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On March 15 2011 09:07 NicolBolas wrote:Show nested quote +What is hype?
If something is hype, it makes the crowd get excited. Simple as that. Grammar note: things are not "hype". Something can be hype d, or cause hype, or have hype, but "hype" is not a property that something can simply be. I don't like this notion of appropriating words for a different purpose. "Hype" has a perfectly functional definition already. If it's "Simple as that", why not just say: If something is exciting, it makes the crowed get excited. It says exactly what you want without torturing the English language (more than it gets tortured on a daily basis on the Internet, at least). Just say that Colossi are boring; that's a word that already exists and describes exactly what you're talking about. Something like that was tried in the beta, and Blizzard changed it to what it is. Because it didn't work. Show nested quote +require Colossi to have Warp Prisms with them if they want to get anywhere fast.
For the animation, imagine the Colossus chargin' it's lasers, then releasing a strong blast all at once. Think Yamato Cannon. Look, if you want Shuttle/Reaver back, just say so. Don't try to hide what you want by pretending to be compromising. You want the Shuttle/Reaver dynamic back.
I like this guy. His name rocks too.
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Colossi are the main reason why I sometimes really, really hate playing protoss. I could never betray Aiur but damn those big bastards are boring as hell to use.
The further SC2 progresses, the more I'm feeling like I'm playing a pure macro race...and coming from wc3 I fricking HATE it. I started with toss because all the fancy stuff (forcefields to begin with) you can do in battles interest me. But nowadays it's just about massing a big ball of everything + colossus without dying to anything like drops, nydus or whatever, then a-moving around the map. The thing is, every funny cute thing you can do is LESS effective. Is blink good? Sure it is, but not as good as 4 colossi. Are phoenixes good? Sure they are, but man do they suck at actually killing stuff that runs around on the ground.
I think the OP has captured a core problem of current SC2 - that the most efficient strategies/compositions are the ones that require little skill to execute in battles. Because you could say the same thing about zerg, where, for example, fungal is highly underused because - despite being cool - it's just less effective than massing stuff. But then again, isn't zerg supposed to be the macro race? I 100% agree on "bring back stuff that requires skill to use and is cool to watch".
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We will not have the Colossi removed now, that's for sure.
But we can push forward the idea of having more (USABLE) exciting microable units to influence the content of the future patchs and expansions.
To take an illustrative example, what if in SC:BW defilers weren't used in 3/4 of the TvZ game, science lab vessel never used, ultralisks pretty rare, and mutalisks not microable as before... Well that's SC2 for you, muta/bling (banelings replacing lurkers) against tanks/marines/medics.
I think Blizzard assumed from day1 that SC2 was so awesome that no matter what the strategies/maps would be used, people would still get overly-excited about it, no matter what...
Now after the ZvZ metagame ended up being a roach war a-move in 1/2 of the high level game, that TvT is a camping fest except with fewer drops since they are now vikings and that medivac is much slower than in BW for some reasons, etc... They will have to realize how wrong they were.
We go to the GSL site and on various streams like we go to the movies
No matter what kind of special effects are used and how much acting potential the actors have and/or what a genius the realisator is, if the movie ends up being boring, it sucks, period.
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Excellent first post.
I don't think the suggestion at the end is all too bad. I think it would work. But I think there's a much better way to do it (or possible the two could be combined):
- Make it so the colossus has an "active" ability. That is, an ability that actually requires something from the user. And make this really good. So yeah, increasing the damage like that and making it slower may be one idea.
But basically, the things that are cool are those that require action from users. Vultures in sc1 required you to place the mines and do so perfectly if you wanted to engage a goon group. Reavers required shuttle control and dropping the reaver and picking it up just after the shot and so on. As well as building new scarabs. Templars of course cast storms.
I basically want more and more active abilities in sc2. I think that would make all the difference. For example, what if you had to manually make banelings explode? That's almost the same as when you use burrowed banelings.
In sc2 we have a lot of passive units and passive abilities. Concussive shells is the absolute worst in my opinion. It adds no excitement value and it makes the game boring. You've already dealt with colossus. Reapers also have nothing special. Hellions are a bit better but again requires no real control. You can't do anything with them. There's no difference between me and Boxer using hellions. Immortals have the same problem. They're supposed to be a special unit but you don't have to do anything with them. They just shoot. And even though they deal 50 damage you wouldn't guess it from how you have to use them nor the shot animation...
