On June 12 2011 23:45 Quotidian wrote: To me - as a terran player - the way blizzard are flip-flopping on so many issues, most recently and most noteably the tvp thor nerf, seems to suggest that they don't really know what they're doing. It at least shows that they're just a bunch of everyman, joe schmo game developers with no particularly deep understanding of their game. They seem to be frantically trying things out, and killing a ton of potential strategies in the process.
Their reasoning for the thor nerf is just weird to me. In the latest situation report, Kim said
First, we definitely don’t like seeing Thors en masse. Due to the visual size of the unit, as well as a small pathing radius, Thors can obscure the other units in your army too easily. This can be problematic because it's important to know roughly how many units an opponent has when scouting. We want the Thor to be the type of unit that you add to your main army, and we definitely don’t want them to be the core of your army to the point where you strive to build as many as possible.
the first question is, why is it bad that thors are massed? Blizzard's reasoning so far has been "we don't want thors massed." Don't want is the reasoning of a six-year old. The second question is, why is the thor singled out for visually obstructing other units, when the same can be said for every other massive unit in the game, except for the archon? Blizzard's myopic way of balancing and their inability to think holistically about their game, which forces match-ups like tvp to be extremely boring and stereotyped, basically killed any faith I had in them as developers. The fact that SC2 is as balanced as it is because the balancing team are willing to sacrifice variety in strategies for stereotyped balance (ie, terran HAS to all-in early or go mmm/v/g in tvp), and also due to simple luck. SC2 could easily have been a HUGE mess with these people at the helm.
Holy shit I never realized how juvenile Blizzard's balancing reasoning is haha.
"We don't want people to make a lot of Thors because they obscure the other units visually, so we nerfed them."
Maybe they should change something about the way the game works other than changing the stats of 1 unit? Just a thought. Wow.
their reasoning is especially problematic considering "fixing" the thor doesn't fix the same supposed problem in other units, like the colossus or broodlord.
I think blizzard can do a better job balancing the game than people whining on forums. most of the complaining about colossi are either: People who whine because they lost a game to somebody who made collossi. Protoss players who want the reaver back.
And there are many people who think this game should be exactly like BW, when it is obviously not BW. Blizzard listens to the community, and they do a great job.
On June 12 2011 15:31 Taiyoken wrote: If anything, I feel that there are too many units right now. There was a speculation of taking away units in HotS and future expansions and I think this is just a very poor design, units should never actually be removed.
Also there is a problem with adding 'new' units across the board - there aren't THAT many unique attributes to a unit, you'll eventually end up with slight overlap in abilities/design and then people will whine that 'omg it's the same unit'
$0.02
Your first paragraph doesn't make any sense. You say there are too many units, but don't want anything to be done about it. Simple logic would dictate that if you believe "there are too many units" then there are two options. The first option would be to remove some units, which you specifically say should never be done. The second option is that you think nothing should be done at all. The second option infers that it is as good as its going to get, or the risk of changing things is not worth it.
There is a concept in development referred to as killing your child. This is in regards to the idea that sometimes a developer gets too attached to an idea. Down the road they realize there are some troubles with this idea and they are faced with two possibilities. The first being to make it work and that is sometimes the right path to take; however, forcing something to work can damage the quality of the product which leads to option two. Which is to scrap the idea.
The pont you make about having too may units is completely valid, and Blizzard was very adamant about that point as well. So it all boils down to three main points.
1. We agree that there can be too many units. 2. I stipulate that it is ok to remove units, especially units that are not fun, not interesting, or ones that do not fulfill their role. 3. These weak units can be replaced with better units. This helps prevent the issue of having too many units while also removing bad units and preventing overlap.
If you disagree with any of those points, then you would have to agree that no units should have been removed during alpha or beta.
I think Blizzard are being a lot more controlling of StarCraft 2 then they were with Brood War. They need to realize that if they want SC 2 to reach the level BW was at, they need to give more power to the community, not less. Hiring professional map makers to make the maps for Ladder is something they can do quite easily that will solve a lot of problems.
