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On February 02 2012 03:12 AfricanPsycho wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2012 02:49 ZenithM wrote:On February 02 2012 02:07 AfricanPsycho wrote:On February 02 2012 01:59 HardlyNever wrote:
Complaint
Protoss sucks at the information war, especially against terran. It is incredibly easy for terran to both completely scout protoss, while completely deny scouting of their own base for the first 7-8 minutes of the game. Protoss have a similar problem against zerg, but it feels more balanced, as both sides have a reasonble opportunity to both scout and deny scouting.
Solution
There are two actually, for the scouting thing:
1. Let observers come out of the nexus, requiring either stargate, robo, or twilight. This idea has been floating around for a while, but it is still a good one and solves another issue of protoss being REQUIRED to go robo tech at some early stage in the game simply to have detection.
2. Reduce hallucination cost to 50/50, and reduce research time some. Hallucination is basically only used for scouting, and in its current form, doesn't come out fast enough. I don't think buffing it will change the metagame much in any other way, as the most "abusive" thing you could do with it is hallu earlier and maybe blink up somewhere. With the blink nerf though, I doubt the timing would change much.
Side effects
I don't think either of these changes would have very negative side affects for the game, and would result in less "build order losses" for protoss. Neither of these changes have very much aggressive/abusive potential, they just serve to get protoss closer to even footing in the information war, which I believe should be equal for all the races. I agree it would solve alot of PvT problems if protoss had more scouting/detection options, It kinda sucks thats in TvP a robo and obs is always required even it realy limits PvT openers alot. I don't know man. I'm a full Protoss player, and I think the need for a robo to be safe from cloak is one of the things that keep Terran in the game in PvT. Building a robo is a big investment, and it realistically constricts your builds and slows your teching (the standard nowadays strays away from colossus on 2 base and prefers twilight tech at first). With this assumption Terran essentially knows what you're doing in the first 7-8 minutes if you have a nexus and you're not some coin flipping newbie, so he doesn't have to figure out and waste scans everywhere to see what you're building. Not building a robo is always a risk you're taking and you can be punished for it, the game is kinda balanced around that. If I was able to build an observer from the nexus after twilight or stargate, I would open 1 gate FE 4 gate pressure into twilight every game and fast tech to blink then charge, much faster than usual. This kind of build is way more powerful than building your obligatory robo before teching, but you can die to banshees. I'm not saying the mandatory robo is a good design for the matchup, but I can guaranty that PvT would become much easier for P and trickier for Terran if you weren't forced to build the robo. Even trickier than it already is, and it would not be such a good thing apparently (many low level Terrans complain about TvP being impossible to win). Edit: Oh yeah, I have the DT icon :D I must disagree with you, I think it is horrible game design that protoss if forced to take a later expansion than T in most occasion (15 nex not that viable IMO) and then follow it up with a robo, which gives a standard terran a huge advantage early game (even without factoring in mules). I think it would be a good change if terran were forced to react to a toss build every once in a while instead of always going MMM every single game and occasionally 111 and that 2 base thor stuff. That build you said would be super good vs bio play, yet I think a terran could repond with blue flame marauder and crush that zealot heavy army with ease, however if he plays blind he will have trouble getting his third. I think diversity will be a good change for the matchup, so I disagree with you. Also I felt some toss IMBA insinuation coming from you due to that "only thing that keeps terran in the game comment". Terran has a response to everything P does. Collusus = viking. Hightemp = ghost. Zealot = kiting or marine heavy or blue flame? there problem is they blindly MMM viking then complain if they had the wrong amount of viking/ghost when they get rolled. I have countless times seen a lategame P deathball get ROLLED by a good T composition.
To say protoss players NEED to go robo is a bit misleading. Alot of koreans go straight to templars. But yeah, they will straight up die to cloaked banshee.
And the other way around, terran don't NEED to go raven to deal with DT's. 1 scan --> turrets. Obviously you can't compare detection directly. The terran will lose 1 mule/scan and such. But only have observers with 60health and cannons seems a bit broken.
I like the idea of observers out of nexi - requiring TC/SG/Robo. Alot of matchups are somewhat dependant on observers atm.
Maybe you could make some emergancy detection like spending 50nexus energy on a building making it detect for 10-15secs. Much like the scan. It's not dependable or stable. But then you wouldn't just instantly die to cloak if you were unprepared.
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On February 02 2012 06:03 Tyrant0 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2012 01:59 HardlyNever wrote:
Complaint
Protoss sucks at the information war, especially against terran. It is incredibly easy for terran to both completely scout protoss, while completely deny scouting of their own base for the first 7-8 minutes of the game. Protoss have a similar problem against zerg, but it feels more balanced, as both sides have a reasonble opportunity to both scout and deny scouting.
