[D] What SC2 is missing? - Page 29

In ZvP how do you prepare for an upcoming battle? ZvT? PvT? PvZ? TvP? Chances are the answer everyone gives to that question is exactly the same. You minimize or maximize surface area, what else can you do? Units in this game don't require setup time. The function of nearly every unit in this game is simple and one dimensional, reduce or improve DPS. One of the few exceptions to this is the siege tank, I'll touch more on this later.

While I agree that there seems to be relatively little preparation before battles compared to BW, I also think that people are not using the preparation mechanics provided in sc2 which makes it SEEM like there are not preparation measures that can be taken, when in fact, there ARE measures that can be taken. For instance, force fields can be preemptively placed in order to funnel/deny enemy units into an area. If the opposing army chooses to engage into the force fields, they are at a disadvantage, but with proper use of massive units, or simply sheer numbers, the army is able to overcome the advantageous preparation of the protoss army.

We used to have a term that was used abundantly on this board that described a pivotal aspect of competitive play. Controlling the game flow is, in essence, controlling the pace of the game. In ZvT, if a Terran wanted to push out and kill your third, you exercised your map control to slow down the Terran push by slowly moving back lurkers as they got in tank range. Conversely, if you wanted to force an engagement as Terran you unsiege and attack towards another position or drop harass his bases, forcing the Zerg to completely reposition. When you're controlling the flow, the only things that can happen are the things you allow to happen. If he wants a big fight, you drop everywhere. If he wants a macro game, you attack him constantly.

I believe we already see this to an extent in sc2, however it is not quite prevalent yet. The simplest example I can think of is in TvZ when the zerg player has zerglings and a mutalisk ball while the terran player has a marine tank army. The mutalisk ball can be used to harass however once the marine tank army moves out the mutalisk ball has to return and help defend the push. The terran player is effectively controlling the actions and positioning of the zerg player by pushing out to stop the mutalisk harass. By moving the lings and mutalisks to a defensive position, options for harass are opened to the terran player. Note that the terran player does not actually have to attack, he simply has to move forward as if he were going to attack. I believe this is an appropriate example? Please correct me if i'm wrong.

Map control isn't really how much of the map you are literally covering with buildings and units, rather it is how much area can you freely move without contest. Put simply, just because you have a unit in a certain area doesn't mean you have map control of that area, it's that fact that you can actively deny movement in that area that makes it map control. It seems to me like all these ideas build upon one another and that if you want to be able to control the flow of the game you need to have map control, and if you want to have map control you need units that can do more than add DPS. You need units with map prescence. BW had units like lurkers, siege tanks, and vultures that could very effectively control sections of the map. Can you name one other than the siege tank that SC2 has?

I definitely agree that there seems to be more of a lack of controlling space in sc2. I believe this comes from the current trend in playstyle of either turtling or pushing. There seems to be less of anything in between due to the mentality that if you're behind you should turtle and harass to get ahead and if you're ahead you should expand and contain to maintain your advantage while defending harass. (This is my very generalized understanding, again if incorrect please correct.)

On the contrary, using SlayerS_Boxer vs Sen from the TSL series today as an example, Both on Shakuras Plateau and on Crevasse, we see Boxer taking up entrenched positions in the middle of Shakuras with bunkers and tanks and on the high ground outside Sen's bases. From my understanding, in Crevasse this allowed Boxer to move small forces of marines to the two leftmost expansions without entirely repositioning his army. (While Boxer was already ahead at this time, if he had moved his entire army, there would have been opportunities for counter attacks by Sen). In Shakuras Plateau, This entrenched position in the middle of the map was not as effective due to the fact that Sen still had very easy access to both his northernmost expansions and thus was able to effectively fend off the marine drops that Boxer implemented. I believe these two games serve as an example of how controlling different spaces and denying access in turn allows you access to other parts of the map. In Shakuras, Boxer was denying movement through the center of the map so the ling blings did not really have an effective attack route into the west side of the map that Boxer controlled. Interestingly enough, Boxer chose to marine drop the top expansions which was space that he did not have control of. The result was that Sen was able to defend some of the drops. There was also an instance where Sen broke the entrenchment of Boxer in the middle of Shakuras, however due to the losses incurred while breaking the entrenchment, Sen was not able to progress further because Boxer's waiting macroed reinforcements were already there. It did however, allow Sen more space to move around on the map.

I don't really know how to explain positioning, but thankfully there are units that personify the idea of positioning perfectly: siege tanks and lurkers. If you've ever been a victim of a lurker or siege tank contain you know how powerful these units are when they are properly setup. 5 properly setup siege tanks can mow down twice the amount of dragoons and 5 properly positioned lurkers could deny an infinite amount of marines from touching your expansion.


