Show nested quote +On June 14 2010 09:33 farseer_dk wrote:
What do I do when I see broodlords? I go HOLY SHIT I NEED TO TECH SWITCH and usually end up losing. You already have stalkers, so you research blink and pump out more of them and screw the tech switch.
Thing is, stalkers are great against the actually brood lords but terrible against the broodlings... But I guess i should just make more stalkers. I'm not that great a player and one of my faults is bad micro... I'm really not that good at chasing down air with stalkers. Anyhow this is totally offtopic.
But speaking of broodlords, they're a natural transition out of corruptors since corruptors are good against collossi, the problem is, they require spire tech so a zerg player that elects not to make a spire and instead goes roach/hydra or mass hydra, they have to tech switch to counter collosus. If a zerg player needs to kill Collossi and stalkers, they should not have to back-tech to spire and then greater spire. They should just be able to add an Ultralisk Cavern and have a decent shot.
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On June 14 2010 07:21 FarbrorAbavna wrote:
Just fired up kulas ravine in the map tester and played around with the ultras, confirming what I've been seeing when using ultras while playing when the beta was up. Ultras do indeed attack over one row, not more than one though, of lings so no need to have them not collide with light units. What would happen if they didnt collide with light units, well hydras are light so think about that(yes of course you could make an exception that ultras collide with hydras).
Most importantly though, how about...you not make ultras when you see that your terran opponent is going mech. If you insist on using ultras then you know that you are at somewhat of an disadvantage since mech is pretty efficient against ultras. This is not a flaw of the game it is a flaw of your decision making.
What would happen if you reduced the ultras size? well the splash from tanks would now start to hit other units close by and the role of the ultra as a tanking unit would severly diminish, basically it would be even less useful.
Regarding the day[9] daily #131, we could see that ultras dont just outright do nothing against mech. In other words you can get away with stubbornly hitting your head against a wall(figureatively speaking), but its nothing you actually would recommend to someone. We could also see that when the terran player is passive you abuse nydus worms and drops to great success(Hello Ultras!). Is it hard to use this playstyle? yes, quite alot for most people(myself included). Is it a flaw that it's hard, nope. You need to practice more or just use broodlords instead(with corruptors of course) together with some ground support.
Do the ultra actually need to be viable against everything and anything(except air if we are to be somewhat realistic)? No that would be silly. No unit is really viable against anything and everything. Is the Ultra perhaps less viable, it has a smaller window of use, than most other units? Yes. Is it too narrow though? I dont think so. I actually like it cos then you have an advantage off the bat when using your ultras, the so called element of surprise.
Did you seriously just say that the ultralisk is still a tanking unit? Roaches tank better than ultralisks in almost every situation. The problem with the ultralisk is that there is no reason to use them over brood lords. Also the fact that it needs to wander up to its target to finally attack it is a problem. Maybe if it gained some charge ability like the zelot it would be viable but the problem is right now if you continue to use it as a tanking unit, you loose so much money it almost hurts. Wander 4 ultralisks into a group of tanks and thors or even maurader tank you loose 2 of them before you even do single point of damage. The problem with ultralisks as a tanking unit is that they are FRAIL. They may have a lot of HP but they are frail old men trying to take on tanks and mauraders or thors. Send the same resource value of roaches in with your zerglings instead of ultralisks and you'll get much better results. Of course if you have that much gas then ultras COULD be effective because if you look at the math 300 minerals = 4 roaches for a total of 8 supply vs 1 single ultralisk for 4 supply, but come on 4 roaches costs 100 gas vs double that for an ultralisk.
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Ultralisks do not need to be fixed...frenzy, corruption, and infested terran need to be fixed...
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After listening to Day9 dailies, I think it's fine.
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United Arab Emirates492 Posts
Reduce the size/radius, increase the range, and improve pathing.
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moving with an attack command gets higher priority than using a move command:
1) send in ultras w/ attack
2) micro lings e.a. with (mostly) move commands, pull them back for a split second here and there
3) ???
4) profit
sry, but... this sounds like a demand for 1a2a3a to me as ultras work reeeelatively well this way.
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For those wanting to see some Ultralisks used effectively in a game, I was going through Artosis' replay pack and came across this game against a Protoss named YonG. In the decisive battle YonG was ahead on army size but behind a bit on economy as Artosis had just taken a third on the gold.
Here are 2 screenshots before the battle:
![[image loading]](http://img813.imageshack.us/img813/6994/artosisvyong1a.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://img813.imageshack.us/img813/6427/artosisvyong1b.jpg)
The Protoss had 3575/1950 army against Zerg's 1975/1075.
3 Zealots/6 Collossi/13 Stalkers/3 Sentries vs 4 Zerglings/6 Hydras/3 Ultras /3 Roaches
Granted, the Zerg's income was 2052/608 vs 960/464 for the protoss so he was reinforcing faster during the fight. Protoss had a nearby pylon and was also warping in stalkers. However, my intial assessment was the protoss would just roll through the army before reinforcements could even arrive. Here are screenshots from the end of the battle:
![[image loading]](http://img822.imageshack.us/img822/4678/artosisvyong2a.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://img822.imageshack.us/img822/6981/artosisvyong2b.jpg)
Not only did they hold, the zerg actually won. With a lower army value. The ultralisks made all the difference. Against a very standard protoss army composition of collossi/stalker/sentry, the ultras successfully walked through the force fields to engage, even in a very tight choke.