Solution
There are two actually, for the scouting thing:
1. Let observers come out of the nexus, requiring either stargate, robo, or twilight. This idea has been floating around for a while, but it is still a good one and solves another issue of protoss being REQUIRED to go robo tech at some early stage in the game simply to have detection.
2. Reduce hallucination cost to 50/50, and reduce research time some. Hallucination is basically only used for scouting, and in its current form, doesn't come out fast enough. I don't think buffing it will change the metagame much in any other way, as the most "abusive" thing you could do with it is hallu earlier and maybe blink up somewhere. With the blink nerf though, I doubt the timing would change much.
Side effects
I don't think either of these changes would have very negative side affects for the game, and would result in less "build order losses" for protoss. Neither of these changes have very much aggressive/abusive potential, they just serve to get protoss closer to even footing in the information war, which I believe should be equal for all the races. You can scout a Terran and pin them between two completely different paths based on marauders. And you definitely aren't required to go blind robo unless you have any indication the Terran is capable of sending cloaked banshees. Which for Protoss who actually don't know how to poke a Terrans ramp they pretty much assume it every time. If anything hallucination should be moved to the nexus. Not because scouting in PvT is an issue but because it's inconsequential after warp gate is done, and sees very little use otherwise.
You can't *know* it. If the Protoss sees a bunker and 2 depots at the ramp, the assumption is cloaked banshee, or some 1/1/1 shenanigans. But at the same time, it could just as well be a big marine/marauder timing push with stim, and he's just hiding his marauders, only revealing the marines in the bunker. Or maybe fast drop, into expand? Maybe even reactor hellions, into mech. You can't tell.
The safest play is of course to go robo + observer. I know that you need to try and limit what your opponent *could* be doing (eliminate assumptions), but until your observer reaches their base, a good Terrran will just keep you in the dark.
Alternatively, you can try early phoenixes, and then get a robo later if you see a starpot w/ tech lab. Of course, this leaves you somewhat vulnerable to an early marine/marauder push, but with good timing and micro, I think it can work. I know I've pulled it off, but I'm diamond, so not the highest level of play.
To say protoss players NEED to go robo is a bit misleading. Alot of koreans go straight to templars. But yeah, they will straight up die to cloaked banshee.
So what you're actually saying is, yes, Protoss NEED to go robo.
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Problem:
Zerg doesn't have a response to storm nor EMP.
Solution
Give zerg a new unit in HOTS or give a unit a new ability to drain energy.
Side Effects:
I can't really think of any. It forces micro from both sides and the races will become more equally balanced. While people might argue that zerg shouldn't get this because the races needs to be different and zerg can just mass against this, the races have some fundamental equalities and I believe this should be one of them and zerg dont trade effectively in the late game.
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On February 03 2012 01:48 Olsson wrote:
Problem:
Zerg doesn't have a response to storm nor EMP.
Solution
Give zerg a new unit in HOTS or give a unit a new ability to drain energy.
Side Effects:
I can't really think of any. It forces micro from both sides and the races will become more equally balanced. While people might argue that zerg shouldn't get this because the races needs to be different and zerg can just mass against this, the races have some fundamental equalities and I believe this should be one of them and zerg dont trade effectively in the late game.
Side Effects
Would completely break the game in its current form. Serious. I think it was a very deliberate design decision for Zerg not to have an energy removing ability. It would break the game. Think about removing sentry energy in early/mid game against protoss. Protoss would literally almost never win.
I think the disruption web thing they are giving Zerg in HotS is an ok medium. It doesn't drain energy, but (in its current form) you can't cast while under it, so it requires additional micro from the player under it.
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On February 02 2012 05:14 Jermstuddog wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2012 04:41 roymarthyup wrote:
I must be the only toss that thinks mutas are completely balanced right now.
My PvZ involves fast hallucination and constant scouting. I stopped doing FFE because its hard to get a perfect read and scout all the incoming all ins.
A FFE is only equal to a hatch-first econ-zerg if the protoss only gets one cannon. However if the protoss plays normal, the zerg can throw in all-ins anytime he wants that are impossible to scout and destroy the 1 cannon FFE. its so lame. regardless that is a discussion for FFE, i will discuss mutas
I believe if you go 2gate expand against a hatch first zerg your equal in economy to a hatch first zerg if you keep cranking out sentries. sentries allow you to defend against any pressure on your expo either lings, banes, or roaches.