With balance things are a bit trickier, but so far their reasoning has been a bit too much about how 'they' want the units the be used. They need to allow more space for the pro gamers to develop the metagame, and base any changes off that.
Its simple really, they want it to be like Brood War, so use Brood War's development as their model.
Designing stuff is hard. Designing games is hard, designing thermostats is hard, designing web sites is hard. I think all of us will generally agree that this stuff is hard. But many people don’t know why it’s hard.
One of the reasons designing stuff is so hard is because there are no solutions to any problems, at least not in a larger, systemic view.
“But theburricane! What about chat channels at release? That seems like a pretty simple freakin’ thing to include that everybody and their dog wanted!”
Fair enough, if Blizz had included chat channels at release that would have solved the “have chat channels at release problem”. But if they had spent time on chat channels, something else would have had to fall off the radar. Maybe we would have had no Achievements.
“Pffft. Those are unimportant to competitive play.”
Perhaps we would have had no FFA matchmaking.
“Again, how does that affect the serious gamers?”
Maybe it doesn’t. Perhaps we wouldn’t have had the RealID friend system when the game launched.
“You mean facebook integration? Guffaw. Puh-lease.”
But you see the point? Design is not about solving problems, because those solutions will invariably cause problems elsewhere. Design is about making conscious tradeoffs to address the problems that are most impactful, and address them at the appropriate time.
Takeaway 1
I’m not saying “hey man, lay off Blizzard they’re tryin’ real hard here!” They are, but that’s no reason to lay off them. We simply have to sit down and ask, “Why is Blizzard making/not making this change at this time?” I guarantee you the answer is not because they have “bad communication”, are “blinded by their own pride”, or are “[fascinated] with ’meat shield units’.”.
Blizzard’s “bad communication”
It is easy to interpret good user research as bad communication. Research participants will make suggestions, “I think you should do X here”, but when they see the finished/updated product, their suggestions won’t be included. The designers will have implemented something that addresses that problem in a different way, and all the participant can see is “Well this solution doesn’t fix everything mine did! Why didn’t they go with what I had suggested?”
An example: Everybody and their dog says to Blizzard, “You really need to change your maps. Seriously, Steppes of War? Seriously?!” So Blizzard begins to add new maps into their map pool, and look to community feedback as to what maps they would like to see. “GSL maps, of course!” But when we finally get Tal’Darim Altar, it’s got a bunch of destructible rocks and giant chokes and crap.
“That’s not what we suggested! This doesn’t solve the problem. Look at LSPrime, he even gave them reasons why they shouldn’t do what they did. And they still did it. That’s aggravating.” (Of course, what LSPrime was arguing for, the imbalance achieved by a 3rd base with 8 minerals 2 gas, is something that will go unfelt by everyone up to very tippy-top of Masters League. How many of us have honestly thought to ourselves, “The third has 8 minerals?! Great, that means I can run Plexa’s Shock and Awe build more effectively once I take it!”, or something similar?)
However, from Blizzard’s perspective they are making balancing their solution so that it applies positively to every group. To simplify it, “We are giving the ‘competitive’ players larger maps, and we are giving the ‘casual’ players maps that limit their options enough to suggest clear goals.”
Takeaway 2
Think systemically when you encounter a solution different from the one you’ve proposed. Chances are either ‘solves’ the problem in an entirely different way, or it solves problems you didn’t even know existed.
Know your audience
It is very easy for us at teamliquid to labor under the misapprehension that we make up the majority of the SC2 community. Or that we + the reddit community are the majority. Or that we + all the online SC2 communities are the majority of SC2 players. But the truth is if you walked up to every SC2 player individually and said, “My opening build order is 10 depot, 12 rax, 13 gas” more than half would respond, “Why do you build 10 depots? Don’t you just have one SCV building depots the whole game?”
