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On August 15 2010 19:59 shynee wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 10:13 Kare wrote: Im gonna say something now because I think it needs to be said, stop making these ridiculous threads and learn to play instead.
User was temp banned for this post. another temp ban for an honest opinion.. tl admins grow some balls.. here comes the ban
Telling the 5th best Zerg in the US to learn to play just makes you look like a fucking moron.
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On August 15 2010 19:59 shynee wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 10:13 Kare wrote: Im gonna say something now because I think it needs to be said, stop making these ridiculous threads and learn to play instead.
User was temp banned for this post. another temp ban for an honest opinion.. tl admins grow some balls.. here comes the ban So if you make a detailed thread about an issue, with considerable knowledge to back it up, and also with other players contribution, and i say: get your fckin garbage out of here, it means I expressed my opionion and nobody should do anything about it? The one with the honest opinion is probably a silver level ragekid, while the poster of this topic is a top american Zerg Btw calling out the admins over sg like this, not a smart idea, if i were one, you would be already banned.
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On August 15 2010 19:47 Jameser wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 19:43 RedX1277 wrote:Hello, this is my first post on TL and I wish to speak my mind about this balance matter. I am a platinum player ranked 20 currently so my oppinion about balance isn't valid so I won't go into that. I have a more general question to ask and see what your opinions are about it. What is most important in a game such as starcraft 2, to balance the game for the intense pro level which represents a very low player base, or to balance the game for the other 99,9% ? If they balance the game according to how the pro players play it, how will it affect the other big chunk? Will it affect the others in the same way? I don't have the experience or anything to see the answeres for this myself and perhaps they are silly questions, and if they are just plainly ignore them and I will have my answere there and still live happily ever after.  edit: It can seem to be off-topic, but I find it to be very related to all these balance posts. basically what I think this comes down to, is do they balance it around future community-made maps (that will be balanced on pro level) or do they balance it around their own (crappy) ladder map pool (which will mean balance on casual level) right now it's unbalanced on casual level at a time when there exists no pro-level maps, which makes for a clusterfuck of suck.
I can't help but think that this "pro level vs casuals" argument that is often brought up comes from ex-WoW players, where there was constantly a discussion between making raids super hard for the elite raiders or super easy for the "casuals".
And it is sooooooooooooo wrong. It simply is. You can not compare mmorpg balancing with RTS balancing, it simply doesn't ever have the same effects on the different skill levels. When you ask that question ("casuals vs pros?") you imply that balancing a matchup for the pros automatically makes it harder for the casuals in that matchup, which, in RTS, is almost never (if ever) the case. I can't think of any scenario which would make it harder for the casuals if it's balanced for pro-level play, no matter how hard I think about it.
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+ Show Spoiler +On August 15 2010 18:16 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 1, As Sheth mentioned, Zerg has no ability to defend against sieging or to siege. Due to the "spawn larvae" ability of the queen the Zerg units had to be made a bit more squishy. I think it is time the Zerg players woke up and realized that no advantage comes without a cost and in this case the cost is not being able to rush a sieged position without heavy casualties. Zerg also got one additional trick and that is the ability to move while burrowed. Assaulting sieged tanks should still be possible if the Terran is a slacker on his detection. If he isnt it is equally fine, because he had to spend resources on detection, which might have been spent for additional tanks. The big question is: Should Zerg be able to assault a sieged up defensive position? IMO the answer is no, because the same wouldnt work for Protoss either. Immortals can get EMPed and you have loads of Marines at the front anyways and the whole bunch of Gateway units gets eaten by splash. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 2, The Terran is very flexible with strategies, but Zerg is not.
What do Zergs have? They have speedlings or roaches. There are more ways to open than Roaches and Speedlings, because the Terran also has to build more buildings to be able to build mech or air for example. Sometimes they even need two additional buildings if they want to go for a high tech unit and need a tech lab. So this argument of Zerg not having options doesnt really count IMO. Terrans being very flexible is correct, however, because their assault methods can look VERY different. I havent seen Zerg harrass a base with 4 burrowed Roaches yet though, so some Zerg abilities are definetely underused. I feel that many times the Zerg are hindered by the mantra of "you do not want to build static defenses", which Day[9] and other commentators spread around. At 300 hit points and a range of 7 the Spine Crawler is MUCH cheaper to defend a base from harrassing Hellions than six Zerglings are AND you even save larvae on that. Just build 4-5 Spine Crawlers and only a handful of Zerglings and you should be fine against Hellions and early infantry aggression. Adding a third queen to your two bases should make the defense against air complete (plus more energy for Transfusion and Creep Tumors) and you didnt even need any gas to do it. The point where Zerg is at a total advantage is the mid- to late-game, when they have several tech buildings and the option to do a complete tech switch in one production cycle. The real crunch is getting to that point. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 3, The Terran mobility is too good comparing to the Zerg ground army. I agree with you here, but I would phrase it a little differently: The mobility disadvantage of Terrans does not come into play that much due to the horribly small size of the maps. If the maps were larger the Terrans would have to build bunkers and turrets as defensive structures when they advance on an enemy, simply because it takes a long time to reinforce and replace any lost units. This is not the case atm and there is no map - except for Desert Oasis (!!!!) maybe - where the Zerg could choose to go around the Terran army to attack his base instead. The small size of the maps also guarantee that the Zerg players do NOT use the Nydus Network as a simple mobility advantage to "teleport" from their base to a spot near the opponents base; it is only used as an "assault method" directly into the enemies base atm. All of this is due to the size of the maps. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 4, Zerg army is hard-countered, and Terran army is slightly-countered.