Ive played against a few zerg practice partners ive told them to POWER OUT NONSTOP drones and dont even make zerglings, and my 2gate expo still is equal on economy to those zergs. By the time those zergs have 54 workers (2base saturation) I have 48 workers (not too far behind, you chrono out that difference quickly) plus a huge ball of sentries. Trust me ask any zerg player and they will tell you if they are at 54drones and the toss is at 48workers and they are both 2bases, the zerg is pretty fukked. The secret to this is you have to be CONSTANTLY chronoboosting probes even when your expansion is building, then when its done chrono probes out of 2 nexus. The beauty of this ive noticed is that because forcefield is so powerful, i can actually constantly chronoboost probes and STILL if the zerg cuts economy and tries to all-in me, 3gates worth of sentry/zealot/stalker popping completely crushes any all-in from the zerg and it also still allows you to make probes. So you can constantly make probes while also constantly producing off of 3gates. It requires no early scouting like FFE needs to do so it doesnt die to 7minute all-ins and is equal to anything the zerg does
I believe if you DONT FFE, then it becomes extremely easy to take your third as toss. all you need to do is constantly power out max economy chronoboosting probes, while making sentry/zealot/stalker off 3gates, while constantly hallucination scouting.
Now with your constant hallucination scouting, the MOMENT zerg takes a third you also take a third and guess what your army is so big you can easily defend 2 places easily. Taking a third against zerg is so easy if you just wait for him to take his, and as long as you didnt FFE your gateway army should be so big you defend nicely
As for the mutas, ive found this tactic to work best against mutas. I get double stargate when i see the spire, and i crank out 10 pheonix no matter what. If he gets muta i increase that to 15. Those 10 or 15 pheonix demand the zerg gets a bunch of spore crawlers, at least 3 per mineral line. If its 2 spores per mineral line you can fly in kill the queen and kill a bunch of drones then fly out with minimal losses. The pheonix are a EXPENSIVE counter to muta, however normally your gateway/forcefield army just crushes anything the zerg can do before he has broodlords, so the fact that you need to spend 2250 mineral on 15pheonix to become immune to mutalisks isnt a big deal.
So i get 10 pheonix if i see a spire, 15 pheonix if i see any mutas. To counter mutas you just spread all your pheonix around the map to scout where the mutas are and you pretty much are playing with a maphack because mutas cant get near your probes without your pheonix seeing it
There is one tactic a zerg could do against me that might work. If a zerg gets a spire, i will spend 1800 minerals and 1300gas to purchase 10pheonix+2stargates no matter what. This means if a zerg spends 200/200 on a spire, he essentially forces me to spend 1800/1300 to counter a 200/200 action. So if a zerg just made a spire, but then made zero air units and all-inn'ed me with a huge roach/ling/baneling/hydra attack, maybe that would work, however i believe even that would fail because FORCEFIELD/SENTRIES completely crush all zerg ground forces no matter what, and even if i have a smaller army than the zerg my FORCEFIELDS will just crush him anyway. And then once my pheonix pop out, the zerg is forced to spend 500 minerals on spore crawlers to not lose drones, so in the end i am down by 1100 minerals and 1100gas just because the zerg made that spire, however i think the trade off is worth it because FORCEFIELDS completely WRECK zerg ground forces and forcefields are much more valuable than 1100 minerals and 1100 gas
so if you see mutas, you have 15pheonix and use them like a maphack. Or if you see no mutas, you stop at 10pheonix and use them as a less-powerful maphack. you now have 3bases compared to the zergs 3. NEXT what you do is you take your fourth base the moment zerg takes his fourth because you are still constantly hallucination scouting, and because your gateway army is so big you can still defend 3places at once easily with forcefields and ALSO you spread your pheonix around the map constantly patrolling everywhere so because you have a semi-maphack it makes it easier to defend your 4bases against zerg harassment
With this constant hallucination-scouting playstyle, it makes it easy to always equal a zerg on bases. Which is the zergs worst nightmare. You usualy find enough money to add in 2-3 collossi, and heck maybe some voidrays/mothership/archons to counter broodlords.
As long as you have 15pheonix, mutalisks are not a problem at all. Use your pheonix like a maphack and spread them all over your base perimeter, when you see mutas coming send over 3stalkers and warp in 3stalkers and 15pheonix+6stalkers will kill 25mutas if the zerg tries to engage or the zerg runs away and just buys you more time to maxout to 200/200. If the zerg has more mutas than that even better for you because you just increase your pheonix count to maybe 20 if you see so many mutas. However never go above 20 pheonix. Treat your 20pheonix as a air superiority force that isnt too great against corrupters/broodlords armor-wise but the rate of disadvantage pheonix have against corrupters/broodlords armor wise is nothing compared to the rate of disadvantage the zerg ground forces have against toss ground forces Scariest playstyle to go against as a muta-going Zerg. By getting a significant number of phoenix in play and keeping them alive rather than throwing them away, you force an arms race that Zerg can't hope to win. You don't need to stay equal on phoenix numbers, you only need to stay reasonable. From there, you are free to fill out your army with Stalkers, Sentries, and Archons or Colossi, giving you a very powerful, all-purpose army AND you've kept pace with the Zerg economy all game long. Too bad reasonable strategies aren't welcome here... NERF MUTAS! The one issue I have with this is the Zerg can add corruptors to fly around with their mutas. This makes phoenix a LOT less effective.
