On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
The Problem is much more fundamental: Lurkers are some kind of special defense unit. They are made for cost-efficient defense, but beeing tricky in offensive use. What are Banelings? Just another unit that has no specified situation, can work offensively and defensively.
Why is that important? Lurkers helped spreading out matches. When I can defend a base super cost efficiently with a couple of lurkers and static defense and perhaps some mobile forces which I can move there any time, then it means that I do not need my main army to defend that spot. Because even if I'ld lose those lurkers and that base, the probability that I killed a lot of enemy units is high.
That does not work anymore in SC2. Almost every army fights at the almost same cost efficiency level regardless whether it attacks or defends. Having 10 Banelings defend an expansion on their own? Better not, they'll just splash before reaching their enemies. That's where the difference between a Lurker and a Baneling is.
What also follows out of this: Spread out match leads to more importance of single actions and single units. A 3-Base situation won't benefit DT or HT drops for example, so people just focuss on defending because spreading further won't work out well as there is no cost efficient defense. Also, we already know those graphs, more than 3 base are pretty useless in SC2 anyways.
The problem with SC2 is that unit composition always trumps micro. Whether or not you win is based on tipping point mechanics between DPS and unit survivability.
But the community clearly doesn't want this. If you read one of the balance threads, live-reports etc. things that get whined about are AOE unit. Colossus, Templar and Tanks for instance. And they all got nerfed. Yet there are still so many whines about them.
I don't think you can really say this. Colossus behave like mobile tanks without setup times. I can fully understand why people whine about them. Templar did have a problem. Warp in storm was a silly dynamic. Tanks I can't say much, not sure why they got nerfed.
Anyway some of the whine about these units were logical. Units that control space should have downsides, these 2 did not have downsides until recently.
But the community clearly doesn't want this. If you read one of the balance threads, live-reports etc. things that get whined about are AOE unit. Colossus, Templar and Tanks for instance. And they all got nerfed. Yet there are still so many whines about them.
I don't think you can really say this. Colossus behave like mobile tanks without setup times. I can fully understand why people whine about them. Templar did have a problem. Warp in storm was a silly dynamic. Tanks I can't say much, not sure why they got nerfed.
Anyway some of the whine about these units were logical. Units that control space should have downsides, these 2 did not have downsides until recently.
Well Reavers behaved so as well, but they were ridiculously slow so they needed dropships, which led to no setup time but extreeeemely cool micro battles! Colossi are just Dropship and Reaver combined -> few micro requirement left. It's kinda sad...
What blizzard does: If a unit deals a lot of damage, they nerf the damage. What they should do to reach a broodwar-situation: They should make it require a lot of micro to deal that damage, but be less efficient with weak micro.
For example Colossi: Removing Colossi and bringing in Reavers again -> Same damage potential, but a harder micro requirements to deal it.
On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
The Problem is much more fundamental: Lurkers are some kind of special defense unit. They are made for cost-efficient defense, but beeing tricky in offensive use. What are Banelings? Just another unit that has no specified situation, can work offensively and defensively.
Why is that important? Lurkers helped spreading out matches. When I can defend a base super cost efficiently with a couple of lurkers and static defense and perhaps some mobile forces which I can move there any time, then it means that I do not need my main army to defend that spot. Because even if I'ld lose those lurkers and that base, the probability that I killed a lot of enemy units is high.
That does not work anymore in SC2. Almost every army fights at the almost same cost efficiency level regardless whether it attacks or defends. Having 10 Banelings defend an expansion on their own? Better not, they'll just splash before reaching their enemies. That's where the difference between a Lurker and a Baneling is.
You said that SC2 micro looked boring and was unspectacular. I posted a video of marine micro avoiding baneling splash, much like that Nada video where he avoid lurker splash by marine micro. You reply by explaining how banelings and lurkers differ in use? What does that have to do with anything?
On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
The Problem is much more fundamental: Lurkers are some kind of special defense unit. They are made for cost-efficient defense, but beeing tricky in offensive use. What are Banelings? Just another unit that has no specified situation, can work offensively and defensively.
Why is that important? Lurkers helped spreading out matches. When I can defend a base super cost efficiently with a couple of lurkers and static defense and perhaps some mobile forces which I can move there any time, then it means that I do not need my main army to defend that spot. Because even if I'ld lose those lurkers and that base, the probability that I killed a lot of enemy units is high.
That does not work anymore in SC2. Almost every army fights at the almost same cost efficiency level regardless whether it attacks or defends. Having 10 Banelings defend an expansion on their own? Better not, they'll just splash before reaching their enemies. That's where the difference between a Lurker and a Baneling is.