For each unit or unit combination of Zerg, Terran can find a very effective unit or unit combo to counter it hard. This can easily be abused by a Zerg by making tech switches. The thing is that Zerg players seem to think that "stuff is only effective in a swarm of units" and thus complain about the cost, but that is not entirely true. Many times the Terrans do drops with a Medivac or two full of Marine/Marauders. Some even master the art of dropping at several places at once. I dont think I have seen a Zerg do that yet and especially the burrowed movement of Roaches and Infestors will make it hard to catch the culprits if they dont get greedy. The need to build A LOT of defensive structures (Turrets and Cannons for detection) will rise and those are resources lost to their offensive capability. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 5, Zerg units are too weak compared to BW when they are in small number. This has been done to offset the increased larva production capability due to the queen. If the spawn larva ability is reworked (changed to 2 additional larvae and no " unlimited stacking") then it would be reasonable to make Zerg units tougher. Simply buffing the Zerg units durability would make them much too powerful in the late game where the stacked larvae simply allows for "instant" reproduction of a 200/200 army. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 6, The new AI helps Terran too much.
(1) In SC2 unit turn to get into a ball - good for tanks, ravens to kill zerg, also good for marauders to consume damage for marines, good for thors to block the tanks, etc.. Also good for Terran to reposition their reinforcement very quickly. It used to be a pain to let the newly-made Terran units to cooperate perfectly with the attacking army in BW.
(2) The auto-repair thing is terrible. Zerglings do not attack the repairing scv, so if a thor is being surrounded and auto-repaired, no zergling will do any damage to it unless you force them to attack scvs one by one. Not to mention that the scvs around a thor is very difficult to catch.
(3) Tanks do not waste DPS.. They are too smart to avoid self-damage now. If you spawn infested terran in the middle of a ball of Terran tanks, only one tank will fire, and it is not a big deal. In BW the tanks around the infested terran will all die instantly. I dont think your points are really valid and offer only a one-sided view on the matter ... (1) Bio-balls are great for Zerg too: Fungal Growth and if the Terran has tanks and you fire a few Broodlings into it (or sacrifice a few of your own units) they get punished for it by their own army. (2) This doesnt have anything to do with AUTO-repair. The thing you mention happens in an early push, where the SCVs are told to repair by the player most of the time. Auto-repair can make it easier, but the thing you mention doesnt really change for a good Terran who micros his stuff. (3) Tanks also got considerably more expensive compared to BW ... most notably 3 food instead of 2. The thing is that the movement AI from BW was crap and technology has improved. It isnt only the defense that has been improved by this, but the offense as well or would you prefer advancing in a single-file-line with your attacking units as was the case in BW? Especially Zerg gain from being able to move in a tight formation, because it means more of their units reach the target at the same time. As a whole I think the one factor which makes the game so hard for Zerg is the map size. The possibility for harrass is just so great and the Terran units (Reaper, Hellion) are so efficient at it that it is frequently used. The Zerg race needs the longest time to "get into gear" and this makes it vulnerable to harrass. On a larger map there is at least the option to simply go around an enemy to harrass where his troops are not.
The larvae stacking is capped at 19 larvaes per hatchery. Granted, it's a lot, but it takes a lot of time to get it stacked up, not only should you be 200/200 already, but you should after you hit the food cap, wait another ~200 seconds of perfect spawn larvae usage to actually reach that cap. Not to mention the resource cost of this. It's very situational.
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On August 15 2010 20:16 heishe wrote: And it is sooooooooooooo wrong. It simply is. You can not compare mmorpg balancing with RTS balancing, it simply doesn't ever have the same effects on the different skill levels. When you ask that question ("casuals vs pros?") you imply that balancing a matchup for the pros automatically makes it harder for the casuals in that matchup, which, in RTS, is almost never (if ever) the case. I can't think of any scenario which would make it harder for the casuals if it's balanced for pro-level play, no matter how hard I think about it.
Casuals do not have the APM and insane micro that pros have.
If a specific early push can be defended by a pro with insane micro but a casual cannot defend against the same push, then this will lead to a disparity in win/loss ratios between pros and casuals.
Just one quick example.