Most SC2 players lack even the basic vocabulary that we as a competitive community have developed as a tool to help us think critically and reflectively about the way we play. Most SC2 players don’t know why Steppes of War was removed, unless they’ve read the Blizzard Situation Report explaining why. They probably had no idea it was blacklisted by thousands of people.
Blizzard has the daunting, grizzling task of designing a product that meets the expectations and needs of an infinitely large and diverse user group. All designs suffer from this requirement to varying extent, but Blizzard in particular has a very polar user base. Bronze league 4v4ers versus Grandmasters 1v1 Rank 1.
Takeaway 3
When Blizzard designs for their broader user base, it feels like they are not listening to their competitive, online communities. Because we live in our dream world where everyone has a finely-crafted opening BO, aggressive yet thoughtful 3rd base timing, and over-arching gameplan, we can completely ignore the huge number of people who enter a game thinking nothing but “I’m going to make a forge right away so I can get a cannon up in case he zergling rushes me.”
When we encounter a decision by Blizzard that impacts us ‘negatively,’ we also need to think about the people who are being affected ‘positively’ and how their experience playing this game is going to change.
Overall takeaway
I have a lot of respect for sluggaslamoo, who took the time to voice the opinions of many community members. Specifically opnions regarding how Blizzard is out of touch with its player base via poor communication and decision making, even though they think they are right next to us, hwaiting all the way. Although I disagree with him whole-heartedly, I agree that the overall experience TL’ers have expressed, the feelings and emotions they have felt, over the past few months is that whatever Blizzard hands them is 50% treasure, 50% trash.
I think this is a mindset problem, however. We need to realize that what we as reflective, competitive gamers define as trash is really treasure for a gigantic number of ‘casual’, one-game-a-day players. They have extremely different needs than we do, and it is something Blizzard owes to everyone who pays them to play their game to provide the best experience possible. They have a duty to systemically support all of their user bases as they continue to design and implement two more expansions.
The thing I don't like is that when a map maker spends time and effort to make a new map and Blizzard redesigns that map without permission. If I were the map maker, that would be the last time I make any map.
On June 12 2011 15:44 iaguz wrote: I think the OP is poorly formed and makes bad arguments. Also the community is fucking stupid if you've not noticed. The roach is boring? The fuck? It burrows, regens, moves, tanks, kites and has good dynamics in the matchups. Just because it's a unit you build tons of (who'd of thought ZERG builds tons of UNITS to SWARM people?) doesn't make it boring. Same goes for the Marauder, which we don't see as much as we used to (people still crying about these fucking things?)
Blizzard knows when the listen to us and when not to. It's worked pretty well for us so far as far as patch changes go and as far as maps go. They don't rush to do thing and they do them well. Huzzah for blizzard!
Well, except for the LAN thing of course.
Your argument seems to be that Blizzard knows what they are doing and are always right. This information comes from your second paragraph where you basically say Blizzard knows better than everyone else, they always do the right thing at the right pace.
You then counter your argument by saying Blizzard is not doing the right thing in regards to LAN. So at this point we are both in agreement that Blizzard can be wrong and the community right. At this very point the foundation for your argument falls apart because Blizzard is now fallible.
Now we proceed with the agreement that Blizzard can be wrong and make mistakes. The next step will be to look at the maps. You state that Blizzard knows when to listen to the community and proceeds at the right pace. There are three maps I want to discuss here: Steppes of War Xel Naga Caverns Shattered Temple
If Blizzard proceeded at the right pace, you would then be agreeing that Steppes of War was a good map to have for 6 months. I would disagree with and I am confident most if not all of the community would agree.
Xel Naga Caverns was made by David Kim after the community complained about the map pool a lot. This proves that the community can be right and that Blizzard can listen to us.
Shattered Temple is a redesign of the classic Lost Temple. Lost Temple was not a well balanced map at all, in fact I would stipulate that it was a terrible map when close positions and cliff abuse is taken into account. The revised version is better, but it is still heavily Terran favored against Zerg.