Another unique aspect of the siege tank and lurker was that they required time before they were useful, tanks had to siege and lurkers had to burrow. This introduced a unique dynamic in which armies weren't always doing 100% DPS and introduced the idea that you can actively seek to cost-effectively trade units BEFORE tanks or lurkers were setup. This gave micromanagement a larger role to play other than simply pulling away damaged units. If you're attacking into a Terran army as Zerg, you are using lings to tank the majority of the damage and buy time for your lurkers to burrow in addition to trapping marines and killing tanks. Of course, your Terran opponent isn't just sitting there, he's microing his marines back, dodging spines, escaping lings, and picking off the lurkers that you are still advancing. As a zerg or terran in ZvT it was entirely possible to attack into the opposing army and kill almost nothing while losing everything if your control was worse.

What this adds up to is that it gives the person with proper positioning a significant defender's advantage so, even if you come out somewhat behind in an engagement, your opponent can't immediately attack into your remaining army without severe repercussion. This also introduced a way to delay your opponent by slowly giving up ground rather than doing what most SC2 player have to do, which is run back to their nat and turtle until they have a unit advantage. It also meant it required some finesse to get the most out of your attack. If your opponent was low on unit count, you couldn't just 1a into his army, micro a little, and still come out on top. What it really comes down to is that unit relationships were far more complex and, as a result, proper engagements required a higher level of control.

I agree mostly with the setup time idea, but I believe there is lots of potential to be explored in static defense placements for zerg and terran. Not so sure about protoss.

One of the only sources of player-unit interaction in SC2 are spellcasters because they are one of the only units that require actual micromanagement to use properly. The problem with the spellcasters, though, is that they themselves don't promote a player involved response. Think about the sentry and the spells it has, if a guardian shield or forcefield goes up, as the opposing player what are you doing differently? Chances are you aren't doing anything or you are in full retreat. What about the infestor? What's your response to the infestor besides maximizing surface area or neutralizing it before the battle? When a fungal goes off there is literally nothing you can do to avoid further damage, you just sit there thinking, "well this kinda sucks, I need to spread more".

If we take a moment to consider BW spellcasters, we can see that not only did BW spellcasters involve massive player-unit interaction to use properly but also player-unit interaction to combat. Psi storm required tons of apm to use effectively or to dodge; irradiate could be used to massacre high value zerg units but it could also be turned against you; and dark swarm required exquisite levels of control on both sides. When you see a dark swarm get thrown up in a TvZ you don't go, "well that sucks, I need to kill defilers faster", you unsiege your tanks, run out of lurker range and keep raining shells because dark swarm assists zerg units rather than directly hindering terran units. I mean, obviously it hinders terran units to an extent, but you are able to mitigate damage and micro out of it, there's not an instantaneous downpour of lasers down on your army because staple damage dealers required setup time. It's not like it was easy for the zerg to use properly either, it wasn't a fire and forget spell like forcefield. After it was casted both players were microing their asses off.

Take plague vs fungal growth. If all my front marines plagued, I can run them behind healthier units and still use them to some degree. If I get my front marines fungal'd I get to sit there watching them die stuck in place and there's almost nothing I can do to avoid a second fungal other than running headlong into more fungals. More importantly, plague required a large amount of time to research and you could only cast one per defiler before you had to consume, and many times dark swarm was a better choice. On the other hand, fungal is the primary infestor spell and is smartcasted.

Psi storm vs psi storm? A psi storm in SC2 is almost meaningless. In BW, the beauty of psi storm was purely because of the mechanics required to cast it. I don't think there is any debate here. In SC2 smartcast forced a nerf on psi storm to the point where a single psi storm means almost nothing and it requires the screen to be carpeted for it to even be effective. In BW, sequential psi storms were extremely difficult to pull off mid-battle, but had a tremendous payoff. In SC2, not only is it not impressive to see 4 psi storms casted, it's damn stupid to micro against. Microing against a storm almost always means running into 3 more storms because it's so ridiculously easy to cast.

Even staple units were replaced by less interesting, less interactive versions of themselves. Colossus vs reaver? Baneling vs lurker? Viking vs wraith? Thor vs goliath? Phoenix vs corsair? Immortal vs dragoon? Muta vs muta? Hydra vs hydra? There's just no contest.