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On August 15 2010 18:16 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 1, As Sheth mentioned, Zerg has no ability to defend against sieging or to siege. Due to the "spawn larvae" ability of the queen the Zerg units had to be made a bit more squishy. I think it is time the Zerg players woke up and realized that no advantage comes without a cost and in this case the cost is not being able to rush a sieged position without heavy casualties. Zerg also got one additional trick and that is the ability to move while burrowed. Assaulting sieged tanks should still be possible if the Terran is a slacker on his detection. If he isnt it is equally fine, because he had to spend resources on detection, which might have been spent for additional tanks. The big question is: Should Zerg be able to assault a sieged up defensive position? IMO the answer is no, because the same wouldnt work for Protoss either. Immortals can get EMPed and you have loads of Marines at the front anyways and the whole bunch of Gateway units gets eaten by splash. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 2, The Terran is very flexible with strategies, but Zerg is not.
What do Zergs have? They have speedlings or roaches. There are more ways to open than Roaches and Speedlings, because the Terran also has to build more buildings to be able to build mech or air for example. Sometimes they even need two additional buildings if they want to go for a high tech unit and need a tech lab. So this argument of Zerg not having options doesnt really count IMO. Terrans being very flexible is correct, however, because their assault methods can look VERY different. I havent seen Zerg harrass a base with 4 burrowed Roaches yet though, so some Zerg abilities are definetely underused. I feel that many times the Zerg are hindered by the mantra of "you do not want to build static defenses", which Day[9] and other commentators spread around. At 300 hit points and a range of 7 the Spine Crawler is MUCH cheaper to defend a base from harrassing Hellions than six Zerglings are AND you even save larvae on that. Just build 4-5 Spine Crawlers and only a handful of Zerglings and you should be fine against Hellions and early infantry aggression. Adding a third queen to your two bases should make the defense against air complete (plus more energy for Transfusion and Creep Tumors) and you didnt even need any gas to do it. The point where Zerg is at a total advantage is the mid- to late-game, when they have several tech buildings and the option to do a complete tech switch in one production cycle. The real crunch is getting to that point. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 3, The Terran mobility is too good comparing to the Zerg ground army. I agree with you here, but I would phrase it a little differently: The mobility disadvantage of Terrans does not come into play that much due to the horribly small size of the maps. If the maps were larger the Terrans would have to build bunkers and turrets as defensive structures when they advance on an enemy, simply because it takes a long time to reinforce and replace any lost units. This is not the case atm and there is no map - except for Desert Oasis (!!!!) maybe - where the Zerg could choose to go around the Terran army to attack his base instead. The small size of the maps also guarantee that the Zerg players do NOT use the Nydus Network as a simple mobility advantage to "teleport" from their base to a spot near the opponents base; it is only used as an "assault method" directly into the enemies base atm. All of this is due to the size of the maps. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 4, Zerg army is hard-countered, and Terran army is slightly-countered.
For each unit or unit combination of Zerg, Terran can find a very effective unit or unit combo to counter it hard. This can easily be abused by a Zerg by making tech switches. The thing is that Zerg players seem to think that "stuff is only effective in a swarm of units" and thus complain about the cost, but that is not entirely true. Many times the Terrans do drops with a Medivac or two full of Marine/Marauders. Some even master the art of dropping at several places at once. I dont think I have seen a Zerg do that yet and especially the burrowed movement of Roaches and Infestors will make it hard to catch the culprits if they dont get greedy. The need to build A LOT of defensive structures (Turrets and Cannons for detection) will rise and those are resources lost to their offensive capability. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 5, Zerg units are too weak compared to BW when they are in small number. This has been done to offset the increased larva production capability due to the queen. If the spawn larva ability is reworked (changed to 2 additional larvae and no "unlimited stacking") then it would be reasonable to make Zerg units tougher. Simply buffing the Zerg units durability would make them much too powerful in the late game where the stacked larvae simply allows for "instant" reproduction of a 200/200 army. Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 09:34 MasterAsia wrote: 6, The new AI helps Terran too much.
(1) In SC2 unit turn to get into a ball - good for tanks, ravens to kill zerg, also good for marauders to consume damage for marines, good for thors to block the tanks, etc.. Also good for Terran to reposition their reinforcement very quickly. It used to be a pain to let the newly-made Terran units to cooperate perfectly with the attacking army in BW.
(2) The auto-repair thing is terrible. Zerglings do not attack the repairing scv, so if a thor is being surrounded and auto-repaired, no zergling will do any damage to it unless you force them to attack scvs one by one. Not to mention that the scvs around a thor is very difficult to catch.