Terran has a 71.6% win rate against Zerg on that map in Tournaments. That means there is no close spawning allowed. Terran also has a 56.9% win rate against Protoss on that map. Those statistics make the map look really bad actually, and that is without close spawns.
I think it is quite fair to say that Blizzard has plenty of room to improve when it comes to maps.
On June 13 2011 03:54 shmoo wrote: Terran has a 71.6% win rate against Zerg on that map in Tournaments. That means there is no close spawning allowed. Terran also has a 56.9% win rate against Protoss on that map. Those statistics make the map look really bad actually, and that is without close spawns.
I think it is quite fair to say that Blizzard has plenty of room to improve when it comes to maps.
Not that I think the map is good, but the numbers are much closer to 50/50 on ST 1.1. Metagame issues can make a map look bad if they're around when that map is used.
Anyway non-Blizz maps don't exactly have great balance stats either.
On June 12 2011 14:37 ptrpb wrote: so many comparisons to BW, people are really expecting it to be BW plus new graphics and better UI. I don't know how many times people have to say "it's a different game" before people start to realize that while the games are similar, they still are different games.
Honestly, if you play that SC2 BW mod... It's just really so much more fun... Maybe it's the BW maps, maybe it's the BW units, maybe it's the nostalgia but I don't know man. Sc2 is fun but it could a lot more fun (not saying it should be BW with new graphics, just pointing out SC2 could really be much more interesting and diverse and versatile.)
On June 13 2011 03:25 theburricane wrote: Design is hard
Designing stuff is hard. Designing games is hard, designing thermostats is hard, designing web sites is hard. I think all of us will generally agree that this stuff is hard. But many people don’t know why it’s hard.
One of the reasons designing stuff is so hard is because there are no solutions to any problems, at least not in a larger, systemic view.
“But theburricane! What about chat channels at release? That seems like a pretty simple freakin’ thing to include that everybody and their dog wanted!”
Fair enough, if Blizz had included chat channels at release that would have solved the “have chat channels at release problem”. But if they had spent time on chat channels, something else would have had to fall off the radar. Maybe we would have had no Achievements.
“Pffft. Those are unimportant to competitive play.”
Perhaps we would have had no FFA matchmaking.
“Again, how does that affect the serious gamers?”
Maybe it doesn’t. Perhaps we wouldn’t have had the RealID friend system when the game launched.
“You mean facebook integration? Guffaw. Puh-lease.”
But you see the point? Design is not about solving problems, because those solutions will invariably cause problems elsewhere. Design is about making conscious tradeoffs to address the problems that are most impactful, and address them at the appropriate time.
Takeaway 1
I’m not saying “hey man, lay off Blizzard they’re tryin’ real hard here!” They are, but that’s no reason to lay off them. We simply have to sit down and ask, “Why is Blizzard making/not making this change at this time?” I guarantee you the answer is not because they have “bad communication”, are “blinded by their own pride”, or are “[fascinated] with ’meat shield units’.”.
Blizzard’s “bad communication”
It is easy to interpret good user research as bad communication. Research participants will make suggestions, “I think you should do X here”, but when they see the finished/updated product, their suggestions won’t be included. The designers will have implemented something that addresses that problem in a different way, and all the participant can see is “Well this solution doesn’t fix everything mine did! Why didn’t they go with what I had suggested?”
An example: Everybody and their dog says to Blizzard, “You really need to change your maps. Seriously, Steppes of War? Seriously?!” So Blizzard begins to add new maps into their map pool, and look to community feedback as to what maps they would like to see. “GSL maps, of course!” But when we finally get Tal’Darim Altar, it’s got a bunch of destructible rocks and giant chokes and crap.
“That’s not what we suggested! This doesn’t solve the problem. Look at LSPrime, he even gave them reasons why they shouldn’t do what they did. And they still did it. That’s aggravating.” (Of course, what LSPrime was arguing for, the imbalance achieved by a 3rd base with 8 minerals 2 gas, is something that will go unfelt by everyone up to very tippy-top of Masters League. How many of us have honestly thought to ourselves, “The third has 8 minerals?! Great, that means I can run Plexa’s Shock and Awe build more effectively once I take it!”, or something similar?)