You said that SC2 micro looked boring and was unspectacular. I posted a video of marine micro avoiding baneling splash, much like that Nada video where he avoid lurker splash by marine micro. You reply by explaining how banelings and lurkers differ in use? What does that have to do with anything?
1. There are way less battles leading to that kind of interesting micro in SC2, with some baneling battles beeing an exeption much rather. Vulture vs Dragoons got completely removed for example and was kinda awesome, and Hellions vs Lings is way less spectacular and easier to micro than Vulture vs Lings. 2. Imo Lurkers were much harder to micro than banelings, and also harder to counter with micro 3. I just said that Banelings are no suitable replacement for Lurkers, because Lurkers had more than just that micro aspect, but also a game-designing aspect which Banelings totally miss.
I don't know if this has been mentioned, but I think the unit clumping has a lot to do with why battles in SC2 aren't as fun to watch. You get these huge balls of units that just annihilate eachother. When the units are more spread out the battles take longer, terrain matters more and there's more time to adapt to the battle.
On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
The Problem is much more fundamental: Lurkers are some kind of special defense unit. They are made for cost-efficient defense, but beeing tricky in offensive use. What are Banelings? Just another unit that has no specified situation, can work offensively and defensively.
Why is that important? Lurkers helped spreading out matches. When I can defend a base super cost efficiently with a couple of lurkers and static defense and perhaps some mobile forces which I can move there any time, then it means that I do not need my main army to defend that spot. Because even if I'ld lose those lurkers and that base, the probability that I killed a lot of enemy units is high.
That does not work anymore in SC2. Almost every army fights at the almost same cost efficiency level regardless whether it attacks or defends. Having 10 Banelings defend an expansion on their own? Better not, they'll just splash before reaching their enemies. That's where the difference between a Lurker and a Baneling is.
What also follows out of this: Spread out match leads to more importance of single actions and single units. A 3-Base situation won't benefit DT or HT drops for example, so people just focuss on defending because spreading further won't work out well as there is no cost efficient defense. Also, we already know those graphs, more than 3 base are pretty useless in SC2 anyways.
And this is why some people refuse to give SC2 time to evolve.
Let me tell you something, the same way you just did, but for the sake of all this great thread, I'll do it the other way around. Lurkers are boring compared to banelings because they do exactly what anyone would think of doing with them : burrow them at your base to defend or try to bring them offensively and use them kind of like siege tanks to make your main army stronger. While banelings not only can they blow shit up, but you can burrow them at random place to kill a good amount of units, something that cant be done with lurkers because once they attack, the enemy knows where they are and they're now semi-useless. Banelings can also be used to burst a building down very quickly to open a path for your main forces. Banelings are also great to use with other ground units to do a great surround, which lurkers cant do. Another things you can do with banelings that you can't do with lurker is to bomb drop them on your opponent's army with your main forces are fighting.
I just did what you did. Say good things about something I like and totally put down something I don't like just to make my personal preference look even better, all in a masterful display of ignorance about the things I dislike.
We're all equally stupid in this endless argument.
On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
The Problem is much more fundamental: Lurkers are some kind of special defense unit. They are made for cost-efficient defense, but beeing tricky in offensive use. What are Banelings? Just another unit that has no specified situation, can work offensively and defensively.
Why is that important? Lurkers helped spreading out matches. When I can defend a base super cost efficiently with a couple of lurkers and static defense and perhaps some mobile forces which I can move there any time, then it means that I do not need my main army to defend that spot. Because even if I'ld lose those lurkers and that base, the probability that I killed a lot of enemy units is high.
That does not work anymore in SC2. Almost every army fights at the almost same cost efficiency level regardless whether it attacks or defends. Having 10 Banelings defend an expansion on their own? Better not, they'll just splash before reaching their enemies. That's where the difference between a Lurker and a Baneling is.
You said that SC2 micro looked boring and was unspectacular. I posted a video of marine micro avoiding baneling splash, much like that Nada video where he avoid lurker splash by marine micro. You reply by explaining how banelings and lurkers differ in use? What does that have to do with anything?
1. There are way less battles leading to that kind of interesting micro in SC2, with some baneling battles beeing an exeption much rather 2. Imo Lurkers were much harder to micro than banelings, and also harder to counter with micro 3. I just said that Banelings are no suitable replacement for Lurkers, because Lurkers had more than just that micro aspect, but also a game-designing aspect which Banelings totally miss.
