July 15th - StarCraft II Live Chat Session - Page 6

LORE/SINGLEPLAYER
-- Kerrigan plays a larger role in the story.
-- Medic, Firebat, Vulture, Wraith, Science Vessel, Goliath return in campaign.
-- Some units from MP that are in SP will start weaker then have upgrades.
-- ~12 unique campaign units for the single player
-- Small Protoss side-campaign will allow users to play as Protoss in Terran campaign.
-- Upwards of 40 minutes of cinematics in the campaign. Almost 1 hour with in-game cinemas.
-- You can change the difficulty of the campaign on a per-mission basis.
-- There will be an achievement for beating the campaign on the highest difficulty setting.
-- You do not need to beat the campaign once to unlock higher difficulty settings.
-- UED don't play a major role in Terran campaign but perhaps a greater role in the future campaigns.
-- Zerg campaign will focus more on "infesting" and "evolving" than money, researching, and recruiting like the Terran Campaign.

MULTIPLAYER
-- About 10 maps in the 1v1 queue for release.
-- Community maps will be included in map pool with some Blizzard alterations to address pathing bugs or mineral/gas placement issues.
-- Protoss continues to have slightly higher win %, but nerfs done for now.
-- No changes planned for Mothership. No consensus on UP/OP.
-- Maps like Incineration Zone will continue to be removed if they become unbalanced.
-- 50/50 matchup balance in emphasized in Diamond League and even more so in Top 1% stats, try to still keep lower leagues close (better than 55/45) but it's not an emphasis.
-- Blizzard does not believe that there is an issue with EMP in TvP.
-- Blizzard liking idea for in-game "toggle" for life bars and also way to make life bars smaller. No promises. But expressed interest.
-- Can't upgrade supply cap to 300 due to hardware limitations (especially in 4v4). Will re-evaluate if becomes possible with typical hardware.
-- Balance is based on 1v1, but Blizzard still feels 4v4 is somewhat balanced.
-- Between AoE spells, Stalker Blink, etc Blizzard feels there is MORE micro in SC2 than SC1.
-- No plans for Carrier buffs (seems strong to them), but they will re-evaluate in a month or two.
-- Blizzard currently does not like 2 Roaches for 3 food. Not even happy with .5 food Zerglings.
-- Void Ray "fazing" will be "addressed".
-- Underground casting bugs with Fungal Growth and Neural Parasite will be investigated.
-- TvZ stats show approx 50/50 balance. Thinks there may be an issue with tanks, but stats don't show it yet. They will be watching closely this matchup.
-- Browder on why they can't remove tank overkill: "To help with perfomance, units do not fire all at once. There is a tiny offset between different units firing their weapons. From the users perspective it is almost simultaenous, but the shots are actually 1/8-1/16th of a second apart. Since units cannot target units that are already dead and since Siege Tanks hit their targets instantly, this creates the situation you are describing, where Siege Tanks waste fewer shots."
-- Blizzard doesn't like solution of Ultralisks "walking over" Zerglings. Didn't address pushing of Zerglings.
-- Blizzard not planning on adding Korean BW professional style maps to map pool. Ladder maps need to be accessible to all levels of players and not be too technical. They're happy with tournaments using their own sophisticated maps.
-- Blizzard is comfortable with the functionality of the current Macro Mechanics
-- No plans at the moment to change feeding outside of current time limits.
-- Blizzard will clear the ladders in-between "seasons". No definite plans for how long a season will last, however.
-- Blizzard looking into places in UI to add a resource counter to team games.
-- New Force Field trapping functionality is NOT intended but was the unfortunate result of another bug fix. A patch with the release will restore it's original functionality and still preserve the other bug fix (an issue with Zerglings on creep being able to squeeze by a line of Zealots on a ramp).
-- You will be able to "do some key rebinding" like F-keys in the release.
-- No plans to change Void Rays (especially not to reset their charge when changing targets).
-- No plans to change Psi Storm, but first logical change may be to make it not have to be researched.
-- Blizzard feels Terran Mech is "too specialized". May work to make it more "muddy" and remove some of the potency of the hard counters that the various units present (Thors against Mutas, Vikings and BCs, Hellions and Light).
-- Blizzard feels Zerg may be too weak in Tier 2. No definite plans, but they're investigating. Urges Zerg to branch out and try all units.
-- No plans to add DTs to the Templar Archives. They like the Shrine as an advertisement about the possibility of DTs. They make make the Shrine cheaper or faster to build if it remains an issue.
-- No plans to add additional T1 anti-air to Zerg army. Happy with Queen's role in this regard. Suggests getting more than 1.