However, from Blizzard’s perspective they are making balancing their solution so that it applies positively to every group. To simplify it, “We are giving the ‘competitive’ players larger maps, and we are giving the ‘casual’ players maps that limit their options enough to suggest clear goals.”
Takeaway 2
Think systemically when you encounter a solution different from the one you’ve proposed. Chances are either ‘solves’ the problem in an entirely different way, or it solves problems you didn’t even know existed.
Know your audience
It is very easy for us at teamliquid to labor under the misapprehension that we make up the majority of the SC2 community. Or that we + the reddit community are the majority. Or that we + all the online SC2 communities are the majority of SC2 players. But the truth is if you walked up to every SC2 player individually and said, “My opening build order is 10 depot, 12 rax, 13 gas” more than half would respond, “Why do you build 10 depots? Don’t you just have one SCV building depots the whole game?”
Most SC2 players lack even the basic vocabulary that we as a competitive community have developed as a tool to help us think critically and reflectively about the way we play. Most SC2 players don’t know why Steppes of War was removed, unless they’ve read the Blizzard Situation Report explaining why. They probably had no idea it was blacklisted by thousands of people.
Blizzard has the daunting, grizzling task of designing a product that meets the expectations and needs of an infinitely large and diverse user group. All designs suffer from this requirement to varying extent, but Blizzard in particular has a very polar user base. Bronze league 4v4ers versus Grandmasters 1v1 Rank 1.
Takeaway 3
When Blizzard designs for their broader user base, it feels like they are not listening to their competitive, online communities. Because we live in our dream world where everyone has a finely-crafted opening BO, aggressive yet thoughtful 3rd base timing, and over-arching gameplan, we can completely ignore the huge number of people who enter a game thinking nothing but “I’m going to make a forge right away so I can get a cannon up in case he zergling rushes me.”
When we encounter a decision by Blizzard that impacts us ‘negatively,’ we also need to think about the people who are being affected ‘positively’ and how their experience playing this game is going to change.
Overall takeaway
I have a lot of respect for sluggaslamoo, who took the time to voice the opinions of many community members. Specifically opnions regarding how Blizzard is out of touch with its player base via poor communication and decision making, even though they think they are right next to us, hwaiting all the way. Although I disagree with him whole-heartedly, I agree that the overall experience TL’ers have expressed, the feelings and emotions they have felt, over the past few months is that whatever Blizzard hands them is 50% treasure, 50% trash.
I think this is a mindset problem, however. We need to realize that what we as reflective, competitive gamers define as trash is really treasure for a gigantic number of ‘casual’, one-game-a-day players. They have extremely different needs than we do, and it is something Blizzard owes to everyone who pays them to play their game to provide the best experience possible. They have a duty to systemically support all of their user bases as they continue to design and implement two more expansions.
I wish I could give you a million dollars. People feel that the game needs to be balanced around the highest tier of players. While this is largely true, people often times forget that competitive players aren't the entire market for this game, and thus shouldn't get upset that Blizzard doesn't bend to their very will.
On June 12 2011 14:37 ptrpb wrote: so many comparisons to BW, people are really expecting it to be BW plus new graphics and better UI. I don't know how many times people have to say "it's a different game" before people start to realize that while the games are similar, they still are different games.
Honestly, if you play that SC2 BW mod... It's just really so much more fun... Maybe it's the BW maps, maybe it's the BW units, maybe it's the nostalgia but I don't know man. Sc2 is fun but it could a lot more fun (not saying it should be BW with new graphics, just pointing out SC2 could really be much more interesting and diverse and versatile.)
Maybe it's because you used to play BW and are a bit biaseed as well... As you say yourself, nostalgia is most likely a huge factor.