(3) Tanks do not waste DPS.. They are too smart to avoid self-damage now. If you spawn infested terran in the middle of a ball of Terran tanks, only one tank will fire, and it is not a big deal. In BW the tanks around the infested terran will all die instantly. I dont think your points are really valid and offer only a one-sided view on the matter ... (1) Bio-balls are great for Zerg too: Fungal Growth and if the Terran has tanks and you fire a few Broodlings into it (or sacrifice a few of your own units) they get punished for it by their own army. (2) This doesnt have anything to do with AUTO-repair. The thing you mention happens in an early push, where the SCVs are told to repair by the player most of the time. Auto-repair can make it easier, but the thing you mention doesnt really change for a good Terran who micros his stuff. (3) Tanks also got considerably more expensive compared to BW ... most notably 3 food instead of 2. The thing is that the movement AI from BW was crap and technology has improved. It isnt only the defense that has been improved by this, but the offense as well or would you prefer advancing in a single-file-line with your attacking units as was the case in BW? Especially Zerg gain from being able to move in a tight formation, because it means more of their units reach the target at the same time. As a whole I think the one factor which makes the game so hard for Zerg is the map size. The possibility for harrass is just so great and the Terran units (Reaper, Hellion) are so efficient at it that it is frequently used. The Zerg race needs the longest time to "get into gear" and this makes it vulnerable to harrass. On a larger map there is at least the option to simply go around an enemy to harrass where his troops are not.
You don't seem to know anything about Zerg at all.
5-6 Spine Crawlers to defend against Hellion harrass? Really? You do realize that to make a spine crawler costs also a Drone? Do you have any idea how important and valuable workers are, ESPECIALLY for Zerg, that early in the game? Yeah, let's make 5-6 Spine Crawlers, his Harrass won't do shit for sure, but he can expand completely freely and assume complete map control, and own me mid-game because I wasted hundreds on useless Spine Crawlers. You need to also understand that HELLIONS aren't exactly an investment that hurts Terran even if they are lost, because as long as they force Zerg to stop droning, mission accomplished, and if the Zerg overreacts and starts making shit ton of spine crawlers, well, game over.
Late game for Zerg is fine, the issue is GETTING there. 90% of your games you won't because you get CRUSHED during early game mid-game period. And what do you wanna Tech switch to against a Mech ball? Mutalisks? Roaches? Hydralisks? Zerglings? Oh wait, doesen't mech ball own all of these units? And in a very cost efficient matter? Your saying that Zerg shouldn't run into a positioned force, I can agree with that, but what else you want us to do? Harrass with mutalisks? Turrets deflect it easily. Nydus worm? Even if it it's not spotted for some odd reason and killed before it even spawns, the Terran can just push towards your nearest base and kill you since half your army is on the other side of the map. Let me ask you, who wins in a base race? Terran, always. Zergs main strenght is re-inforcing alot of units, and if he loses that through losing his hatcheries, it's over. I've tried countering and base trades to death. It's much easier for a Terran to defend due to siege tanks and wall-ins and shit blocking your stuff, while Terran has a breeze just walking up, meeting some resistance but generally will just run over, destroy your shit, then you have 1 zerg army and 1 Terran army left, Terran army will destroy the Zerg army and since they can lift their CCs and buildings to safety, they can just setup a new base somewehere with his mech ball.
And seriously, I mentioned this in another thread. How do you prepare for the unknown? I mean it's close to impossible to gather proper intel against a good Terran. All I can see is a factory and a Rax, what goes behind those walls is unknown. I can try to sneak a OL but only a stupid Terran would let me see anything worthwhile. So most of the time I need to guess what he is doing or just wait for Lair, but that is usually too late. It's too late to start preparing to make banelings if he rolls out with 30 marines and you were rushing to Hydralisks since you were expecting Banshees. And the sad part is: You need to prepare for both. Luckily for Zergs, the amount of Bio pushes have been reducing due to more and more people discovering 2 fact and similiar stuff. But if your caught pants down against a bio push when you went roaches or hydras, you will lose. You absolutely need banelings against the first bio push. Or a shit ton of Spine Crawlers, but again, is it worth it in the long run.
The rush distances in this game are so ridicolously small save maybe Desert Oasis, so even the ''very immobile'' mech army has a easy time strolling up to your base in matter of seconds. Oh and did I mention that most maps are narrow as hell too, only making it easier for mech to rip your units apart?
Also, are you seriously saying that Zerg gains more from the better AI? Really? You mentioned that more units get to the range faster, then what about bio balls? What about Stalker balls with Colosuss? It benefits the other 2 races way more due to them having more ranged units. We only got the Hydralisk. The roach is too short ranged. Every race in BW had the ''line'' problem. But only a stupid person would send their units and attack in a line. BW was much about positioning your troops first.
Oh and Zerg doesen't have any ''proper'' aoe either. They got banelings, which die on impact and are useless against most ground units. (very non-cost effective) Then we got FG which is a spell and doesen't stack. Then we get Melee aoe at T3 with ultralisks, yay. Ultralisks are decent though, too bad we don't get to use them enough. While Terran has the strongest AoEers in the game. Tanks, Thors, Hellions (which granted are useless against numerous units, but atleast they don't die and also don't cost gas. On top of that they are very good against Hydralisks, also they can be microed against Roaches early game.) All these AoEs stack, and are consistent. In BW Zerg had something similiar: The Lurker which sadly isn't among us anymore.
Protoss got the Colossus, and Storm. Also the Force Field which makes these 2 just so much stronger.
