On July 14 2012 06:10 9-BiT wrote: When you have 2 years of balancing with how we are now, there is no way to undo it all and make it better than it is right now, even though in theory this is better. Wishful thinking.
we're expecting a game to last 10+ years. to say, "we've come too far, we can't change now" is a horrible attitude when trying to make the best game possible. they have two expansions to deal with it and being lazy(i dont wanna do it again~ T.T) is no excuse.
maybe thats just my view, i dont take excuses kindly. do what must be done.
If they're lazy, then why the hell are we leaving them to balance for us? Why not create tournament maps with proper settings/balance?
cause 99,99..% of the people who bitch about blizzard and balance have no idea how to balance a game. its all "fanfiction" and in reality it would be far inferior to the state right now.
Fanfiction is terrible, just terrible. Improving pathing is something that may happen in HotS, but they are not going to tell people they are going to do it. It will likely be one of many "stealth" updates that tweek the gameplay that we don't currently know about.
On July 14 2012 06:10 9-BiT wrote: When you have 2 years of balancing with how we are now, there is no way to undo it all and make it better than it is right now, even though in theory this is better. Wishful thinking.
we're expecting a game to last 10+ years. to say, "we've come too far, we can't change now" is a horrible attitude when trying to make the best game possible. they have two expansions to deal with it and being lazy(i dont wanna do it again~ T.T) is no excuse.
maybe thats just my view, i dont take excuses kindly. do what must be done.
If they're lazy, then why the hell are we leaving them to balance for us? Why not create tournament maps with proper settings/balance?
cause 99,99..% of the people who bitch about blizzard and balance have no idea how to balance a game. its all "fanfiction" and in reality it would be far inferior to the state right now.
In all fairness then, who is enough of a realist/expert to balance the game?
From what I've learned, only the very top of the progamers are allowed to comment on balance. So maybe only major tournaments winners can be allowed to decide how to balance the game.
Referring to "The Elephant in the Room" (TLFE) puts this in the perspective that the basic gist of army movement in SC2 has not changed since its release. The OP seems especially considered with the viewer, and I really understand the point. I'm a longtime BW fan, and I'm trying to get into SC2 viewing (I don't play) by watching high level stuff. I've tried catching most of the TSL qualifiers and the free GOMtv vods. At the very least, blob vs. blob makes it hard for casters to call an exciting. When armies meet the casters so often just say "And here we go!" or some variation on that. It's difficult to find a game tense or exciting when you are just sort of waiting for this really short moment that just has too many things going on.
I've been slowly learning the micro associated with the larger battles, and it certainly adds subtlety to the battle, but it's not visually engaging. I would be 100% in favor of increasing unit buffer sizes or changing the pathing code. There are some wonderful ideas going for SC2 and interesting units, but there are some things that seem incredibly obvious to fix, and blob vs. blob is one of them.
On July 14 2012 06:10 9-BiT wrote: When you have 2 years of balancing with how we are now, there is no way to undo it all and make it better than it is right now, even though in theory this is better. Wishful thinking.
we're expecting a game to last 10+ years. to say, "we've come too far, we can't change now" is a horrible attitude when trying to make the best game possible. they have two expansions to deal with it and being lazy(i dont wanna do it again~ T.T) is no excuse.
maybe thats just my view, i dont take excuses kindly. do what must be done.
If they're lazy, then why the hell are we leaving them to balance for us? Why not create tournament maps with proper settings/balance?
I think you would be interested in MavercK's SC2BW Mod then (assuming he adds his movement mod to his SC2BW mod)
On July 13 2012 07:11 Xapti wrote: One of the larger problems with this change is that it will weaken melee units like zerglings vs moving targets because the melee units will now interfere with each others movement. A simple example is 4 zerglings attacking a retreating SCV/drone/probe; when a zergling is in range to attack it, it will stop and attack, slowing down the other units. Right now the attacking zergling would get pushed aside a bit.
The more recent recommendation someone made of retaining group formations (really huge "magic box" size) is a bunch better idea than this I'd say.
Except that it doesnt really fix the problem. The modified movement mod ended up still looking pretty deathbally. Besides according to MavercK the magic box sizes for SC1 and SC2 are pretty much the same.
Maybe it doesn't fix the problem entirely, but it still helps, doesn't it? If not helping death ball mechanics, it still helps the game overall —I'd say— by adding strategy with regards to using unit formations and micro-managing them. That said, it could be overpowered vs AoE (namely marine vs baneling), which is probably it's biggest problem.
Regarding SC1 vs SC2, I don't see why SC2 needs to be like SC1. You seem to be talking about something that I don't know or care about. Just because SC1 doesn't have a larger magic box doesn't mean the SC2 magic box can't be huge.
I dont think that the unit movement is bad it is just different and different is hard for people sometimes. Clumped up units just require a different kind of micro then bw units did. You know splitting and what not.