There's less battles leading to that micro CURRENTLY. Cause not many players are able to do it, noone had seen it before Marineking. Maybe well see more of that kind of micro further down the road. I've seen impressive marine/blink stalker/DT/Banshee/Muta micro in SC2 so far, i expect it to develop further in the future.
If you ask anyone who has seen him play from the beginning they would tell you the same fucking thing. There is no argument and your opinion is baseless. The facts are in his play and other obligations. They are all there. It isn't arguable.
Geoff the "Incontrol" freak Robinson did make a few comments regarding NaDa's play in the NASL a few days ago when he was up against dde. Geoff praised NaDa for his spectacular mechanics (keeping his minerals below 200-300). He showed great macro, but hell he made so many mistakes with his micro and unit control he could have lost that game at least 5 times. -_- You can bark and play the 'opinion' card all you want, but the fact of the matter is he isn't even close to playing like his former self. You know what they called him before Genius Terran? TORNADO Terran because the guy used to be everywhere at once fucking your shit up. (EDIT: Fun fact, before players started coining the Protoss Death Ball in SC2 it was used to describe Terran in BW). NaDa started it. You look at the minimap and his units movement look like a hurricane. He is the grand master of SK Terran. The fucker perfected it.
With that said, this thread is about improving SC2 game play. That is what you should take away from it, so take off your beer goggles and stop trying to turn it into something different.
The fact you trying to attack players who have YEARS of experience playing RTS games should make you step back for a second and think about what they have to say.
karpo, the same could be said about Hasuob's Void Rays at the LAN in Italy. Then you got to ask yourself, how do these units effect the game flow and map control?
Nice OP, but I think a fundamental problem is that the opening poster assumes familiarity and skill with BW when analyzing BW's spectator appeal. If a B+ ICCup player watches a huge battle, than yeah, they're going to be amazed at unit control and micro because they know how hard it is. A person who has barely played BW will not. Further, if someone who watched a BW match decides they want to play because it looks fun, they will most likely be driven off by the very mechanics you praise as being so conducive to the spectator experience.
Like you, I hope that future patches/expansions/metagame shifts encourage positional play and a better flow. But while BW did (and does) have awesome aspects for the skilled player and skilled spectator, it is not built to expand the popularity of eSport Starcraft with today's audience. SC2 has that initial wow factor, and has easy accessibility - which is probably why it is taking off so well right now.
On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
The Problem is much more fundamental: Lurkers are some kind of special defense unit. They are made for cost-efficient defense, but beeing tricky in offensive use. What are Banelings? Just another unit that has no specified situation, can work offensively and defensively.
Why is that important? Lurkers helped spreading out matches. When I can defend a base super cost efficiently with a couple of lurkers and static defense and perhaps some mobile forces which I can move there any time, then it means that I do not need my main army to defend that spot. Because even if I'ld lose those lurkers and that base, the probability that I killed a lot of enemy units is high.
That does not work anymore in SC2. Almost every army fights at the almost same cost efficiency level regardless whether it attacks or defends. Having 10 Banelings defend an expansion on their own? Better not, they'll just splash before reaching their enemies. That's where the difference between a Lurker and a Baneling is.
What also follows out of this: Spread out match leads to more importance of single actions and single units. A 3-Base situation won't benefit DT or HT drops for example, so people just focuss on defending because spreading further won't work out well as there is no cost efficient defense. Also, we already know those graphs, more than 3 base are pretty useless in SC2 anyways.
And this is why some people refuse to give SC2 time to evolve.
Let me tell you something, the same way you just did, but for the sake of all this great thread, I'll do it the other way around. Lurkers are boring compared to banelings because they do exactly what anyone would think of doing with them : burrow them at your base to defend or try to bring them offensively and use them kind of like siege tanks to make your main army stronger. While banelings not only can they blow shit up, but you can burrow them at random place to kill a good amount of units, something that cant be done with lurkers because once they attack, the enemy knows where they are and they're now semi-useless. Banelings can also be used to burst a building down very quickly to open a path for your main forces. Banelings are also great to use with other ground units to do a great surround, which lurkers cant do. Another things you can do with banelings that you can't do with lurker is to bomb drop them on your opponent's army with your main forces are fighting.
I just did what you did. Say good things about something I like and totally put down something I don't like just to make my personal preference look even better, all in a masterful display of ignorance about the things I dislike.
We're all equally stupid in this endless argument.
