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On June 01 2011 05:26 roymarthyup wrote:
i really dislike the idea of removing units
i cant think of any unit in the game right now that could be removed without completely wrecking balance in some way
I can think of several. Just from one race, you can remove carrier and mothership without unbalancing anything. If it wasn't for the fact that you need drops to reach expansions on some maps, you could even remove the warp prism without too many issues and up until recently archons wasn't really used either.
One thing to note is that the units will likely be replaced, not just removed and as such a new unit could fit a similar role or make up for it in another way.
I really dislike the marauder, roach, stalker trio as tier 1.5 units for both races. They are way too similar and makes for a very uninteresting dynamic. Compared for example to the dynamic of dragoon and vulture in BW.
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On June 01 2011 05:24 Kezzer wrote:Show nested quote +On June 01 2011 05:13 Probe1 wrote:On June 01 2011 04:55 Kezzer wrote:
20 missions and a few more units in multiplayer for $60...? I know this has been discussed to death but it is just absurd To use an app you have to buy a phone and some kind of plan. I assure you it costs much more then WoL. On June 01 2011 04:53 reprise wrote:On June 01 2011 04:45 Probe1 wrote:
From the point of view of someone who didn't watch competitive bw the reaver wasn't as exciting as the collosus. It was fun but it required way more skill to use than a colossus. Maybe thats why it is hated >< The Reaver is much more exciting to watch than Collosus. The fact that it's severely handicapped by it's speed made it a nailbiting experience to watch and see if the shuttle carrying it is going to get sniped, or if the scarab which has the possibility to change the outcome of a game, become a dud. The Collosus is boring because it is predictable, easy to use yet extrenely powerful, making it a staple unit in every game. Thank you for explaining that to me. I played BW at launch. I just was never competitive past playing the ladder occasionally. Reavers were just this frustrating unit that always fell down at a clutch moment for me and I know its a sin against all that is holy but I can't force myself to like watching BW after so long. PS: I'll never knock it however. I was just speaking from personal experience. I understand brood war is gods gift to humanity. On June 01 2011 04:53 zhfac wrote:
Does anyone else think that some of the "special strains" that are available to be evolved (such as the Zerling) should be renamed Devouring Ones? Maybe we might even get to see Hunter Killers again? I wish someone had asked this question. That is a fantastic idea and who didn't love hunter killers. To use an app you have to buy a phone and some kind of plan. I assure you it costs much more then WoL. Yeah, and to use WoL you need a computer which I assure you costs much more than a phone. The point is, most people have computers and phones so we can factor that out of the equation. The point is, you buy an app for anything from $1-$3 on average. These apps can be games or for general utility. An expansion to our current app priced at $60 (ok fine for a game, maybe for not pc but fine) that then forces us to pay for certain "premium maps" if we want them. And I know you people out there that are saying 'well just don't buy the maps'. Do you not understand that we are then missing out on the experience on good maps? Whatabout ones to try? DotA, one of the greatest custom maps in existence has always been free. I absolutely hated the game before I tried it, because I saw DotA everywhere on the WC3 custom maps list. Had I not tried it I wouldn't have found that I loved it and then gone on to buy HoN to get an even better experience(imo). With this new system I have no doubt that a game like DotA where the devs put a lot of time into would be one of the premium maps, and as a result I probably wouldn't pay for it and never play it. Not to mention, the kind of people that make excellent maps right now that don't charge for them are the people we want making the maps. The people that truly enjoy making maps and are self motivated to complete and balance them. We don't want a bunch of mapmakers who do it for the money...
Too bad Blizzard already stated months ago that a map like DotA is not customized enough to belong as a premium map. Premium maps are going to be heavily customized and probably have all sorts of UI changes. People need to read up on things before they start complaining.
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On June 01 2011 05:37 _ING wrote:Show nested quote +On June 01 2011 05:26 roymarthyup wrote:
i cant think of any unit in the game right now that could be removed without completely wrecking balance in some way. also creates a scenario where WoL progames could be more exciting than HOTS progames "Carrier has arrived." Have you ever this outside of 4v4s, bronze league, or custom games? I'm fairly certain they could toss away the carrier and no one would even notice. Before the speed buff, the same thing could've been said about battlecruisers, although those have always been more viable than carriers.