That said, I have been using this style a lot against zergs who don't add ~5 corruptors
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On February 03 2012 01:48 Olsson wrote:
Problem:
Zerg doesn't have a response to storm nor EMP.
Solution
Give zerg a new unit in HOTS or give a unit a new ability to drain energy.
Side Effects:
I can't really think of any. It forces micro from both sides and the races will become more equally balanced. While people might argue that zerg shouldn't get this because the races needs to be different and zerg can just mass against this, the races have some fundamental equalities and I believe this should be one of them and zerg dont trade effectively in the late game.
I think that the Infestor is the most easily accessible Tier 2 spellcaster, and is really strong for the resources you spend for them. I play Zerg, and I think that these three units are very close to being balanced, if they aren't already.
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On February 03 2012 03:13 Jacobs Ladder wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2012 05:14 Jermstuddog wrote:On February 02 2012 04:41 roymarthyup wrote:
I must be the only toss that thinks mutas are completely balanced right now.
My PvZ involves fast hallucination and constant scouting. I stopped doing FFE because its hard to get a perfect read and scout all the incoming all ins.
A FFE is only equal to a hatch-first econ-zerg if the protoss only gets one cannon. However if the protoss plays normal, the zerg can throw in all-ins anytime he wants that are impossible to scout and destroy the 1 cannon FFE. its so lame. regardless that is a discussion for FFE, i will discuss mutas
I believe if you go 2gate expand against a hatch first zerg your equal in economy to a hatch first zerg if you keep cranking out sentries. sentries allow you to defend against any pressure on your expo either lings, banes, or roaches.
Ive played against a few zerg practice partners ive told them to POWER OUT NONSTOP drones and dont even make zerglings, and my 2gate expo still is equal on economy to those zergs. By the time those zergs have 54 workers (2base saturation) I have 48 workers (not too far behind, you chrono out that difference quickly) plus a huge ball of sentries. Trust me ask any zerg player and they will tell you if they are at 54drones and the toss is at 48workers and they are both 2bases, the zerg is pretty fukked. The secret to this is you have to be CONSTANTLY chronoboosting probes even when your expansion is building, then when its done chrono probes out of 2 nexus. The beauty of this ive noticed is that because forcefield is so powerful, i can actually constantly chronoboost probes and STILL if the zerg cuts economy and tries to all-in me, 3gates worth of sentry/zealot/stalker popping completely crushes any all-in from the zerg and it also still allows you to make probes. So you can constantly make probes while also constantly producing off of 3gates. It requires no early scouting like FFE needs to do so it doesnt die to 7minute all-ins and is equal to anything the zerg does
I believe if you DONT FFE, then it becomes extremely easy to take your third as toss. all you need to do is constantly power out max economy chronoboosting probes, while making sentry/zealot/stalker off 3gates, while constantly hallucination scouting.
Now with your constant hallucination scouting, the MOMENT zerg takes a third you also take a third and guess what your army is so big you can easily defend 2 places easily. Taking a third against zerg is so easy if you just wait for him to take his, and as long as you didnt FFE your gateway army should be so big you defend nicely
As for the mutas, ive found this tactic to work best against mutas. I get double stargate when i see the spire, and i crank out 10 pheonix no matter what. If he gets muta i increase that to 15. Those 10 or 15 pheonix demand the zerg gets a bunch of spore crawlers, at least 3 per mineral line. If its 2 spores per mineral line you can fly in kill the queen and kill a bunch of drones then fly out with minimal losses. The pheonix are a EXPENSIVE counter to muta, however normally your gateway/forcefield army just crushes anything the zerg can do before he has broodlords, so the fact that you need to spend 2250 mineral on 15pheonix to become immune to mutalisks isnt a big deal.
So i get 10 pheonix if i see a spire, 15 pheonix if i see any mutas. To counter mutas you just spread all your pheonix around the map to scout where the mutas are and you pretty much are playing with a maphack because mutas cant get near your probes without your pheonix seeing it
There is one tactic a zerg could do against me that might work. If a zerg gets a spire, i will spend 1800 minerals and 1300gas to purchase 10pheonix+2stargates no matter what. This means if a zerg spends 200/200 on a spire, he essentially forces me to spend 1800/1300 to counter a 200/200 action. So if a zerg just made a spire, but then made zero air units and all-inn'ed me with a huge roach/ling/baneling/hydra attack, maybe that would work, however i believe even that would fail because FORCEFIELD/SENTRIES completely crush all zerg ground forces no matter what, and even if i have a smaller army than the zerg my FORCEFIELDS will just crush him anyway. And then once my pheonix pop out, the zerg is forced to spend 500 minerals on spore crawlers to not lose drones, so in the end i am down by 1100 minerals and 1100gas just because the zerg made that spire, however i think the trade off is worth it because FORCEFIELDS completely WRECK zerg ground forces and forcefields are much more valuable than 1100 minerals and 1100 gas
so if you see mutas, you have 15pheonix and use them like a maphack. Or if you see no mutas, you stop at 10pheonix and use them as a less-powerful maphack. you now have 3bases compared to the zergs 3. NEXT what you do is you take your fourth base the moment zerg takes his fourth because you are still constantly hallucination scouting, and because your gateway army is so big you can still defend 3places at once easily with forcefields and ALSO you spread your pheonix around the map constantly patrolling everywhere so because you have a semi-maphack it makes it easier to defend your 4bases against zerg harassment
With this constant hallucination-scouting playstyle, it makes it easy to always equal a zerg on bases. Which is the zergs worst nightmare. You usualy find enough money to add in 2-3 collossi, and heck maybe some voidrays/mothership/archons to counter broodlords.