Banelingtraps work totally different than lurkertraps (which can be reeinforced with units, while banelings just die after beeing scanned) and thus don't give a significant positional advantage to the zerg, while Lurkers are definitly able to do that. Banelings used with other ground forces can be great, yes, but that's where the problem is because it all leads to blob-syndrome of all units beeing clumped together at a single position of the map. And Lurkers could also be used with other units, leading to significantly more micro on both sides by the way.
Also, lurkers provided much longer fights than Banelings, which are pretty much the epitome of a unit ending a fight within miliseconds. Just watch that Jaedong vs Stork replay, no SC2 fight would ever last as long as some of the battles they have there, and that's why micro becomes even more important as there is more time for each player to micro their units.
On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
The Problem is much more fundamental: Lurkers are some kind of special defense unit. They are made for cost-efficient defense, but beeing tricky in offensive use. What are Banelings? Just another unit that has no specified situation, can work offensively and defensively.
Why is that important? Lurkers helped spreading out matches. When I can defend a base super cost efficiently with a couple of lurkers and static defense and perhaps some mobile forces which I can move there any time, then it means that I do not need my main army to defend that spot. Because even if I'ld lose those lurkers and that base, the probability that I killed a lot of enemy units is high.
That does not work anymore in SC2. Almost every army fights at the almost same cost efficiency level regardless whether it attacks or defends. Having 10 Banelings defend an expansion on their own? Better not, they'll just splash before reaching their enemies. That's where the difference between a Lurker and a Baneling is.
You said that SC2 micro looked boring and was unspectacular. I posted a video of marine micro avoiding baneling splash, much like that Nada video where he avoid lurker splash by marine micro. You reply by explaining how banelings and lurkers differ in use? What does that have to do with anything?
1. There are way less battles leading to that kind of interesting micro in SC2, with some baneling battles beeing an exeption much rather. Vulture vs Dragoons got completely removed for example and was kinda awesome, and Hellions vs Lings is way less spectacular and easier to micro than Vulture vs Lings. 2. Imo Lurkers were much harder to micro than banelings, and also harder to counter with micro 3. I just said that Banelings are no suitable replacement for Lurkers, because Lurkers had more than just that micro aspect, but also a game-designing aspect which Banelings totally miss.
Except that banelings are NOT a replacement for Lurkers. If any zerg unit has to be lurker replacement that would be roaches when used defensively. Burrow micro to avoid forcefield and such looks more like lurker than banelings will ever do. Of course we'll never get any marine micro against burrow roaches because of scans. If lurkers make a comeback in HotS I bet they'll morph from roaches, not hydras. (Let's pray for moving burrowed lurkers... oh boy)
If you ask anyone who has seen him play from the beginning they would tell you the same fucking thing. There is no argument and your opinion is baseless. The facts are in his play and other obligations. They are all there. It isn't arguable.
Geoff the "Incontrol" freak Robinson did make a few comments regarding NaDa's play in the NASL a few days ago when he was up against dde. Geoff praised NaDa for his spectacular mechanics (keeping his minerals below 200-300). He showed great macro, but hell he made so many mistakes with his micro and macro he could have lost that game at least 5 times. -_- You can bark and play the 'opinion' card all you want, but the fact of the matter is he isn't even close to playing like his former self. You know what they called him before Genius Terran? TORNADO Terran because the guy used to be everywhere at once fucking your shit up. He is the grand master of SK Terran. The fucker perfected it.
With that said, this thread is about improving SC2 game play. That is what you should take away from it, so take off your beer goggles and stop trying to turn it into something different.
The fact you trying to attack players who have YEARS of experience playing RTS games should make you step back for a second and think about what they have to say.
karpo, the same could be said about Hasuob's Void Rays at the LAN in Italy. Then you got to ask yourself, how do these units effect the game flow and map control?
I don't need to ask myself anything. I responded clearly towards someone posting about SC2 MICRO being boring and unspectacular. He responded by sidestepping the question and talked about unit purpose, something i didn't bring up at all.
If someone disses SC2 micro and i call him on it doesn't mean that i need to delve into unit balance or game flow. Marinekings baneling micro is considered awesome by many just as Nadas micro against lurkers.
On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
I'm sorry for nitpicking, but I think it is important to stress the major difference is that there is much more of a 2 player interaction between lurkers and marines compared to banelings. Effectively using lurkers requires refined judgment and micro skills. You've gotta decide when and where you burrow which all depends on the angles of attack and retreat, how far you can move in + the amount of marine shots you can take + the distance from the marines you want to burrow and how you believe the other player is going to respond to your own lurker positioning. Learning how to effectively create well spread and angled attacks with lurkers took me quite a while to learn, but the mindgames and positioning war between lurker + lings and rines is something hard to match. Imagine the excitement of hellions hitting the perfect line up of workers, except in order to fire they must hold position for half a second and wait. All this is completely ignoring the evilness of hold position lurkers too.