So please, don't say the new AI benefits Zerg, that's just ignorant. The new AI forcefully makes your units clump, something that imo Zerg wants to avoid mainly due to AoE. While a BALL of Bio becomes much stronger and harder to surround.
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not gonna lie, i was originally a person to sit and complain to myself about how zerg needs to try to do different tactics instead of QQing, but this post was really good, ty op.
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6, The new AI helps Terran too much.
(2) The auto-repair thing is terrible. Zerglings do not attack the repairing scv, so if a thor is being surrounded and auto-repaired, no zergling will do any damage to it unless you force them to attack scvs one by one. Not to mention that the scvs around a thor is very difficult to catch.
(3) Tanks do not waste DPS.. They are too smart to avoid self-damage now. If you spawn infested terran in the middle of a ball of Terran tanks, only one tank will fire, and it is not a big deal. In BW the tanks around the infested terran will all die instantly.
These are two things that I find just so incredibly ridiculous. I've lost 2 games because SCVs auto repairing a Thor just absolutely obliterated me. Granted I probably could have done a better job focus firing SCVs but it's honestly pretty difficult to individually focus SCVs even when doing a "shift" command and it's tough to trade units for something like a worker in a battle situation.
Secondly, I've always been under the impression that tank "smart firing" has been a huge issue for a long time. Beating even a decent terran mech player relies on me getting Ultralisks. Without ultralisks it's EXTREMELY difficult to win a game.
Finally I'd like to say that nobody is saying that Terran is unbeatable. What I am saying is that I have to work extra hard and play significantly better than my opponent in order to win. Based on my own personal definition of imbalance if I have to do more and play better than my opponent "significantly" (i.e. he just beats me with 1a2a3a) in order to win than that specific matchup is imbalanced.
I'm a rank 4 diamond zerg player (not that it means much of anything) and I feel that ZvT is imbalanced.
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This may be one of the cases where the current battlenet 2.0 system is actually a really good thing. It should be easy for Blizzard to look in their database and get some statistics such as "What is the winrate in TvZ where both players have MMR over x?" It seems quite possible to me that the answer to that question depends strongly on x. The winrate may be very different in top diamond as compared to low diamond even.
To everyone who is not concerned with that right now (casuals vs hardcore argument), remember that the game is still very new. While it may seems ok right now to you, or at your level, your opponents are learning. If you are seeing reaper harass right now as a zerg, and you can deal with it quite ok. Think about this: you may tell the OP to learn 2 play better, but imagine what would happen if your opponents doing reaper harass learned to play better a bit better. Your idea that it can be dealt with may all of a sudden not be true anymore. There are quite some examples of strategies failed badly when not executed well (for example, on ICCUP, everyone tried to do the Fantasy build immediately after the match, and almost everyone sucked badly with it).
In other words, when someone at your level attempts a strategy against you, and you can hold it off, that does NOT mean that that is true at every level. Maybe at a higher level, if you get two equally skilled players, it can no longer be held off. And right now, everyone is learning, they just learn faster at the top (due to invested time, level of opponents, experience with other RTS). So if there is imbalance, or problems at the top, it will trickle down, maybe now it is only visible at the top diamond, but as OP said, Terran around him were clearly learning and he saw his winrate drop.
And cut down on the whole "honest" opinion thing. There are two kinds of opinions: Informed and uninformed opinions. You can be honestly uninformed, but the only thing that matters about your opinion is that it is uninformed.
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On August 15 2010 19:43 RedX1277 wrote: Hello, this is my first post on TL and I wish to speak my mind about this balance matter.
I am a platinum player ranked 20 currently so my oppinion about balance isn't valid so I won't go into that. I have a more general question to ask and see what your opinions are about it.
What is most important in a game such as starcraft 2, to balance the game for the intense pro level which represents a very low player base, or to balance the game for the other 99,9% ?
How exactly do you balance for casuals OR pros.. By definition, balance should be objective and unbiased. And pro's are the best population to get unbiased ideas on balance from, for many reasons - it is the only level of play where individual skill is close to peaking and racial imbalance could determine the outcome of games if present. Most average players learn from pros and the game evolves with the strategies they pioneer, not the other way around. For that reason I find that top zergs rerolling is cause for concern, especially this early after release.
If you imagine the other scenario, blizzard balancing after the avg. Joes whine you end up with a game that is easily exploited at the very high tier - World of Warcraft arenas in other words. If they have the same mentality about Starcraft 2 as WoW this game should flop compared to BW, which was such a success because it was balanced to the point where i'd call it the 20th century chess. Should it go something like WoW i'd expect the patches to do close to nothing and major fixes to be around 6 months in the making, also they won't ever truly balance the game - just make protoss/zerg the next FoTM with their content packs.
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On August 15 2010 20:44 Nixda wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 20:16 heishe wrote: And it is sooooooooooooo wrong. It simply is. You can not compare mmorpg balancing with RTS balancing, it simply doesn't ever have the same effects on the different skill levels. When you ask that question ("casuals vs pros?") you imply that balancing a matchup for the pros automatically makes it harder for the casuals in that matchup, which, in RTS, is almost never (if ever) the case. I can't think of any scenario which would make it harder for the casuals if it's balanced for pro-level play, no matter how hard I think about it. Casuals do not have the APM and insane micro that pros have. If a specific early push can be defended by a pro with insane micro but a casual cannot defend against the same push, then this will lead to a disparity in win/loss ratios between pros and casuals. Just one quick example.