In case people might put this down to superior upgrades, the protoss was 1/0 while the zerg was 0/1/2 and the ultras did not have their carapace upgrade. Others might say that broodlords would have done the job just as well in the situation. However, I have seen collossi/stalker very successfully counter broodlords. The collossi stand back and burn up any broodlings while the stalkers take down the broodlords. It's not clear they would have been superior.
Another thing to note is that the army composition here is predominantly Ultra/Roach. Roaches can soak more hits from collossi while the ultras tear through the stalkers. Although many are hoping to see BW style ultra/ling armies again, that is not what is used here.
I don't claim this to be the definitive answer but there is at least some evidence that patch 15 ultralisks are already viable.
Edit: Fixed imageshack links.
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Ultralisks are viable right now. It's just like anything else. It's how you use them.
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On June 15 2010 10:56 theSAiNT wrote:For those wanting to see some Ultralisks used effectively in a game, I was going through Artosis' replay pack and came across this game against a Protoss named YonG. In the decisive battle YonG was ahead on army size but behind a bit on economy as Artosis had just taken a third on the gold. Here are 2 screenshots before the battle: The Protoss had 3575/1950 army against Zerg's 1975/1075. 3 Zealots/6 Collossi/13 Stalkers/3 Sentries vs 4 Zerglings/6 Hydras/3 Ultras /3 Roaches Granted, the Zerg's income was 2052/608 vs 960/464 for the protoss so he was reinforcing faster during the fight. Protoss had a nearby pylon and was also warping in stalkers. However, my intial assessment was the protoss would just roll through the army before reinforcements could even arrive. Here are screenshots from the end of the battle: Not only did they hold, the zerg actually won. With a lower army value. The ultralisks made all the difference. Against a very standard protoss army composition of collossi/stalker/sentry, the ultras successfully walked through the force fields to engage, even in a very tight choke. In case people might put this down to superior upgrades, the protoss was 1/0 while the zerg was 0/1/2 and the ultras did not have their carapace upgrade. Others might say that broodlords would have done the job just as well in the situation. However, I have seen collossi/stalker very successfully counter broodlords. The collossi stand back and burn up any broodlings while the stalkers take down the broodlords. It's not clear they would have been superior. Another thing to note is that the army composition here is predominantly Ultra/Roach. Roaches can soak more hits from collossi while the ultras tear through the stalkers. Although many are hoping to see BW style ultra/ling armies again, that is not what is used here. I don't claim this to be the definitive answer but there is at least some evidence that patch 15 ultralisks are already viable.
your image links are broken...
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On June 15 2010 23:11 farseer_dk wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2010 10:56 theSAiNT wrote:For those wanting to see some Ultralisks used effectively in a game, I was going through Artosis' replay pack and came across this game against a Protoss named YonG. In the decisive battle YonG was ahead on army size but behind a bit on economy as Artosis had just taken a third on the gold. Here are 2 screenshots before the battle: The Protoss had 3575/1950 army against Zerg's 1975/1075. 3 Zealots/6 Collossi/13 Stalkers/3 Sentries vs 4 Zerglings/6 Hydras/3 Ultras /3 Roaches Granted, the Zerg's income was 2052/608 vs 960/464 for the protoss so he was reinforcing faster during the fight. Protoss had a nearby pylon and was also warping in stalkers. However, my intial assessment was the protoss would just roll through the army before reinforcements could even arrive. Here are screenshots from the end of the battle: Not only did they hold, the zerg actually won. With a lower army value. The ultralisks made all the difference. Against a very standard protoss army composition of collossi/stalker/sentry, the ultras successfully walked through the force fields to engage, even in a very tight choke. In case people might put this down to superior upgrades, the protoss was 1/0 while the zerg was 0/1/2 and the ultras did not have their carapace upgrade. Others might say that broodlords would have done the job just as well in the situation. However, I have seen collossi/stalker very successfully counter broodlords. The collossi stand back and burn up any broodlings while the stalkers take down the broodlords. It's not clear they would have been superior. Another thing to note is that the army composition here is predominantly Ultra/Roach. Roaches can soak more hits from collossi while the ultras tear through the stalkers. Although many are hoping to see BW style ultra/ling armies again, that is not what is used here. I don't claim this to be the definitive answer but there is at least some evidence that patch 15 ultralisks are already viable. your image links are broken...
Fixed them. Thanks. Imageshack doesn't appear to follow TL forum conventions...
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This is totally stats based, but...
When you look at the ultralisk and compare it to the immortal it's dps comes out to be
Ultralisk:40damage/0.861 seconds = 46.57 dps
Immortal:50damage/1.45 seconds = 34.482 dps
Ultralisk : 15 damage/0.861 seconds = 17.42 dps
Immortal: 20damage/1.45 seconds = 13.97 dps
Which seems about right given their respective prices, although the ultralisk has a hefty advatange in hp per price:
Ultralisk: 300 min / 200 gas 500hp (1 armor)
Immortal: 250 min / 100 gas 100 hardened shields 200 hp (1 armor)
Except for the ridiculous amount of splash: 180 degress radius of 2 of 33% damage. This makes the ultralisk attack feel like a ton of bricks.
Pure stats. As long as the ultralisk can get into melee without getting majorly kited, it will shine as a dpsing unit. Fungal growth and creep tumors can further that end.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://img813.imageshack.us/i/artosisvyong1a.jpg/)
![[image loading]](http://img813.imageshack.us/i/artosisvyong1b.jpg/)
![[image loading]](http://img822.imageshack.us/i/artosisvyong2a.jpg/)
![[image loading]](http://img822.imageshack.us/i/artosisvyong2b.jpg/)