Unfortunately, I've not seen/been able to do any baneling micro apart from using them as mines or having other units act as meatshields/distractions while rolling fullspeed towards the biggest marine group. They're an excellent addition to the game, but sadly can't compete just yet.
On April 16 2011 21:27 teekesselchen wrote: I fully agree to the opening post. The relation of playstyles and unit handling was really reduced to a poor one in SC2. This is what I think since the start of beta and I'm very glad that somebody formulated that so well here. Micro looks absolutely unspectacular, boring and goes way too much into detail instead of beeing obvious like in SC:BW.
Also, the ratio of the importance of single units (or low numbers of units) got really lowered imo. One Reaver? Yes, please. One Colossus? Na, better build four or five! One Siegetank defending an expansion in BW? Can be quite effective. One Tank defending an SC2-Expansion? Waste of money, will get off a maximum of two shots before dying.
SC2 mechanics indeed did reduce the importance of units to the dps I deliver, agreed. As everything just clumbs up to a big blob with everything attackning, micro got diminished.
How is this micro any different from Nada micro against Lurkers? Also Sjows great banshee control and decisionmaking in his recent Dreamhack run was great, just some examples.
The Problem is much more fundamental: Lurkers are some kind of special defense unit. They are made for cost-efficient defense, but beeing tricky in offensive use. What are Banelings? Just another unit that has no specified situation, can work offensively and defensively.
Why is that important? Lurkers helped spreading out matches. When I can defend a base super cost efficiently with a couple of lurkers and static defense and perhaps some mobile forces which I can move there any time, then it means that I do not need my main army to defend that spot. Because even if I'ld lose those lurkers and that base, the probability that I killed a lot of enemy units is high.
That does not work anymore in SC2. Almost every army fights at the almost same cost efficiency level regardless whether it attacks or defends. Having 10 Banelings defend an expansion on their own? Better not, they'll just splash before reaching their enemies. That's where the difference between a Lurker and a Baneling is.
You said that SC2 micro looked boring and was unspectacular. I posted a video of marine micro avoiding baneling splash, much like that Nada video where he avoid lurker splash by marine micro. You reply by explaining how banelings and lurkers differ in use? What does that have to do with anything?
1. There are way less battles leading to that kind of interesting micro in SC2, with some baneling battles beeing an exeption much rather. Vulture vs Dragoons got completely removed for example and was kinda awesome, and Hellions vs Lings is way less spectacular and easier to micro than Vulture vs Lings. 2. Imo Lurkers were much harder to micro than banelings, and also harder to counter with micro 3. I just said that Banelings are no suitable replacement for Lurkers, because Lurkers had more than just that micro aspect, but also a game-designing aspect which Banelings totally miss.
I think you're missing the point. The most micro intense thing in SC2 is simply boxing a few marines and right clicking. That's it. I'm sure you can think of a thousand different things that required more micro in SC1.
Not sure if it's related. But I can't imagine being interested in watching SC2 for 10 year. There is only so much that players can do because SC2 is pretty simplified.
In my opinion it IS the early stage of SC2 that is somewhat responsible for this. (I know you won't accept this as the only reason.)
People claim that you need less APM for SC2. I would rather say that you could do MUCH more amazing stuff with high APM in SC2. For example, I can't recall many (if any) battles where the zerg player is controlling two muta flocks simultaneously in SC2. But just because you CAN have them in one control group doesn't mean you have to. Harassing 2 bases at the same time could be amazing, but the skills needed aren't developed yet.
To me, a key concept of RTS is to overburden the opponents ability to multitask. And there is still huge potential.
Another point / reason might be the apparent choice of Blizzard to keep games short(er). Which resolves in less numbers of epic battles.
On April 16 2011 10:20 Antisocialmunky wrote: I think there is game-flow type play but people aren't utilizing them fully yet especially because things go boom quite quickly in SCII. After all things like creep and pylon warp in require 'setup' time.
it's somewhat similar, but kind of misses the mark. if we are playing PvZ in SC2 and i come out slightly ahead, i can IMMEDIATELY attack you creep or no creep. there is no position you can hold if you don't have a unit advantage. with units like lurker or siege tank, i can more effectively hold ground so a slight advantage doesn't turn into a snowball steamroll.
They also took away the high ground miss percentage, another aspect of BW which affected positional play.
EPT
