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Dynamic Unit Movements, Your Thoughts? - Page 11

Forum Index > SC2 General
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Tumor
Profile Joined July 2010
Austria192 Posts
May 17 2011 11:23 GMT
#201
yes, u found the reason, thats one thing i alsways hated, next to the "why my ultras cant do dmg ohh there are 15 lings in front of them blocking everything" it would make alot of things more interesting. like a very smal unseen thing between 2 units that they cant get that close togeather.
Raskit
Profile Joined July 2009
579 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-17 11:25:19
May 17 2011 11:24 GMT
#202
As a spectator, anything that helps counteract clumping ball Vs. ball commentator doesn't even know wtf is going on gaming end battles is a good thing.
SeaSwift
Profile Blog Joined February 2011
Scotland4486 Posts
May 17 2011 11:27 GMT
#203
On May 17 2011 18:37 NicolBolas wrote:

You, like many other people, seem to be under the impression that "clumping" is just something that can be taken away. That there's some line of code that they can just excise and presto, units don't "clump" anymore.


Actually, there is. If you increase the collision radius of units, they won't clump up so much. Problem solved?
Blizzard_torments_me
Profile Joined February 2010
Romania199 Posts
May 17 2011 11:32 GMT
#204
On May 17 2011 18:37 NicolBolas wrote:
Show nested quote +
If you watch SCBW games, units don't push each other around, so the space around each unit is always changning, and this results in a dynamic movement.
If you only move with one control group, units show the same dynamic movement.


There's nothing more "dynamic" with this than with SC2's standard pathing. Neither is more "dynamic" than the other.

Show nested quote +
1. (the most important) Unit movements become more dynamic.
Even if you hotkey them separately, those small groups will move like a clump of jelly anyways. It doesn't look natural, and your army looks smaller than it actually is.


No, having them spread out makes your army look bigger than it actually is. Your army is the size of their collective collision area. No more, no less.

Everything else here is a value judgement.

Show nested quote +
2. It's easier to tell the difference between units.
SCBW is in 2-d and it uses less colours, while SC2 is 3-d and uses a variety of colours. So it's easier to differentiate units in SCBW. You can tell this by playing SC2 in the lowest graphic settings.
The lowest graphic setting allows you to tell the difference between units and the difference between units and map tiles much more effectively.


You seem to be sabotaging your own argument. You say that the lowest graphics setting makes it easier to see the different between units. But the lowest graphics settings does not change the units pathing. So "clumped" units would be perfectly distinguishable if the higher graphics settings didn't do things that made it hard to tell units apart. Therefore, you're saying that you don't need to change pathfinding; you need to get Blizzard to adjust the higher graphics levels to make units more visually distinct.

Show nested quote +
This is something blizzard should definitely just try out on the PTR.


You, like many other people, seem to be under the impression that "clumping" is just something that can be taken away. That there's some line of code that they can just excise and presto, units don't "clump" anymore.

What you call "clumping" is not something that was deliberately engineered into the game. It is no more deliberately engineered than Muta-stacking or Patrol-micro were deliberately engineered into SC1. "Clumping" is the ultimate and inevitable result of having better pathing.

Units go in the most direct path to the designated target. If you tell a large group of units that are relatively close where to go, then they will all go together. As a single group. Because that's the fastest, most optimal way for all of those units to do what the player told them to do.

What people are asking for is nothing less than for Blizzard to break pathfinding. You want to take the excellent pathfinding in SC2 and break it so that units do not take the optimal path.

Breaking pathfinding would have far reaching implications. Units will, by "design", not go where you tell them to. This could lead to any number of unpleasant emergent properties for unit pathing. Maybe Stalkers start acting like Dragoons from SC1, which is not even remotely like a good thing. If you try to get two Thors down a ramp, will they get stuck on each other and neither be able to progress?

What you are asking for is not a simple or trivial thing. It is not something you just do. It fundamentally changes everything. Not just unit balance, but everything.