As long as you have 15pheonix, mutalisks are not a problem at all. Use your pheonix like a maphack and spread them all over your base perimeter, when you see mutas coming send over 3stalkers and warp in 3stalkers and 15pheonix+6stalkers will kill 25mutas if the zerg tries to engage or the zerg runs away and just buys you more time to maxout to 200/200. If the zerg has more mutas than that even better for you because you just increase your pheonix count to maybe 20 if you see so many mutas. However never go above 20 pheonix. Treat your 20pheonix as a air superiority force that isnt too great against corrupters/broodlords armor-wise but the rate of disadvantage pheonix have against corrupters/broodlords armor wise is nothing compared to the rate of disadvantage the zerg ground forces have against toss ground forces Scariest playstyle to go against as a muta-going Zerg. By getting a significant number of phoenix in play and keeping them alive rather than throwing them away, you force an arms race that Zerg can't hope to win. You don't need to stay equal on phoenix numbers, you only need to stay reasonable. From there, you are free to fill out your army with Stalkers, Sentries, and Archons or Colossi, giving you a very powerful, all-purpose army AND you've kept pace with the Zerg economy all game long. Too bad reasonable strategies aren't welcome here... NERF MUTAS! The one issue I have with this is the Zerg can add corruptors to fly around with their mutas. This makes phoenix a LOT less effective. That said, I have been using this style a lot against zergs who don't add ~5 corruptors
The other issue is regardless of the intention of the zerg player, you have to assume they are going mutalisk and get a decent phoenix count (say, 5 to 8) because if the zerg player does spawn 12 mutas at once (or 20 if you are Curious) then you're screwed. you can never catch up.
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Complaint:
Terran only needs ~25 scvs in late game, once they have 5+ OCs (mules). Zerg needs 70-80 drones, and that means the zerg army will always ~50 supply lower than the terran army. The late game zerg army usually consists of Broodlords + Infestors which is very immobile and takes a lot of supply. This makes it very hard to defend against multiple 3/3 marine drops.
Since Terran is always ahead ~50 army supply, he has more freedom to do effective harass in late game.
Another complaint about mules, is that a terran player can just spam infinite mules if he "forgot" about them for a while.
Solution:
Mules should cost 2 supply.
Side effects:
Early terran timing attacks (and all ins) will be just slightly weaker, which isn't a bad thing. I think that bunker rushes or 1 base timing attacks shouldn't have such a high win rate in a balanced rts game.
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Problem: 3/3 zealots are too good of tanks Late game PvT, but 0/0 Zealots are meh early game.
Solution: Swap zealot's life and shields, so they have 100 shield 50 life or 75/75.
Side effects: Microing zealots would increase proficiency a huge amount. EMP will Make zealots 1/3 hp/1/2, however Terran should be EMPing HT/Sentries, ghost energy would be used less efficiently/more ghosts would be needed, eating into the medivac/viking/upgrades...
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Protoss and Terran are just so unfair againt zerg. They can get away with so many things, Zergs can't scout for shit. It's just not right.
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On February 06 2012 13:01 cyclone25 wrote:
Complaint:
Terran only needs ~25 scvs in late game, once they have 5+ OCs (mules). Zerg needs 70-80 drones, and that means the zerg army will always ~50 supply lower than the terran army. The late game zerg army usually consists of Broodlords + Infestors which is very immobile and takes a lot of supply. This makes it very hard to defend against multiple 3/3 marine drops.
Since Terran is always ahead ~50 army supply, he has more freedom to do effective harass in late game.
Another complaint about mules, is that a terran player can just spam infinite mules if he "forgot" about them for a while.
Solution:
Mules should cost 2 supply.
Side effects:
Early terran timing attacks (and all ins) will be just slightly weaker, which isn't a bad thing. I think that bunker rushes or 1 base timing attacks shouldn't have such a high win rate in a balanced rts game.