I agree that there are some mechanics that are fire and forget and some spells like fungal that have little in the way of mitigation after the spell has been cast. I think this does provide the potential for a different kind of micro though - a more mindgame oriented style. In HoN/Dota, baiting cooldowns and waisting the opponent's mana is a part of the early game play, and I think there is potential for this in sc2 as well. Rarely do I see a partial bio army running into a protoss army feigning a full frontal attack, but running back the instant before force fields are going to go down to waste sentry energy. Similarly, I don't see baited emps and fungals on units that are sent in with the intention of being split at the exact right time to waste infestor/ghost energy. I also think that if people control space more these kinds of micromanagement strategies may become more prevalent due to spellcaster abilities becoming relatively more engagement changing than just large balls of units rolling over smaller unit balls. (Not to say that spells are not game changing in large unit balls, but I think they have more importance relatively in small unit group confrontations. Think canon HT vs a small zerg force at an expansion. The success of HT storms largely decides the outcome.)

I'm not sure how I stand on the interactiveness of units. Sometimes I think that the units in sc2 are pretty boring compared to BW, sometimes i think that people definitely have not learned to use the unit combinations to their full potential.

Having a mechanics requirement was what made things in BW impressive. Saying an RTS player only wins because he's faster is like saying a boxer only wins because he's stronger and not a better fighter. It's just stupid.

The high mechanical requirement enabled extremely skilled players to use their units in ways no one ever could. It made large engagements an event in itself because of how difficult it is to maintain your composure when you are controlling 200/200 armies with a 12 unit limit. Huge army fights were a means to and end, and not and end within themselves. The final battle wasn't a formality to end the game that you knew ended minutes ago, it was a direct contest between players. It was the moment when both players go, "I don't care how big your army is, I have mine and I'm going to kill you with it". Have you noticed that during SC2 battle commentators can't say anything other than, "SO MUCH STUFF IS DYING!!", it's because there's nothing for players to do during fights other than pull back damaged units. There's no clutch psi storms, elegant spine dodging, ruthless zealot bombing, flyby reavers, or gross surrounds. It's a variation of 1a vs another variation of 1a.

The sweet irony is that, if multiple unit selection was implemented in BW, battles would still be more interesting and impressive than SC2 battles simply because of unit dynamics. You can't just 1a BW units and have then attack at full effectiveness.

I think that there is potential for mechanical requirement, but we'll really see how engagements can change with micro.

When fighting a marine tank entrenchment as zerg let's say, how you engage is largely going to dictate the outcome. Is the terran player splitting his marines? Are the mutalisks taking advantage of the marines running to pick off tanks? Are the banelings being split to effectively nullify the marine split? Are tanks focus firing banelings to allow the marines as much freedom to attack as possible?

I also feel that the lack of space control that players play with currently. If people start controlling larger areas, the amount of time spent engaging increases and things like repositioning your army become more important.

Another side thought - how many times have we seen things like massive units being dropped onto force fields, emps on PDDs, 360 baneling drops, fake baneling drops, ultra/zealot bombs? There is so much that people can do, just we have to figure out how to make them effective.

It has EVERYTHING to do with the spectators, one of the main reason that BW was such an intense game is because it provided the necessary build-up and tension. Staple damage dealers like the lurker and siege tank made you hold your every time an attack happened. It's like riding a roller coaster, the slow trip up to the first drop is what makes that first drop so exhilarating. When lurkers are burrowing, mines are being laid, or tanks are sieging the audience is collectively holding its breath. When a protoss or zerg attacks prepares into a heavily fortified tank line, that moment, before the engagement, is just as important, if not more important, than the engagement itself, from a viewer perspective. It's like watching the closing seconds of a tied basketball game, time is out but the ball is in the air. The entire context of the situation gives the action importance, it's not action for action's sake. When I watch an SC2 TvP battle, or ZvP battle there's absolutely no tension. There's TONS of things, exploding, catching on fire, or dying in other sparkly ways, but I don't really care because the conclusion is nearly forgone, I'm just waiting for the AI to make a fancy show out of it.

On the other hand when Savior preparing to dive into oov's gigantic tank line I'm sitting there thinking to myself, "He's not going for it is he? OMG HE'S GOING FOR IT! AAAAAAAAA(<--when the army starts advancing)". When the first dark swarms go off and lurkers burrow "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA", when the spines go off and the first row of tanks disappears, "OOOOOOOMMMMGGGGGGGGGG". I can continue watch his progression laid out clearly on my screen. The zerg pushing into terran territory, how far is he going to get? Commentators and fangirls screaming, tank after tank exploding, zergling after zergling splattering all over the map, but Savior keeps marching till there are no tanks left, "HOLY SHIT. I guess that's why they call him Maestro".

Agree with this. Like throughout my post, I believe there is entirely the potential for this in sc2. Throughout most of the SlayerS_Boxer vs. Sen series I can definitely say I felt the edge of my seat intensity that I get from watching BW.