While carriers may or may not have problems related to build time, that's not really what stops them from being used. Battlecruisers were a unit that actually functioned before their buff not because the terran capital ship is somehow so much better than the protoss's, but due to metagame reasons. Carriers aren't as effective because the switch into them doesn't require the opponent to switch their own composition to compensate. Terran can continue making the vikings and/or marines they already were, zerg will continue making the corrupters for anti-colossus or hydralisks for anti-anything-but-colossus armies, and even in mirror you're probably already looking at a good number of blink stalkers on the field. There is no significant strategic advantage to making the carrier switch except as a finishing move to a game that's already over.
I'd say the mothership is the more useful fleet beacon tech unit in that it opens up new possibilities that the opponent must respect.
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Bahahahahahaha, Browder loves NEstea's spine rush. David Kim likes TLO.
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and Day9 appearance on the interview XD
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WTF? is that "remove this and that unit" all about. Basically everyone says : "Remove this unit cuz it creates imbalance or that he can't a-move into that shit and win". Always these stupid fucking comparisons between bw and Sc2 and they are really getting on my nerves.
Remove Colossi and replace them with Reavers. ......totally Bullshit...that wouldn't adress the issue at all. Every other Protoss Techtree besides robo is dumb as fuck and that is the problem. Carriers and Mothership are useless...Hight Templars only viable during the endgame now and DT rushs are kinda all in. Current Metagme Toss revolve around Colossi cuz its a strong army...thats all. I can't believe that there are still people out there who believes that the Colossi would be the main problem. It's the fucking units which haven't found their role in each matchup... a role that fits their design and actually work..this and nothing else is the main issue.
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great read. i cant wait for this to be released!
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United States7166 Posts
On June 01 2011 05:44 Archerofaiur wrote:Show nested quote +On June 01 2011 05:41 Zelniq wrote:
In fact I just realized how interesting a comparison you can make between the colossus and the lurker. One unit is adored and constantly called for its return, whereas another is disliked by nearly all players/specatators alike (afaik). Im as big of a fan of the Lurker as anyone but this type of statement isnt fair. The Lurker is not in the game currently and the Collossus is. The displeased are always more vocal than the pleased.
ok then replace that with "One unit was very well designed, made for excellent gameplay, loved by players of all races, hard-countered no units provided excellent micro, and was exciting to watch for spectators, whereas the other was none of these things.
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On June 01 2011 03:17 TheDougler wrote:Show nested quote +On June 01 2011 03:02 BlasiuS wrote:On June 01 2011 02:53 TheDougler wrote:On June 01 2011 02:50 BlasiuS wrote:
The mineral cost should be high enough to discourage massing them in the early-game or mid-game. For example, imagine if the cost of the overseer was 400/0, or 400/25. Would you see more of them late-game? Absolutely. Yeah, I'm sure this thought process goes through every zerg player's head: Hmm, I could expand right now, but what I really wish for is a flying doofus who can detect and goop things... Just saying... Even if that number was like 200/25 we wouldn't see more overseers. Because when do you REALLY need them? Only for detection really. uh if they were 200/25 mass contaminate would probably be standard every game in every zerg matchup. You actually think people would pay 400/25 on top of the original 100 for the overseer just for contaminate? I think you'd see overseers even less than you do now. It's not THAT bad to build the overseer when you need to currently. Choosing between expanding and building an overseer tho? That's a pretty fricken easy choice.
of course they would. There are plenty of situations where it's more beneficial to spend minerals on units instead of expanding. 100 gas is too expensive to make more than 1-2 overseers, unless you suddenly need instant detection (this is the only reason people make multiple overseers).
Also, late in the game when you have your side of the map, you can't take any more expansions. It's at this point where a high-mineral, low-gas cost unit would be most useful.
I can almost guarantee if the gas cost was lowered on the overseer, they would be used a LOT more, even if the mineral cost was raised. Gas is the limiting resource, not minerals. It's the high gas cost that makes the overseer cost-prohibitive.
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On June 01 2011 05:41 Zelniq wrote:
Yeah removing the colossus entirely and adding another (hopefully better designed) unit would be the best and most sensible decision. I do wonder how many people would actually miss it. From what I've noticed, every player, even (or especially) protoss players, they dislike using the colossus and find it a very boring/poorly designed unit to either use or deal with.