Adding 2 supply to any unit is pretty extreme. Making them cost 1 supply would be enough.
Ragemode you might want to read the OP.
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On February 06 2012 13:01 cyclone25 wrote:
Complaint:
Terran only needs ~25 scvs in late game, once they have 5+ OCs (mules). Zerg needs 70-80 drones, and that means the zerg army will always ~50 supply lower than the terran army. The late game zerg army usually consists of Broodlords + Infestors which is very immobile and takes a lot of supply. This makes it very hard to defend against multiple 3/3 marine drops.
Since Terran is always ahead ~50 army supply, he has more freedom to do effective harass in late game.
Another complaint about mules, is that a terran player can just spam infinite mules if he "forgot" about them for a while.
Solution:
Mules should cost 2 supply.
Side effects:
Early terran timing attacks (and all ins) will be just slightly weaker, which isn't a bad thing. I think that bunker rushes or 1 base timing attacks shouldn't have such a high win rate in a balanced rts game.
All three races have trouble defending expansions in late game. Terran have trouble because the only non-supply base defense they have is PF's, and you can't put those everywhere (and an undefended PF dies to a not-that-large army). Zerg has trouble with an infestor-broodlord army because that unit composition sacrifices mobility for raw power, and lack of mobility makes defense much more difficult. Protoss has trouble because Protoss tends to rely on warp-in for defense, and if he/she is maxed, warp-in can't happen. This is interesting and thought-proviking game design, and doesn't need to be "fixed." If you're focusing on infestor-broodlord, you SHOULD be weak to drops. If SC2 is reaching relatively balanced winrates even with Terran's ability to make closer to a true max (by the way, 80 drones is probably too many late game), then that indicates that Terran has weaker lategame compositions (which they do), so there's no problem.
Bunker rushes and 1 base timing attacks only have high win rates against insufficiently prepared opponents. At the top level they don't work all that often, and typically bunker rushes are just a high level skill check to weed out zergs in group play that don't have what it takes to play at pro level.
2 supply is a HUGE nerf, at a time when Terrans are hardly dominating the match-up. If drops are giving you trouble, moar spines.
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On February 06 2012 13:01 cyclone25 wrote:
Complaint:
Terran only needs ~25 scvs in late game, once they have 5+ OCs (mules). Zerg needs 70-80 drones, and that means the zerg army will always ~50 supply lower than the terran army. The late game zerg army usually consists of Broodlords + Infestors which is very immobile and takes a lot of supply. This makes it very hard to defend against multiple 3/3 marine drops.
Since Terran is always ahead ~50 army supply, he has more freedom to do effective harass in late game.
Another complaint about mules, is that a terran player can just spam infinite mules if he "forgot" about them for a while.
Solution:
Mules should cost 2 supply.
Side effects:
Early terran timing attacks (and all ins) will be just slightly weaker, which isn't a bad thing. I think that bunker rushes or 1 base timing attacks shouldn't have such a high win rate in a balanced rts game.
Terran has the slowest re-max between the three races. So late-game if they have the same army size as the opponent and trade 1 to 1 the opponent will have a timing window to kill the Terran with the re-supply. If the Terran army is bigger, then the opponent can still re-supply as quickly and trade effectively but the terran won't die to a counter. And plus a Terran maxed army usually consists of bio units while a maxed zerg/toss consists of infestor/broods or toss deathball which is more powerful than bio.
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I've just recently started playing a few 2v2's and 3v3s etc. I've noticed that hardly anyone plays zerg. Is Zerg a bit underpowered in team games, with the lack of an abundance of expansions and gases?
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On March 15 2012 01:04 Zorkmid wrote:
I've just recently started playing a few 2v2's and 3v3s etc. I've noticed that hardly anyone plays zerg. Is Zerg a bit underpowered in team games, with the lack of an abundance of expansions and gases?
Maybe your level in team games is not high enough, because a Zerg player is almost mandatory in high level 2v2. PT is viable but only because your late game is most likely better than the ZX team.
Take a look at that: http://www.sc2ranks.com/ranks/eu/master/2
As you can see, most teams have a Z. However, I find (as a 2v2 PT top 50 player) that ZZ is the weakest team against PT, and probably one of the weaker teams in 2v2 altogether. So you have to have some Zerg, but not too much :D
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On February 06 2012 13:01 cyclone25 wrote:
Complaint:
Terran only needs ~25 scvs in late game, once they have 5+ OCs (mules). Zerg needs 70-80 drones, and that means the zerg army will always ~50 supply lower than the terran army. The late game zerg army usually consists of Broodlords + Infestors which is very immobile and takes a lot of supply. This makes it very hard to defend against multiple 3/3 marine drops.
Since Terran is always ahead ~50 army supply, he has more freedom to do effective harass in late game.