I'm thinking about doing a write-up around this general theme of lack of active abilities and the over-abundance of passive abilities. I think it's really, really hurting sc2.
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I want shuttle-reaver back. Reaver's had a lot of things I love about starcraft; they've got a high skillcap being dumb- and slow as hell, they can potentially do a shitton of damage and importantly, give Protoss a scary mineral harassing move early on besides DT, they are in a way easily countered; they just embody starcraft to me =)
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On March 15 2011 19:05 Elefanto wrote:Show nested quote +On March 15 2011 18:57 Talin wrote:
Colossi and Sentries make Protoss boring to play and especially boring to watch. It's the worst
combination of units/abilities imaginable, it's just so anti-Starcraft it's painful. Personally, i find sentries super cool and exciting to play with, and watch. There are so many different uses of force fields, and it's not as easy as many people make it to be. And the more skilled you are, the more efficient your force field usage gets. Compare MC force field usage to your average protoss. Also hallucination has so much potential.
Yepp. I don't think people are bored with sentries at all. I know they're a pain to face if you're zerg (terrans shouldn't complain because of how ridiculously easy MM just rolls protoss without forcefields) but properly placed force fields are really cool.
Keeping in line with my previous post: it's an active ability.
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OP claims that "cool" units are micro intensive and allow for creative/unsusual play and then proposes changes to colossi that extremely counters these attributes.
The huge problem with colossi right now is how untweakable it is right now. I dont this there is anything that could be changed without swaying the balance hugely in either way. The way it was designed, powerful unit with powerful upgrade (say hello high templar) makes it even harder to mess around with subltle tweaks.
I'm really really convinced the only possible way to handle this problem is to introduce new unit, and then make drastic changes, possibly make toss less dependent on this unit.
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Blizzard did say they will be adding new units to make the game more dynamic. Which can possibly make collosus not the only choice. Or perhaps an upgrade to allow the colossus kick a zealot into a bio ball and see how many rines get knocked out. Would be cool.
Be ready to see more cool stuff in the up coming expansions. Just like Brood war really made SC the coolest RTS ever... HOTS and LoTV may possibly do the same.
Keep up the suggestions, although it may help to post them in the blizzard forums as well  The kick a zealot ability upgrade may be a good one. Intense timing and micro having to line up the colossus and zealot with the stimmed bio ball or Roach army and taking a whole lane of units out... CAN"T WAIT
well, Im a zerg actually, can't wait to burrow away from any oncoming zealots bowling balls.... that'd be fun to watch.
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I agree that Colossus are pretty much not fun to watch, just group them all up and put some Stalkers under them, and then move out. That Daigo video made my jaw drop, and Reavers frequently make MCB/OGN commentators explode with excitement. At least Storm is still exciting.
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I think I have an idea that may have huge potential:
change it so that enemy massive ground units (thor, ultralisk, colossus) draw the fire of the colossus, so its splash attack is nullified.
This will make it so that its late game will not be ridiculous, mid game remains the same, increase the importance of immortals, viability of storm, prevents colossus vs colossus PvP, and increase the complexity of every matchup.
Major tweaks would have to be done for the balance of each unit, some of my suggestions are:
-Increase effectiveness of immortals - range or special ability possibly. Or maybe also make immortal units massive, with a special ability to take down other massive units.
-Allow colossus to attack air - (a buff to counter their nerf. enemy massive air units would still draw their fire)
-decrease ultralisk/ultralisk cavern build time (so zerg can attain a massive unit in relatively comparable time to thor/colossus)
feedback? additional suggestions?
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On March 15 2011 21:59 Poststrata wrote:Blizzard did say they will be adding new units to make the game more dynamic. Which can possibly make collosus not the only choice. Or perhaps an upgrade to allow the colossus kick a zealot into a bio ball and see how many rines get knocked out. Would be cool. Be ready to see more cool stuff in the up coming expansions. Just like Brood war really made SC the coolest RTS ever... HOTS and LoTV may possibly do the same. Keep up the suggestions, although it may help to post them in the blizzard forums as well The kick a zealot ability upgrade may be a good one. Intense timing and micro having to line up the colossus and zealot with the stimmed bio ball or Roach army and taking a whole lane of units out... CAN"T WAIT
This is the main issue though.
They are already plenty of unused units which could help creating a more dynamic game.
Warp-prism is theoretically like a SC1 shuttle except better, why is it not used ?
Because it's slower than the shuttle in SC1 and gets destroid by muta/queen/marines/vikings which all the race natually get in their MU against P etc...