A good, more specific example, is that an early 1 thor/5-6 marine/2-3 hellion/3-4 scv push will destroy pretty much all low level zerg, and some high level zerg (but most certainly not all).
Basically, low-level players don't have very good micro, and their battles are mostly a-moves, so it's all about unit choice. They do not have the ability to focus fire, and will not know about things like hold-position zerglings to get rid of the repairing SCVs (though in fairness, I've come to realize that most high-level players don't seem to know about this either). So a push that is not particularly difficult for me to hold of will cause many 'casuals' to cry about imbalance.
There are many other examples, but you should get the idea. Most cheese falls into this category (works on low-level, won't work on anyone with skill). If you balance for all levels, that means you basically have to balance a-move armies. Which obviously will get boring really, really fast.
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On August 15 2010 20:16 heishe wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 19:47 Jameser wrote:On August 15 2010 19:43 RedX1277 wrote:Hello, this is my first post on TL and I wish to speak my mind about this balance matter. I am a platinum player ranked 20 currently so my oppinion about balance isn't valid so I won't go into that. I have a more general question to ask and see what your opinions are about it. What is most important in a game such as starcraft 2, to balance the game for the intense pro level which represents a very low player base, or to balance the game for the other 99,9% ? If they balance the game according to how the pro players play it, how will it affect the other big chunk? Will it affect the others in the same way? I don't have the experience or anything to see the answeres for this myself and perhaps they are silly questions, and if they are just plainly ignore them and I will have my answere there and still live happily ever after.  edit: It can seem to be off-topic, but I find it to be very related to all these balance posts. basically what I think this comes down to, is do they balance it around future community-made maps (that will be balanced on pro level) or do they balance it around their own (crappy) ladder map pool (which will mean balance on casual level) right now it's unbalanced on casual level at a time when there exists no pro-level maps, which makes for a clusterfuck of suck. I can't help but think that this "pro level vs casuals" argument that is often brought up comes from ex-WoW players, where there was constantly a discussion between making raids super hard for the elite raiders or super easy for the "casuals". And it is sooooooooooooo wrong. It simply is. You can not compare mmorpg balancing with RTS balancing, it simply doesn't ever have the same effects on the different skill levels. When you ask that question ("casuals vs pros?") you imply that balancing a matchup for the pros automatically makes it harder for the casuals in that matchup, which, in RTS, is almost never (if ever) the case. I can't think of any scenario which would make it harder for the casuals if it's balanced for pro-level play, no matter how hard I think about it.
The main reasons why some people do not precieve this imbalance is because of good matchmaking. People loose and win against terran and thus the imbalance that exists is not apparent but for a small minority of players.
The difference between 400 diamond and 800 diamond league is like night and day, if anything it’s a credit to blizzards amazing matchmaking system. The game is pretty balanced at lower levels of diamond because we the players are not regularly abusing these imbalances. Heck i dont even know what there is for terran to abuse. WHEN i try to play imba i more often than not just loose.
When you get occasionally qued up against someone and he rapes you rather than shout imbalance most of us focus on improving our own play, shrug it off and pwn some lower level Terrans and thus people question the people who shout imbalance.
Thusly the argument of balance at all levels is relatively silly.
BLIZZARD will still have to fix this game for the pro level players so we get to see a wide variety of races played by players who play the race because they have self respect and for the lower levels I present to you the end all be all argument of balance: The matchmaking system will put your winrate at a steady 50% anyhow so the casuals will be satisfied regardless.
However from the spectator point of view, everyone playing terran is just not going to be a satisfying viewer experience.
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On August 15 2010 21:02 explicit wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 19:43 RedX1277 wrote: Hello, this is my first post on TL and I wish to speak my mind about this balance matter.
I am a platinum player ranked 20 currently so my oppinion about balance isn't valid so I won't go into that. I have a more general question to ask and see what your opinions are about it.
What is most important in a game such as starcraft 2, to balance the game for the intense pro level which represents a very low player base, or to balance the game for the other 99,9% ?
How exactly do you balance for casuals OR pros.. By definition, balance should be objective and unbiased. And pro's are the best population to get unbiased ideas on balance from, for many reasons - it is the only level of play where individual skill is close to peaking and racial imbalance could determine the outcome of games if present. Most average players learn from pros and the game evolves with the strategies they pioneer, not the other way around. For that reason I find that top zergs rerolling is cause for concern, especially this early after release. If you imagine the other scenario, blizzard balancing after the avg. Joes whine you end up with a game that is easily exploited at the very high tier - World of Warcraft arenas in other words. If they have the same mentality about Starcraft 2 as WoW this game should flop compared to BW, which was such a success because it was balanced to the point where i'd call it the 20th century chess. Should it go something like WoW i'd expect the patches to do close to nothing and major fixes to be around 6 months in the making, also they won't ever truly balance the game - just make protoss/zerg the next FoTM with their content packs.