For there to be a blob vs blob battle, I am fine with that as long as the battle lasts more than 5 seconds. In BW, deathball collisions can last at least 10 seconds and upwards to a minute of just micro, sparring across many screens. This is what I would love for SC2 to have. I have no issue with the pathing, but its the terrible, terrible damage issue thats killing this pathing issue. If units were more like their BW counterparts, blob vs blob battles would actually be more epic because the engagements would last longer, and give players an opportunity to micro it out longer.
Didn't we already settle that this would wreck balance in the previous thread? Then again, I guess HotS is already doing that. Still, I don't think Blizzard will do this in HotS. Maybe LotV, but I sincerely doubt it. Come to think of it, dynamic unit movement may actually reduce the skillcap, due to things like perma-split marines and such. I'd be open to arguments on that point, though.
In the last thread, the overwhelming majority said that it was a bad idea because it would destroy AOE damage and make single target damage pretty much OP. it would take the skill out of controlling a "ball" (more squarish now which looks funky to me even more so) against collosus or banelings. Both of those units require micro, despite claims of Noob-ish units especially for the collosus. The fact is that by spacing out units like this, people effectively make forcefields too powerful since they can block even more units and they make single target DPS units, namely the marine too powerful in that you cannot kill a group of them with AOE anymore if micro'd against it now. I think we are overlooking balance for an aesthetic which is one of the topics BW players complain about in regards to SCII.
On July 17 2012 13:20 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote: Didn't we already settle that this would wreck balance in the previous thread? Then again, I guess HotS is already doing that. Still, I don't think Blizzard will do this in HotS. Maybe LotV, but I sincerely doubt it. Come to think of it, dynamic unit movement may actually reduce the skillcap, due to things like perma-split marines and such. I'd be open to arguments on that point, though.
First of all, it won't 'wreck balance' whatsoever. A few AoE tweaks and you're good to go. Secondly, this IS the previous thread, created over a year ago. Finally, this ridiculous idea that spread out units reduces the skill cap is silly. Marine splitting is not the most exciting kind of micro fathomable, you know? It just inverts the micro paradigm, the skill cap is unchanged or even helped by this.
The above poster - really? does the response to the foolish 'aoe nerf/dps' have to be given on every single page? You fix the foundation (spacing/movement), then you tweak AoE, etc. Not that hard my friend.
And legibility and perceived army size are hugely important factors that SC2 sucks at.
On July 17 2012 13:20 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote: Didn't we already settle that this would wreck balance in the previous thread? Then again, I guess HotS is already doing that. Still, I don't think Blizzard will do this in HotS. Maybe LotV, but I sincerely doubt it. Come to think of it, dynamic unit movement may actually reduce the skillcap, due to things like perma-split marines and such. I'd be open to arguments on that point, though.
Perma-spread Marines DONT reduce the skillcap, because you can still choose to clump them up in a tight ball and either way you are screwed against Zergling-Baneling attacks, because clumped up Marines are "countered" by Banelings and spread out ones are "countered" by Zerglings (more surface area to attack). If you spread your Marines your own dps will be reduced by a lot because some of the will be spread so far that they will only start shooting rather late, so you will be faced with a choice on how to risk your army ... and choosing between two evils is always good.
Blizzard will never incorporate anything like this into SC2 for the simple reason that they are arrogant and believe themselves to have designed a game without faults. Also changes like this would be like admitting to not being perfect. As always I have the pessimistic "win-win" point of view, because either I am proven wrong and they change the game for the better OR I am rpoven right.
How can the movement in the opening post and the movement in Sc2BW be added to the game? Are they a dependencie file or are they purely created in the data editor?
On July 21 2012 01:15 Kabel wrote: How can the movement in the opening post and the movement in Sc2BW be added to the game? Are they a dependencie file or are they purely created in the data editor?
On July 17 2012 13:24 docvoc wrote: In the last thread, the overwhelming majority said that it was a bad idea because it would destroy AOE damage and make single target damage pretty much OP. it would take the skill out of controlling a "ball" (more squarish now which looks funky to me even more so) against collosus or banelings. Both of those units require micro, despite claims of Noob-ish units especially for the collosus. The fact is that by spacing out units like this, people effectively make forcefields too powerful since they can block even more units and they make single target DPS units, namely the marine too powerful in that you cannot kill a group of them with AOE anymore if micro'd against it now. I think we are overlooking balance for an aesthetic which is one of the topics BW players complain about in regards to SCII.
All of that is easily fixed by changing the radius of AoE spells and attacks accordingly.
I listened to an episode of The Starcast with EGSuppy, where he mentions this thread as a change he'd like to see in SC2.
With all of the experimentaion being done in the HoTS Beta, now would be a great time to revisit this idea. Blizzard could potentially balance new units around this bigger collision space and play around with the a new game dynamic to see how it plays out.
Could some pros maybe post this on the Blizzard private forums to get this idea in front of their eyes?
I really really REALLY like this idea. I think it brings up a good point of the reduction of splash units. Right now with the units auto clumping, it is really easy to lose all of your units to splash dmg if you arent carefully controlling or looking at them (i am speaking with more of an emphasis on the non-progamers, b/c they are important as well). I hope a blizzard representative sees this and hopefully put this in their design of HOTS.
EPT