I personally don't know if this would make SC2's overall gameplay better or not. But I do know this: if it is possible for pathfinding to be too good, if it is possible for the game to do what the player told it to too well, then StarCraft-style RTS gameplay is, as a whole, fundamentally broken. If the only way to make good gameplay is to break the interface, then something is dreadfully wrong with StarCraft-style RTS games.



Agreed.And it will never happen.You can be sure of that.
sc2sHakA
Profile Joined May 2010
Germany11 Posts
May 17 2011 11:34 GMT
#205
really really hope that blizzard is aware of this problem, which in my opinion could be easily changed, of course it woule require a lot (!) of testing, and i dont feel they would consider such a huge hange in the most basic game dynamics... is there a official statement which addresses this issue?
"AH! Day[9]'s burning!" (Helion) // "I got my earphone" (Banshee)
starcraft911
Profile Blog Joined July 2008
Korea (South)1263 Posts
May 17 2011 11:45 GMT
#206
I'm strongly opposed to this and I long for the micro battles of bw. One of the few things in sc2 that reminds me of the micro I had to do in bw is splitting my marines against banelings. My army is moments from victory and moments from defeat at all times in TvZ and micro makes up for that. You add a feature like this and you change the entire game in what I believe would be the wrong direction for an exciting spectator game.
Jermstuddog
Profile Blog Joined June 2010
United States2231 Posts
May 17 2011 11:48 GMT
#207
I think there should be an option that you click, much like WC3.

For those who think it would remove the need of micro from the game, simply refer to WC3. That entire game revolved around micro, so I doubt that would be much of an issue.

Both clumping and spreading should be options. One is not better than the other, one does not prove you more skillful than the other. Both have their advantages, why am I forced to clump?
As it turns out, marines don't actually cost any money -Jinro
Rassy
Profile Joined August 2010
Netherlands2308 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-17 12:03:27
May 17 2011 11:54 GMT
#208
Hey
verry interesting point and the clumping of units when moving with them is quiet annoying
The trick you can do with the muta magic box you should be able to do with anny random combination of units
There should be a command to let the unit group you selected keep its current formation when moving and returning to its current formation after going through a choke for example
this would include "slowing down" faster units so that they keep the same formation with the slower units...
when a moving all the units would move till in range of fire of course
in current game its near impossible to let your units keep a certain formation when moving due to differences in speed/seize/passing of chokes and bumping into eachoter, unless you like a grandmaster player
using formations for your army is something that every player should be able to do imo
i do remember some verry old rts games did have this option to keep formation while moving
KULA_u
Profile Joined March 2010
Switzerland107 Posts
May 17 2011 12:00 GMT
#209
I would cry tears of joy if they actually implemented this change.

From the start it was clear that the SC2 pathing system had a really bad effect ony things like splash (becomming overly powerful) and concentrated fire (protoss/m&m&m ball). I never understood why they did it like that. I always thought about increasing collision size... but this is way better. (also increasing colision size totally nullifies attack power of zerglings and other melee units)

plz blizzard!
jemag
Profile Blog Joined October 2010
Canada98 Posts
May 17 2011 12:04 GMT
#210
I don't think it's a good idea. I think clumping actually adds a lot to unit positioning pre-battle and unit microing during battle. It's actually a skill right now to be able to spread your units in a good fashion or to split them to mitigate splash damage.
emythrel
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
United Kingdom2599 Posts
May 17 2011 12:12 GMT
#211
On May 17 2011 10:01 WinteRR wrote:
Very good article. I agree with it. This is probably the reason why siege tanks in SC2 seem so 'strong' when in comparison to their BW counterpart do relatively little damage. I feel this would be a good change to the game (especially to the colossus IMHO).


You gotta remember that tanks didn't have smart fire in BW, clumping or no clumping tanks in SC2 would still be very strong as they rarely overkill, thats why they do less damage in SC2.... smart fire with 70 damage per shot would be silly.
When there is nothing left to lose but your dignity, it is already gone.
Deadlyfish
Profile Joined August 2010
Denmark1980 Posts
May 17 2011 12:14 GMT
#212
I dont think it should be changed because it would change the entire game. Every splash effect would have to be changed and such, it would completely change the balance of the game.