While I agree that if they make sweeping changes it will do nothing but shift FoTM around, I totally disagree with your last point. Time of patching has nothing to do with it, and in fact, I'm extraordinarily glad that they are taking time to gather data, observe, and more importantly let the game and players evolve before they step in. If they make changes too quickly, they will be correcting perceived imbalances, rather than actual ones, and may change something that wouldn't need changing had they allowed more time for people to figure out how to deal with it.
The best example of this is BW Protoss. They were considered useless and underpowered for years, to the point that many teams would not accept Protoss players. Eventually, people figured out how to play them, and people discovered to their surprise that P was, in fact, balanced relative to the other races.
I cannot predict whether that is the case with Zerg currently, but I very much hope that they keep their slow pace of balance, since it gives us time to actually develop strategies and find out. I can say, however, that the excessive self-pitying that most of my fellow Zerg seem to display is not helpful in any way. A pity party after a game means you will probably learn nothing from it. Moreover, if you work to try to adapt and win, and Blizzard DOES end up buffing Zerg, where will that leave you? Winning easily.
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Great OP, agree with much of it. Also I still think that maps are a big factor in this matchup, as a zerg I dislike most of the maps right now.
I really hope some changes in the next patch.
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On August 15 2010 21:37 BillyMole wrote: The best example of this is BW Protoss. They were considered useless and underpowered for years, to the point that many teams would not accept Protoss players. Eventually, people figured out how to play them, and people discovered to their surprise that P was, in fact, balanced relative to the other races. I don't get this argument, even though I hear it a lot. So since people suffered for several years thinking that a certain race was underpowered, we should just let history repeat itself until we somehow "figure out" how to fix all the issues? What if there really is no magic solution? Wouldn't it be better to just buff the weak race now and then nerf it later if it's found that it's actually too strong?
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On August 15 2010 20:50 ci_esteban wrote:Show nested quote + 6, The new AI helps Terran too much.
(2) The auto-repair thing is terrible. Zerglings do not attack the repairing scv, so if a thor is being surrounded and auto-repaired, no zergling will do any damage to it unless you force them to attack scvs one by one. Not to mention that the scvs around a thor is very difficult to catch.
(3) Tanks do not waste DPS.. They are too smart to avoid self-damage now. If you spawn infested terran in the middle of a ball of Terran tanks, only one tank will fire, and it is not a big deal. In BW the tanks around the infested terran will all die instantly.
These are two things that I find just so incredibly ridiculous. I've lost 2 games because SCVs auto repairing a Thor just absolutely obliterated me. Granted I probably could have done a better job focus firing SCVs but it's honestly pretty difficult to individually focus SCVs even when doing a "shift" command and it's tough to trade units for something like a worker in a battle situation. Secondly, I've always been under the impression that tank "smart firing" has been a huge issue for a long time. Beating even a decent terran mech player relies on me getting Ultralisks. Without ultralisks it's EXTREMELY difficult to win a game. Finally I'd like to say that nobody is saying that Terran is unbeatable. What I am saying is that I have to work extra hard and play significantly better than my opponent in order to win. Based on my own personal definition of imbalance if I have to do more and play better than my opponent "significantly" (i.e. he just beats me with 1a2a3a) in order to win than that specific matchup is imbalanced. I'm a rank 4 diamond zerg player (not that it means much of anything) and I feel that ZvT is imbalanced.
In my first game as terran (after I rolled random instead of zerg), I got the +40 kills on 1 unit achievement. He threw everything at me. Mutas, lings, hydras, roaches, broodlords, ultralisks. Thank you thor+tank+scv.
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a guy mentioned the sneaky roach/infestor burrow tactics to harrass. T hasusually a wall at the front. and there IS a limit to larva stacking ... don`t know the exact number but i think it was 18/19 or so per hatch ? and even if you throw a 200 Z army at a 150 T army and you lose 100 supply and rebuild to 150 again you will lose to T´s 110 supply army that´s still alive. that´s just how my last game went. marine marauder thor vs infestor speedling muta roach. believe it or not ... OP is 100% correct as everybody knows.
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On August 15 2010 20:44 Nixda wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 20:16 heishe wrote: And it is sooooooooooooo wrong. It simply is. You can not compare mmorpg balancing with RTS balancing, it simply doesn't ever have the same effects on the different skill levels. When you ask that question ("casuals vs pros?") you imply that balancing a matchup for the pros automatically makes it harder for the casuals in that matchup, which, in RTS, is almost never (if ever) the case. I can't think of any scenario which would make it harder for the casuals if it's balanced for pro-level play, no matter how hard I think about it. Casuals do not have the APM and insane micro that pros have. If a specific early push can be defended by a pro with insane micro but a casual cannot defend against the same push, then this will lead to a disparity in win/loss ratios between pros and casuals. Just one quick example.
the situation you describe implies imbalance though. If a pro has to have insane micro to defend an early game push where his opponent doesn't need just as much micro to pull it off, then it's imbalanced.
and if now a patch comes out that either buffs the defender in a way that he doesn't need insane micro anymore or nerfs the attacker in a way that he needs the same insane micro, it won't make a difference for the casuals, as no casual will be able to pull off that insane early game harass / attack just like no casual would be able to defend it.