BNET
-- Plans for automated tournaments but these are "a little ways off".
-- Cross-region coming but they need to investigate how to do it fairly (business issues).
-- There is an offline mode where you can play the "campaign, skirmish against the AI or challenge mode" without needing to be connected to Battle.net.
-- Blizzard investigating making ladder division change checks more frequent around release.
-- Private chat channels will appear in a post-launch patch.
-- Updates to BNET will be ongoing throughout the lifecycle of SC2.
-- There will be a unique Pro League with previously announced details after launch.
-- No plans still for LAN support. Point to multiple people playing WoW on same internet connection.
-- Tournament and eSports functionality will be addressed in a post launch patch (to address needs of players who want to make easy pick-up tournies).
-- There will be (or already is) an option to disable achievement popups.
-- Blizzard will address custom game finding issues. Like the grouping the way it is now as opposed to game spamming, but miss the days of "no rush" titles. Looking for how to add this in the best way.
-- Blizzard will add a way to save games in custom matches in the future.
-- Blizzard is working to add servers and lower ping in SEA. They ask players in places like Australia to not buy US client and to populate the community on the SEA servers.
-- Blizzard adding ability view replays with friends within BNet, but it's not a launch feature.
-- Blizzard aware of issue with off-racing hurting someone's ladder ranking. Unsure of the right response, but they will investigate and find a solution that makes everyone happy. For now, you just have to take the hit with the knowledge it makes you a better player overall.
-- You can't earn achievements or access cloud file storage when in Offline Mode.
-- It takes 30+ games in the current system for the system to really get knowledge of where to promote you.
-- The promotion system is "very conservative" and therefore it's not advised for people to tank their placement matches either in beta or release. They may make the system more aggressive around release to get people seeded correctly in leagues.
-- Blizzard says being able to draw on the screen during a group replay game "would be a ton of fun." No plans for it, though.
-- Plans perhaps in one of the expansions to allow people to watch live Tournament Games.


MISC
-- Current in-game sounds are release-final.
-- More units coming in the expansions, but goal to keep the game easy to understand.
-- Zerg "swarminess" is supposed to come in SC2 from their macro ability to completely refabricate a large army after the last is lost, not from the amount of units on the field.
-- Confirms that any Pro Edition LAN-enabled SC2 client rumors are just that... rumors.
-- Lurker was traded for Roach+Baneling. Scrapped due to prevalent detection and "without Dark Swarm Lurkers don't have quire the same level of use they had in SC1".
-- For tournament licensing information send email to sc-tourneyinfo@blizzard.com
-- Blizzard may explore multiplayer campaigns in the future expansions
-- Blizzard will include some multiplayer co-op custom games soon after release
-- Some work is started, but serious work on the first expansion will start Mid-to-Late August.
-- LoS mechanics (like old Overseer Spore Cloud) is "probably something we will explore in the Zerg expansion."
-- Browder on Mothership: "I think Vortex is more fun than Stasis. I also think the single ness of the unit is a fun addition for the Protoss. But it certainly wasn't our most creative unit to date."
-- Blizzard will look into being able to press ALT+# to instantly go to a screen.
-- Blizzard tried to add a lot of SC1 mechanics into SC2 (like muta stacking). For the rest, says community "will have to find new tactics and not rely on old ones."
-- SC2 is rated T for Teen by the ESRB.
-- Blizzard may patch SCBW to work in Windows 7 but this will not occur at least until after release.
-- "terrible terrible damage" is likely a cheat code in SC2.
-- Sigaty on what region/client to buy: "You should buy the language version and region that you want to play in. The ability to switch language and which language you want to switch to is going to vary from region to region."
-- Terran is the most popular MP race. Unknown if this is because it's default, their expansion, familiar, or perceived as OP.
-- There may be a SC2 demo after release, but it will be a little bit in the future.
-- On Latin America client: "Our players in Latin America still ahve the option of purchasing an unlimited play client directly from us. We do have the ADDITIONAL option (for players who want it) to buy a lower-cost box that has limited play time. You can then buy additional play time if you like. So it's up to you which way you want to go. And yes the game will be fully voiced and localized in Latin American Spanish (not Castellano)."
-- Servers will be up for those going to midnight releases. Should be available when game is available.
-- Blizzard feels Zerg doesn't need another unit pre-expansion. Feel that they may even be doing better than BW when you take out lesser-used units like the Devourer.
-- With faster Protoss shield regeneration in SC2, there won't be a Shield Battery.
-- Campaign should provide over 20-30 hours of entertainment depending on the person.
-- Browder on Marauders and design philosophy: " Like many strong units, people complain (especially people who lose to them). We think they are pretty fun. They hit hard, are vulnerable to air and can be overcome by Zerglings or Zealots. The fact that they are so vulnerable to air is one of the core weaknesses that we like about the unit since it brings other units into the game to counter them."
-- Blizzard ok if Infested Terrans are not used widely at all skill levels. Some spells (like Thor strike cannons) may be there for flavor or unusual strategies. They hope not many spells work this way, but ok if some do.
-- Archon is almost intentionally weak because it steps on the role of the Collosus and Pheonix. Blizzard ok with this and other iconic old units being potentially less useful than in BW.


MAP EDITOR
-- Snow tileset is coming in the future, not this release.
-- Galaxy Editor has some UI improvements as well as stability improvements in addition to all the campaign art for release.
-- Galaxy Editor won't include any art for the Zerg and Protoss campaigns until they come out
-- Blizzard working on lowering input latency for Custom Games to help faciliate games with arrow key movement, etc.
-- Should be able to mix tilesets in the editor. If this was removed it is probably unintended and will be addressed.