In fact I just realized how interesting a comparison you can make between the colossus and the lurker. One unit is adored and constantly called for its return, whereas another is disliked by nearly all players/specatators alike (afaik). And yet they're similar enough (both powerful line-attack AoE ranged units) to make comparisons from, and make conclusions as to why the lurker was so successful as a well designed unit that made for exciting/good gameplay, and why the colossus failed on those accounts.
In terms of mobility, the colossus is the complete opposite of the lurker: the lurker requires good positioning and setup before it can be used to attack, then had to undergo a 1.5ish second vulnerable period where its not able to move or attack as it Burrows into the ground, and then becomes completely immobile and therefore very vulnerable. To help offset this weakness, is the cloaked nature while burrowed, providing some level of protection for a now immobile unit, adding a layer of depth with the dynamic of detection, getting detection, the strength or mobility of the detection, killing/targeting of detectors, etc. (I could write a whole article on the significance that cloaked units provided in BW, and should be providing in SC2. There's very good reasons why lurkers, DTs, spider mines, and even arbiters played such a crucial role to the game's success at the professional level. It added a much needed dimension to units beyond simply ground or air.).
Whereas the colossus is, on top of being able to simply move and attack whenever it wishes, also have no collision with their other units giving it unprecedented levels of freedom for a ground unit to move in battles. Not even taking their cliff-walking ability into account (mostly as an easy way to circumvent any well designed map terrain and reduce the potency of drops and multi-pronged attacks), add to that their much stronger durability and you get one of the toughest units to kill in the game that has eliminated nearly every vulnerability from the ground: the complete opposite of the immobile lurker. I'm sure at the time it seemed like a cool idea to Blizzard to have ridiculous levels of mobility for the most powerful splash/long-ranged unit in the game, but it turned out to be a poor combination of strengths for a single unit to have. There's good reasons why the 3 ground splash units in the game: the lurker, reaver, siege tank, all had strong aoe attacks offset by very low mobility. Blizzard seems to have missed the significance of that combination of attributes when designing the colossus.
Then of course there's the attack animation, the lurker had a nice straight line attack that could be dodged provided really good control and/or really good unit positioning. Of course there's yet another level of depth as the lurker player could use the map's terrain features to eliminate these issues, being able to hold key positions such as ramps or narrow chokes much stronger than open terrain. But you take the colossus whose attack is in a perpendicular line, is instantaneous and cannot be dodged whatsoever, and for the most part you get a unit that does not care how well you microed your units, what kind of terrain features are used, or where your army is positioned (relatively speaking).
This is all so true.
Oh how i would want Blizzard to adress this =/
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On June 01 2011 05:50 Zelniq wrote:Show nested quote +On June 01 2011 05:44 Archerofaiur wrote:On June 01 2011 05:41 Zelniq wrote:
In fact I just realized how interesting a comparison you can make between the colossus and the lurker. One unit is adored and constantly called for its return, whereas another is disliked by nearly all players/specatators alike (afaik). Im as big of a fan of the Lurker as anyone but this type of statement isnt fair. The Lurker is not in the game currently and the Collossus is. The displeased are always more vocal than the pleased. ok then replace that with "One unit was very well designed, made for excellent gameplay, loved by players of all races, hard-countered no units provided excellent micro, and was exciting to watch for spectators, whereas the other was none of these things.
we are getting a bit off topic but the Lurker isnt in competition for the Collossi slot. Its in competition for the Baneling, Roach, Ultra slot. Reaver is what you should compare Collossi too.
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United States7483 Posts
Charging for maps worries me.
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United States7166 Posts
On June 01 2011 06:00 Archerofaiur wrote:Show nested quote +On June 01 2011 05:50 Zelniq wrote:On June 01 2011 05:44 Archerofaiur wrote:On June 01 2011 05:41 Zelniq wrote:
In fact I just realized how interesting a comparison you can make between the colossus and the lurker. One unit is adored and constantly called for its return, whereas another is disliked by nearly all players/specatators alike (afaik). Im as big of a fan of the Lurker as anyone but this type of statement isnt fair. The Lurker is not in the game currently and the Collossus is. The displeased are always more vocal than the pleased. ok then replace that with "One unit was very well designed, made for excellent gameplay, loved by players of all races, hard-countered no units provided excellent micro, and was exciting to watch for spectators, whereas the other was none of these things. we are getting a bit off topic but the Lurker isnt in competition for the Collossi slot. Its in competition for the Baneling, Roach, Ultra slot. Reaver is what you should compare Collossi too.