Same thing for Terran dropship, they're not used for dropping that much (considering that Terran gets plenty of them in every single game they should be used more) ? Why ? Simply because they're too damn slow ...
Buff the speed of these 2 units and you will realize how quick the metagame will change and how much more dynamic the SC2 game will be... You don't need any new units for that, just match the speed of these 2 units with the speed they had in BW...
What are you telling me ? Zerg will get wrecked ? Then let's buff nydus worm as well... Huh ? Could make nydus worm too good against FEing Protoss ? What about nydus worm requiring hive tech so, would force the Zerg to use it a bit more...
See, it's very easy to increase the mobility of this game, the reason why it has not been done is either because Blizzard don't know how to do it or don't believe it is necessary.
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On March 15 2011 22:14 TeWy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 15 2011 21:59 Poststrata wrote:Blizzard did say they will be adding new units to make the game more dynamic. Which can possibly make collosus not the only choice. Or perhaps an upgrade to allow the colossus kick a zealot into a bio ball and see how many rines get knocked out. Would be cool. Be ready to see more cool stuff in the up coming expansions. Just like Brood war really made SC the coolest RTS ever... HOTS and LoTV may possibly do the same. Keep up the suggestions, although it may help to post them in the blizzard forums as well The kick a zealot ability upgrade may be a good one. Intense timing and micro having to line up the colossus and zealot with the stimmed bio ball or Roach army and taking a whole lane of units out... CAN"T WAIT This is the main issue though. They are already plenty of unused units which could help creating a more dynamic game. Warp-prism is theoretically like a SC1 shuttle except better, why is it not used ? Because it's slower than the shuttle in SC1 and gets destroid by muta/queen/marines/vikings which all the race natually get in their MU against P etc... Same thing for Terran dropship, they're not used for dropping that much (considering that Terran gets plenty of them in every single game they should be used more) ? Why ? Simply because they're too damn slow ... Buff the speed of these 2 units and you will realize how quick the metagame will change and how much more dynamic the SC2 game will be... You don't need any new units for that, just match the speed of these 2 units with the speed they had in BW... What are you telling me ? Zerg will get wrecked ? Then let's buff nydus worm as well... Huh ? Could make nydus worm too good against FEing Protoss ? What about nydus worm requiring hive tech so, would force the Zerg to use it a bit more... See, it's very easy to increase the mobility of this game, the reason why it has not been done is either because Blizzard don't know how to do it or don't believe it is necessary.
Your suggestions are terrible, please stop.
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On March 15 2011 09:07 NicolBolas wrote:Show nested quote +What is hype?
If something is hype, it makes the crowd get excited. Simple as that. Grammar note: things are not "hype". Something can be hype d, or cause hype, or have hype, but "hype" is not a property that something can simply be. I don't like this notion of appropriating words for a different purpose. "Hype" has a perfectly functional definition already. If it's "Simple as that", why not just say: If something is exciting, it makes the crowed get excited. It says exactly what you want without torturing the English language (more than it gets tortured on a daily basis on the Internet, at least). Just say that Colossi are boring; that's a word that already exists and describes exactly what you're talking about..
Even though i don't like the word "hype" very much, and prefer "exciting" as well, i have to disagree about that grammar point.
When something is "x", x is gramatically an adjective. And there are many adjectives that are nouns as well. A lot of adjectives' definition in the dictionary say "property of that which has [n]" where n is the correspondent noun. So something "hype" is something that causes hype, or excitment. Even though i'm not sure it's added in the english dictionary, this is how a language increases, and one of the reasons why there needs to be new editions of english dictionary once in a while.
That being said, i still think exciting is a more appropriate adjective anyway. And one of the main reasons i find the colossus not that exciting is the fact that we have to see and use it almost everygame with toss, and not as an optional strategy. Pretty boring things can become more exciting if they are seen less often, which isn't the case with colossi at all.
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I've been browsing this thread, as I just out right hate the collusus.(Masters P >_< if it matters)
But OP, I assume you've seen what happens to a collusus when like 8 or so vikings or 6 corruptors get onto it?
It dies. No chance.
And you can argue that it "Keep your army in position!", unfortunately flying units are way more mobile and the collusus dies so quick they will get that collusus kill one way or another. So making this useless beast move slower is not a viable solution.
Everyone has seen what happens to a protoss army when it tries to fight stim-bioball(or hydra army) without colusus support yea? Spoilers: It's really sad.