Another complaint about mules, is that a terran player can just spam infinite mules if he "forgot" about them for a while.
Solution:
Mules should cost 2 supply.
Side effects:
Early terran timing attacks (and all ins) will be just slightly weaker, which isn't a bad thing. I think that bunker rushes or 1 base timing attacks shouldn't have such a high win rate in a balanced rts game.
The supply argument is misleading. Zerg's actual army will be smaller than the Terran's in the super lategame, but certainly if we're talking about drops, you have to consider spine crawlers. In defensive roles Spine crawlers are a borderline 'unit' costing 0 supply. Yes they are wonky shitty half immobile units, but again, no supply. Each macro Orbital, costing 550 minerals, does the work of 4 SCVs/supply.
Planetaries can be used in some situations, but they can't be placed everywhere and they cost gas.
So basically, the terran's lack of photon cannons and spine crawlers is made up for at a rate of 4 virtual supply per 550 mineral investment. Without free supply mules, Terran would be at a clear and fundamental disadvantage.
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On March 15 2012 01:04 Zorkmid wrote:
I've just recently started playing a few 2v2's and 3v3s etc. I've noticed that hardly anyone plays zerg. Is Zerg a bit underpowered in team games, with the lack of an abundance of expansions and gases?
What are you talking about? I'm ranked top 8 in master league with my friend and any team with a zerg is so hard to beat. Almost every team we play has a zerg in it
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I posted this on gamefaqs with decent results, I'm curious to see what TL thinks about it. Reformatting my post to meet the requirements of this topic.
Problem
Warpgates are imbalanced in the sense that they remove the defender's advantage, which makes balancing very, very tricky. Also many people complain that unupgraded gateway units are weak, and it's probably because if they were too good, early WG attacks would be too OP. What this does is that it makes it difficult for protoss to hold early attacks without heavy reliance on sentries.
Solution
What if the warp in time was proportional to the distance between the warpgate itself and the warp in location? For example, assume all the warpgates are in the protoss' main. Warping in at the main or natural would take the normal 5 seconds. Warping in at the 3rd would take a few extra seconds. Warping in at your opponent's front door would take even more seconds. It could be based on some kind of formula, or maybe whenever you select warpgate there will be multiple circles like a sensor tower, and warping in certain circles will have different times to warp in.
I think this could address a few problems. With this change, you can now buff zealots and stalkers slightly without fear of early WG attacks being OP. Since warpin times will be the same if you warp very close to your base, slightly stronger zealots and stalkers will make it slightly easier for protoss to hold early attacks without relying on sentries as much.
Another problem I've heard is that lategame tvp where after a huge engagement, the protoss can warp in instantly and push if he manages to come out of that engagement favorably. However warping in at a pylon near the opponent's base will take longer, and thus give the terran more time to reproduce his units and defend a possible counter. Note that if the terran wins the engagement and wants to push, protoss reinforcing at his main or expo will take the same amount of time as normal.
This also gives, in pvp, a better defender's advantage, which is what it sorely lacks. I think maps like tal darim and belshir beach might not boil down to 4gate vs 4gate with this nerf.
Side Effects:
Early protoss attacks will be weaker (slightly stronger zealots and stalkers will slightly compensate for the longer reinforcement times), notably any 2-base allin they execute. Personally I think that's fine as I don't enjoy watching 2-base allins, but from a balance perspective it needs to be considered.
Slightly stronger zealots (and stalkers for that matter) will make proxies a little stronger too, though of course that depends on how much they are buffed. As for how much to buff them, I don't know.
As for the actual extra time to take to warp in at a farther location, I'm not sure either. That would just need to be playtested.
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On February 02 2012 18:39 Paincarnate wrote:Show nested quote +On February 02 2012 06:03 Tyrant0 wrote:On February 02 2012 01:59 HardlyNever wrote:
Complaint
Protoss sucks at the information war, especially against terran. It is incredibly easy for terran to both completely scout protoss, while completely deny scouting of their own base for the first 7-8 minutes of the game. Protoss have a similar problem against zerg, but it feels more balanced, as both sides have a reasonble opportunity to both scout and deny scouting.
Solution
There are two actually, for the scouting thing:
1. Let observers come out of the nexus, requiring either stargate, robo, or twilight. This idea has been floating around for a while, but it is still a good one and solves another issue of protoss being REQUIRED to go robo tech at some early stage in the game simply to have detection.
2. Reduce hallucination cost to 50/50, and reduce research time some. Hallucination is basically only used for scouting, and in its current form, doesn't come out fast enough. I don't think buffing it will change the metagame much in any other way, as the most "abusive" thing you could do with it is hallu earlier and maybe blink up somewhere. With the blink nerf though, I doubt the timing would change much.