People are already complaining when they make a fairly minor change like the warpgate research time. If you change something like this people would have to start all over again with a lot of builds etc.

Good idea, but too late now
If wishes were horses we'd be eating steak right now.
DorF
Profile Blog Joined July 2009
Sweden961 Posts
May 17 2011 12:20 GMT
#213
This, (if implemented) would be the best thing to ever happen to sc2
On a side note: I'm like the biggest BW fan ever and what really kills sc2 for me is this amongst other things and this would also bring about some balance changes to banelings since they'd be pretty ineffective towards a much easier Terran-spreading tactic.
BW for life !
epoc
Profile Joined December 2010
Finland1190 Posts
May 17 2011 12:21 GMT
#214
I don't really know. It worked well in bw and I think it would kill stupid deathballs but still it looks a little stupid.
hugman
Profile Joined June 2009
Sweden4644 Posts
May 17 2011 12:23 GMT
#215
This has always been my biggest gripe with the game. I think fixing it would improve both the player and spectator experience a lot.
MorroW
Profile Joined August 2008
Sweden3522 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-17 12:41:44
May 17 2011 12:37 GMT
#216
On May 17 2011 10:11 Falcor wrote:
This is never going to happen imo. The game was balanced around "balls" so if they implemented this everything would have to change

dont you realize when people get better at microing their armies will look more ideal regardless of the ai pathing? :p
i think the end result would be better if units knew other friendly units were in the way. they wouldnt spread out like in bw or wc3 tho because the pathing is still going to be alot better and it wouldnt look this spread out on move command anyway

remember in bw it actually required an extremely amount of skill just to keep your mariens together while pushing towards the zerg because if they were just moving by themselves there would be too many lone marines getting picked off by mutalisks. so i think the argument to say the current sc2 ai pathing of units not blocking encourages more micro is wrong.

either way you make the ai it would require alot of skill to make the units move in the way you want but i think units moving to dodge friendly units in the way simply makes more sense and would give opportunity for more micro.
for example storm and fungal micro is alot harder for the one spreading his units than the one casting the spells. this would acatually balance the skill requirements a little
Progamerpls no copy pasterino
Sueco
Profile Joined September 2009
Sweden283 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-05-17 12:41:19
May 17 2011 12:39 GMT
#217
It even looks better frome a visual perspective. SC2 units completely lack personal space, and it looks dumb and simplistic.

I never knew why but I always thought SC1 unit movement looked more natural and organic than SC2's efficiently packed unit balls. Now I understand why.

The more I understand about SC2's design, the more underwhelmed I am. Let's pray Blizzard is watching to this thread. Lets make the post count skyrocket.... post you muppets, post!
zul
Profile Blog Joined February 2010
Germany5427 Posts
May 17 2011 12:39 GMT
#218
If this gets changed it would lower DPS of so called "deathballs" since fewer units are in attackrange and it would help melee units to fight vs ranged. right now 50 Supply Marauder&marines/stalkers put out so much dps while giving melees very little attack surface.
keep it deep! @zulison
Noocta
Profile Joined June 2010
France12578 Posts
May 17 2011 12:46 GMT
#219
Even if it look freaking col and more ntural, it will change the balance of the game so much.
Melee and splash damage units would have to be tweak a lot to make this work. Even units like marines would be so hard to deal with with a natural spreading.
" I'm not gonna fight you. I'm gonna kick your ass ! "
CptHandsome
Profile Joined September 2010
Denmark95 Posts
May 17 2011 13:12 GMT
#220
It honestly comes down to how much is desired to be automated and how much should rely on skill. It would, for instance, make the game immensely easier if queued units didn't cost anything before they were actually built. However, this would surely assist in ruining the game by taking away some of the skill levels needed to compete at higher levels.
This is the same thing. Yes, it would decrease the power of splash attacks. But is that to be desired? In my honest opinnion; no. Micro is a central element of sc2 and this would basically destroy the currrent game, making it way, way, way too easy.
Is that a sword? Luxury! Is that a horse? Sloth! Is that a helmet? Vanity!
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