As for maps... I don't think it's a huge problem. Having "somewhat unbalanced" maps is fine, as long as it's not a main trend. It makes wins on that particular map more important to progress. Take savior for example. He dominated terrans in maps which had like 80% TvZ win rate. It's one of the reasons he became a bonjwa. His ability to overcome a seemingly overwhelming situation.
This makes thing more epic. When Bisu 3-0's Savior in what was previously considered the worst matchup ever and makes a "revolution" that's what epicness means.
I don't really care if maps are a bit unbalanced, they'll always be, and it's normal, it also makes sets more interesting strategically. It makes a Bo7 have more depth.
On June 12 2011 17:44 Dismantlethethroat wrote: Pros will always complain because all they care about is winning, and not the game.
Other than Idra close to no pros complain at all. 99% of the complaining comes from gold league and below, tbh.
You are both wrong to a degree.
I do agree that most of the whining comes from casual players who think they are good, but there are plenty of pros who will complain about balance.
I cannot think of any that do it on the level that Idra does, but there are plenty that do it.
Examples could include: The Brotoss party on SotG a few weeks ago Jinro has made some statements about balance on his stream MC has said zerg is op. I believe MVP said terran was weak.
A lot of it is likely just venting due to frustration, but plenty of pros complain about balance at some point.
There's a lot of pressure on blizzard from activision's standpoint to make the game as playable at lower levels as it is at upper levels. This probably drastically effects balance changes as some things can be ridiculously broken at lower levels and not too much of a concern at higher levels.
That being said balancing the game at higher levels really then only caters to a small part of the community. How can they make the game completely even on a higher playing field while making sure everything below it remains unaffected? If I had to guess I'd say this is their main concern. Broodwar is an amazing game no doubt, but the niche of playing it and playing it well is a lot smaller than in sc2. Activision's pressures on blizzard to make the game "balanced" at all levels so as many people as possible can pick up the game and play it is their business objective.
Designing stuff is hard. Designing games is hard, designing thermostats is hard, designing web sites is hard. I think all of us will generally agree that this stuff is hard. But many people don’t know why it’s hard.
One of the reasons designing stuff is so hard is because there are no solutions to any problems, at least not in a larger, systemic view. (etc)
Completely agree. When I read the OP's "Blizzard is out of touch", my first thought was "most likely you don't know all the factor that influence their design".
If tournament maps are perfectly balanced for pro players, and ladder maps are better for the less skilled player, including myself, I have no problems with that.
I'm sure Browder and the rest of the design team are very smart, but I can't help but feel that they are stuck in their own little world.
This expresses my feelings too.
I think they are still thinking like computer game designers. They think in 5-year game design cycles and in broadening market appeal with "cool" units. NOT as the creators of a possible global spectator sport. I have seen plenty of more sensible ideas in the TL forums than anything I've heard Mr. Browder say.
I'm sad to say this but it may come to the point where the community is better off taking control of game design, much like what the CS mod did for HL deathmatch, or how the DotA mod revitalized WC3.
No he's not. Any Code A scrub would wipe the floor with him.
Code A players are some of the best players in the world. There are tons of dedicated Korean sc2 gamers training everyday in hopes of making code A, and a majority of them will not make it.
I'm sure Browder and the rest of the design team are very smart, but I can't help but feel that they are stuck in their own little world.
This expresses my feelings too.
I think they are still thinking like computer game designers. They think in 5-year game design cycles and in broadening market appeal with "cool" units. NOT as the creators of a possible global spectator sport. I have seen plenty of more sensible ideas in the TL forums than anything I've heard Mr. Browder say.
I'm sad to say this but it may come to the point where the community is better off taking control of game design, much like what the CS mod did for HL deathmatch, or how the DotA mod revitalized WC3.
Those two mods were nothing like the original multiplayer for both games. And it wasn't "the community" taking control. It was a couple of guys striking gold with a brilliant idea.
EPT
Now I only have to look on and congratulate myself for playing BW.