Side effects
I don't think either of these changes would have very negative side affects for the game, and would result in less "build order losses" for protoss. Neither of these changes have very much aggressive/abusive potential, they just serve to get protoss closer to even footing in the information war, which I believe should be equal for all the races. You can scout a Terran and pin them between two completely different paths based on marauders. And you definitely aren't required to go blind robo unless you have any indication the Terran is capable of sending cloaked banshees. Which for Protoss who actually don't know how to poke a Terrans ramp they pretty much assume it every time. If anything hallucination should be moved to the nexus. Not because scouting in PvT is an issue but because it's inconsequential after warp gate is done, and sees very little use otherwise. You can't *know* it. If the Protoss sees a bunker and 2 depots at the ramp, the assumption is cloaked banshee, or some 1/1/1 shenanigans. But at the same time, it could just as well be a big marine/marauder timing push with stim, and he's just hiding his marauders, only revealing the marines in the bunker. Or maybe fast drop, into expand? Maybe even reactor hellions, into mech. You can't tell. The safest play is of course to go robo + observer. I know that you need to try and limit what your opponent *could* be doing (eliminate assumptions), but until your observer reaches their base, a good Terrran will just keep you in the dark. Alternatively, you can try early phoenixes, and then get a robo later if you see a starpot w/ tech lab. Of course, this leaves you somewhat vulnerable to an early marine/marauder push, but with good timing and micro, I think it can work. I know I've pulled it off, but I'm diamond, so not the highest level of play. Show nested quote +
To say protoss players NEED to go robo is a bit misleading. Alot of koreans go straight to templars. But yeah, they will straight up die to cloaked banshee.
So what you're actually saying is, yes, Protoss NEED to go robo.
Don't forget about hallucination, it's toss's early game scout option instead of scan or overlord...
I'm not sure why you wouldn't want the robo at some point anyway, if you open with templar then you are obviously taking a risk to cloaked banshee, well placed cannons can mostly keep you ok but a smart terran will always do some damage, and cannons are a pretty big investment if it's just to stop 1 or 2 cloaked banshees and you're trying to defend all of your production and your mineral line.
Robo also opens up collosus, immortals, observers which you'll obviously want for banshees and for watching army position mid/late game. Dont forget about WARP PRISMS, which are just so good vs terran :-)
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On March 20 2012 06:36 IMPrime wrote:
I posted this on gamefaqs with decent results, I'm curious to see what TL thinks about it. Reformatting my post to meet the requirements of this topic.
Problem
Warpgates are imbalanced in the sense that they remove the defender's advantage, which makes balancing very, very tricky. Also many people complain that unupgraded gateway units are weak, and it's probably because if they were too good, early WG attacks would be too OP. What this does is that it makes it difficult for protoss to hold early attacks without heavy reliance on sentries.
Solution
What if the warp in time was proportional to the distance between the warpgate itself and the warp in location? For example, assume all the warpgates are in the protoss' main. Warping in at the main or natural would take the normal 5 seconds. Warping in at the 3rd would take a few extra seconds. Warping in at your opponent's front door would take even more seconds. It could be based on some kind of formula, or maybe whenever you select warpgate there will be multiple circles like a sensor tower, and warping in certain circles will have different times to warp in.
I think this could address a few problems. With this change, you can now buff zealots and stalkers slightly without fear of early WG attacks being OP. Since warpin times will be the same if you warp very close to your base, slightly stronger zealots and stalkers will make it slightly easier for protoss to hold early attacks without relying on sentries as much.
Another problem I've heard is that lategame tvp where after a huge engagement, the protoss can warp in instantly and push if he manages to come out of that engagement favorably. However warping in at a pylon near the opponent's base will take longer, and thus give the terran more time to reproduce his units and defend a possible counter. Note that if the terran wins the engagement and wants to push, protoss reinforcing at his main or expo will take the same amount of time as normal.
This also gives, in pvp, a better defender's advantage, which is what it sorely lacks. I think maps like tal darim and belshir beach might not boil down to 4gate vs 4gate with this nerf.
Side Effects:
Early protoss attacks will be weaker (slightly stronger zealots and stalkers will slightly compensate for the longer reinforcement times), notably any 2-base allin they execute. Personally I think that's fine as I don't enjoy watching 2-base allins, but from a balance perspective it needs to be considered.
Slightly stronger zealots (and stalkers for that matter) will make proxies a little stronger too, though of course that depends on how much they are buffed. As for how much to buff them, I don't know.
As for the actual extra time to take to warp in at a farther location, I'm not sure either. That would just need to be playtested.
Another side effect is that it adds an extra incentive to proxy gates early game, as if they don't get scouted/killed you can theoretically warp in faster when attacking. Late game if you start building more gates in your 5th/6th base which can potentially be in a different corner of the map, you may be penalized when trying to warp in at your original main.
This is very interesting, I wish we had a way to easily test out the balance on things like this.
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EPT