On August 15 2010 21:28 BillyMole wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 20:44 Nixda wrote:On August 15 2010 20:16 heishe wrote: And it is sooooooooooooo wrong. It simply is. You can not compare mmorpg balancing with RTS balancing, it simply doesn't ever have the same effects on the different skill levels. When you ask that question ("casuals vs pros?") you imply that balancing a matchup for the pros automatically makes it harder for the casuals in that matchup, which, in RTS, is almost never (if ever) the case. I can't think of any scenario which would make it harder for the casuals if it's balanced for pro-level play, no matter how hard I think about it. Casuals do not have the APM and insane micro that pros have. If a specific early push can be defended by a pro with insane micro but a casual cannot defend against the same push, then this will lead to a disparity in win/loss ratios between pros and casuals. Just one quick example. A good, more specific example, is that an early 1 thor/5-6 marine/2-3 hellion/3-4 scv push will destroy pretty much all low level zerg, and some high level zerg (but most certainly not all). Basically, low-level players don't have very good micro, and their battles are mostly a-moves, so it's all about unit choice. They do not have the ability to focus fire, and will not know about things like hold-position zerglings to get rid of the repairing SCVs (though in fairness, I've come to realize that most high-level players don't seem to know about this either). So a push that is not particularly difficult for me to hold of will cause many 'casuals' to cry about imbalance. There are many other examples, but you should get the idea. Most cheese falls into this category (works on low-level, won't work on anyone with skill). If you balance for all levels, that means you basically have to balance a-move armies. Which obviously will get boring really, really fast.
No "casual" will be able to pull off a good timed thor/rine/hellion push, and what you desribe is just one of the many pushes which are pretty hard to defend as zerg, no matter which skill level the zerg or the terran is, and the zerg is always going to need much much much more micro/macro/scouting to defend against it than the terran is going to need to pull it off. it's an imbalanced push, thus what I'm saying is still correct.
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The problem with zerg could be that Activision/Blizzard made spawn larvae too strong to begin with, and therefore had to balance the units instead of balancing the spawn larvae mechanics. Now roaches was completely destroyed compared to how Dustin pictured them, and hydras are almost unplayable off-creep, and every tech building takes long time to build, and the tech climbing is really steep.
Instead, what they should have done IMO, was to balance the spawn larvae mechanic instead of making the units and build times so much worse. I feel that spawning 2 or 3 larvae instead of 4 could have stopped a lot of what Activision/Blizzard did to break zerg.
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On August 15 2010 22:07 archon256 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2010 21:37 BillyMole wrote: The best example of this is BW Protoss. They were considered useless and underpowered for years, to the point that many teams would not accept Protoss players. Eventually, people figured out how to play them, and people discovered to their surprise that P was, in fact, balanced relative to the other races. I don't get this argument, even though I hear it a lot. So since people suffered for several years thinking that a certain race was underpowered, we should just let history repeat itself until we somehow "figure out" how to fix all the issues? What if there really is no magic solution? Wouldn't it be better to just buff the weak race now and then nerf it later if it's found that it's actually too strong?
For a variety of reasons. The largest of which is that unnecessary patching is a bad thing for the sport. It causes ripples amongst the fans, who get discontent when their idol loses because the base game was changed.
Moreover, neither you nor anyone else has proven that Zerg is actually weak. I'll grant you there are a number of signs, sure, but a couple weeks of gathering data from what few pros there are right now (and there aren't that many) is not enough to justify changes. This is particularly true since I've realized that even most high-level players don't know how some of the basic game mechanics work. A good example would be hold-position lings to get rid of pesky repairing SCVs, or the same hold-position lings to flay worker lines while under defensive fire. Things like this show that even pro play is still in it's infancy, and there's lots of learning to happen before we can really conclude something is OP. Beta's over, get used to a slow pace of changes. The alternative, fast-paced and often unnecessary changes, lead to WoW syndrome, which is a shifting FotM race that nobody here wants to see happen.
This is especially true since the current "pros" seem all too willing to abandon their chosen race because of perceived imbalance. Real pros do not do that, just look at the pioneers of modern Protoss play. It's a fundamental attitude, and I believe that it means the ones that have the wrong one will not be significant in the pro scene in the future. That's just a personal prediction, but I believe we will see it play out. True pros look for what they messed up that caused losses, and if they can't immediately see anything, they look deeper (outside the box, so to speak). The rest, well, the first symptom is crying about imbalance. After that, they'll use the "I did everything right, I just got outplayed" excuse, and so on.
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