I'm liking this Immortal/Sentry/Zealot combination though OP, you HAVE to micro your immortals to shoot marauders and your forcefields need to be clutch, but it eliminates the dependence on Colussus balls and hoping they don't get sniped, and is pretty satisfying to pull off.
OR: + Show Spoiler +Give us back the damn reaver!
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then perhaps we're in agreement the collosis should be removed
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If colossi were even a tiny bit slower, it would have to be made untargettable by airunits.
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God, I've been playing Protoss mainly since launch, and have recently come to the same conclusion- Collosi are a necessary part of the Brotoss force that is just flat out boring to use. I'd been trying to implement more HT into my forces, but after the next patch, how often will one opt to go for HT as opposed to collosus. It's at the point that TvP, ZvP, and PvP are all so stale and collosi-centered that I'm beginning to try T out for the first time seriously. Let me tell you, doing this at a 3,000 diamond level is not the easiest thing ><
Give us something more exciting. I don't care that the collosus is disgustingly good, I want to have fun, please.
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I think blizzard went overboard with the passive effects. You don't get excited about an immortal only taking 10 damage, or a roach regenerating slowly, or a collosus climbing up and down cliffs.
I do feel from a spectators POV, that protoss got the bad end of all the races. On top of that, most of the units that do splash damage have pretty serious drawbacks.
-Hellions have to hit in a line, so in order to hit the most, you have to position the hellion nicely rather than just move it in.
-Siege tanks have to be immobile to do splash damage, and even some vision support to boot.
-Banelings have to get up to point blank range.
-EMP, Storm and Fungal are all energy based.
-Ultra's make the dragoon AI live on, just getting this thing up front of the army is something that makes me think back to those days on Destination. WHY WOULDNT YOU CROSS THE BRIDGE DRAGOON.
Collosi on the other hand don't need support units to use their full potential. They come out of the box ready to do the max damage, with a reasonable speed and the ability to look over cliffs. The only things the support units do is prevent the collosus from dying so it can keep on rocking the battlefield.
<useless suggestion that everyone skips>
I would be in favour of having a mode-style unit made out of the collosi. Much like the viking or the siege tank. One mode that does less damage and has the advantages of looking over cliffs and cliff climbing, and one that allows the collosi to 'duck' lower to the ground. This mode allows for more DPS and not being able to hit by air, but the tradeoff is that it gets a severe range reduction ( to like 6 or 7 ) and no cliff climbing. Perhaps playing with the movement speeds on these modes are options too.
</useless suggestion that everyone skips>
I think the protoss units LOOK cool and flashy. They certainly seem impressive from a novice point of view. But the lack of WOW CONTROLL like blink stalkers across the race makes it less fun to watch than a matchup like TvP or TvZ.
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The answer has already been suggested tbh; the collosus needs to do it's damage in real-time. The first time i played vs collosus i tried to be uber1337 and micro out of the beam - but it isn't possible as the animation isn't actually representative of how the damage is calculated.
Just make it so the damage is in sync with the animation, and calculates the damage dealt as the beam moves along. I.e. the beam has a certain dps and units take dmg proportional to how long they stayed in the beam.
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On March 15 2011 23:13 Chaosvuistje wrote:
-Ultra's make the dragoon AI live on, just getting this thing up front of the army is something that makes me think back to those days on Destination. WHY WOULDNT YOU CROSS THE BRIDGE DRAGOON.
Quoting for the biblical lulz.
Collosi on the other hand don't need support units to use their full potential. They come out of the box ready to do the max damage, with a reasonable speed and the ability to look over cliffs. The only things the support units do is prevent the collosus from dying so it can keep on rocking the battlefield.
Imagine if they required air upgrades for armor and attack *gasp* we might see carriers as a viable transition. I'd like colossi a lot more if you could do something other than... making more.
<useless suggestion that everyone skips>
I would be in favour of having a mode-style unit made out of the collosi. Much like the viking or the siege tank. One mode that does less damage and has the advantages of looking over cliffs and cliff climbing, and one that allows the collosi to 'duck' lower to the ground. This mode allows for more DPS and not being able to hit by air, but the tradeoff is that it gets a severe range reduction ( to like 6 or 7 ) and no cliff climbing. Perhaps playing with the movement speeds on these modes are options too.
</useless suggestion that everyone skips>
I think this is cool, but it'd need to be FAST. there's a reason landing vikings is a bad idea, lol.
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EPT