I'm talking specifically design principles not what unit should replace the colossus.
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Did Blizzard ever actually say they would not change how the colossus functioned? Insofar as I can tell, the only concrete bit of multiplayer balance we got was a very insightful discussion by David Kim about early game scouting and the problems a lack of it might be causing. I see little reason to despair about multiplayer just yet.
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Still no lurkers but i'll bet everything I own they'll be in singleplayer.
On June 01 2011 05:37 _ING wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On June 01 2011 05:26 roymarthyup wrote:
i cant think of any unit in the game right now that could be removed without completely wrecking balance in some way. also creates a scenario where WoL progames could be more exciting than HOTS progames "Carrier has arrived." Have you ever this outside of 4v4s, bronze league, or custom games? I'm fairly certain they could toss away the carrier and no one would even notice. Before the speed buff, the same thing could've been said about battlecruisers, although those have always been more viable than carriers.
I think that goes more towards fan service. Carriers were as iconic as lurkers to some people.
On June 01 2011 05:33 Tor wrote:
The entire singleplayer is based around Kerrigan. Protoss campaign will probably be based around Zeratul or Artanis.
Artanis will probably be it actually. That was a good point.
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On June 01 2011 06:04 Keren wrote:
Did Blizzard ever actually say they would not change how the colossus functioned? Insofar as I can tell, the only concrete bit of multiplayer balance we got was a very insightful discussion by David Kim about early game scouting and the problems a lack of it might be causing. I see little reason to despair about multiplayer just yet.
They haven't adressed the Collusus even. Which I think is worrying. As we can see almost everyone dislikes the unit in someway.
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On June 01 2011 06:02 Whitewing wrote:
Charging for maps worries me.
This is to court small developers like those who make games for the ipad etc. I would think. It will guaranteed have no effect on normal laddering. And since the games will be associated with a marketplace instead of standard custom maps, it will likely have no effect on custom map makers. I guess the idea is that if you give developers a way to make money then you give them incentive to raise quality.
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On June 01 2011 05:45 Tor wrote:
This approach is about creating different mechanics that could be used to make the game more interesting. It has flaws because it's not actively addressing a gameplay concern, however; designing units for fun and designing units to address gameplay don't necessarily cancel eachother out. You can do both at the same time.
Now i'm not saying blizzard is perfect and that they'll design a great unit every time. But I don't think you can immediately rule out blizzards design philosophy of fun first just because you think they're going to ignore healthy gameplay.
Right, I'm not saying that "fun" abilities will lead to inherently bad design. But they need to address gameplay issues to actually be fun. In the Reaper's case, the cliff-jumping ability complements their status as a harassment unit, allowing them to bypass static or relatively immobile defenses (without being, say an air unit). But would giving Spore Crawlers the ability to cliff-jump make them significantly more interesting or dynamic as a unit? Obviously, that's an extreme example, but designing the "fun" abilities first, then placing them into a unit role, can lead to pitfalls where the ability doesn't really complement the actual unit role, or at least not as effectively as another ability or design could.
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On June 01 2011 06:07 Tor wrote:This is to court small developers like those who make games for the ipad etc. I would think. It will guaranteed have no effect on normal laddering. And since the games will be associated with a marketplace instead of standard custom maps, it will likely have no effect on custom map makers. I guess the idea is that if you give developers a way to make money then you give them incentive to raise quality.
Personally i think that the marketplace will be a bust. Very few people are willing to pay for UMS's or new ladder maps, especially if their from blizzard.
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Great writeup, thanks for the article. A lot more info here than I was able to find anywhere else online.
On June 01 2011 06:05 Zorgaz wrote:Show nested quote +On June 01 2011 06:04 Keren wrote:
Did Blizzard ever actually say they would not change how the colossus functioned? Insofar as I can tell, the only concrete bit of multiplayer balance we got was a very insightful discussion by David Kim about early game scouting and the problems a lack of it might be causing. I see little reason to despair about multiplayer just yet. They haven't adressed the Collusus even. Which I think is worrying. As we can see almost everyone dislikes the unit in someway.
I don't really dislike the Colossus and I would imagine a lot of Protoss players don't hate/dislike it so much as we got bored with massing it pretty much every game being optimal. We would like variety not taking away the colossus.
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EPT
